StoryCorps: Outloud


Ari Shapiro - 2015
    StoryCorps OutLoud is a multi-year initiative dedicated to recording and preserving LGBTQ stories across America."OutLoud" honors the stories of those who lived before the 1969 Stonewall uprisings, celebrates the lives of LGBTQ youth, and amplifies the voices of those most often excluded from the historical record. The end result is a diverse collection of stories that enriches our nation s history. StoryCorps OutLoud sets out across the country to record and preserve the stories of LGBT individuals, along with their families and friends. OutLoud is a project undertaken in the memory of Isay's father, psychiatrist Dr. Richard Isay. Professionally credited for helping to persuade the mental health community that homosexuality is not a mental disorder, Dr. Isay was himself a closeted gay man for many years. He came out to his son at the age of 52 and, in 2011, he married his partner of 31 years, Gordon Harrell, before passing away suddenly from cancer on June 28, 2012. On June 28, 2014, the 45th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising, StoryCorps inaugurated OutLoud, a three-year project to capture the experiences of L.G.B.T.Q. people. In particular, the project will seek stories from young people, minorities and those who lived before the uprising, which was a response by gays to a police raid on the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village and helped precipitate the gay rights movement.

Mother of Sorrows


Richard McCann - 2005
    Thirty years later, one of the brothers-the only remaining survivor of a family he seeks both to leave behind and to preserve in words forever-narrates these precise and heartbreaking tales. Suffused with the beauty of Richard McCann's extraordinary language, Mother of Sorrows introduces us to an elegant writer like no other in contemporary fiction.

One Way or Another


Peter Cameron - 1986
    Families, homes, lovers, marriages -- the safe havens they have been taught to depend on no longer guarantee shelter or stability.ONE WAY OR ANOTHER introduces Peter Cameron as an extraordinary writer, one distinguished not only by his prose, which is always abundantly witty and pitch-perfect, but also by a rare generosity of heart.Included in this book are two stories that were selected for the O. HENRY PRIZE STORIES: "Homework," first published in The New Yorker, and "Excerpts from Swan Lake," first published in The Kenyon Review.

Bending the Landscape: Fantasy


Nicola GriffithDelia Sherman - 1997
    But don't expect the usual fantasy backdrops-these stories will give you a frisson, a thrill, as they fizz off the page. They are extraordinary characters living outside the bounds of reality. But you will recognize them... It's about being gay, being straight, falling in love, sorrowful partings, death, and fantastic circumstances. Bending the Landscape stretches the standard fantasy genre.

Tales of Nevèrÿon


Samuel R. Delany - 1979
    Delany appropriated the conceits of sword-and-sorcery fantasy to explore his characteristic themes of language, power, gender, and the nature of civilization. Wesleyan University Press has reissued the long-unavailable Nevèrÿon volumes in trade paperback. The eleven stories, novellas, and novels in Return to Nevèrÿon's four volumes chronicle a long-ago land on civilization's brink, perhaps in Asia or Africa, or even on the Mediterranean. Taken slave in childhood, Gorgik gains his freedom, leads a slave revolt, and becomes a minister of state, finally abolishing slavery. Ironically, however, he is sexually aroused by the iron slave collars of servitude. Does this contaminate his mission - or intensify it? Presumably elaborated from an ancient text of unknown geographical origin, the stories are sunk in translators' and commentators' introductions and appendices, forming a richly comic frame.

Close to the Knives: A Memoir of Disintegration


David Wojnarowicz - 1991
    Street life, drugs, art and nature, family, AIDS, politics, friendship and acceptance: Wojnarowicz challenges us to examine our lives -- politically, socially, emotionally, and aesthetically.

The Living One


Lewis Gannett - 1992
    The invitation to spend some time with his dad - the Baron Malcolm Spoor - comes as a surprise. But what awaits Torrance at his father's windswept estate is far worse than he could ever imagine. Welcome to the world of The Living One, one of the most frightening, clever, and suspenseful novels of the year. In this tour-de-force debut, Lewis Gannett spins a spellbinding story that summons up magic, body thievery, killer dogs, ESP wars, and lusty, genre-defying sex - straight, gay, and forms yet unnamed. The Spoors are the ultimate dysfunctional family. Wealthy, shamelessly extravagant, and impossibly attractive, they are also cursed. The curse has been handed down from father to son for seven hundred years, ever since the Crusades, when a bizarre and mystifying event created a recurring pattern of madness and death. As Baron Malcolm Spoor prepares for his demise, he must pass on the family riches - and its traditions - to his estranged son. But Malcolm and Torrance both have secrets they would rather keep to themselves, secrets that are nearly revealed when a shadowy government scientist picks up psychic readings from the Spoor estate and a bohemian teacher becomes personally involved with Torrance. These two begin an investigation into the extraordinary life of Baron Malcolm Spoor, and their findings are truly horrifying. Updating elements of the epistolary novel popularized in Dracula, Lewis Gannett tells his gothic story through the inventive use of videotape transcripts, diary entries, and historical records. Vivid, scary, mythic, and engrossing, The Living One explores the terrifying dimensions of family guilt, aging, and the murderous tensions between fathers and sons. Lewis Gannett has written a startling and thrilling novel that marks the debut of an original new voice in fiction.

