I'd heard about this novel by the author of the classic "City of Night" and "Sexual Outlaw" but I couldn't find it. When I finally got a copy of it, it was worth waiting for. I can't believe this novel is out of print, can't believe it's not listed among "modern best". It deserves to be there. Its range is awesome--characters from all walks of life--porn, Bel Air mansions, the streets, evangelical TV, Mr. America. The three main characters that roam throughout LA and all these lives are memorable; and the writing is superb. There's a section called "On Nothing" that is really amazing. I'm recommending this book to everyone, and I hope it'll get the attention it deserves.

A brilliant, daring, sensual novel with a varied cast of characters, including a female porn star, a wealthy Bel Air family, a Chicano kid among punk-rockers, a gothic evangelist, a sexy TV anchorwoman, a male stripper, a vice cop on the prowl, two teenage street hustlers in love, a black maid from Watts. Three mysterious young people, a girl, and two young men, link all these disparate lives in a startling climax. An apocalyptic view of Los Angeles, from its mansions to its dark streets, freeways, sunny beaches. A terrific novel full of insights and surprises. One of Rechy's best.

As per the above statement this book is emotionally devastating at times. Clearly the author's most focussed and encompassing novel, summing up most of the themes of his other novels.

A masterpiece of Gay literature, broke so many taboos before its time.I remember reading this novel in the late 70s before AIDS became prevelant,when so many queers walked the backstreets and alleys not to mention bathhouses in there search for free sex and lust. This is a monumental exploration into the psyche of homosexuality and being wanted by all means .necessary. I cant wait for the movie!

I had heard about this book, and it seemed to make some people angry and some people said it was great. I hadn't read it until I saw that the SF Chronicle listed it as one of the "100 Best Non-Fiction of the Century" and I thought, wow. So I read it, and was surprised to find how timely the book is, how it speaks about the same issues confronting gay men right now, and speaks about them intelligently--and, also, it's a very sexy book, that describes three sex-crammed days and nights by its main character roaming through streets, alleys, under piers. The book deserves to be rated high on "best" lists. It sure ranks in mine. Terrific writing, too.

This remains the most powerful manifesto of gay power, as well as being a document of oppression. Graphic sexual encounters are strongly depicted. Between each main section, an essay comments on a wide range of gay life--from gay bars to the gay pride parade, bodybuiding, hustling, S & M, gay relationships with women, laws, vice cops. Although many of Rechy's ideas have now been embraced by others, the book remains as startling, bold, and original as when it first appeared. A gay "Fire Next Time."

This fictional novel is the story of Marilyn's hypothetical daughter, fathered by Robert Kennedy. Normalyn Morgan recieves a letter from the woman she thought was her mother after her death stating that MM was her real mother, and she heads for LA to find out the truth. The book is not only a great read, it's a lesson to all those on a quest for the truth, whether about MM's affairs with the Kennedys or about her death....I really believe Rechy is trying to make a statement about these truth-hunters. Check it out, it leaves you with some interesting questions!

A "noir" novel about Norma Jeane Morgan, a shy Texas teenager whose supposed mother leaves her evidence that she may be the great movie star's secret daughter. Norma Jeane journeys to L.A. to discover her origin and encounters a range of vivid characters. Some are from present-day Hollywood, like Troja, a gorgeous male M.M. impersonator, and Kirk, a former Mr. America. Others are from scandal-ridden Hollywood past, like the vicious gossip columnist who ruled with her venom. A weird cult of teenagers known as the Dead Movie Stars--who impersonate their idols after discovering hidden scandals about them--lead Normalyn to her startling discovery in a novel that is a mystery, a romance, a conjecture about what might have been. An enthralling, can't-put-it down novel.

