The University of Wisconsin Press


Gay & Lesbian Interest / Fiction

 

Fred in Love
Felice Picano

Terrace Books

"Having always been allergic to cats, reading Felice Picano's new book about his beloved cat Fred was so vivid that it caused sneezing and made my eyes water."—Bob Smith, author of Openly Bob

In the early 1970s, when he was still an aspiring, unpublished writer, Felice Picano began a remarkable relationship with an extraordinary animal: a days-old kitten slated for euthanasia who refused to perish. Rescued, named, and trained, Fred became an extraordinarily intelligent companion, ally, teacher, and constant wonder to the author as he began his ascent through the Bohemian circles of Greenwich Village, among musicians, actors, curious characters, and even the famous British actress in hiding right next door.

But when an acquaintance brought his female cat to be serviced by Fred, an entire new set of experiences opened up for the cat—and for Picano, who had never had the nerve to befriend her owner, his ideal man. The course of love seldom runs straight for cats or for men, and this time would (hilariously) prove no different.

This is another of Picano's distinguished portraits of a vanished era, when a new gay domain was solidifying only a few years after the Stonewall Riots, and the still nascent gay literary world that Picano would help invent was just a conception. Fred in Love is a charming, nostalgic, funny, gossipy, involving, and ultimately enlightening story about how we learn and grow, and how we love—whether the object of our affection is a cat or another human being. It is sure to take its place next to Picano's now classic literary memoirs.

"A lovely, not too nostalgic portrait of what is now a vanished bohemia." —Jim Marks, executive editor, Lambda Literary Foundation

"A beautifully written roman à clef centered on the felicitous and mysterious connection between Man and Cat."—Tony Mendoza, author of Ernie: A Photographer's Memoir

photo of author Felice PicanoFelice Picano is the author of many books, including the best-selling novels Like People in History, Looking Glass Lives, The Lure, and Eyes as well as the literary memoirs Ambidextrous, Men Who Loved Me, and A House on the Ocean, a House on the Bay. He is also the author with Dr. Charles Silverstein of The New Joy of Gay Sex. He has won the Ferro-Grumley Award for best gay novel (Like People in History), was a finalist for the Ernest Hemingway Award, and has been nominated for three Lambda Literary Awards. A native of New York, Felice Picano now lives in Los Angeles.

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Cover of Fred in Love shows a black and white cat like many of us have owned at one time.

February 2005
LC: 2004025623 PS
108 pp.  5 x 8 1/2
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Cloth $14.95 t
ISBN 978-0-299-20910-0
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