Memory Board


Jane Rule - 1987
    Until his wife's death, not even his children -- Diana's nieces and nephews -- have known about Diana and her lifetime companion Constance. But now David seeks to bridge over those years and recapture the closeness of childhood, to become part of Diana's life, to have her be a major part of his.For the independent, irascible Diana, the overtures from her brother are an unwelcome intrusion. Retired from her medical practice, she spends her days fully occupied with Constance, for whom memory is increasingly a sometime thing.David, growing ever more fond of the enchanting Constance, struggles to win her trust... and Diana is inexorably drawn into the events and drama of David's family life.In Memory Board the incomparable Jane Rule gives us her tenderest, most poignant, most humor-filled novel... and brings to us altogether fresh insights into living and loving and the nature of commitment.

War Boy


Kief Hillsbery - 2000
    On the bus headed out of town they hook up with Finn and Critter, a couple of speed-freak boyfriends who take a shine to both of them. They also meet Ula, who is mourning the death of her fiancé and taking a trip across the United States in his memory. The five become fast allies, united by personal loss and by the allure of intimacy only friends in the throes of conflict can understand. When Jonnyboy drops out of sight, Radboy stays behind in San Francisco, where the underground world he has been introduced to inspires his own burgeoning sexual and emotional desires.

The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister


Anne Lister - 1992
    She kept extensive diaries of her life and loves, written partly in code. Made up of Greek letters mingled with other symbols of her own devising, Anne referred to the code as her "crypthand," and the use of it allowed her the freedom to describe her intimate life in great detail. Her diaries have been edited by Helena Whitbread, who spent years decoding and transcribing them.

The Memoirs of a Beautiful Boy


Robert Leleux - 2008
    Robert Leleux presents an achingly funny memoir about a boy growing up gay in Texas, with a flamboyant, surgically-enhanced, be-wigged impossibility of a mother.

When You Are Engulfed in Flames


David Sedaris - 2008
    Two straight-A students head off to school, and when only one of them returns home Chesney Yelverton is coaxed from retirement and assigned to what proves to be the most difficult and deadly - case of his career. From the shining notorious East Side, When You Are Engulfed in Flames confirms once again that David Sedaris is a master of mystery and suspense.Or how about...when set on fire, most of us either fumble for our wallets or waste valuable time feeling sorry for ourselves. David Sedaris has studied this phenomenon, and his resulting insights may very well save your life. Author of the national bestsellers Should You Be Attacked By Snakes and If You Are Surrounded by Mean Ghosts, David Sedaris, with When You Are Engulfed in Flames, is clearly at the top of his game.Oh, all right...David Sedaris has written yet another book of essays (his sixth). Subjects include a parasitic worm that once lived in his mother-in-law's leg, an encounter with a dingo, and the recreational use of an external catheter. Also recounted is the buying of a human skeleton and the author's attempt to quit smoking In Tokyo.Master of nothing, at the dead center of his game, Sedaris proves that when you play with matches, you sometimes light the whole pack on fire.(front flap)

Everything We Never Wanted


Sienna Waters - 2020
    The responsibility terrifies her, she never wanted this.In the course of a year, Kat Stein has gone from happily married second-grade teacher, to divorced, broke and hanging onto her job by a thread. The loss of her perfect life is devastating, she never wanted this.And when travel-crazed hippy meets disciplined, strait-laced teacher, it's hate at first sight. Alex and Kat couldn't be more different, and neither is exactly living her best life. Until a rigged school election, a painful accident in the woods, and the re-appearance of Libby's mysterious father mean that the two are reluctantly bound together...Getting everything you ever wanted is hard enough. But getting everything you never wanted? That's a whole lot trickier...Everything We Never Wanted is a new stand-alone lesbian romance from Sienna Waters, the author of the Oakview and Monday's Child lesfic series.

Becoming Nancy


Terry Ronald - 2011
    But David is up to the challenge. Living in a three-bedroom semi in 1970s' working-class East Dulwich, surrounded by his somewhat colourful relatives, he is bright, smart-mouthed, fanatical about pop music and ready to shine. Rehearsals begin, and he strikes up a friendship with the handsome yet enigmatic Maxie Boswell, captain of the school football team. As their alliance deepens it appears they might become more than just good friends, but that can't be right, can it?Discovering a confidant in empathetic teacher, Hamish McClarnon, and spurred on by his no-nonsense best friend, Frances Bassey, David takes on the school bully, the National Front, and anyone else who threatens to stand in the way of true love.Vibrant, warm, and full of life, this uproarious and touching coming-of-age novel, set against the backdrop of South-East London in the thrill of the late seventies, will transport you straight back to your first music obsession and the highs and lows of your first love.

Christopher and His Kind


Christopher Isherwood - 1976
    His friends and colleagues during this time included W. H. Auden, Stephen Spender, and E. M. Forster, as well as colorful figures he met in Germany and later fictionalized in his two Berlin novels-who appeared again, fictionalized to an even greater degree, in I Am a Camera and Cabaret. What most impressed the first readers of this memoir, however, was the candor with which he describes his life in gay Berlin of the 1930s and his struggles to save his companion, a German man named Heinz, from the Nazis. An engrossing and dramatic story and a fascinating glimpse into a little-known world, Christopher and His Kind remains one of Isherwood's greatest achievements. A major figure in twentieth-century fiction and the gay rights movement, Christopher Isherwood (1904-1986) is the author of Down There on a Visit, Lions and Shadows, A Meeting by the River, The Memorial, Prater Violet, A Single Man, and The World in the Evening, all available from the University of Minnesota Press.