Once I started reading this novel, which was assigned reading at Harvard last year, I dedicated myself to reading it straight through, that's how real Amalia, the beautiful opinionated, moving, passionate, and at times self-evading woman, is as she rummages through her life, much violence--including marrying the man who rapes her, her son in gangs, another son hustling, her daughter concealing a knife, her live-in boyfriend attempting to advance on her daughter, and through it all only faith in the Holy Mother sustains Amalia, until this one day when her faith is shattered--her son is dead in prison, and everything is collapsing. That's when the book pushes the reader to the extremity of her despair--in a mall in Beverly Hill!--and, there, Amalia will or will not experience the miracle she finally demands. I'll never foget this woman, nor her family, nor the tattered new Hollywood populated by Hispanics. Despite its seriousness, there is much humor, especially iln Amalia's wonderful way of rearranging things--even religious dogma--to allow for reconcilliation with her own unconventionals views. This is an unforgettable novel.

Lyrical account of one day in the life of a beautiful Mexican-American woman and her family in Los Angeles today as she discovers her son is a gay hustler, her daughter may be roaming around with gangs, her live-in lover may be harboring dangerous secrets. A further shattering revelation about her firstborn tests her enduring faith and pushes her to the brink of such despair that she demands a miracle. This book is moving and, yes, at times hilarious in its depiction of Amalia's indomitability. You'll never forget the dazzling, astonishing ending in a glitzy Beverly Hills mall.

The articles about Abraham Lincoln and George Washington alone should be required reading for all U.S. history classes. Kenneth Starr would have gone wild looking at the private lives of our country's two greatest leaders.

As many times as I have explored this amazing multimedia CD-ROM, I constantly find something new to appreciate. A photograph in a collage that links to an artifact with the voice of John Rechy revealing new meaning...a path through a thicket of trees that reveals the author standing shirtless above his beloved city.... Mysteries and Desire is a masterful, extraordinary work whose technique rises to the level of its subject. Anyone interested in John Rechy, literature, digital content or new media should not miss this experience.

...This book has something for everyone. If all you want is a steamy read then just read the sex chapters, if you're only interested in the history of gay rights/oppression just read the other chapters. The sex chapters are graphic, and romantically rendered (the author being a big fan of public sex.) The historic chapters are fascinating and disturbing, a first-hand account of the persecution that has ruined lives, the kind of persecution that a younger person might find extreme, appalling, and entirely un-American.
I suggest you read the entire book, as the author's intention is to make the persecuted more personal, and to explain that a life of street-sex may be more than a self-involved search for orgasms. (Rechy actually makes a pretty good case for narcissism as a life strategy.) The book is made truly beautiful by Rechy's intense honesty (always surprising coming from such an overt egotist.) The ugly and the beautiful, shown side by side, simultaneously, run concurrent, until one may be prompted to ask which is which. Rechy does not just defend his lifestyle, he also faces its many problems.
In the end , my favorite thing about the book is that it raised so many questions in my mind. Throughout reading the book I found myself becoming angry with many of the author's declarations, and the questions piled up. By the final chapter, however, Rechy had answered every one of them, ultimately offering a sort of philosophy of what it means to be gay, and what it means to live under the gun of others' ideologies.
I would recommend this book to ANYONE with an open mind, or ANYONE who needs to open their mind a little more.

A wealthy man invitess an exotic--and erotic--cast of characters to his private island probably somewhere in the Caribbean--there are references to voodoo. The group includes an ageless woman who may be a practicing witch, a priest with a terrifying secret, a call boy, "the most beautiful woman in the world," a Lesbian superstar, a bodybuilder, a queen in mourning drag--and the host's strange teenage son, who may be the most evil of the lot. This gathering of beautiful people inevitably find themselves involved in or witnessing a ritual murder. Readers of Rechy's earlier novels, including "City of Night" will not be surprised by the controlled, lyrical prose with which the dramatic events are chronicled. An oddly beautiful book that should not be out of print.

Whenever I see a list of 100 great books, I always look to see if there's a single book about being gay by an openly gay modern American writer, and there never is. I guess this is a kind of prejudice--because if ever a novel deserved to be in the high ranks of American literature, not just gay literature, it is "City of Night." Read as a novel about being gay, it's memorable--but it's equally impressive because of its beautiful literary form, the language, at times poetic, at times stark. The cast of characters is awesome--hustlers, drag queens, women in the fringes, cruisers of every kind. It's the kind of book you read and read again. I did, and it's even better each time. A real classic, and I read somewhere that there might be a movie. Wow!

