City Boy: My Life in New York During the 1960s-'70s

by Edmund White. New York: Bloomsbury, USA, c. 2009, 297 pages.

(from my LibraryThing's Early Reviewers)

White's memoir begins when he he arrives in New York City from the Midwest where he followed his lover instead of going on to Harvard. He is is not a writer yet and these two decades are a formative time in his literary career.

As a gay man, White was still hoping to be "cured" as he regularly (like many other gay men at the time) saw a therapist. In 1969, as the gay movement began with Stonewall, White began to embrace his own identity--and he had little choice when, in 1977, he famously co-authored "The Joy of Gay Sex."

The reader is invited to hear White's tales of the famous artists and literary figures he surrounded himself with and his many lovers and experiences before and in the early days of AIDS. This book is gossip and at the same time revelation. This is a social history of New York at that time told by an insider.

Three Girls and Their Brother: a novel

by Theresa Rebeck. New York : Shaye Areheart Books, c2008. 341 pages.

After one very successful photo shoot for The New Yorker, three gorgeous, red-headed sisters find themselves as the latest "It Girls" (think "Hilton sisters" plus some literary roots). Their brother in turn finds himself taking on the protector role against the unscrupulous and moral-lacking members of the entertainment/modeling world, the paparazzi and the hungry-for-scandal public. Told in four parts by each sibling. An Alex Award winner for 2009.