Richard Lipez, who reimaged the gay tective novel, di at 83

Contents:

• GAY DETECTIVE NOVELS BOOKS
• GAY DETECTIVE NOVELS
• THE GAY DETECTIVE: HOMOSEXUALY CRIME FICTN
• BT GAY MYSTERY
• GAY DETECTIVE COP BOOKS
• GAY MURR MYSTERY DETECTIVE BOOKS
• GAY DETECTIV
• BT NOVELS WH A GAY ROMANCE AND CRIME SOLVG PLOT/SUBPLOT
• GAY DETECTIVE BOOKS
• THE HAMMETT AND CHANDLER OF GAY DETECTIVE FICTN
• A REISSUE HELPS REVIVE JOSEPH HANSEN'S SERI ABOUT A TOUGH, GAY TECTIVE
• RICHARD LIPEZ, WHO REIMAGED THE GAY DETECTIVE NOVEL, DI AT 83

GAY DETECTIVE NOVELS BOOKS

There isn’t enough space this article (or, ed, a rather long history book) to explore the long and shameful lerary history of amg gay characters as eher victims or villas. Fast forward through several s of margalizg gay voic or treatg gay romance as eroti, and the days, we’ve fally got mastream publishers wakg up to the fact that queer stori have a vast and growg dience, although we ntue to be bted to the outsized ntributns of small prs such as Bywater Books. Of his but, Rs Thomas has wrten, “I had a gay protagonist long before I had a tective protagonist, ” and while this layed the path to publitn, bee for some absurd reason publishers ed to thk women on wanted straight hearthrobs—I subm to you as evince the ENTIRE world of fan fictn—by the time Thomas published Firewatchg, he did so to near-universal acclaim.

Now, I’m close to fishg U Up?, her ice-ld sophomore novel of love and loss LA, and I’m rather annoyed at havg to stop readg to wre this blurb. In 1986 Los Angel, homophobia is an all-time high, and an ultra-nservative anizatn is ready to fan the flam of hatred wh a ballot iative to round up HIV posive Angelos and put them mps. Plakcy about the history of homosexualy crime fictn, and then make sure you're signed and ment below for a chance to w a py of The Next One Will Kill You!

GAY DETECTIVE NOVELS

And before I wrote my first mystery featurg a gay tective, I read Joseph Hansen, Michael Nava, Mark Zubro, and Nathan Aldyne. Jt as Christie, Sayers, and Gardner were among the pneers of the ntemporary mystery, Hansen, Nava, Zubro, and Aldyne were the lears rporatg gay characters to crime fictn. Their books opened doors to gay culture at a time when homosexualy was nsired a psychiatric disorr and a sure way to break a mother’s heart.

He was one of the very first mastream thors to wre about a gay tective—an surance vtigator named Dave Brandstetter. His wasn’t the first gay tective to h prt—that honor, I believe, belongs to Pharoah Love, a sexy, sassy Ain-Amerin police tective workg Manhattan, thored by Gee Baxt. His seven mysteri starrg gay Hispanic attorney Henry Rs foc a great al on the AIDS epimic and s effect on men, their iends, and their fai, and they n be heart breakg.

Mark Zubro also has a strong social nscience, but his books are leavened wh humor and a bg sarsm directed agast homophob and school admistrators, among other awful sorts. Schoolteacher Tom Mason and his lover (and eventual hband), baseball star Stt Carpenter, are amatr slths who solve crim and fight for jtice schools and gay neighborhoods, focg on muny, iendship, and fairns all thgs.

THE GAY DETECTIVE: HOMOSEXUALY CRIME FICTN

Zubro’s send seri foc on Pl Turner, an openly gay homici tective—a rary at the time of the first book, Sorry Now, published by St. Zubro has said that he created Turner to show another si of gay life: a voted father whose kids e first. Mart’s was, as far as I know, the first mastream publisher to set up a gay imprt, wh Richard Stevenson, Grant Michaels, and Michael Craft among s stable of thors.

BT GAY MYSTERY

His sikick, a straight woman named Clarisse, starts out as a realtor and then go to law school, but she ntu to hold a torch for Daniel, who is most rolutely gay. The culture of the gay bar is on display here, as well as what was like to live Boston the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Those who are terted learng more n check out The Gay Male Slth Prt and Film by D.

Together, the thors stched a quilt that reflected the diversy of gay experience.

GAY DETECTIVE COP BOOKS

As for me, I want to keep up the tradns, and I thk that Ang Green, the openly gay FBI agent at the center of The Next One Will Kill You, is a te scendant of those who have e before him.

Insurance vtigator Dave Brandstretter is unapologetilly gay, tough, and mascule, but also tenr.

” Published 1970, the book lnched a groundbreakg seri, the gold standard for ser gay crime fictn.

GAY MURR MYSTERY DETECTIVE BOOKS

Gay and Lato, Nava’s fense attorney Henry Rs echo Brandstretter’s mixture of vulnerabily and hardboiled edgs.

