New in December: Morrissey, Katherine V. Forrest, Jameson Currier, Keja L. Valens, and Randall Mann

Author: Edit Team

December 1, 2013

December is upon us and so are a slew of new and noteworthy LGBT books.

Renowned writer and editor Katherine V. Forrest is releasing High Desert (Spinsters Ink), her first new novel in eight years:

In this long-awaited new installment of the legendary Kate Delafield mystery series, Kate is forced to confront her most formidable opponent: herself.

Kate Delafield is in a world of trouble. Five months into mandated retirement from the LAPD, her long term on-again off-again relationship with Aimee Grant is off again. She’s become hopelessly dependent on the only substance that can drown her pain over Aimee—and the illness of her best friend. She is lost without her police career and beset by terrifying dreams.

Into this world walks Captain Carolina Walcott of the LAPD, with a request that Kate secretly try to locate Kate’s former police partner, Joe Cameron, who has vanished. She also offers Kate a business card—the name on it a woman from Kate’s past who may be able to offer a lifeline back to the self Kate once was.

As she deals with a shocking and inexplicable homicide, Kate also pursues a trail of evidence toward Cameron that leads her into the high desert. Here she will find profound challenges to the truth of everything she ever believed in as a principled police officer. Here she must decide what it is she still believes: about her past, her present, her future.

Sometimes it is not enough to simply sing your life; sometimes you have to write it all down. Released earlier this year in the United Kingdom, pop balladeer Morrissey’s memoir Autobiography (Putnam) finally gets a stateside release this month.

From the publisher:

Autobiography covers Morrissey’s life from his birth until the present day.

Steven Patrick Morrissey was born in Manchester on May 22nd 1959. Singer-songwriter and co-founder of the Smiths (1982-1987), Morrissey has been a solo artist for twenty-six years, during which time he has had three number 1 albums in England in three different decades.

Achieving eleven Top 10 albums (plus nine with the Smiths), his songs have been recorded by David Bowie, Nancy Sinatra, Marianne Faithfull, Chrissie Hynde, Thelma Houston, My Chemical Romance and Christy Moore, amongst others.

An animal protectionist, in 2006 Morrissey was voted the second greatest living British icon by viewers of the BBC, losing out to Sir David Attenborough. In 2007 Morrissey was voted the greatest northern male, past or present, in a nationwide newspaper poll. In 2012, Morrissey was awarded the Keys to the City of Tel-Aviv.

It has been said ‘Most pop stars have to be dead before they reach the iconic status that Morrissey has reached in his lifetime.’

How is female desire represented in Caribbean literary fiction? Seeking to provide some answers, Palgrave Macmillan is publishing Desire between Women in Caribbean Literature by Keja L. Valens, an in-depth study of female relationships in Caribbean literature.

From Palgrave MacMillian:

Relations between women – like the branches and roots of the mangrove – twist around, across, and within others as they pervade Caribbean letters. While relations between women are incorporated into the novels of José Martí, Mayotte Capécia, Maryse Condé, Jamaica Kincaid, Patricia Powell, and Rosario Ferré, little has been written about them. Desire between Women in Caribbean Literature elucidates the place of desire between women in Caribbean literature, compelling readers to rethink how we read the structures as well as the practices of sexuality

Looking for signs of intelligent life in the universe? Don’t fret, scholar Jennifer Reed examines the cultural impact of the brilliant writers/comedians Lily Tomlin and Jane Wagner in her new book The Queer Cultural Work of Lily Tomlin and Jane Wagner (Palgrave Macmillan).

From the publisher:

Lily Tomlin and Jane Wagner have been partners in life and work for more than forty years. Over those years they have been comedic pioneers in television, sound recording, film, theatre, and animation. They have won numerous prestigious awards and endeared themselves to generations of Americans. Although Lily Tomlin is the famous one-Ernestine (‘Have I reached the party to whom I am speaking?’) and Edith Ann (‘And that’s the truth.’) – her most meaningful work has been created in partnership with Jane Wagner. This book explores the ways they have used and expanded notions of queer to make their unique impact on American culture.

Writer, editor, and publisher Jameson Currier has assembled an all-star line up of writers for a new fiction anthology, With: New Gay Fiction (Chelsea Station Editions):

With: New Gay Fiction, edited by Jameson Currier, features sixteen authors writing on relationships with men: gay men with their friends, lovers, partners, husbands, dates, tricks, boyfriends, hustlers, idols, teachers, mentors, fathers, brothers, family, teams, co-workers, relatives, and strangers.

Contributors include David Bergman, Michael Carroll, Lewis DeSimone, Jack Fritscher, Ronald M. Gauthier, Michael Graves, Shaun Levin, Dan López, Jeff Mann, Vincent Meis, Matthew A. Merendo, Joel A. Nichols, David Pratt, Tom Schabarum, Stefen Styrsky, and William Sterling Walker.