Desert Sons


Mark Kendrick - 2001
    Scott Faraday is 16, gregarious, talented, never been in a relationship, and is out to only a select few. Ryan St. Charles is 17, hot-tempered, has already has been in a long relationship, yet is barely out to himself. Behind Ryan's carefully fashioned façade is emotional scarring from a past he's never been able to reconcile. When he comes to live with his uncle in Yucca Valley, CA, he meets Scott. An unlikely pair, the boys form a tentative friendship. When Scott starts to suspect that Ryan might be gay, he plans his coming out to him. The result is that he transforms their friendship into his first real relationship. Then, Ryan's hidden past comes into view. Scott is not at all prepared for what he discovers: suicide attempts, past abuse, and loads of denial. Tightly focused on their new relationship, Desert Sons follows these two teenagers as they plunge headlong through a summer that will forever change them both.

My Life as a Goddess: A Memoir through (Un) Popular Culture


Guy Branum - 2018
    Self-taught, introspective, and from a stiflingly boring farm town, he couldn’t relate to his neighbors. While other boys played outside, he stayed indoors reading Greek mythology. And being gay and overweight, he got used to diminishing himself. But little by little, he started learning from all the sad, strange, lonely outcasts in history who had come before him, and he started to feel hope. In this collection of personal essays, Guy talks about finding a sense of belonging at Berkeley—and stirring up controversy in a newspaper column that led to a run‑in with the Secret Service. He recounts the pitfalls of being typecast as the “Sassy Gay Friend,” and how, after taking a wrong turn in life (i.e. law school), he found stand‑up comedy and artistic freedom. He analyzes society’s calculated deprivation of personhood from fat people, and how, though it’s taken him a while to accept who he is, he has learned that with a little patience and a lot of humor, self-acceptance is possible. Written with Guy’s characteristic blend of wit, guile, and rumination, My Life as a Goddess is an unforgettable and deeply moving book by one of today’s most endearing and galvanizing voices in comedy.

Conundrum


Jan Morris - 1974
    James Morris distinguished himself in the British military, became a successful and physically daring reporter, climbed mountains, crossed deserts, and established a reputation as a historian of the British empire. He was happily married, with several children. To all appearances, he was not only a man, but a man’s man.Except that appearances, as James Morris had known from early childhood, can be deeply misleading. James Morris had known all his conscious life that at heart he was a woman. Conundrum , one of the earliest books to discuss transsexuality with honesty and without prurience, tells the story of James Morris’s hidden life and how he decided to bring it into the open, as he resolved first on a hormone treatment and, second, on risky experimental surgery that would turn him into the woman that he truly was.

Wallaçonia


David Pratt - 2017
    To escape the pressure, he imagines the woods and marshes around his home to be an independent country, Wallaçonia, where he is accepted and recognized as the "upright and sterling" young man people expect him to be. And he may make it yet: this could be the week he and his girlfriend Liz finally have sex, putting to rest any lingering doubts Jim has about what kind of guy he really is. But then Pat Baxter, a neighbor, asks him to help out in his bookstore during the holiday rush, and Jim starts making new connections - and rediscovering an old one. Will Jim leave the sanctuary of his imaginary Wallaçonia for the real world? And which real world will it be, the one with Liz or the one that beckons from the bookstore?

Overshare: Love, Laughs, Sexuality and Secrets


Rose Ellen Dix - 2018
    but now they are taking oversharing to a whole new level. Discussing sexuality, revealing secrets and empowering others, OVERSHARE is a book packed with Rose and Rosie's unique take on friendships, fame, mental health and LGBT issues.As visibly out members of the LGBT community, they open up about their own experiences, both together and as individuals, and have written this book in the hope that it gives strength to those who have faced similar difficulties. They are spreading a message of positivity and inclusivity, and want everyone to feel comfortable in their own skin, no matter what their sexuality. Delve deep into the unfiltered highs and lows of Rose and Rosie's life: family relationships, secrets of a happy marriage, struggles with OCD and anxiety, finding love and navigating the world as a gay couple. Get ready to laugh, cry, cringe and OVERSHARE.

Tim and Pete


James Robert Baker - 1993
    Sarcastic, satiric, violent, and exhilarating, "Tim & Pete" is a fiercely imagined, boldly realized vision of the cultural war raging in the hearts of the disenfranchised and in the streets of America.

Looking For It


Michael Thomas Ford - 2004
    As Mike pours beer, wipes glasses and hears everything, he's also witness to the men who come here looking for what they need - sex, direction, friendship, spiritual fulfillment, and love. People like: Stephen Darby - As an accountant, he knows many secrets. But Stephen has his own secret, one he's never been able to share with anyone close to him. Being the perfect son costs him dearly, and now it may take from him the one man he longs for. Pete Thayer - Playing it straight, Pete takes out his frustrations on transmissions and engines during the day, then spends his nights trying to quench his needs through anonymous sex. John and Russell - The golden couple in town has the ideal relationship everyone wants. But behind the scenes, their storybook marriage is on the verge of facing some explosive trials. Father Thomas Dunn - More and more the gentle priest is feeling a need to express the secret desires that conflict with his devotion to the church, sending his faith into a tailspin and making him question what he really wants from life. Simon Bird - He's a fixture in town, an old queen everyone finds amusing and entertaining. Still mourning the loss of his longtime lover, Simon yearns to find love and a place in a culture that worships youth and beauty.With unflinching honesty, keen insight, and his trademark humor, Michael Thomas Ford weaves together the unforgettable stories of these seven men, chronicling their dreams, hurts, heartbreaks, joys, and hopes, while taking readers on an emotional journey to find what it is we're all looking for.