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The Penguin books that redefined love and relationships

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‘Tales of the City’ taught me the importance of finding your chosen family when you’re LGBTQ

Nine brilliant pieces of gender-bending fiction

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9 brilliant pieces of gender bending fiction

Maybe The Moon

Armistead Maupin was born in Washington, D.C. in 1944 but was brought up in Raleigh, North Carolina. A graduate of the University of North Carolina, he served as a naval officer in Vietnam before moving to California in 1971 as a reporter for the Associated Press. In 1976 he launched his daily newspaper serial, Tales of the City, in the San Francisco Chronicle. The first fiction to appear in an American daily for decades, Tales grew into an international sensation when compiled and rewritten as novels. Maupin's six-volume Tales of the City sequence - Tales of the City, More Tales of the City, Further Tales of the City, Babycakes, Significant Others, and Sure of You - are now multi-million bestsellers published in eleven languages. The first three of these novels were adapted into widely acclaimed television mini-series. Maupin's 1992 novel, Maybe the Moon, chronicling the adventures of the world's shortest woman, was a number one bestseller. His novel The Night Listener was made into a feature film starring Robin Williams and Toni Collette in 2006. 
 
Armistead Maupin lives in San Francisco, California. For more information about Armistead Maupin and his work, please visit his official author website at: www.armisteadmaupin.com

The number one international bestseller by the author of Tales of the City 
 
'Wonderful, funny, poignant and gutsy’ Mademoiselle 
‘Scathingly funny, haunting…Maupin enlightens, entertains and empowers his readers’ Atlanta Journal 
‘Highly funny and deeply poignant…With a heartfelt resonance few male writers ever accomplish' Boston Herald 
‘Perfectly pitched and heartbreaking. There hasn't been a funnier, or sadder, novel this year’ Entertainment Weekly 
__________ 
 
All of thirty-one inches tall, Cadence (Cady) Roth is a true survivor in a town where - as she says - 'you can die of encouragement'. Her early leading role as a lovable elf in a smash-hit American film proved a major disappointment since moviegoers never saw the face behind the rubber mask. After a decade of hollow promises from the Industry, she is still waiting for the miracle that will make her a star. 
From her infrequent meetings with agents and studio moguls to her regular, harrowing encounters with small children, large dogs and human ignorance, we track our spunky heroine across the saffron-hazed wasteland of Los Angeles. Then one day a lanky piano player saunters into Cady's life, unleashing heady new emotions, and she finds herself going for broke, shooting the moon with a scheme so hare-brained and daring that it just might succeed... 
 
Maybe the Moon is the poignant and moving tale of an outsider told from the inside which eloquently speaks to the resilience of the human spirit.

A Memoir

Logical Family

Armistead Maupin is the author of Tales of the City, More Tales of the City, Further Tales of the City, Babycakes, Significant Others, Sure of You, Maybe the Moon, The Night Listener, Michael Tolliver Lives, Mary Ann in Autumn, The Days of Anna Madrigal and Mona of the Manor. He also wrote an acclaimed memoir, Logical Family. 
 
Three television miniseries starring Olympia Dukakis and Laura Linney were made from the first three Tales novels. The Night Listener became a feature film starring Robin Williams and Toni Collette. Maupin lives in London with his husband, Christopher Turner. 
 
For more information on Armistead Maupin and his books, see his website at www.armisteadmaupin.com

‘Logical Family is a sweet, filthy peach of a memoir from a cultural explosion of a man’ Caitlin Moran 
‘A beautiful memoir — so tender and funny and dignified and kind that it left me a little weepy’ Alan Cumming 
‘I read Logical Family as slowly as I could. It was like having the great man visit and sit smoking and gossiping from an armchair at the foot of the bed’ Patrick Gale 
__________ 
 
In this long-awaited memoir, the beloved author of the bestselling Tales of the City series chronicles his odyssey from the old South to freewheeling San Francisco, and his evolution from curious youth to ground-breaking writer and gay rights pioneer. 
 
Raised in the heart of conservative North Carolina, Armistead Maupin lost his virginity to another man ‘on the very spot where the first shots of the Civil War were fired’. Realizing that the South was too small for him, this son of a traditional lawyer packed his earthly belongings into his Opel GT and took to the road in search of adventure. It was a journey that would lead him from a homoerotic Navy initiation ceremony in the jungles of Vietnam to that strangest of strange lands: San Francisco in the early 1970s.

