A steam room tsunami, missing ceili dancers, visual poetry, a run through London and a unicorn

[photo: Justin David]

It was the first outing for "London's peerless gay literary salon" Polari - proudly entering its tenth year in business - on Friday and John-John and I duly joined a whole host of familiar regulars in the audience (including Emma, Toby, sexy Lexi, Val Lee, Suzie Feay, Karen McLeod, Anya Nyx and the rest) to welcome it in.


[photo: Justin David]

Host Paul Burston - whose own latest novel, the mystery crime thriller The Black Path was published in the autumn - teased us with the suggestion that something "very special indeed" was planned for the tenth anniversary, then proudly introduced the evening's impressive line-up...


[photo: Justin David]

...opening with the lovely Chris Chalmers - another regular attendee and fêted author, "long-listed" for the Polari First Book Prize in 2013. For us, he read from his latest novel Light From Other Windows, an intriguing tale of how a family's secrets unravel in the wake of the dramatic death of the youngest son in a tsunami that swamps Tenerife. The boy had kept a meticulous blog that painfully exposes his insights into the character of each and every one of them, and shockingly reveals that he had a few secrets of his own.

In order to save us from the full trauma so early in the evening, Mr Chalmers focused in on one of the family members, gay Jem, a gym-bunny and - it would seem - less-than-faithful boyfriend, as he is tempted by the (low-hanging) fruit of another in the steam-room of a posh hotel. Phew!


[photo: Justin David]

Dampening our ardour after that little fantasy session was the task that fell to Ann Mann (who, as I observed when she last read for us back at Xmas 2013, was one of the original members of The George Mitchell Singers - aka The Black & White Minstrels - and stalwart of BBC broadcasting) gave us a rather intriguing snippet from her new book Arcanum. A mystery of dramatic proportions, the tale revolves around the disappearance without trace of an entire coach-load of Irish folk dancers, interwoven with the ghosts and superstitions, premonitions and magic that permeate the history of the Emerald Isle.


[photo: Justin David]

How does one follow so many layers of mystery? With an audio-visual extravaganza, of course! For every poem Mr Nathan Evans (for it was he) read from the anthology Threads, he displayed an accompanying visual by the ever-lovely Justin David (also our "official photographer" for the night) - some of them quite hilarious. The poems he read for us explored life, domesticity, observations on urban living and relationships - and here he is reading a couple at the book's launch in the autumn:

Nathan Evans - Threads

Grabbing the chance during the break for a drink and a fag and a bit of a catch-up on all the gossip, it was soon time to resume our seats for a brace of top-notch readers.


[photo: Justin David]

First up, the superb Rosie Garland (aka "Rosie Lugosi"), author of the darkly gothic novels The Palace of Curiosities and Vixen - and with another The Night Brother on its way, it's a wonder she has found the time to write poetry as well. However, an anthology of her own poetry As in Judy is out now - and, from the poems she read for us, it will be brilliant!

How about the dreams of a young tomboy?

When You Grow Up
At night, she leaps and does not land. Spreads her arms and soars
above the fenced and neatly weeded garden. Her dreams
are practice sessions where she lifts cars, sees through walls, fights

dragons. She is a pirate captain, a queen, a horse. She is neither girl
nor boy: the distinctions are irrelevant when her small body encompasses
male and female, human, beast. A turbulent child figure-heading

the prow of her beaked ship, she buckles on armour, rescues
princesses from spinning wheels and charming princes,
fearless of the shapes beneath the bed. Too soon

she hears the call: Breakfast! Now! Blinks this world into focus.
Hushes battle cries, sets her teeth against the summons
to dolls, dresses, a future sweet with happy-ever- afters

and you’ll change. You’ll see. She sheathes her sword
between the pages of her book. Every bedtime her mother tucks in
the sheet of husband, marriage, children: tucks it in tight.

Or in complete contrast - a unicorn?

Rosie Garland - A Short History Of Unicorns

Even our estimable headliner Stella Duffy OBE was full of enthusiasm for Ms Garland's performance. Praise, indeed, from the author of fourteen novels, fifty short stories, ten plays and numerous articles; co-director of the Fun Palaces campaign for wider participation in all forms of arts and culture; and winner (twice) of the Stonewall Writer of the Year award.

She also congratulated Paul on the longevity of Polari - with a dire warning to the assembled audience to treasure it and never to take such things for granted (referring to events across the pond): "rights can so easily be taken away in an instant".


