When We Rise by
2017 LAMBDA LITERARY AWARD WINNER The partial inspiration for the ABC television mini-series! "You could read Cleve Jones's book because you should know about the struggle for gay, lesbian, and transgender rights from one of its key participants--maybe heroes--but really, you should read it for pleasure and joy."--Rebecca Solnit, author of Men Explain Things to Me Born in 1954, Cleve Jones was among the last generation of gay Americans who grew up wondering if there were others out there like himself. There were. Like thousands of other young people, Jones, nearly penniless, was drawn in the early 1970s to San Francisco, a city electrified by progressive politics and sexual freedom. Jones found community--in the hotel rooms and ramshackle apartments shared by other young adventurers, in the city's bathhouses and gay bars like The Stud, and in the burgeoning gay district, the Castro, where a New York transplant named Harvey Milk set up a camera shop, began shouting through his bullhorn, and soon became the nation's most outspoken gay elected official. With Milk's encouragement, Jones dove into politics and found his calling in "the movement." When Milk was killed by an assassin's bullet in 1978, Jones took up his mentor's progressive mantle--only to see the arrival of AIDS transform his life once again. By turns tender and uproarious, When We Rise is Jones' account of his remarkable life. He chronicles the heartbreak of losing countless friends to AIDS, which very nearly killed him, too; his co-founding of the San Francisco AIDS Foundation during the terrifying early years of the epidemic; his conception of the AIDS Memorial Quilt, the largest community art project in history; the bewitching story of 1970s San Francisco and the magnetic spell it cast for thousands of young gay people and other misfits; and the harrowing, sexy, and sometimes hilarious stories of Cleve's passionate relationships with friends and lovers during an era defined by both unprecedented freedom and and violence alike. When We Rise is not only the story of a hero to the LQBTQ community, but the vibrantly voice memoir of a full and transformative American life.
How to Survive a Plague by
A New York Times 2016 Notable Book The definitive history of the successful battle to halt the AIDS epidemic--from the creator of, and inspired by, the seminal documentary How to Survive a Plague. A riveting, powerful telling of the story of the grassroots movement of activists, many of them in a life-or-death struggle, who seized upon scientific research to help develop the drugs that turned HIV from a mostly fatal infection to a manageable disease. Ignored by public officials, religious leaders, and the nation at large, and confronted with shame and hatred, this small group of men and women chose to fight for their right to live by educating themselves and demanding to become full partners in the race for effective treatments. Around the globe, 16 million people are alive today thanks to their efforts. Not since the publication of Randy Shilts's classic And the Band Played On has a book measured the AIDS plague in such brutally human, intimate, and soaring terms. In dramatic fashion, we witness the founding of ACT UP and TAG (Treatment Action Group), and the rise of an underground drug market in opposition to the prohibitively expensive (and sometimes toxic) AZT. We watch as these activists learn to become their own researchers, lobbyists, drug smugglers, and clinicians, establishing their own newspapers, research journals, and laboratories, and as they go on to force reform in the nation's disease-fighting agencies. With his unparalleled access to this community David France illuminates the lives of extraordinary characters, including the closeted Wall Street trader-turned-activist, the high school dropout who found purpose battling pharmaceutical giants in New York, the South African physician who helped establish the first officially recognized buyers' club at the height of the epidemic, and the public relations executive fighting to save his own life for the sake of his young daughter. Expansive yet richly detailed, this is an insider's account of a pivotal moment in the history of American civil rights. Powerful, heart-wrenching, and finally exhilarating, How to Survive a Plague is destined to become an essential part of the literature of AIDS.
Geography of the Heart by
Poignant and affectionate,Geography of the Heart is a moving portrait of Lambda Award winner Fenton Johnson, the son of a Kentucky whiskey brewer, and his fateful lover Larry Rose, who, three years into their intense relationship, died of AIDS. Rose had been upfront about his condition from the start of his relationship with Johnson, and the knowledge left their interactions fraught with the pain of anticipated loss. Though Johnson never contracted the virus himself, Rose's physical decline haunted him. He had come to depend on Rose for his care and understanding as much as Rose, increasingly fragile as their relationship progresses, depended on him. The vivid, poignant, and wise tribute to his soulmate that Johnson has distilled into The Geography of the Heart is a memoir like no other, a startling story of compassion, perseverance, and the acute wounds that can linger in the shadow of true love.
