Book picks similar to
Heroic Desire: Lesbian Identities and Cultural Space by Sally R. Munt
lgbtq
lgbt-culture
urban-planning
gay
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.
Forgotten Memories
Kat Smith - 2019
Investigative reporter Claire Weatherly assigned to write the in-depth article on Elise and Forest Ridge faces her own challenges. Her mother, a resident at Forest Ridge, is about to participate in a new clinical trial. As the interview gets underway, Claire’s partner, Detective Megan Wolfe, is injured in the line of duty. Elise rushes Claire to the hospital where she finds another woman has already arrived at Megan’s bedside. As Elise and Claire navigate the professional and personal challenges in their lives will they be able to forget the painful memories of their failed relationships and move forward to find love again?
Pray the Gay Away
Michael Zakar - 2017
Coming out is hard. The struggle is ongoing, a daily part of life whether to a new friend, a co-worker, or most importantly yourself. Pray the Gay Away chronicles Michael and Zach as they face awkward sexual encounters, drug-fueled escapades, coming out to each other, and their biggest foe - Mom, a woman who not only gave birth to what she calls one regret - but two. The memoir hilariously and poignantly explores what it’s like growing up as gay, Iraqi twins in modern America. Pray the Gay Away was inspired the night Mom snuck into their bedroom and force fed them “holy grapes,” determined to “de-gay” them. The Zakar Twins are new voices speaking out against generations, particularly within the Iraqi culture, who look down on being gay. This book is not only for the LBGTQ community, but for young adults, looking to achieve normalcy.
Denial: My 25 Years Without a Soul
Jonathan Rauch - 2013
A memoir...
Full of Grace: A Monday's Child Romance
Sienna Waters - 2019
Why would a dancer provoke the wrath of an anonymous letter writer? And when her director hires ex-soldier Sam Weaver to be Alena's bodyguard, the dancer is furious. Having her privacy invaded and her independence ripped away mean that Alena hates Sam at first sight.Sam's reeling from a job gone wrong, an incident that means she's practically unemployable in the security field. A contract with Alena could be enough to prop up Sam's failing reputation. The only problem? Alena doesn't want her there and refuses to follow her instructions, meaning she's a risk that Sam might not be able to afford to take.Alena and Sam might be stuck with each other, but that doesn't mean they have to like each other. Unfortunately, the heart doesn't always listen to the head. And as danger races closer the two must decide just exactly what chances they're prepared to take.Love has to be about compromise, but what if you've never had to compromise before? Career-oriented Alena and controlling Sam are the last people in the world willing to change themselves for love. There's no reason they should be together and every reason they should stay apart, but can Alena and Sam end up in each others' arms anyway?Full of Grace is the second in the Monday's Child series of lesbian romance novels, and features a HEA ending. Monday's Child books can be read independently and in any order.
Desert Sky
Ellie Green - 2021
The only downside? When the nearest neighbour is hundreds of kilometres away, it’s hard to date.Newly qualified teacher, Grace, can’t wait to start a life away the town where she’s only known for one thing. Travelling across the country to take a job as a governess is about as far as she can get.Grace and Ari are easy friends, spending their time riding horses, swimming in waterholes and watching their favourite movies late into the night.But Ari’s feelings begin to extend beyond friendship. Ari has a crush, no matter how much she tries to talk herself out of it. What she doesn’t know is Grace is harbouring feelings of her own. And in close confines, the attraction is becoming difficult to ignore.Their connection is strong, but if they want to build a relationship, they will need to move beyond the shadows of the past.Can they find a way to each other’s hearts?
I Will Survive
Leow Yangfa - 2011
Prefacing these stories are contributions from 5 local commentators who share their personal reflections on the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender communities in Singapore. They are: Mrs Juliana Toh, Executive Director of Counselling and Care Centre; Reverend Yap Kim Hao, former Methodist Bishop of Singapore; transgender activist Ms Leona Lo; and former Nominated Members of Parliament Ms Braema Mathi and Mr Siew Kum Hong. The book also contains a glossary of the common terms used to describe the diversity within the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender communities, and a listing of relevant community and professional resources in Singapore. The editor’s proceeds from sales of the ebook will be donated to Oogachaga, a counselling and support service.
Straight Walk: A Supermodel's Journey to Finding Her Truth
Patricia Velásquez - 2015
In her unprivileged community in Venezuela, food and water were scarce. It pained her to see her mother work so hard, often denying herself food or clothing for the sake of her six children, and Patricia was determined to escape this impoverished life. Straight Walk is the story of how this courageous young girl found a way to earn money for her family—and ultimately became a supermodel and Hollywood actress.When Patricia was in her late teens, a friend groomed her to enter the Miss Venezuela pageant, which opened the door to the modeling world. From there, her story weaves its way onto the runways of Milan, Paris, London and New York working for designers like Isaac Mizrahi, Karl Lagerfeld, and Carolina Herrera. By some people’s estimation, she was the first Latina Supermodel, living life in the Glamazon era. Patricia landed on the cover of most every major fashion magazine in the world and posed for the Sports Illustrated’s Swimsuit Edition and Victoria’s Secret.For many years, Patricia used her professional success to compensate for a secret she hid from her family. She convinced herself that her family’s happiness was more important than her own, and she spent years feeling achingly alone. Worse, she didn’t know the price she’d pay for keeping a secret and living a lie, preventing not only herself from walking her journey, but those she loved most. Now she shares her story to empower others to live authentic lives and find their truth.
