Synopses & Reviews
This remarkable novel begins in 1850s Louisiana, where Gilda escapes slavery and learns about freedom while working in a brothel. After being initiated into eternal life as one who "shares the blood" by two women there, Gilda spends the next two hundred years searching for a place to call home. An instant lesbian classic when it was first published in 1991, The Gilda Stories has endured as an auspiciously prescient book in its explorations of blackness, radical ecology, re-definitions of family, and yes, the erotic potential of the vampire story.
Review
"Gomez's characters are rooted in historical reality yet lift seductively out of it, to trouble traditional models of family, identity, and literary genre and imagine for us bold new patterns. A lush, exciting, inspiring read." Sarah Waters, author of Tipping the Velvet
Review
"This revolutionary classic by a pioneer in black speculative fiction will delight and inspire generations to come." Tananarive Due, author of Ghost Summer
Review
"The Gilda Stories is groundbreaking not just for the wild lives it portrays, but for how it portrays them — communally, unapologetically, roaming fiercely over space and time." Emma Donoghue, author of Room
About the Author
Jewelle Gomez is a writer, activist, and the author of many books including
Forty-Three Septembers,
Don't Explain,
The Lipstick Papers,
Flamingoes and Bears, and
Oral Tradition.
The Gilda Stories was the recipient of two Lambda Literary Awards, and was adapted for the stage by the Urban Bush Women theater company in thirteen United States cities.
Alexis Pauline Gumbs was named one of UTNE Reader's 50 Visionaries Transforming the World, a Reproductive Reality Check Shero, a Black Woman Rising nominee, and was awarded one of the first-ever "Too Sexy for 501c3" trophies. She lives in Durham, North Carolina.