Showing results by publisher "Lethe Press" in LGBTQ+

Thirteen weird and queer short stories by one of the more notable names in gay speculative fiction. But these passionate hookups and romantic encounters range from the eerie to the horrifying to the wondrous.

Noah's text says, I've found some candidates for murder. Ray chuckles and knows that Noah sent the message to cheer him. Both boys realize they stand apart from others their age. One lacks social graces, the other has perfected being charming. Both are too willing to embark on a true challenge of their superiority but neither realizes what such a crime will do because no matter how they see themselves, how they need one another, they still possess the same emotions of H. sapiens.

Carter Calhoun was once a Hollywood legend, an agent both loved and loathed by stars and studio executives alike. But then the suicide of his lover and star client, matinee idol Sam Madison, sent Carter to the bottom of the bottle. Carter became a housebound recluse. Now, years later, new evidence reveals Sam may have been murdered and Carter emerges from seclusion to find his killer.

Roger, a young man, finds himself more-than-a-tourist but less than a Parisian in the City of Lights. Escaping a relationship with a friend that was never as platonic as his own parents believed, Roger discovers the nights and men of Paris to be affairs complicated by drugs, ex-patriots, and trysts. His awkward relationship with Marcel, a laconic native as addicting as the coke he sells, threatens to smother Roger.

Who are the Ultra Fabulous Glitter Squadron? If you need to ask then you have not been anywhere near a television, computer, or disco recently. No other superheroes are as dedicated or dazzling as these gals. Some of them tuck, some of them are pure trout, but they all kick ass in high heels and rollerskates. A.C. Wise's debut collection of heroic tales is half whimsy and half 1950s pulp reborn for the 21st century.

The much-anticipated sequel to Purgatory follows the flight of Confederate Private Ian Campbell and Union soldier Drew Conrad from the battlefields of the Civil War. Weary and wounded, the pair dare not drop their guard not only because enemies on both sides can be found along the way to a family homestead in West Virginia - Ian and Drew are lovers and society's view of sodomy hounds them both.

The year is 1935, but this is an America where cross-dressing goes almost unremarked, often unnoticed, and gay relationships are mundane; gay marriage, a quotidian fact of life. Famed chef and female impersonator Pancetta Brulee of New Orleans has been hired to cater a gay engagement party for two prominent grooms at the infamous Faux Pas Island and the Robicheaux estate. Both the family and island have a terrible past, and most Cajuns and Creoles avoid the place like the plague.

Are you prepared to enter acclaimed author Hal Duncan's world of scruffians and scamps and sodomites? Beware, for it is filled with the gay pirate gods of Love and Death, immortal scoundrels, and young men who find themselves forced to become villains. But who amongst us does not adore a gamin antihero? These fantastical tales from the fringes of an imaginative realm of supernatural fairies and human fey will captivate the listener.

Long before "Don't ask, don't tell", gays served in the military - sometimes openly - more often in secret. In this volume the author imagines what their lives might have been like. Within, you will find tales of historical fiction mixed occasionally with supernatural horror, including: a French fusilier fighting guerrillas and growing disillusionment in Napoleonic Spain; soldiers encountering the unthinkable during the 1812 occupation and retreat from Moscow; and more.

Jack Farley, at 21 years of age, thought his life should be a dream come true. But somewhere along the way he found himself lost and alone. So, in 1983, he finds himself at the crossroads, unsure of which path will lead him back to passion and fulfillment. He returns to home, to Dallas, to old loves that broke his heart. But every step along the way is filled with mishaps, new discoveries, and, if he's lucky, a chance to not only find love but also acceptance by his estranged father.

Six of Marco Fontana's early cases show some of the forces that helped shape the young P.I. In high school, Fontana discovers that he has a knack for crime solving - not only that, he likes it. When his English teacher is accused of murdering the school disciplinarian, Marco takes it upon himself to investigate. Some years later, after Marco has explored his options, we find him in his first office on Latimer and Twelfth. Trouble easily manages to find him there.

Born into an extraordinarily talented family, 29-year-old Michael Van Allen is the gay son of a well-known concert pianist and an equally famous painter. All his life he has yearned for the talent and creativity that should have been his birthright but have somehow been denied him. When he wakes up in a mental hospital, his memory gone, his former life erased, his doctor tells him of his screaming breakdown during one of his father's performances. This is the story of Michael's journey in search of his former self.

A satirical romp through the lives of 20-something queer ne'er-do-wells in Wales. Caroline and her Dom live out their normal lives among the poverty, alcoholics, and street preachers of Swansea. But when Dom and his straight roommate fall in love - a passionate, secret, nonsexual love - their lives are transformed into a queer chaos. The battle between preachers and drag queens, skinheads and sex workers, boyfriend and girlfriend, is set to change the city forever in an inventive story that embraces queer life today.

A much-lauded essayist and poet, Jeff Mann writes of the passion and pain of being a Southern gentleman who happens to be invested in many worlds: the hungers of gay bear culture, the propensities of leather and bondage, the frustrations of academia, and the perspectives of an Appalachian who has traveled the world. In Binding the God, his second collection of essays, Mann offers listeners another tour of his consciousness and experiences.

Ancient folklore and modern myth come together in these stories by author Craig Laurance Gidney. Here are found the struggles of a medieval Japanese monk seduced by a mischievous fairy, and a young slave who finds mystery deep within the briar patch of an antebellum plantation. Gidney offers a gay teen obsessed with his patron saint, Lena Horne, and, in the title story, an ailing tourist seeks escape at a distant shore but never reckons on encountering an African sea god. Rich, poetic, dark and disturbing, these are distinctive tales not soon forgotten.

On a scorching summer's day in 1903, the sheriff of Creek County, Eugene Grey, unexpectedly finds himself partnered with feisty young federal marshal Forest O'Rourke. The marshal is hell-bent on capturing a wanted man - a man Eugene knows as nothing but an amiable old geezer living quietly in the hills. But, of course, all is not as it seems.

Set in the post-Napoleonic years of the 1820s, Standish is a tale of two men - one discovering his sexuality and the other struggling to overcome his traumatic past. Ambrose Standish, a studious and fragile young man, has dreams of regaining the great house his grandfather lost in a card game.

Artie's performing career has him traveling more. Aunt Ruth tries to wean herself from San Francisco into married life in Hillsborough. Tim's family - both adopted and blood - are beset by drama amid a rash of armed robberies in the neighborhood. There's a sexy new cop on the beat. And people are getting shot. Nick is in Europe with his grandmother, and Tim is left behind to figure out the rules of a modern gay relationship.

In this companion volume to his critically acclaimed, Lambda Literary Award-winning book Gay Spirituality, noted author Toby Johnson further explicates his visionary stance that gay people's nature as outsiders gives them a uniquely powerful perspective on the nature of God and religion. By living outside gender norms, gay people are more open to seeing across boundaries of gender and gain access to a less dualistic outlook on the nature of life.

In his new collection, Bitter Waters, Brenchley has assembled stories queer and weird: a man with morbidly sensitive hearing sets sail to chart dangerous rocks called the Silences; a ship's chandler from among his shadowed stock gives an old friend a compass that guides through Hell rather than point north; a eunuch and his dwarf lover leave the Sultan's harem to visit the baths of a city poisoned by magic; a youth who climbed the echelons of power thanks to his looks and guile finds being on the losing side of war has forced his to return to his sordid, early life.