[rating=4]
192 pages • Serpent’s Tail • July 3rd, 2008

This book is a hefty celebration of powerful femininity in all its queer forms, says Abigail Wiseman.

“Now, as I look at myself in the mirror wearing my impossible heals, my bosom sweetly strangled in a corset and a dildo dangling between my legs, I smile. Come on, does anyone really think I look like a slave to patriarchy?”
– Itziar Ziga
‘Playing with our Latin Femme’.

[rating=5]
224 pages • Faber & Faber • August 14th, 2008 [PB]

The exceptional Wounded by the first-rate satirist Percival Everett is a love story about our common humanity more than it is about sexuality.

“I let him kiss me, felt his shivering face soften to mine. I just wanted him warm, warmer. I couldn’t pull away;I was trying to save his life.”

[rating=5]
Released on November 28th, 2008

Take That’s latest album is so assorted that it can feel a little all-over-the-place. It needs time and attention to cohere into a whole.

It will only be with familiarity and time that this album will sound like a coherent entity, but since the songs are so strong and enjoyable I suspect it will be worth the wait.

[rating=4]
Released on November 18th, 2008

Another corker from The Killers!

Instantly a more attractive (and definitely better dressed) proposition than the other boorish, boring guitar bands noodling about the festival circuit, they seemed more glitter and eyeliner than lager and scuffed trainers.

[rating=5]
224 pages • Little, Brown • 1968

Wildly funny and deepy serious, Myra Breckinridge is a classic that marked a turning point in American history and literature.

The issues that Vidal explores – how identity and sexuality are shaped by the cinema and television, and how machismo is played out in irrational wars on foreign nations – are as relevant now as they were in 1968. It is a classic of the Cold War era in American literature.

Jim Akers on his diagnosis as HIV positive and how that changed his life.

A moving story that about being HIV positive changed a young man’s life.

I was told I had acquired a virus for which there was no cure, no successful treatment, and only one probable outcome: early death. In 1990, the average life expectancy for a person with HIV was between eight and twelve years.

From Recipes to Pecs: A brief personal history of gay magazines

A look back at this history of gay magazines, and recollections of their importance of the coming out process, by Paul Baker.

Gay Times used to feature pictures of gay celebrities or icons on its front cover in the 1980s and early 1990s – can you imagine Jimmy Somerville getting on the front cover of GT now? By the mid 1990s a change was afoot and now the rules were that the front cover was always a meaty young orange torso, with almost every other issue featuring the word SEX in big bold capitals.

Thanks to the Geography teacher: Growing up with the Lesbian magazine

A look back at this history of gay magazines, and recollections of their importance of the coming out process, by Abigail Wiseman.

I discovered Diva magazine. To me it seemed ‘lame’ compared to my exposure to American mags. It was nevertheless a significant tool in starting my new life in London, where I knew no-one.

Reaching for the Top Shelf: Remembering a first time

A look back at this history of gay magazines, and recollections of their importance of the coming out process, by Bryon Fear.

I wasn’t able to return to the newsagent until the following weekend. Going to ‘town’ on a school night was not only unthinkable, but would have been highly suspicious. The next seven days were spent debating and berating my cowardice.

An historical timeline of gay magazines, from 1897 to 2008.

The first gay magazine, Der Eigene, was published in Germany in 1896. The medium has gone from politics and activism to pop and hard-core.

“The word magazine is an Arabic term for storehouse. Although periodicals had been published before, it was first used to describe a publication in 1731 with advent of the Gentlemen’s Magazine.”