The New York Years: Stories by Felice Picano Book

This handsome volume is a reprint of Felice Picano's early story collection, Slashed to Ribbons in Defense of Love (1981), as well as the novella An Asian Minor: The True Story of Ganymede (1982), both long out of print. In his brief introduction--which constitutes, as he points out, a miniature history of gay publishing of the period--Picano recounts the circumstances under which these pieces first appeared. Written in the pivotal decade between 1972 and 1981, they emerged in various forms beginning in 1978, some in skin mags like Stallion and Blueboy. Many have since been anthologized. Rereading them now, Picano reflects that he is "less embarrassed" than he expected to be by these early efforts, and that only the first story, "Spinning," about a New York club disc jockey known as "The King of Smooth," is obviously dated to a pre-AIDS disco-and-drugs era. But the rest of these stories, especially "Shy," which is based on a real sexual encounter with the famously shy Montgomery Clift; the much-reprinted ghost story "Hunter"; and "A Stroke," in which a successful young songwriter shows himself off to the father who rejected him, are as well written and immediate as any contemporary gay fiction. --Regina Marler Read More