Terminal Event
Ali Spooner - 2011
A near-fatal accident, at age twelve, makes her visions clearer, but not the reason for them. As she matures, Lisa, a spirit, enters her visions to guide her in using her gift, but still not the reason why. After Tally’s gift helps locate the body of a murdered teen, she realizes her gift is to help lost souls find their peace.When it’s discovered, a serial killer murdered the teen, Blair “Spooky” Cooper is the Agent in Charge assigned to the case. A task force of local detectives and FBI forms to track the killer. Blair enlists the aid of Tally, and together with the team, Tally helps them piece together the puzzle of murders spanning twenty years throughout the Deep South.Even with the complication of the case, Blair and Tally have an undeniable attraction to each other. As they close in on the killer, the killer focuses on Tally, jeopardizing her bond with Blair and everyone around her. For the sake of the case, they put their attraction on the back burner until the killer is caught. Will the killer be caught or continue to evade authorities? Can Tally and Blair’s budding romance survive the possibility? Read this intense murder mystery romance and find out.
Pride: The Unlikely Story of the True Heroes of the Miner's Strike
Tim Tate - 2017
They did so in the midst of the 1984 miners’ strike—the most bitter and divisive dispute for more than half a century. In the 1980s, Margaret Thatcher’s social and fiscal policies devastated Britain’s traditional industries, as AIDS began to claim lives across the nation. As the government and police battled "the enemy within" in communities across the land and newspapers whipped up fear of the gay "perverts" who were supposedly responsible for inflicting this disease, miners and homosexuals unexpectedly made a stand together and forged a lasting friendship. It was an alliance which helped keep an entire valley clothed and fed during the darkest months of the strike. And it led directly to unions and the Labour Party accepting gay equality as a cause to be championed. Pride tells the inspiring true story of how two very different communities—each struggling to overcome its own bitter internal arguments, as well as facing the power of a hostile government and press—found common cause against overwhelming odds. And how this one simple but unlikely act of friendship would, in time, help change life in Britain—forever. This is the true story that inspired the Golden Globe Award-nominated, GLAAD-nominated, BAFTA-winning film Pride.
It's Not Really About the Hair: The Honest Truth About Life, Love, and the Business of Beauty
Tabatha Coffey - 2011
Tabatha Coffey, star of the hit Bravo reality show Tabatha’s Salon Takeover, shares her compelling life story with fans, revealing not only the events that have made her so outspoken, but the personal tenets that have contributed to her success and kept her centered and thriving with each new challenge and opportunity.
What Runs Over
Kayleb Rae Candrilli - 2017
Unfurling and unrelenting in its delivery, Candrilli has painted “the mountain” in excruciating detail. They show readers a world of Borax cured bear hides and canned peaches, of urine-filled Gatorade bottles and the syringe and all the syringe may carry. They show a violent world and its many personas. What Runs Over, too, is a story of rural queerness, of a transgender boy almost lost to the forest. The miracle of What Runs Over is that Candrilli has lived to write it at all."When Roethke said 'energy is the soul of poetry,' he might have been anticipating a book like What Runs Over, which is so full of energy it practically vibrates in your hand. Here, Candrilli’s speaker sticks their tongue 'into the heads / of venus fly traps just to feel the bite,' then later, burns holy books in the backyard and rolls around in the ashes until they become 'a painted god.' This is the verve of an urgent new poetic voice announcing itself to the world. As Candrilli writes: 'This is what I look like / when I’m trying to save myself.'"-Kaveh Akbar
Soldier of Change: From the Closet to the Forefront of the Gay Rights Movement
Stephen Snyder-Hill - 2014
policy on gays serving in the military, was repealed in September 2011, soldier Stephen Snyder-Hill (then Captain Hill) was serving in Iraq. Having endured years of this policy, which passively encouraged a culture of fear and secrecy for gay soldiers, Snyder-Hill submitted a video to a Republican primary debate (held two days after the repeal). In the video he asked for the Republicans’ thoughts regarding the repeal and their plans, if any, to extend spousal benefits to legally married gay and lesbian soldiers. His video was booed by the audience on national television. Soldier of Change captures not only the media frenzy that followed that moment, placing Snyder-Hill at the forefront of this modern civil rights movement, but also his twenty-year journey as a gay man in the army: from self-loathing to self-acceptance, to the most important battle of his life–protecting the disenfranchised. Since that time, Snyder-Hill has traveled the country with his husband, giving interviews on major news networks and speaking at universities, community centers, and pride parades, a champion of LGBT equality.
Reckless Paper Birds
John McCullough - 2019
The author of the critically acclaimed collections The Frost Fairs and Spacecraft, Brighton-based John McCullough pulls no punches in this latest - and his most powerful -collection. These are poems of skill, joy and quiet musicality that reflect the conflict and complexity of being.
The Marble Faun of Grey Gardens: A Memoir of the Beales, the Maysles Brothers, and Jacqueline Kennedy
Jerry Torre - 2018
The book is a behind-the-scenes look at “Big Edie” and “Little Edie” and their bizarre and reclusive life of squalor amidst the tremendous wealth of East Hampton, the family bond that developed between Jerry and them, and the afternoon everything was turned upside down forever with the arrival of documentary filmmakers Albert and David Maysles.What begins as a teenager coming upon what he assumed was an old, abandoned house takes on new dimensions when suddenly Edie appeared on the porch draped in a shower curtain with an apron tied around her head. “You must be the Marble Faun,” she told the stunned Jerry. Rather than chasing him away as he at first feared, she invited Jerry to meet her mother upstairs.So begins a strange and unusually close friendship with the two women as Jerry takes on the task of volunteer gardener of their estate, often sleeping nights in their living room and staying out of the way of mother-daughter arguments. The Marble Faun of Grey Gardens is Jerry’s look back on the filming of Grey Gardens but also how the notoriety the movie achieved changed his life along with the Beales’s as their private world was shared with audiences everywhere.