[photo: Justin David]

Ms Duffy's newest work is the historical novel London Lies Beneath - based on the true tragic story of the boys of the 2nd Walworth Scout troop, who drowned off Leysdown on 4 August 1912. However, it from was the optimistic early section of the book that Stella read for us, as the exuberant boys run all the way from Trafalgar Square back home [and if you so wish, you can follow the route yourself]:

These lads want to go out, yes, see the world, but they want to come home as well. London is home.

London, but not this London, up town London. Home is the other side of the river. That's Big Ben ringing out the hour and so the three boys have their task - ready, set, go. Running now, along the Strand, dodging trams and carriages, swiftly round the copper who doesn't want dirty lads from the wrong side of the river running along his patch, doesn't trust them as far as he could throw them. A quick stop at St Mary le Strand, once round the church as they promised they always will, it would be cheating just to turn the corner to the river, then fast over Waterloo Bridge to the south, to home. Real London, the London that is beneath. Beneath the fancy shops of the north side, beneath the big white houses with their bells and whistles and servants upstairs and downstairs and in my lady's chamber, beneath the lower lip of the river that swells full and rich with the tide, shrinking back to mud flats and dirty docks twice a day. Proper London, that's where our boy lived. Lived. Where he and his friends and their families lived, happily enough, scraping out a living but only just, crammed in tight one against the other, spreading out only on high days and holidays and then just for a day trip on the tram, back to the hearth come night, and the hearth cold unless they could scrape up a coin for the coal...

...Nearly there lads, nearly home. A swift sprint down Newington Butts, well and truly breathless by Draper Street, under the train lines, finally, finally, here's Heygate with the big synagogue standing at a diagonal on the corner, then the Cuming and the library, now the dog-leg that is Larcom Street. And here they are, home. Home. Red faces, chests pumping, bare legs stinging in the wind. Not quite three miles and they've done it in under half an hour if the Town Hall clock is right. Course it is, this is the Walworth clock, course it's right. Slap on the back, punch to the arm. Good mate, good lad.

Read in Ms Duffy's inimitable style, we were as breathless as "the lads" by the end. We love listening to her almost as much as we love reading her work.


[photo: Justin David]

And that was it - with only the "curtain call", the applause and our usual round of schmoozing with chums, it was time for the pub!

Our next outing is an LGBT History Month special on 24th February - featuring readings from Tim Murphy, Dr Sebastian Buckle, Leon Craig, Suzi Feay ...and Paul Burston himself!

Faboo.

Viva Polari!

Silver wings, furry footballer sex, bears, weddings and Aleister Crowley

Whoo-ooo-ooo! It was the "Hallowe'en Special" Polari last night, and John-John, little Tony, Ange, Roland, Emma, Toby and I were waiting to be thrilled...





As ever, Mr Paul Burston opened proceedings at "London's peerless gay literary salon" in a suitably OTT fashion - with borrowed silver lamé wing-cape and Grace Jones-stylee devil horns and mask, he fluttered from the wings to introduce our first guest reader, "Mr Charlie Bauer" (why he'd want to name himself after a dead "ultra-left anarchist sympathiser" beats me). Mr Bauer, a scriptwriter for such hit series as Monarch of the Glen and assistant director of films such as Howard's End and Peter's Friends, read some rather nifty pieces from the superbly titled The Man Who Wanked His Way To Greece (a TV drama series in development with ITV), involving family intrigues and theft at a gay wedding, which warmed us up rather nicely.



Next, tackling a far more serious subject of gender dysphoria and the impact that "coming out" as a trans woman to friends and family has, with its unexpected discoveries, confessions and the impossible-to-recreate memories of past lives, Andie Davidson read a few of her works on the subject. Quite emotional stuff to take on board, but carrying some important messages for our mixed audience nonetheless.



However any feelings of melancholy were swept away with the inimitable arrival of that "Hurricane Sandy of bonk-busters", our favourite Miss Rebecca Chance (aka Lauren Henderson; she answered the question on her publishers' website "What’s your best quality?" with "I'm very modest")!





Roping in, as is her wont, both her "gay husband" and Mr Burston into her sleazily salacious reading from the forthcoming new book Bad Angels, involving the refrigerated fur closet of a Russian oligarch (of course), a Premier League footballer not-at-all-based-on Wayne Rooney (of course) and his first gay sexual encounter with the apartment's hunky black concierge (of course) - complete with all the actions and groans. Very steamy stuff indeed; I needed some fresh air after that! And a change of pants.