Scissors, Paper, Rock by
"For the first time since he left his birthplace in Kentucky for San Francisco, Raphael Hardin has returned home alone. Before, he had always brought men with him on his visits, lovers with whom his mother had been "civil, even flirtatious," while his father retreated to his sacred workshop." "Now his mother has died and, at age thirty-six, Raphael has come back to see his dying father, who knows and disapproves of Raphael's boyfriends but who is unaware that this, his youngest child, may be ill as well." "Raphael's halting, often painful attempt to reconcile with his father forms the centerpiece of Fenton Johnson's astonishing novel - the second for a writer whose work The Chicago Tribune has called "as rich and Southern as fried-chicken gravy." At times funny, at times heartbreakingly poignant, Scissors, Paper, Rock explores with wisdom and humor the many kinds of family, the infinite varieties of love." "For nearly two centuries, the Hardins have considered Strang Knob - a community tucked into a westward-flung finger of the Appalachians - the center of their universe. On a day "when the clouds began to spit snow" Raphael's father, Tom Hardin, set mink traps with his bride-to-be, Rose Ella, and touched something in her heart forever by plunging into a flooded river to save a drowning dog. Throughout the raising of seven children, Rose Ella and Tom's love became a slipknot; the harder they strained at it, the tighter it bound them one to another." "But for their children, the Hardin household was both a nest of plain affection and a place to leave. Now when Tom speaks to his urbanized sons and daughters, he feels as if he's calling across a river of neckties and office lights. It falls on Miss Camilla Perkins, the Hardins' next door neighbor, to provide shelter for Raphael, who has been diagnosed with AIDS. In her home he hooks up his intravenous tube while his hungry heart feeds off the spinster's memories of a simpler, though never easy, era." "Through the intricately interwoven stories of the Hardin parents and children, Scissors, Paper, Rock contrasts the families we inherit - our blood ties - with the families we choose, our partners in love and our friends. After making love with a childhood friend in his parents' backyard, Raphael muses: "Who are those who will remember him? Who will remember the artistic sons gone to distant cities to die of euphemisms?""--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved
Workable Sisterhood by
Workable Sisterhood is an empirical look at sixteen HIV-positive women who have a history of drug use, conflict with the law, or a history of working in the sex trade. What makes their experience with the HIV/AIDS virus and their political participation different from their counterparts of people with HIV? Michele Tracy Berger argues that it is the influence of a phenomenon she labels "intersectional stigma," a complex process by which women of color, already experiencing race, class, and gender oppression, are also labeled, judged, and given inferior treatment because of their status as drug users, sex workers, and HIV-positive women. The work explores the barriers of stigma in relation to political participation, and demonstrates how stigma can be effectively challenged and redirected. The majority of the women in Berger's book are women of color, in particular African Americans and Latinas. The study elaborates the process by which these women have become conscious of their social position as HIV-positive and politically active as activists, advocates, or helpers. She builds a picture of community-based political participation that challenges popular, medical, and scholarly representations of "crack addicted prostitutes" and HIV-positive women as social problems or victims, rather than as agents of social change. Berger argues that the women's development of a political identity is directly related to a process called "life reconstruction." This process includes substance- abuse treatment, the recognition of gender as a salient factor in their lives, and the use of nontraditional political resources.
The Lives of LGBT Older Adults by
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered (LGBT) older adults have unique and varying physical and mental health needs. Yet their experiences have often been ignored in gerontological and LGBT studies. In this important and timely volume, Orel and Fruhauf bring together crucial research from leading experts in the field to shed light on the unique challenges facing this oft-overlooked but growing population. This book uses a life course perspective to investigate how LGBT older adults have been shaped by social stigma and systematic discrimination. Although many of their experiences are similar to those of younger LGBT individuals, LGBT elders grew up in a particularly oppressive time, which continues to impact their well-being. However, these individuals have also developed coping mechanisms to adapt to stigma, discrimination, and the challenges of aging. Thus, the book explores not only the challenges and needs of this population but also their strengths and resilience. The intersection of cultural factors and personal attributes is highlighted.