In Another Place, Not Here


Dionne Brand - 1986
    . . a work of great beauty and moral imagination," In Another Place, Not Here tells of two contemporary Caribbean women who find brief refuge in each other on an island in the midst of political uprising. Elizete, dreaming of running to another place to escape the harshness of her daily life on the island, meets Verlia, an urban woman in constant flight who has returned to her island birthplace with hopes of revolution. Their tumultuous story moves between city and island, past and future, fantasy and reality.

The Norton Anthology of World Masterpieces


Maynard MackFrancis Abiola Irele - 1956
    Like all Norton Anthologies, the Expanded Edition in One Volume of The Norton Anthology of World Masterpieces is foremost a teaching anthology, edited to meet the needs of today's students discovering a range of literary traditions for the first time.

Labyrinth: Short Stories


Mainak Dhar - 2012
    This is to keep you on the edge with each turn in the alleys of the Labyrinth.Labyrinth: Short Stories is an array of fifteen tales that cover genres like adventure, romance, paranormal, fantasy, history, and many more.Summary Of The BookLabyrinth: Short Stories, published in 2012, is a collection of fifteen short stories written by various Indian authors. Each tale belongs to a different genre and era, thereby giving this book a unique and refreshing feel. Labyrinth: Short Stories starts off with The Martyr, which has been written by Mainak Dhar. It revolves around young Kemal who finds himself in the middle of a war in Afghanistan. Puppet Show, by Aditi Chincholi, explains how a doctor cannot find a way to break a spell that has been cast over the natives of a valley.Bagheera Log Huts takes readers into the heart of an Indian jungle, where the search for a wild cat turns into an unexpected adventure. Shawn Pereira’s I'll Be Back describes an out-of-body experience, which shows how things can take a downward spiral when one is caught in the wrong place, at the wrong time. Aditi Chincholi’s second story, Sym World, is set in a fantasy land which the protagonist Kyoto has willingly entered, but cannot find a way out. In Mortified, written by Jeevan Varma, readers will find themselves in a small Indian township where a mortified Sharmaji is going to be attacked. This is followed by Crashing Impacts, a tale of love and sacrifice that spans almost ten years.Rishabh Chaturvedi’s The Night Of The Wokambee describes how Revant is in a quandary when a strange creature visits his house every night. Both Mists of Time by Niharika Puri, and Russkaya Rulyetka by Shawn Pereira, illustrate how a person makes impulsive decisions when he is overcome with rage and jealousy. Candies shows readers that the pursuit of love is filled with ups and downs. Travel Through The Night, authored by Rishabh Chaturvedi, follows the protagonist into dense sugarcane plantations, where he encounters strange spirits who block his path. A Day of Battle is set during the great epic battle of the Mahabharata, and the author Abhishek Dwivedi shares stories of the bravery of some of the best warriors that this world has ever seen. The next story, Farming On Facebook by Sushant Dharwadkar, takes a huge time leap, and shows how the present generation is unaware of the real world, as their focus lies only on the screens in front of them. About The AuthorsLabyrinth: Short Stories has been written by Mainak Dhar, Richard Fernandes, Jeevan Verma, Rishabh Chaturvedi, Niharika Puri, Aditi Chincholi, Abhishek Dwivedi, Sushant Dharwadkar, Rohit Das, and Shawn Pereira. They are a part of the initiative by Litizen.com. Professionally they are accountants, chefs, media professionals, doctors, and students.