Following the break, it was time for the evening's "big-hitters", starting with the formidable force that is Miss Stella Duffy, prize-winning author, writing in many different literary genres (fourteen books and counting), and all-round fab person.





In keeping with the night's Hallowe'en theme she opened with a chilling tale of a malevolent girl watching her older lover die, then keeping her finger in a box - which made the audience sit up a bit! - before treating us to an extract from her newest work The Purple Shroud, involving the book's heroine the soon-to-be-Empress Theodora witnessing her father being mauled to death by a bear. It sounds more grim than it actually was, for Miss Duffy's tales of Theodora (her first was subtitled "Actress, Empress, Whore") are fascinating and highly entertaining...

Stella Duffy - Theodora: Actress, Empress, Whore

From one intelligently-researched and complex storyteller to another, as the superb Mr Jake Arnott - voted "one of Britain's 100 most influential gay and lesbian people" in 2005 - took to the stage.



He, too, is a fabulous reader as well as writer, putting on all the voices as he drew us into the tangled web of his new novel The House of Rumour, with its fascinating interplay between Bond author Ian Fleming, the satanist Aleister Crowley (who was also a central character in Mr Arnott's The Devil's Paintbrush, which he read for us at Polari back in March 2010), Rudolf Hess, a retired spy and a transsexual prostitute. I'm sure it all makes sense in the end - the official website gives little away either - but the extracts were brilliant in themselves. One of my cultural icons Mr Mark Lawson loved the book, which is a good enough recommendation for me!



The evening ended as ever with tumultuous and well-deserved applause for all concerned. But it wasn't quite over, as darling Alex ("journo-slut") Hopkins and Beige magazine were on hand all evening, filming, and I as well as many of the authors (including VG Lee and DJ Connell) and fans present were interviewed for a special feature they will be doing for Polari's fifth birthday next month.



I can't wait to see the (no doubt embarrassing) footage, nor can I wait for the big birthday event on 26th November - with Susie Boyt, Neil Alexander, Jeff Kristian and Cherry Smyth. Fantabulosa...

Polari at the Southbank

Clairvoyancy, Firefighter Trout, the Queen of Spain's daughter and "Eat Me" shorts

I went along to witness a birth last night. In the quaint surroundings of the mock-Tudor Wheatsheaf pub just off trendy Charlotte Street in Fitzrovia, a fabulous coterie of literary gay men and women gathered to welcome the new anthology of short stories Men and Women (edited by Paul Burston) into the world!



After much re-organisation of the furniture and the lighting (to accommodate the film being made of the proceedings), our host Bobby Nayyar - the powerhouse behind independent publishing house Glasshouse Books - opened proceedings by introducing our first reader from the compilation, the lovely Alex Hopkins (Polari regular, freelance writer, journalist and blogger). He performed (in every sense of the word - the voices and mannerisms of his characters were reminiscent of Kenneth Williams in Round The Horne) rather than read from his tale The Anniversary. It has nothing to do with the infamous Bette Davis film but, as this extract illustrates, it is certainly every bit as camp:

Ben eased his way through the crowd with a confident swagger as Frank stood and bellowed through the nameless faces in his finest Norma Desmond intonation, "You there! Why are you so late?"

As Ben approached Frank looked him up and down scathingly, registering his red eyes and sickly pallor. "Hello Velma,"Ben said shyly, using the nickname he had affectionately given Frank years before.

"I have been waiting here, amongst this rancidity, for almost half an hour, dear", Frank spat, "Clearly you were out on the shame last night - again."

And so we are treated to the fabulous badinage between these two old queens, and beautifully written and absorbing it is too - rather reminiscent of home life here at Dolores Delargo Towers! I loved it, and will immediately be investigating Alex's Dissident Musings blog.



Onward and upward, and our next reader was the diminutive actor and writer Angela Clerkin, whose tale of a very seductive Brighton clairvoyant and her Fuck It List was hilarious and fascinating - and elicited whoops of joy from the the audience as her heroine gets to achieve some remarkable adventures. On investigating Ms Clerkin's work, I am rather upset that I missed her appearance with Stella Duffy as Bette Davis and Joan Crawford in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane at the Drill Hall last December...