Mona of the Manor

Originally published as a series of columns in the San Francisco Chronicle, Tales of the City is the landmark series by Armistead Maupin. The novels chronicle the life of Mary Anne Singleton after she impulsively moves to San Fransicso, following her adventures in the city as she is guided by friends and lovers.

'A breeze' The Times 
‘Delightful comedy of manners' iPaper 
‘A welcome tenth instalment of his iconic Tales Of The City saga’ Mail on Sunday 
‘A witty novel about identity and finding a family in 1980s England’ Woman&Home 
'The message still shines out in the new book: find the people who love and understand you' The Scotsman 
____________________ 
 
The tenth novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin’s best-selling San Francisco saga. 
 
When Mona Ramsey married Lord Teddy Roughton to secure his visa—allowing him to remain in San Francisco to fulfil his wildest dreams—she never imagined she would, by age 48, be the sole owner of Easley House, a romantic country manor in the UK. Now, with her adopted son, Wilfred, Mona has opened Easley’s doors to paying guests to keep her inherited English manor afloat. 
 
As they welcome a married American couple to Easley, Mona and Wilfred discover their new guests’ terrible secret. Instead of focussing on the imminent arrival of old friend Michael Tolliver and matriarch Anna Madrigal, Mona will need to use her considerable charm, willpower and wiles to set things right before Easley’s historic Midsummer ceremony. 
 
Hurdling barriers both social and sexual, Maupin leads the eccentric tenants of Barbary Lane through heartbreak and triumph, through nail-biting terrors and gleeful coincidences in 1980s San Francisco and beyond. The result is a glittering and addictive comedy of manners that continues to beguile new generations of readers.

Tales of the City 8

Mary Ann in Autumn

The eighth novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin&rsquo;s best-selling San Francisco saga. 
 
'Perhaps the most sublime piece of popular literature America has ever produced&rsquo; Salon 
____________________ 
 
A touching portrait of friendship, family, and fresh starts, the City by the Bay welcomes back Mary Ann Singleton, the beloved Tales of the City heroine who started it all. A new chapter begins in the lives of both Mary Ann and Michael &lsquo;Mouse&rsquo; Tolliver when she returns to San Francisco to rejoin her oldest friend after years in New York City&hellip; the reunion that fans of Maupin&rsquo;s beloved Tales of the City series have been awaiting for years. 
 
Hurdling barriers both social and sexual, Maupin leads the eccentric tenants of Barbary Lane through heartbreak and triumph, through nail-biting terrors and gleeful coincidences in a sexually-liberated San Francisco. The result is a glittering and addictive comedy of manners that continues to beguile new generations of readers.

Tales of the City 6

Sure Of You

The sixth novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin’s best-selling San Francisco saga. 
 
‘Maupin's adeptness at fluid dialogue, his flair for shaping characters who thread the needle between pop archetypes and singular human beings… are all on display’ New York Times 
____________________ 
 
A fiercely ambitious TV talk show host finds she must choose between national stardom in New York and a husband and child in San Francisco. Caught in the middle is their longtime friend, a gay man whose own future is even more uncertain. Wistful and compassionate yet subversively funny, Sure of You is Armistead Maupin’s addictively entertaining observation on family, friendship and every relationship in between. 
 
Hurdling barriers both social and sexual, Maupin leads the eccentric tenants of Barbary Lane through heartbreak and triumph, through nail-biting terrors and gleeful coincidences in 1980s San Francisco. The result is a glittering and addictive comedy of manners that continues to beguile new generations of readers.

Tales of the City 7

Michael Tolliver Lives

The seventh novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin&rsquo;s best-selling San Francisco saga. 
 
'Tender-hearted and frolicsome&hellip; A tale of long-lost friends and unrealised dreams, of fear and regret, of penance and redemption, and of the unshakeable sense that this world we love, this life we live, this drama on which we all play, does indeed go by much too fast&rsquo; New York Times 
____________________ 
 
Nearly two decades after ending his iconic Tales of the City saga of San Francisco life, Armistead Maupin revisits his all-too-human hero Michael Tolliver&mdash;the fifty-five-year-old sweet-spirited gardener and survivor of the plague that took so many of his friends and lovers&mdash;for a single day at once mundane and extraordinary... and filled with the everyday miracles of living. 
 
Hurdling barriers both social and sexual, Maupin leads the eccentric tenants of Barbary Lane through heartbreak and triumph, through nail-biting terrors and gleeful coincidences in a sexually-liberated San Francisco. The result is a glittering and addictive comedy of manners that continues to beguile new generations of readers.

