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Felice Picano

Felice Picano is the author of 19 books, including the literary memoirs Ambidextrous, Men Who Loved Me, and A House on the Ocean, a House on the Bay as well as the best-selling novels Like People in History, Looking Glass Lives, The Lure, and Eyes. He is the founder of Sea Horse Press, one of the first gay publishing houses, which later merged with two other publishing houses to become the Gay Presses of New York. With Andrew Holleran, Robert Ferro, Edmund White, and George Whitmore, he founded the Violet Quill Club to promote and increase the visibility of gay authors and their works. He has edited and written for The Advocate, Blueboy, Mandate, GaysWeek, Christopher Street, and Books Editor of The New York Native and has been a culture reviewer for The Los Angeles Examiner, San Francisco Examiner, New York Native, Harvard Lesbian & Gay Review, and the Lambda Book Report. He has won the Ferro-Grumley Award for best gay novel (Like People in History) and the PEN Syndicated Fiction Award for short-story. He was a finalist for the Ernest Hemingway Award and has been nominated for three Lambda Literary Awards. A native of New York, Felice Picano now lives in Los Angeles.

Classic Novels coming out in 2009

THE LURE (April 2009)

Noel Cummings is about to change irrevocably. After witnessing a brutal murder, Noel is recruited by the police to assist as a lure for the killer-at-large. Undercover, Noel moves deeper and deeper into the freneticism of Manhattan's gay highlife... Reprint.

Explosive . . . Picano plays out the novel’s secrets brilliantly, one deliberate card at a time. Felice Picano is one hell of a writer! – Stephen King

Felice Picano has taken the psychological thriller as far as it can go. – Andrew Holleran

Exciting and suspenseful. A strong plot with plenty of action. Builds to a solid surprise ending. –Publishers Weekly

LATE IN THE SEASON (June 2009)

One of the most telling novels about gay life after Stonewall, Late in the Season is one of the finest novels in the long career of one of the founding members of the Violet Quill Club. Set on Fire Island in late September, this is the story of an unlikely pair of friends—a gay composer in his late thirties and an eighteen-year-old schoolgirl—both of whom are trying to make sense of their complicated lives. But much more than this, it is a compelling portrait of a magical time and place, after the Stonewall riots opened up so many possibilities and before AIDS forever changed the face of the gay world. Reprint.

Bittersweet and credible . . . A fresh, different, moving and very contemporary novel. -Publishers Weekly

Easily, the best original gay novel to come along in months. I loved this engaging story, and I’ll bet you’ll love it too. – San Francisco Sentinel

If Noel Coward were to write a gay version of his classic film, Brief Encounter, it might well be something like Late in the Season with a few slight twists. – Bay Area Reporter

LOOKING GLASS LIVES (August 2009)

Cousins Roger and Alistair become lifelong friends when they meet as boys in 1954. They discover their homosexuality and their lives intersect against the backdrop of twentieth-century gay culture, from the beach-boy surfer days of the 1960s to Greenwich Village AIDS activism in the 1990s. Reprint.

Picano … is also a master of suspense, and as Looking Glass Lives hurtles towards its shocking climax, we are both disturbed and terribly pleased to have been on the trip. – Boston Phoenix

An intriguing Gothic tale involving the intertwined lives of three people whose gender (but not their destiny) changes from one lifetime to the next. … [A]n engaging blend of memory, mystery, reincarnation, and sexual tension that should appeal to a wide readership. – Library Journal

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