Completing the triumverate of readers in the first round was the fantabulosa Karen McLeod - she of the notorious balaclava-clad entrance at Polari Stalkers' Night way back in January 2009 - who gave us another of her customary hilarious and slightly twisted tales, Never Can Say Goodbye. This small passage gives us a flavour:

I met Lorna the night my long term girlfriend Suzie had stopped taking her lithium and set fire to the garden shed. Lorna had arrived in her uniform and helmet, jumping out of the fire engine with her unusual face.She introduced herself quickly as Firefighter Trout. At first, she struck me as unattractive with her tiny eyes and big face. The helmet hid all her hair and the chin strap was squeezing her double chin. But within moments she'd unrolled then controlled the jet of water coming out the hose and stamped out the last of the fire into the dandelions with her sooty boots. Her strange face became replaced with fuzzy heroism.

Brilliantly written, and brilliantly delivered!



After the break the lovely William Parker, who entertained us at the last Polari, once more read from Fern Cottage, his engaging tale of an elderly aristocratic gay curmudgeon reflecting on his past life while hating every moment of being confined to a nursing home, summed rather brilliantly up in this extract:

And then, just as I was trying to get a bit of a nap, the old bugger from across the corridor started up. Same thing every damn afternoon I've been here. Top of his voice. "I want to go home. Tell my mother to send her car round for me! I must have my mother's care! Let her know I'm here..."

Two hours of it with his door wide open until I'd really had enough.

"Excuse me!" I shouted. "Could I ask how old you are?"

Exasperated reply after a pause."I'm ninety-two. Ninety-two!"

"In that case, might I be permitted to ask how old you think your bloody mother might be now?" That shut him up for a bit.

I read the whole story today, and I must admit it brought a tear to my eye. Bloody good stuff.



Mr Parker was followed swiftly by "The Queen of Literary Lesbians", Miss Stella Duffy, who admitted that her story Partridge in a Pear Tree was on its second outing for this anthology, having previously been used in a "Twelve Days of Xmas" themed collection (hence the title). Nonetheless, it was excellent to hear the skilfully woven thread of this fantastical tale involving airlines, poetry and the Queen of Spain's daughter... As ever, Miss Duffy at once intrigues and entertains - I always enjoy her writing and she didn't disappoint!



The readings concluded (appropriately), with our fave Mr Paul Burston. As is customary, Mr B usually tries to dress according to the theme, and as his story Enjoy Carioca is all about Brazil he took to the stage draped in the Brazilian flag and headgear. Appropriate, indeed, as he is married to a "Carioca" (a person from Rio de Janeiro) and as he said, "enjoys Carioca every night". The story, too, is slightly smutty and very enticing:

...there was no denying that the boy wore them well. On lesser mortals, the trunks would have looked like false advertising. On him, the words "Enjoy Carioca" couldn't have been more apt. He was like an exotic fruit waiting to be tasted. His trunks were a provocation. Or possibly an invitation. They might just as well have said "Eat Me".

And the tale of two rampant gay men on their honeymoon continues in that vein...

This was a great evening, and an excellent launch for what promises to be a book full of surprises. I am tucking into it already, and look forward to reading the whole thing.



Men and Women is available on Amazon

Byzantine scandal, human glitterballs and teeth-stealing mice!

We had a great evening's entertainment last night (once again), as Paul Burston decked his balls with boughs of holly and presented Polari at Christmas!

Opening the festivities, cuddly Andrew Kay read an amusing extract from his book Pretty Boys All In A Row, set in the hedonistic pre-AIDS world of 1981 Ibiza. Fabulous and decadent, we do get a sense, however, that somehow all is not necessarily right with the party world of Philip and Terry..

But Mr Kay's decadent tale, no matter how divine, is a mere whimsy in comparison to the real treat - none other than the legendary Molly Parkin!! Miss Parkin is one of those unique and immediately recognisable figures about whom the epithet "Swinging Sixties" could have been (and in all honesty probably was) written.

She shagged James Robinson Justice, John Mortimer and that other divine hedonist George Melly (among many others), and, not content with just doing it, she wrote about it too. Several volumes of erotica, indeed. All that in between being one of the great movers and shakers in the fashion industry, a journalist and a model, a staple of the gossip and society columns, and hat-wearer extraordinaire!