Tales Of The City

The first novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin’s best-selling San Francisco saga, is an uproariously moving novel and an indelible portrait of cultural change from the seventies. 
 
Named as one of the BBC’s 100 Most Inspiring Novels, a PBS Great American Read Top 100 Pick and Britain’s favourite gay/lesbian novel from The Big Gay Read 
____________________ 
 
Originally serialised in the San Francisco Chronicle in the 1970s, Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City afforded a mainstream audience of millions its first exposure to straight and gay characters experiencing on equal terms the follies of urban life. 
 
Among the cast of this ground-breaking saga are the lovelorn residents of 28 Barbary Lane: the bewildered but aspiring Mary Ann Singleton, the libidinous Brian Hawkins; Mona Ramsey, still in a sixties trance, Michael 'Mouse' Tolliver, forever in bright-eyed pursuit of Mr. Right; and their marijuana-growing landlady, the indefatigable Mrs. Madrigal. 
 
Hurdling barriers both social and sexual, Maupin leads them through heartbreak and triumph, through nail-biting terrors and gleeful coincidences. The result is a glittering and addictive comedy of manners that continues to beguile new generations of readers.

The first novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin’s best-selling San Francisco saga, is an uproariously moving novel and an indelible portrait of cultural change from the seventies. 
 
Named as one of the BBC’s 100 Most Inspiring Novels, a PBS Great American Read Top 100 Pick and Britain’s favourite gay/lesbian novel from The Big Gay Read 
____________________ 
 
Originally serialised in the San Francisco Chronicle in the 1970s, Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City afforded a mainstream audience of millions its first exposure to straight and gay characters experiencing on equal terms the follies of urban life. 
 
Among the cast of this ground-breaking saga are the lovelorn residents of 28 Barbary Lane: the bewildered but aspiring Mary Ann Singleton, the libidinous Brian Hawkins; Mona Ramsey, still in a sixties trance, Michael 'Mouse' Tolliver, forever in bright-eyed pursuit of Mr. Right; and their marijuana-growing landlady, the indefatigable Mrs. Madrigal. 
 
Hurdling barriers both social and sexual, Maupin leads them through heartbreak and triumph, through nail-biting terrors and gleeful coincidences. The result is a glittering and addictive comedy of manners that continues to beguile new generations of readers.

Tales of the City 5

Significant Others

The fifth novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin&rsquo;s best-selling San Francisco saga. 
 
&lsquo;Some of the sharpest and most speakable dialogue you are ever likely to read&rsquo; Guardian 
____________________ 
 
Tranquillity reigns in the ancient redwood forest until a women-only music festival sets up camp downriver from an all-male retreat for the ruling class. Among those entangled in the ensuing mayhem are a lovesick nurseryman, a panic-stricken philanderer, and the world&rsquo;s most beautiful fat woman. Significant Others is Armistead Maupin&rsquo;s cunningly observed meditation on marriage, friendship and sexual nostalgia. 
 
Hurdling barriers both social and sexual, Maupin leads the eccentric tenants of Barbary Lane through heartbreak and triumph, through nail-biting terrors and gleeful coincidences in 1980s San Francisco. The result is a glittering and addictive comedy of manners that continues to beguile new generations of readers.

Tales of the City 2

More Tales Of The City

The second novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin&rsquo;s best-selling San Francisco saga. 
 
&lsquo;Entertains, illuminates&hellip; A cultural touchstone that has enlarged our understanding of the varieties of human behavior&rsquo; Washington Post 
____________________ 
 
The tenants of 28 Barbary Lane have fled their cosy nest for adventures far afield. Mary Ann Singleton finds love at sea with a forgetful stranger, Mona Ramsey discovers her doppelgänger in a desert whorehouse, and Michael Tolliver bumps into his favourite gynaecologist in a Mexican bar. Meanwhile, their venerable landlady takes the biggest journey of all&mdash;without ever leaving home. 
 
Hurdling barriers both social and sexual, Maupin leads the eccentric tenants of Barbary Lane through heartbreak and triumph, through nail-biting terrors and gleeful coincidences in 1970s San Francisco. The result is a glittering and addictive comedy of manners that continues to beguile new generations of readers.

Tales of the City 3

Further Tales Of The City

The third novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin&rsquo;s best-selling San Francisco saga. 
 