Never Silent by
"Never Silent is a gorgeous book . . . Peter Staley has written an electrifying primer for anyone who's thinking/worrying/wondering about how to change/save the world." --Tony Kushner, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright of Angels in America 2022 Lambda Literary Award Finalist The previously untold stories of the life of the leading subject in David France's How To Survive A Plague, Peter Staley, including his continuing activism In 1987, somebody shoved a flyer into the hand of Peter Staley: massive AIDS demonstration, it announced. After four years on Wall Street as a closeted gay man, Staley was familiar with the homophobia common on trading floors. He also knew that he was not beyond the reach of HIV, having recently been diagnosed with AIDS-Related Complex. A week after the protest, Staley found his way to a packed meeting of the AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power--ACT UP--in the West Village. It would prove to be the best decision he ever made. ACT UP would change the course of AIDS, pressuring the National Institutes of Health, the FDA, and three administrations to finally respond with research that ultimately saved millions of lives. Staley, a shrewd strategist with nerves of steel, organized some of the group's most spectacular actions, from shutting down trading on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange to putting a giant condom over the house of Senator Jesse Helms. Never Silent is the inside story of what brought Staley to ACT UP and the explosive and sometimes painful years to follow--years filled with triumph, humiliation, joy, loss, and persistence. Never Silent is guaranteed to inspire the activist within all of us.
And the Band Played On by
Upon its first publication more than twenty years ago, And the Band Played on was quickly recognized as a masterpiece of investigative reporting. An international bestseller, a nominee for the National Book Critics Circle Award, and made into a critically acclaimed movie, Shilts' expose revealed why AIDS was allowed to spread unchecked during the early 80's while the most trusted institutions ignored or denied the threat. One of the few true modern classics, it changed and framed how AIDS was discussed in the following years. Now republished in a special 20th Anniversary edition, And the Band Played On remains one of the essential books of our time.
Arthur Ashe by
A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK The first comprehensive, authoritative biography of American icon Arthur Ashe--the Jackie Robinson of men's tennis--a pioneering athlete who, after breaking the color barrier, went on to become an influential civil rights activist and public intellectual. Born in Richmond, Virginia, in 1943, by the age of eleven, Arthur Ashe was one of the state's most talented black tennis players. Jim Crow restrictions barred Ashe from competing with whites. Still, in 1960 he won the National Junior Indoor singles title, which led to a tennis scholarship at UCLA. He became the first African American to play for the US Davis Cup team in 1963, and two years later he won the NCAA singles championship. In 1968, he won both the US Amateur title and the first US Open title, rising to a number one national ranking. Turning professional in 1969, he soon became one of the world's most successful tennis stars, winning the Australian Open in 1970 and Wimbledon in 1975. After retiring in 1980, he served four years as the US Davis Cup captain and was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 1985. In this revelatory biography, Raymond Arsenault chronicles Ashe's rise to stardom on the court. But much of the book explores his off-court career as a human rights activist, philanthropist, broadcaster, writer, businessman, and celebrity. In the 1970s and 1980s, Ashe gained renown as an advocate for sportsmanship, education, racial equality, and the elimination of apartheid in South Africa. But from 1979 on, he was forced to deal with a serious heart condition that led to multiple surgeries and blood transfusions, one of which left him HIV-positive. In 1988, after completing a three-volume history of African-American athletes, he was diagnosed with AIDS, a condition he revealed only four years later. After devoting the last ten months of his life to AIDS activism, he died in February 1993 at the age of forty-nine, leaving an inspiring legacy of dignity, integrity, and active citizenship. Based on prodigious research, including more than one hundred interviews, Raymond Arsenault's insightful and compelling biography puts Ashe in the context of both his time and the long struggle of African-American athletes seeking equal opportunity and respect.