We were thrilled to bits to see her, and loved her reading from her memoir Welcome to Mollywood - an amusing extract all about the time her false teeth were stolen by mice! A once in a lifetime treat, indeed, and a lovely lady...



Entertainment of a musical variety - and no less decadent than Miss Parkin - was provided by the fantabulosa walking art-form that is Marcus Reeves. Performing a few of his brilliant and thought-provoking numbers, including some from his Three Zero show (and forthcoming album), he was resplendent in sparkling maquillage and smart suit, like a human glitter-ball crossed with Michael Bublé! We love Marcus - the multi-talented writer behind the wonderful Postcards from God - The Sister Wendy Musical - and hope to see and hear much more of him. I haven't been to see his shows at the Vauxhall Tavern yet, but one day...

After the break it was the turn of the (very funny) Niven Govinden, who read a passage from one of his characteristic stories about friendship, love, and loyalty, before handing the baton to another Polari favourite - Miss Stella Duffy!



Stella is a witty and entertaining writer and reader - I loved her Room of Lost Things - and she loves using the word "cunt". A lot. Last night she entertained us with some passages from her new book, Theodora - Actress, Empress, Whore based on the life of the scandalous Byzantine Empress. It sounds heavy going, but of course in Stella's hands it certainly is not. Debauched, maybe. Decadent, certainly. But never dull. Stella is a brilliant writer, and I would like to get around to this book in due course.

Then, in a brilliant finale to this wonderful evening, Marcus Reeves returned to the stage in the guise of "The Singing Christmas Tree" - totally unexpected, hilarious and as camp as tits, this was the perfect send-off for our favourite "peerless literary salon" for another year.



Polari is not returning until February. How will I cope?!

Hornets, dry cleaning and darkrooms

Last night's Polari provided some interesting interpretations on the theme of South London. Paul Burston was suitably "Brixton-blinged up", with his baggies on and his Calvins showing (that man always struggles to keep his clothes on!), and, once the room (largely full of non-Polari-ites who left after the happy hour) was silenced, introduced our first reader William Eaves.



Will read a few pieces from his varied work, starting with an interesting piece from his as yet unpublished new book featuring a dysfunctional family encountering hornets in their holiday chateau in France. As he said, "Very very South London"(!)

He followed this with a very funny pastiche of an insipid magazine profile from his recent acclaimed work Nothing To Be Afraid Of, in which the lead characters are a pair of thespian sisters. The more pretentious of the two, Martha, is asked by a magazine for an insight into the busy life she has led since she took on the part of Miranda in The Tempest:

"It's a gruelling schedule, which means I have to get the eating right: orange juice, cereal, toast and honey in the morning, a sandwich at lunchtime and something else before the show. Miranda can easily come across as a milksop, but I'm trying to be more hardline about her, so it's lots of hearty food and fresh air. The riverside walk from the Design Museum to Hungerford Bridge is one of my favourites, and you can grab a crab salad and some Orvieto along the way."

Apparently Will was inspired by reading one of the "60 second interviews" in The Metro, and it is so true - how many times do you read this kind of drivel in a free paper or "lifestyle magazine"?



After the break, it was the turn of one of our Polari favourites, the lovely Stella Duffy. She opened with a hilarious poem, oddly titled I don't write poetry. All became clear as it turns out it is all about mistaken identity. For many people (and shamefully, The Guardian newspaper) our Stella is interchangeable with fellow lesbian, the Poet Laureate, with whom she shares a surname. (Hence the line "No, I don't write poetry. That's Carol-Ann.")

She informed us that she was tempted to read from her new book Theodora: Actress, Empress, Whore (set in Istanbul), but - like Will's earlier piece - considered that would be "too far South London". Instead she treated us to a couple of extracts from the Orange Prize-nominated Room of Lost Things, set in Loughborough Junction (between Camberwell and Brixton apparently).

A tangled web of relationships, the book centres around (of all things) a dry-cleaners. Why a dry-cleaners, you ask? But the penny soon drops when we discover the insights that Robert, who runs the business, gains about people - the little pieces of people's lives that arrive in the pockets of garments, the secrets they contain. The dry cleaners is the "room of lost things" of the title. The two passages she read were so beautifully observed and fascinating that both John-John and I just had to buy copies of the book, which Stella kindly signed.

