To Refrain From Embracing – dark and comedic tale about one family’s struggles in Hamilton, Ontario during the 1970s

posted Sunday, July 23, 2023

by: Bryen Dunn in Books

To Refrain From Embracing follows the trials facing a small family from the backdrop of an impoverished steel-working community in working-class Hamilton, Ontario, in the 1970’s,  After an attempted suicide leaves veteran Ted checked into a psychiatric hospital, his wife struggles with family finances and growing concern for the well-being of their young son while also […]

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Urchin is a bold and visionary tale that breaks as many rules as it follows

posted Saturday, July 22, 2023

by: Jeffrey Round in Books

The 2022 Governor General’s Awards nominated novel, Urchin, seamlessly blends fantasy with history, and fiction with fact. Within this Young Adult coming-of-age tale, Kate Story has succeeded in the enviable task of writing a book that is impossible to define—impossible because it is bold and visionary, and breaks as many rules as it follows. The […]

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City of Night – story of one man’s travels through the dark denizens of 1960s American alt-culture

posted Wednesday, July 19, 2023

by: Bryen Dunn in Books

City of Night was John Rechy’s explosive first novel released in 1963, and it marked a radical departure from all other novels of its kind, giving voice to a subculture that had never before been revealed with such acuity. It earned comparisons to Genet and Kerouac, even as Rechy was personally attacked by scandalized reviewers. […]

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Johnny Thunders: In Cold Blood – revised reissue includes new forward, closing chapter, and photographs

posted Tuesday, July 11, 2023

by: Bryen Dunn in Books

Johnny Thunders: In Cold Blood is the definitive portrait of the condemned man of rock’n’roll, from the baptism of fire and tragedy that was The New York Dolls, through the junkie punk years of The Heartbreakers, to his sudden and mysterious death in 1991. It is an unflinching account of a unique guitarist whose drug problems often […]

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This Bird Has Flown – a rock n roll love story, and a second chance at stardom

posted Thursday, July 6, 2023

by: Bryen Dunn in Books

This Bird Has Flown explores love, passion, and the ghosts of our past, and offers a glimpse inside the music business that could only come from beloved songwriter Susanna Hoffs, from The Bangles. Jane Start is thirty-three, broke, and recently single. Ten years prior, she had a hit song, written by world-famous superstar Jonesy, but […]

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The Art of Darkness – The History of Goth

posted Monday, July 3, 2023

by: Bryen Dunn in Books

Finally, after a decade of work, countless interviews and immersing deep into the culture, John Robb‘s definitive book is a journey deep into The Art Of Darkness. The first in-depth book on Goth is a deepdive into the enduring culture and the social, historical and political backdrop that created the space for the art of […]

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Dave Brandstetter, Insurance Claims Investigator—the welcome return of an iconic gay literary hero

posted Wednesday, June 28, 2023

by: Jeffrey Round in Author by Author, Books

More than fifty years after the publication of the first Dave Brandstetter book, Fadeout, and nearly twenty years after its author’s death, Joseph Hansen’s celebrated mystery series is being republished in an affordable format by Penguin Random House. This is great news, as the books had become hard to find or just got too expensive […]

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I Remain, A Memoir – scribes from a west coast 60s love-in lesbian

posted Saturday, June 24, 2023

by: Bryen Dunn in Books

Megan Hutton is a free spirited senior. Born in the Selkirk Mountains of southeastern British Columbia, she roamed for first three years with bears, moose, and deer.  Gradually Megan integrated into a world void of wildlife, and at an early age she began to store her feelings in poetry and stories in a box under […]

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The Story of the B-52s: Neon Side of Town

posted Saturday, June 24, 2023

by: Bryen Dunn in Books

The Story of the B-52s: Neon Side of Town is the first critical history of one of the most legendary and influential bands in American popular music. Locating The B-52s in the intellectual climate of their hometown of Athens, GA and following the band from New York’s downtown scene in the early 1980s to their […]

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The Humble Lover – Edmund White’s latest novel captures the complicated relationship between an older aristocrat and a younger ballet soloist

posted Thursday, June 22, 2023

by: Bryen Dunn in Books

The Humble Lover is a wildly hilarious and irreverent novel about a rich older man who falls in love with a young ballerino. Aldwych West, an eighty-year-old modern-day aristocrat living alone in his Manhattan townhouse, is used to having what he wants. And when he sets eyes on August Dupond, a strong, stunningly beautiful soloist […]

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