MARY ANN IN AUTUMN BY ARMISTEAD MAUPIN, RANDOM HOUSE, $32.95.
San Francisco was captured in fading sunset by novelist Armistead Maupin three decades ago, when, pitching an idea for a daily serial to the San Francisco Chronicle featuring the tales of secretary Mary Ann Singleton and her best friend, gay gardener Michael “Mouse” Tolliver, he defined the city forever in the days of drugs, discos and never-ending rainbows.
His six Tales Of The City novels were best-sellers and colourfully adapted into a high-rating TV mini-series. Mary Ann In Autumn reunites the surviving original cast of characters, 20 years after Mary Ann left San Fran to pursue a TV career in New York. HIV has wreaked havoc, but none of the original humour and courage is lost. Legendary Barbary Lane landlady Mrs Madrigal is in her 80s and as her former ingénue, Mary Ann, now 57, returns for comfort from calamity, she is embraced by a neighbourhood of friends who never forgot her. Achingly nostalgic, but still wickedly irreverent.
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