Author Lucas Hilderbrand gives a beloved contemporary film a thorough critical reexamination in his new book Paris is Burning: Queer Film Classic (Arsenal Pulp Press) :

This latest addition to the Queer Film Classics series is an homage to Paris Is Burning, Jennie Livingston’s brilliant and award-winning 1991 documentary that captures the energy, ambition, wit, and struggle of African-American and Latino participants in the 1980s New York drag ball scene. An unlikely hit when it was first released, the film is a lively, touchingly empathetic portrait of urban drag culture, introducing such performers as Willi Ninja, Pepper LaBeija, and Angie Xtravaganza. Paris is Burning generated enthusiastic buzz from audiences and critics, as well as impassioned debate: did the film present a subversive perspective on the crass values of the 1980s, or did it exploit its subjects and pander to privileged movie audiences? Regardless, the film is considered one of the key films of the New Queer Cinema, and resonates with audiences to this day.

Author Lucas Hilderbrand contextualizes the film within the longer history of drag balls, the practices of documentary, the fervor of the culture wars, and issues of gender, sexuality, race, and class.

Also this month, expect new books from Frank Spinelli, Amy Dunne, Guillermo Luna, and a new poetry collection from Randall Mann.

As always, if we missed an author or book, or if you have a book coming out next month, please email us.

Fiction

Brian Westby (Reprint) by Forrest Reid, Valancourt Books
In Between by Jane Hoppen, Spinsters Ink
Lovers in the Present Afternoon (Reprint) by Kathleen Collins, Spinsters Ink
Secret Life by Amy Dunne, Bold Strokes Books
Switching Gears by Rhavensfyre, Sapphire Books Publishing
With by Jameson Currier Wescott, Chelsea Stations Editions

Nonfiction

Dracula’s Daughters: The Female Vampire on Film by Douglas Brode and Leah Deyneka, Scarecrow Press
License to Wed: What Legal Marriage Means to Same-Sex Couples by Kimberly D. Richman, NYU Press
Living Out Islam: Voices of Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender Muslims by Scott Siraj al-Haqq Kugle, NYU Press
Paris Is Burning: A Queer Film Classic by Lucas Hilderbrand, Aresnal Pulp Press
Sex Happens: The Gay Man’s Guide to Creative Intimacy by Arlen Keith Leight, Langdon Street Press

LGBT Studies

1960s Gay Pulp Fiction: The Misplaced Heritage (Studies in Print Culture and the History of the Book) edited by Drewey Wayne Gunn and Jaime Harker, University of Massachusetts Press
After Queer Theory: The Limits of Sexual Politics by James Penney, Pluto Press
Desire between Women in Caribbean Literature by Keja L. Valens, Palgrave Macmillan
Friendship and Queer Theory in the Renaissance: Gender and Sexuality in Early Modern England by John S. Garrison, Routledge
Montgomery Clift, Queer Star by Elisabetta Girelli, Wayne State University Press
Professing Selves: Transsexuality and Same-Sex Desire in Contemporary Iran by Afsaneh Najmabadi, Duke University Press
Queer Chivalry: Medievalism and the Myth of White Masculinity in Southern Literature by Tison Pugh, LSU Press
The Queer Cultural Work of Lily Tomlin and Jane Wagner by Jennifer Reed, Palgrave Macmillan
The Queer Turn in Feminism: Identities, Sexualities, and the Theater of Gender (Commonalities) by Anne Emmanuelle Berger, Translated by Catherine Porter PhD, Fordam University Press
Safe Space: Gay Neighborhood History and the Politics of Violence by Christina B. Hanhardt, Duke University Press
Sex, or the Unbearable (Theory Q) by Lauren Berlant and Lee Edelman, Duke University Press
Transforming Citizenships: Transgender Articulations of the Law (Sexual Cultures) by Isaac West, NYU Press
Transgender Experience: Place, Ethnicity, and Visibility (Routledge Research in Cultural and Media Studies) by Chantal Zabus and David Coad, Routledge
Virtual Intimacies: Media, Affect, and Queer Sociality by Shaka McGlotten, State University of New York Press

Romance

Conduct Unbecoming by L.A. Witt, Samhain Publishing
Hot Mess by Rowan McAllister, Dreamspinner Press
Going Down for the Count by Cage Thunder, Bold Strokes Books
Like Jazz by Heather Blackmore, Bold Strokes Books
Laughing Down the Moon by Eva Indigo, Bella Books
Love Burns Bright: A Lifetime of Lesbian Romance edited by Radclyffe, Cleis Press
Not As Easy As It Looks by Jaime Samms, Dreamspinner Press
Snow Globe by Georgia Beers, Brisk Press
Rush by Carsen Taite, Bold Strokes Books