ARMISTEAD MAUPIN

The Days of Anna Madrigal, the suspenseful, comic, and touching ninth novel in Armistead Maupin's bestselling "Tales of the City" series, follows one of modern literature's most unforgettable and enduring characters - Anna Madrigal, the legendary transgender landlady of 28 Barbary Lane - as she embarks on a road trip that will take her deep into her past. Now ninety-two, and committed to the notion of "leaving like a lady," Mrs. Madrigal has seemingly found peace with her "logical family" in San Francisco: her devoted young caretaker Jake Greenleaf; her former tenant Brian Hawkins and his daughter Shawna; and Michael Tolliver and Mary Ann Singleton, who have known and loved Anna for nearly four decades. Some members of Anna's family are bound for the otherworldly landscape of Burning Man, the art community in Nevada's Black Rock Desert where 60,000 revelers gather to construct a city designed to last only one week. Anna herself has another destination in mind: a lonely stretch of road outside of Winnemucca where the 16-year-old boy she once was ran away from the whorehouse he called home. With Brian and his beat-up RV, she journeys into the dusty troubled heart of her Depression childhood to unearth a lifetime of secrets and dreams and attend to unfinished business she has long avoided.

The internationally bestselling author of "Tales of the City" revisits his gay Everyman from the series, allowing the 55-year-old Michael Tolliver to tell his story in his own voice. Brimming with gentle insights about the human condition, this is a novel about the act of growing older joyfully.

Michael Tolliver, the sweet-spirited Southerner in Armistead Maupin's classic "Tales of the City" series, is arguably the most beloved gay character in fiction. Now, almost twenty years after ending his groundbreaking saga of San Francisco life, Maupin revisits his all-too-human hero, letting the 55-year-old gardener tell his story in his own voice. Having survived the plague that took so many of his friends and lovers, Michael has learned to embrace the random pleasures of life, the tender alliances that sustain him in the hardest of times, "Michael Tolliver Lives" follows its protagonist as he finds love with a younger man, attends to his dying fundamentalist mother in Florida, and finally reaffirms his allegiance to a wise octogenarian who was once his landlady. While Maupin insists that this book is not, strictly speaking, a continuation of "Tales of the City", a reassuring number of familiar faces appear along the way. As usual, the author's mordant wit and ear for pitch-perfect dialogue serve every aspect of the story - from the bawdy to the bittersweet."Michael Tolliver Lives" is a novel about the act of growing older joyfully and the everyday miracles that somehow make that possible.

This official illustrated companion book features oral histories, archival photographs, behind-the-scenes stills, and the story of the new Focus Features film directed by Gus Van Sant (Good Will Hunting, My Own Private Idaho), starring Academy Award(r) winner Sean Penn (Mystic River, Dead Man Walking) as gay-rights icon Harvey Milk. His life changed history. His courage changed lives. In 1977, Harvey Milk was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, becoming the first openly gay man to be voted into major public office in America. His victory was not just a victory for gay rights; he forged coalitions across the political spectrum. From senior citizens to union workers, Harvey Milk changed the very nature of what it means to be a fighter for human rights and became, before his untimely death in 1978, a hero for all Americans. Part I, "The History," covering Milk's life in New York pre-1973 through his death in San Francisco in 1978, features: * a brief history of Harvey Milk * 90 historical photos * and recollections from Milk's many activist friends in his Castro Street neighborhood, campaigns and eventual victory, Prop 6 protests, the Gay Freedom Day Parade, and Harvey Milk's enduring legacy. Part II, "The Movie," details the making of the film, and includes: * commentary by screenwriter Dustin Lance Black, who was on the set every day * movie stills, side-by-side with the historical photos they re-create * and behind-the-scene shots of the real historical characters who consulted on or appeared in the film.

Gabriel Noone is a writer whose late-night radio stories have brought him into the homes of millions. Noone is in the midst of a painful separation from his lover of ten years, when a publisher sends him the memoir of a thirteen-year-old boy who suffered horrific abuse at the hands of his parents. Pete Lomax is not only a brave and gifted diarist but a devoted listener to Noone's show. When Noone phones the boy to offer encouragement, it soon becomes clear that Pete sees in this heartsick, middle-aged storyteller the loving father he's always wanted. Thus begins an extraordinary friendship that only grows deeper as the boy's health deteriorates. Then, out of the blue, troubling new questions arise, exploding Noone's comfortable assumptions and causing his ordered existence to spin wildly out of control. As he walks the tightrope between truth and illusion, he is finally forced to confront all his relationships - familial, romantic and erotic.

Gabriel Noone es un narrador d'histories, un escriptor de culte, guionista d'un programa de rádio nocturn que li ha obert la porta de milions de llars gràcies a la força de les seves histories urbane

" Les Chroniques nous parlent du présent sur un mode littéraire désuet Maupin n'est pas sans rappeler Dickens. [...] Mais c'est aussi la verve comique et le romanesque le plus échevelé, fait d'enquêtes, d'énigmes et d'anagrammes. [...] C'est que, chez Maupin, tous les destins peuvent ou doivent se croiser : l'action est faite de ces hasards de comédie. Mais les rencontres improbables, n'est-ce pas aussi, en dépit des préjugés des gays chic, la logique sociale de l'exogamie homosexuelle ? Vérité de l'invraisemblable : nous voici bien plongés dans un univers dickensien, où la fantaisie est la clé du réalisme. Du reste, les Chroniques n'ont-elles pas été d'abord publiées en feuilleton, dans un quotidien de San Francisco - à la manière des grands romans du siècle dernier ? Le bonheur de Maupin, c'est donc peut-être cette innocence narrative retrouvée. " Eric Fassin, Le Monde

Una magnífica novela de suspense con un excelente tratamiento de las relaciones humanas y los sentimientos. A sus 54 años Gabriel Noone, guionista de un programa de radio seguido con mucho interés por la comunidad homosexual, atraviesa una profunda crisis debida a la separacion de su pareja Jess, un hombre quince años mas joven y aquejado de sida.. Pero la repentina aparicion en su vida de un admirador de 13 años que le envia un manuscrito dara un vuelco completo a su existencia.