She’s a dited, sensive, and skilled tective, but she remas closeted orr to navigate the homophobic LAPD. assasss, cia, ps, fbi, fictn, gay, gay-romance, genre-fictn, glbt, lgbt, lgbtq, mercenari, mystery, paranormal, police, queer, romance, spi. There have been gay characters Brish tective stori at least sce Agatha Christie, but gay or lbian vtigatg officers are harr to fd.

GAY DETECTIV

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BT NOVELS WH A GAY ROMANCE AND CRIME SOLVG PLOT/SUBPLOT

When I created DS Adam Tyler for Firewatchg, I did so partly bee I wanted to create a fictnal tective who was gay.

There were gay protagonists (rare, but they did exist), and there were gay police officers (often send or third tier the hierarchy of characters), but I uld not thk of a sgle queer protagonist. He explicly stat that he isn’t homosexual, but his obssn wh Dickie Greenleaf, and his tenncy towards unreliable narratn more than suggt otherwise. I fd almost nceivable that there was one gay character at the helm of a mystery seri for over twenty years, and I only very recently disvered him!

He’s openly gay, or homosexual (Hansen apparently hated the term gay), and though he feels no need to announce to everyone he meets, he’s not ashamed of eher. Firstly, like his ntemporary Delafield, he’s an actual p, an LAPD reer police officer (there seem to be far fewer male gay tectiv than female). He’s also a big bear of a man who breaks a lot of the earlier stereotyp (so often mysteri and thrillers the gay man is portrayed as a sleazy, sadistic baddie wh unwholome sexual predilectns).

GAY DETECTIVE BOOKS

So far, Sturgis has steadfastly avoid beg killed off (a rare skill for a gay supportg st member), which mt make him the longt nng gay character a mystery seri ever. Set 1980s San Francis, he’s unashamed to tackle the thornier issu of gay life—dgs, alhol and the AIDS crisis.

Hap Colls is the sensive, broodg workg-class labourer who avoids vlence at almost any st, while Leonard Pe is a gay black Vietnam veteran wh a vlent streak, who’s more than happy to shoot any man who unrtimat him. But ’s Leonard Pe who stands out as somethg special, a gay protagonist the mystery genre who breaks every stereotype the book.

THE HAMMETT AND CHANDLER OF GAY DETECTIVE FICTN

If there are few gay protagonists crime fictn, there are fewer still the annals of historil crime.

They also began to explore the liv of certa people—gays, lbians, racial mori, dg abers, etc. And now, the summer of 2023 brgs two more important centenari to Baxt, born June 11th, 1923, and Joseph Hansen, born July 19th, 1923, have been lled the Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler of gay Amerin tective fictn—each created a seri of mystery novels featurg a gay protagonist long before dog so beme monplace. Baxt troduced his gay Ain-Amerin NYPD tective, Pharoah Love, a novel lled A Queer Kd of Death, which was published 1966 by Simon and Schter.

Hansen troduced Dave Brandstetter, a gay vtigator for Medalln Insurance Company, the 1970 novel Faout, published by Harper and Row. The novels were somethg darg and new: featurg a tough guy tective who was also gay.

A REISSUE HELPS REVIVE JOSEPH HANSEN'S SERI ABOUT A TOUGH, GAY TECTIVE

We learn that he is mourng his longtime lover, a rator, who has recently died; we see him go to a gay bar and hang out wh his bt iend, a lbian named Madge who's overly sceptible to lovely young women; and we watch him beg wooed by a cute young fella he jt may sleep wh. Whout ever htg over the head, Hansen remds that gay life is fely more varied than the sultg stereotyp that long domated our culture, not least the work of hard boiled crime wrers.

AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTUnr the pen name Richard Stevenson, he sought to rrect crime fictn’s portrayals of gay characters as eaks or villas wh an entirely relatable Joe WheatonRichard Lipez, the thor of a seri of crime novels centered on an openly gay tective who, unlike the one-dimensnal pictns mon the genre the 1980s and ’90s, is not a tortured soul or a eak but a relatable character who is ntent wh his life, died on March 16 at his home Becket, Mass. Lipez bee Strachey, a gay tellectual, reprented the anthis of the stereotypil macho, Mr. In “Shock to the System” (1995), Strachey go unrver to vtigate a gay nversn therapy group.

Lipez was a eelance reviewer of mysteri for The Washgton Post for three s — he was irked that crime novels generally gave a lopsid view of gay characters, portrayg them as misfs and villas who often met an unpleasant mise.

RICHARD LIPEZ, WHO REIMAGED THE GAY DETECTIVE NOVEL, DI AT 83

“The earlier pictns of gays and lbians had been of pathetic wretch, ice pick lbians, who were eher the masochistic killers or the pathetic victims or blackmail victims, ” he said a 1998 terview on NPR’s “Frh Air. ”He exempted om his crique the work of Joseph Hansen, who was among the first mystery wrers to create a major gay protagonist, though Mr. Lipez said, most portrayals of gay characters crime fictn were “a lie, and I want to help rrect that lie.