Another 100 Best Books list

The New York Times is out with its list of the "100 Best Books of the 21st Century." (Technically, five of the books don't qualify because they were published in 2000, the last year of the 20th century, but I guess "100 Best Books of the 2000s" isn't as resonant a title.) We gays did reasonably well in terms of representation, with six books by LGBTQ writers and another five books with prominent gay characters/storylines. And our merry band has discussed four of them: Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides; A Brief History of Seven Killings, by Marlon James; Fun Home, by Alison Bechdel; and The Line of Beauty, by Alan Hollinghurst. Anyway, check it out!

The proof is in the Pudding...

Tomorrow night, we'll discuss the final set of stories in Far Out: Recent Queer Science Fiction and Fantasy, edited by Paula Guran. I want to thank Mike Mazza again for nominating the book, which has been one of the strongest anthologies we've ever read. 

By coincidence, the Economist's latest "Off the Charts" newsletter links to "Who Killed the World?," a fascinating piece in The Pudding that documents the growing trend toward pessimism in science fiction. I'd never heard of the site, which bills itself as "a digital publication that explains ideas debated in culture with visual essays," but I'm glad I checked it out. I invite you to do likewise.

Back in the Jungle

Tim Hennessey, who wasn't able to be with us last week for our discussion of Rita Mae Brown's Rubyfruit Jungle, shared some thoughts I wanted to pass along:

"Many of the places in Fort Lauderdale Brown writes about are still there: the Egg N You Diner, Powerline Road, Holiday Park, Navy School. I also loved how she captured the allure of the big city to all gay people, whether they leave their small towns to head to NYC, Chicago, L.A., etc.

"I'm not sure if many of you have read Adriana Trigiani's many best-sellers about life in Appalachia (e.g., the Big Stone Gap series) and Italy (e.g., Lucia, Lucia and The Shoemaker's Wife). She grew up in a hollow in Virginia and attended St. Mary's College in Indiana when I was there. She was a rising star even then."

Thanks, Tim!

In addition, last November I posted an item about the New York Times marking the 50th anniversary of the novel's publication with a roundup of reactions to the novel from a host of musicians and writers. Unfortunately, I was so far ahead of my time (LOL) that only a handful of you read it back then, so I'm taking the liberty of reposting it here. 

I especially like this photo of the author, both because it captures her personality so well and because its caption reminds us of her strong connection to Washington, D.C., during the 1970s. Brown was a founding member of The Furies Collective, a separatist lesbian feminist community in D.C. that purchased and lived in two houses. The experiment only lasted a year (1971-1972), but its example remained influential long afterward. Brown went on to earn a doctorate in political science from the Institute for Public Studies in D.C.

Rita Mae Brown at the 1973 publication party for “Rubyfruit Jungle” at Lammas Women’s Books & More in Washington, D.C.Credit...

JEB (Joan E. Biren) 

 

When I was 1 of 30...

In honor of Pride Month, T, the New York Times Style Magazine, asked 30 creative people, ranging in age from 34 to 93, to share an indelible memory from their 30th year of life. Respondents include several authors whose works we've read, including Edmund White, Danez Smith,  John Rechy and Alexander Chee, who begins his contribution: "It was 1997, and all my lovers kept giving me books."