Starting from a distant past and landing in the present, Gary Goldstein’s new novel “Please Come to Boston” (Hadleigh House Publishing) is all about “finding your authentic self.”

“I went to college at BU and enjoyed my time there,” Goldstein, 67, said in a phone interview from his LA home. “It’s only four years but it’s loomed large in my life.

“I’ve written many screenplays and stage plays but never about college. Or my college. And going to BU remains so vivid for me so many years later, I wanted to take advantage of those memories, look at the place where people change — that’s college.”

This, his third novel, begins at Boston University in 1975 with two freshmen, Mickey and Joe.

“It’s a gay coming of age story. For younger people in that first semester in college, you’re out on your own with freedom and opportunities you’ve never had before. You decide who to become and what opportunities to explore.

“Back in ‘75 it was more difficult to explore your sexuality. This is about self-exploration and how one lives their authentic life. We follow Mickey and Joe from that first semester to the present when they meet up in Boston many years later and we get a sense when you do and don’t live your authentic life. It’s always an important issue, whether it’s sexuality or the careers we choose.”

As a writer, Goldstein knows what’s most important: “It’s about finding the most interesting people and have a character arc. You want personalities that you can see change and set them up for the rest of their lives essentially.”

Goldstein is not surprised that, “Everyone who reads it, the first thing they ask is, Is it autobiographical?

“It’s not but if I look back, Mickey is so much different. Which is why I enjoy writing people who aren’t me.  I feel it’s an amalgam of people I knew back then.

“Joe is,” he added, “a complete fabrication, this self-possessed, consummate jock. Very sensitive, an independent person and a bit of a fantasy character. There’s no one (real person) like him.”

Goldstein’s love for Boston continued after graduation. “I worked and lived there for a number of years,” doing publicity and promotion for Showcase Cinemas and then Universal Pictures “out of their Boston sales office.

“I had the experience of four years on Beacon Street with an apartment that had very low rent and faced the river,” he recalled.

“When you’re young you try to appreciate the environment you’re in and I look back at it now, where I lived and what I paid! It’s just not available anymore. I’m grateful for the experience.”