The Night We Met


Rob Byrnes - 2002
    He has yet to become the literary voice of his generation. And he most definitely has not met Mr. Right. Now, stuck in a dead-end publishing job, and nursing a broken heart, Andrew is resigned to a life of anti-fabulousness...until the night he meets dark, hunky Frank DeBenedetto. With his confident way of taking care of things and his shy demeanor in the bedroom, Frank wins Andrew over. But problems arise when Frank turns out to be the son of the Maria's top boss, and he's engaged to Anna Franco -- daughter of "Crazy Tommy" Franco -- a woman who does not take to catching her fiance in the act of becoming a "made man."Suddenly, Andrew's once-boring life is heating up with enough action to fuel ten novels...if only he can keep his very cute butt intact and his man from ending up on a Most Wanted poster. From a couple of "sensitivity-trained" cops to a persistent FBI agent...from guys with nicknames that all have to do with pain to a Mafia princess whose hair is nearly as big as her mouth...from ex-lovers, drag queens, and suspicious doormen to a cast of other characters as zany as New York itself, "The Night We Met" is a frantic, nonstop, madcap romp through a wild romance no reader will be able to refuse.

The Gallery


John Horne Burns - 1947
    However, Burns's early death at the age of 36 led to the subsequent neglect of this searching book, which captures the shock the war dealt to the preconceptions and ideals of the victorious Americans.Set in occupied Naples in 1944, The Gallery takes its name from the Galleria Umberto, a bombed-out arcade where everybody in town comes together in pursuit of food, drink, sex, money, and oblivion. A daring and enduring novel—one of the first to look directly at gay life in the military—'The Gallery' poignantly conveys the mixed feelings of the men and women who fought the war that made America a superpower."The first book of real magnitude to come out of the last war." —John Dos Passos

Flesh and the Word: An Anthology of Erotic Writing


John PrestonLarry Townsend - 1992
    While providing a fascinating look at the course of gay consciousness over the past fifty years, it also, most enthrallingly, offers the best sexually arousing fiction centering on gay men.Featuring two original tales by Anne Rice, this elegantly written collection also includes such literary luminaries as Edmund White and Alan Hollinghurst, and such legendary cult figures as Larry Townsend and Pat Califia. The stories here range from the nonphysical but highly charged "Brian's Bedroom" by Leigh Rutledge, to the famous, boundary pushing story "Blue Light" by Aaron Travis - a fantasic, haunting piece that explores reversal, compulsion, domination, and otherness in a Texas boarding house. But whether an understated gem or an unforgettable, flamboyant display of sexuality, each of these works has a power of its own, while editor John Preston's commentary places them all in context. This collection of short fiction and nonfiction is for both gay and straight readers who enjoy masterully written erotica. It is at once a cross-section of fine erotic writing, a chronical of gay male sexuality and its growing influence on the culture at large, and an imporatnt addiction to gay literature.Contents:Correspondence with George Platt Lynes by Samuel M. StewardThe sergeant with the rose tattoo by Samuel M. Steward writing as Phil AndrosFrom 'Cruising horny corners' by "Clay Caldwell" writing as Lance LesterWorkout by Roy F. WoodPeekers by T.R. Witomski writing as Ray WaldheimThey call me "Horsemeat" by D.V. Sadero writing as Rick LaneA cowboy Christmas by Lars EighnerThe shirt by Robin MetcalfeNegative image by Michael Lassell writing as Michael LewisBrian's bedroom by Leigh RutledgeBlue light by Steven Saylor writing as Aaron TravisGetting Timchenko by Steven Saylor writing as Aaron TravisBelonging by Pat CalifiaElliott : the garden and the bar by Anne RiceElliott : below stairs by Anne RiceFrom 'Run little leather boy' by Larry Townsend"Malory's big brother" from 'The green hotel stories by Gordon HobanFrom 'A boy's own story' by Edmund WhiteFrom 'The beautiful room is empty' by Edmund White"The Brutus cinema" from 'The swimming pool-library' by Alan Hollinghurst"Mmmmpfgh" by Andrew HolleranThinking off by Scott O'Hara writing as SpunkSafe sex without condoms by John WagenhauserSoggy Biscuit by Barry LoweThe reality of a dream by W. Delon StrodeThe group by John Wagenhauser writing as WolfgangGood with words by Stephen Greco

Oscar Wilde


Richard Ellmann - 1987
    alluring cultural world and someone whose life assumed an unbearably dramatic shape.

Selected Writings


Gertrude Stein - 1962
    It includes The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas in its entirety; selected passages from The Making of Americans; "Melanctha"from Three Lives; portraits of the painters Cezanne, Matisse, and Picasso; Tender Buttons; the opera Four Saints in Three Acts; and poem, plays, lectures, articles, sketches, and a generous portion of her famous book on the Occupation of France, Wars I Have Seen.