&lsquo;An enormously talented writer&hellip; By writing about what's seemingly different Armistead Maupin always manages to capture what's so hilariously painfully true for all of us&rsquo; Amy Tan 
____________________ 
 
The calamity-prone residents of 28 Barbary Lane are at it again in this deliciously dark novel of romance and betrayal. While Anna Madrigal imprisons an anchor-woman in her basement, Michael Tolliver looks for love at the National Gay Rodeo, DeDe Halcyon Day and Mary Ann Singleton track a charismatic psychopath across Alaska, and society columnist Prue Giroux loses her heart to a derelict living in a San Francisco park. 
 
Hurdling barriers both social and sexual, Maupin leads the eccentric tenants of Barbary Lane through heartbreak and triumph, through nail-biting terrors and gleeful coincidences in 1970s San Francisco. The result is a glittering and addictive comedy of manners that continues to beguile new generations of readers.

Tales of the City 4

Babycakes

The fourth novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin&rsquo;s best-selling San Francisco saga. 
 
&lsquo;A consummate entertainer who has made a generation laugh.... It is Maupin's Dickensian gift to be able to render love convincingly&rsquo; Edmund White, Times Literary Supplement 
____________________ 
 
When an ordinary househusband and his ambitious wife decide to start a family, they discover there&rsquo;s more to making a baby than meets the eye. Help arrives in the form of a grieving gay neighbour, a visiting monarch, and the dashing young lieutenant who defects from her yacht. Bittersweet and profoundly affecting, Babycakes was the first piece of fiction to acknowledge the arrival of AIDS. 
 
Hurdling barriers both social and sexual, Maupin leads the eccentric tenants of Barbary Lane through heartbreak and triumph, through nail-biting terrors and gleeful coincidences in 1970s San Francisco. The result is a glittering and addictive comedy of manners that continues to beguile new generations of readers.

Tales of the City 9

The Days of Anna Madrigal

The ninth novel in the beloved Tales of the City series, Armistead Maupin&rsquo;s best-selling San Francisco saga. 
 
'Wonderful. . . . As compulsively readable and endearing as all the previous novels have been&rsquo; Booklist (starred review) 
____________________ 
 
Now ninety-two, Mrs. Madrigal has seemingly found peace with her &lsquo;logical family&rsquo; in San Francisco. Some members of that family are bound for the otherworldly landscape of Burning Man, the art community in Nevada&rsquo;s Black Rock Desert but Anna has another destination in mind: a lonely stretch of road outside of Winnemucca where the 16-year-old boy she once was ran away from the whorehouse he called home. There she journeys into the dusty troubled heart of her Depression childhood to unearth a lifetime of secrets and dreams and attend to some unfinished business she has long avoided. 
 
Hurdling barriers both social and sexual, Maupin leads the eccentric tenants of Barbary Lane through heartbreak and triumph, through nail-biting terrors and gleeful coincidences in a sexually-liberated San Francisco. The result is a glittering and addictive comedy of manners that continues to beguile new generations of readers.

Armistead Maupin

'His most mature, mellow and moving novel yet' Independent 
'A mystery studded with elegant twists and turns' New York Times Book Review 
'Absorbing, sophisticated, funny and touching' Sunday Times 
'A tremendous, hugely satisfying read' Time Out 
________ 
Gabriel Noone is a writer whose late-night radio stories have brought him into the homes of millions. Noone is in the midst of a painful separation from his lover of ten years, when a publisher sends him the memoir of a thirteen-year-old boy who suffered horrific abuse at the hands of his parents. 
 
Pete Lomax is not only a brave and gifted diarist but a devoted listener to Noone's show. When Noone phones the boy to offer encouragement, it soon becomes clear that Pete sees in this heart-sick, middle-aged storyteller the loving father he's always wanted. Thus begins an extraordinary friendship that only grows deeper as the boy's health deteriorates. 
 
Then, out of the blue, troubling new questions arise, exploding Noone's comfortable assumptions and causing his ordered existence to spin wildly out of control. As he walks the tightrope between truth and illusion, he is finally forced to confront all his relationships - familial, romantic and erotic.

Armistead Maupin

Books by Armistead Maupin

Series by Armistead Maupin

Tales of the City

Articles featuring Armistead Maupin

The Penguin books that redefined love and relationships

Books to read to learn more about the AIDS crisis

What to read after watching It’s A Sin

‘Tales of the City’ taught me the importance of finding your chosen family when you’re LGBTQ

9 brilliant pieces of gender bending fiction

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