Paul, concluding the evening's entertainment, asked the audience whether he should lower the tone, to which Stella responded, "shall I start? I can say "Cunt" at the top of my voice if you like...". We love her. Unfazed, he treated us to particularly sordid and smutty extract from Shameless, set in one of the sleazier clubs in Vauxhall. I, for one, will never leave my pint on the bar beneath a walkway full of cruising leather queens - talk about a creamy head...

Another fab evening, we chatted to friends including Rupert Smith and his pal (whose name I forget), author Alan Hollinghurst, and the lovely Frasier from Foyles bookshop, and were overjoyed to learn that January's Polari will be moving from the gorgeous Concrete Bar to a different venue within the South Bank complex - hooray! I look forward to it...

Polari

Like so many queens they have no shame in public

What a fantastic evening "The Lavender Library" turned out to be... Not that I would have expected anything less, with the lovely Paul Burston and Rupert Smith in charge.

Brilliantly MC-ed by The Independent's Suzi Feay, gay writers and such stars as Julian Clary, David McAlmont, Stella Duffy and Andy Bell were asked to champion the gay books and writers that had most influenced them.



Diana Souhami amusingly championed Gertrude Stein and her long, eccentric relationship with Alice B Toklas; and Stella spoke in glowing terms about another literary lesbian Patricia Highsmith and her erotic novel Carol.

Andy was impressed with the similarities between his cruisy sex life and that of Joe Orton as much as the great man's writing, comparing the infamous cottage scene which Joe recalled with such relish in his diary with his own experiences when he encountered a young J*mi Som*rv*lle on Hampstead Heath!

Julian, more characteristically, chose one of our favourites - the Mapp & Lucia stories by E.F. Benson, all stylish and witty banter and mannerisms portrayed by supposedly "straight" characters, that reveal their true gay roots to the more discerning reader.

But for me the crowning glory was Paul Burston, who chose the book that I would say influenced me the most in my life - Queens by Pickles.

A masterpiece - this is one of my favourite books! It has played such a pivotal role in my gay life, and I actually have a guilty secret to share. Visiting the hideous 1960s mausoleum that passed for a library in Newport in the early 80s, I was searching for The Naked Civil Servant by Quentin Crisp - and discovered it had been catalogued by the neo-Fascist authorities that ruled the roost in South Wales at the time in the "Sexual Deviancy" section.

Outraged (and slightly intrigued) by this awful description, I made a thorough investigation of this particular area of the teak'n'gunmetal shelving and discovered the book (Queens) was part of the collection in that category. To my everlasting shame (not really!) I stole it (well, never returned it anyhow), and its tattered and well read and re-read pages adorn my bookshelf to this day (complete with added graffiti by a sexually frustrated reader, carefully Tipp-Exed out by the librarians - how very Joe Orton!)



Published in the year I came out - 1984 - the enigmatic author of Queens must have spent years observing people as he travelled through the London gay scene. His long list of characters - the Screaming Queen, the Straight-Acting Queen, the Old Queen, the Opera Queen, The YMCA Queen, the Insidious Queen, the Clone - and the scenarios and interplay between them that he portrays - are all instantly recognisable today.

Although Paul read out his particular favourite passage from the book, I have one of my own I need to share:

"The girly queens flock to Heaven like toddlers to a sweet shop. They flounce about the place, giggling and shrieking, hands and arms flung about in a wild sign language embellishing phrases like "She Never!" and "Ooh Gloria - don't!". They like to call each other bitch and never ever stand alone.

"Once out of the pubs and set free in Heaven's wide-open spaces, they know no restraint. Lacking androgynous beauty, they daub themselves with Boots blusher and eye-liner, and bat their eyelashes like Sixties sluts... Like so many queens they have no shame in public, but can be quite suburban and prudish in private. This is always an annoying reversal and lets them in for a lot of abuse which, because they are so desperately inadequate, they enjoy...

"Although impressed by money, they are unlike rent boys, and want sex more than cash, more than stardom even. Heaven is where they hope to find love one day. Love, of course, is the same regular big cock."

I think we can identify with that - we have all met these caricatures at some stage in our lives, along with all the others in the book. I certainly can spot Pickles' "types" whenever and wherever I enter a gay bar, and have spent many an absorbing evening doing just that!

Pickles also illustrated his work with some quite grotesque sketches of grotesque people...









Queens by Pickles is a must-read book for every gay person - I cannot recommend it enough!

It is out of print but is available through Amazon Stores