Tales Of The City

The first volume in the widely acclaimed and much-loved seriesThe 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.

“Like those of Dickens and Wilkie Collins, Armistead Maupin's novels have all appeared originally as serials... it is the strength of this approach, with its fantastic adventures and astonishingly contrived coincidences, that makes these novels charming and compelling”

A consummate entertainer... It is Maupin's Dickensian gift to be able to render love convincingly -- Edmund White The Times Literary Supplement
Maupin is a richly gifted comic author Observer
San Francisco is fortunate in having a chronicler as witty and likeable as Armistead Maupin Independent
Literary Review

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-

'Maupin is a richly gifted comic author' Observer A nave young secretary forsakes Cleveland for San Francisco, tumbling headlong into a brave new world of laundromat Lotharios, cut throat debutantes, and Jockey Shorts dance contests.The saga that ensues is manic, romantic, tawdry, touching, and outrageous - unmistakably the handiwork of Armistead Maupin. 'A consummate entertainer...It is Maupin's Dickensian gift to be able to render love convincingly' Edmund White, The Times Literary Supplement 'Like those of Dickens and Wilkie Collins, Armistead Maupin's novels have all appeared originally as serials...it is the strength of this approach, with its fantastic adventures and astonishingly contrived coincidences, that make these novels charming and compelling' The Literary Review 'San Francisco is fortunate in having a chronicler as witty and likeable as Armistead Maupin' Independent Official Author Website:

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