When the recent list of supposed "100 best novels" written in English during the 20th century appeared, I searched,in vain, for any novel written by a gay person that dealt with the gay experience. Not one. Certainly there was some kind of bigotry involved among the judges and the publishers of the list. There are a lot of great books written by gay writers, from before the 20th century, and certainly that has not changed. If any novel belonged on that list, it's Rechy's "City of Night," a sweeping epic about America. I re-read it recently, and was surprised to find that Rechy has included virtually every kind of character one would encounter in the world he depicts--and he brings them to memorable life, queens, hustlers, the woman who owns a gay bar--I'll never forget her, nor Chuck the cowboy, nor Miss Destiny, nor the narrator searching for himself. Yet the judges and publishers of the "100 best" seem to want to banish our writers from literature. Finally, of course, they can't.

After reading this novel again, having read it first ten years ago, I can see why it continues to captivate readers. Now that the "shock" value of its subject has diminished, it may be viewed as a great book, period. It is amazing how contemporary it still feels, how alive the characters remain. Indeed, they continue to haunt long after the reader has finished reading the novel. Can anyone forget Miss Destiny and her longing for a wedding, or Skipper, the aging hustler, or the narrator trying to discover himself during the masked revelry of Mardi Gras? Rechy's writing has been imitated throughout the years, including by non-gay writers. It's good to know that the author is now being honored with several prestigious literary prizes that note not only this great novel but the ones that have followed and that show the author asserting his reputation as a major American writer. This novel, written when the author was still in his twenties, surprises with its keen insight into the human condition.

I've read this novel twice, because, the first time, I raced through it to see how it would end. The second time, it's even better. I've been able to see how expertly Rechy uses language, how vividly the characters are drawn; he uses a different prose style for each of the many characters, a style that conveys the voice of each, from the driven priest to the hustler, the drag queen porn director, the black cowboy. Rechy is masterful at creating an oninous mood, employing the fierce Santa Ana winds of Los Angeles, the raging fires in the city, the approach of the night to arouse a sense of foreboding. It's a very sexual book because he is documenting a time when sex was everywhere, and he conveys that expertly. That he is able to bring all the diverse elements of his novel together in a stunning, startling climax is an accomplishment that ranks with his classic "City of Night." I would include this novel among the top books of the year.

Anyone who wants to know what America was like in late 1981, especially the gay world, should read this exceptional novel. It captures that time exactly, the time when AIDS was just beginning to be whispered about. Rechy includes a wide cast of characters, that range from a priest to a black cowboy, so many others, straight and gay. Some are sad, others are hilarious, like the drag-queen porn director. Rechy roams from rich homes to leather bars; and his description of cruising in a gay bar is a masterpiece, exactly right, funny and sad. It is also a very erotic novel, and always serious in its explorations. By the end of the novel, you'll feel you've lived with all these characters, and you'll be moved by them, even by Dave, the "tough" leatherman, and especially by Jesse the Kid, who brings the single day of the novel to a surprising end that won't leave you. This is a terrific novel, one of Rechy's very best.

Ever since I read "City of Night" in highschool a dozen years ago, I've been waiting for Rechy to write another book like his first classic novel. "The Coming of the Night" was worth the wait. I read it through in one sitting. It's a stunner. I won't ever forget the characters Rechy follows for one day and night, when whispers about AIDS were beginning but not believed. Rechy brings that very sexual time to life, and the book is very, very sexy. Rechy leads you with compassion to understand what was going on, how AIDS struck gay people with as much indifference as the heated wind blowing across the city. The book is beautifully written, and very pertinent to today. At times, it's surprisingly hilarious. I laughed aloud at the drag-queen rehearsing her porn stars for a private performance before a closeted movie executive. The book races back and forth from character to character, all different, all alive. I especially like Jesse, the beautiful 22-year-old kid celebrating a year of being gay; the picture Rechy draws of him is very accurate, very moving. The ending almost knocked me out. I sat there, stunned, absorbing it all. Frankly, this may be Rechy's best novel, as good as "City of Night."