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Liked It “"Michael Tolliver Lives" is claimed as a stand alone novel. In my opinion, it is closure to the abrupt and unanswered questions in the ending to the 6 novels of the Tales of the City series. Michael has always said that his logical family is in San Francisco. Because of a call from his brother,...” see full review » see other reviews » |
Didn’t Like It “Feh...” see full review » see other reviews » |
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“"Michael Tolliver Lives" is claimed as a stand alone novel. In my opinion, it is closure to the abrupt and unanswered questions in the ending to the 6 novels of the Tales of the City series. Michael has always said that his logical family is in San Francisco. Because of a call from his brother, he goes to visit his mother and is drawn back into his biological family. Now 55 years old, Thack is gone, Brian owns and runs the nursery however, Michael still gardens. Through Anna's match-making guidance, he meets and marries a younger man, Ben. I hate to give away any spoilers. Suffice to say, some fans will hate this novel, where I really loved it! There is a really hot sex scene involving a threesome between Michael, Ben and his mama's hairdresser!”
Jimmy W wrote this review Monday, September 21 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
“I've read the Tales of the City series and loved it. This book was so familiar, and it was nice to see the characters again.”
Kathleen D wrote this review Wednesday, September 2 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No“it was like visiting with old friends! I love all of Maupin's books and the characters.”
Amy I wrote this review Tuesday, August 25 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No“Feh...”
MBF203 wrote this review Monday, July 13 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No“As the first chapter opens, it is 2006, and Mike, at 55, is surprised to be alive. Twenty years ago he was certain that he would die of AIDS; now, much to his own bewilderment, he’s thriving, thanks to “a fine-tuned mélange of Viramune and Combivir.” Life is good for Mike: he owns his own house, runs a successful business as a gardener and landscape architect, and was recently married to Ben, who is handsome, charming and 21 years his junior.
Wendy B wrote this review Tuesday, June 23 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
And yet, let’s not forget that we’re in Armistead Maupin’s San Francisco. Thus Mike’s burly assistant, a self-proclaimed “bear cub” named Jake Greenleaf, turns out to be a female-to-male transsexual with whom Mike once had a gender-bending one-night stand. Mike found Ben, on the Internet, on a site devoted to older men and their admirers, on which Ben identified himself as CLEANCUTLAD4U. And their wedding was part of the communal ceremony that took place at San Francisco City Hall after the city declared marriage between same-sex couples legal, with Mayor Gavin Newsom presiding, “so young and handsome and ... neat ... that he actually looked like the man on top of a wedding cake.”
As for Anna Madrigal — the doyenne of Barbary Lane, played so memorably by Olympia Dukakis in the PBS adaptation of the series — she’s now 85, and has moved from her boarding house to a small apartment where she watches lovingly over the three young “trannies” upstairs. Along with Mike, she’s trying to keep an eye on Shawna, the daughter of Mike’s straight best friend, Brian. Shawna has grown up into a sort of Outward Bound explorer of the erotic wilderness, whose adventurings — recounted on a widely read blog — include a stint working at “the Lusty Lady, a peep show in North Beach that recently became the nation’s first worker-owned strip club.” Even the domestic bliss that Mike shares with Ben is distinctly San Franciscan in flavor, with Ben casually giving his older husband testosterone injections and the couple negotiating just how open they want their marriage to be. (“You’re too young to be monogamous,” Mike tells Ben. “And I’m too old.”)
Such, though, is life in the city that Mike’s Orlando-based relatives call “Sodom by the Bay” — a life whose audaciously self-conscious particularity Mike finds alternately delightful and exasperating. Reflecting on a restaurant menu’s description of ingredients as “artisanal” rather than “homemade,” he observes: “Sometimes Northern California just wears me ... down, and I get fed up with our precious patois, our fetishizing of almost everything.” It’s as if, for Maupin as much as for Mike, a certain malaise has settled in; as if “the City” they love so well, with its population of latex fetishists, foot worshipers and people who like to have sex in clown costumes, has started to seem even to them a little too, well, cute.
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“It's nice to check in on the characters we all know and love. Maupin does a great job of incorporating local pop culture in his text. I'm looking forward to visit SF and see some of the places he spoke of.
Keri S wrote this review Friday, June 19 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
The story line is only a recap though.. The main plot of this episode wasn't very gripping, but still nice to have some closure to each characters live journey.
Honesetly the last three chapters were the most gripping.”
“So glad to see Mouse (Spoiler Alert!) survives. Can't wait for the next one.”
All booked up wrote this review Sunday, June 14 2009. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No“I was so excited to see this book in a bookstore after reading the Tales of the City series probably 10 years ago. It was kind of like attending a reunion-somewhat awkward at certain points (mainly the gay sex scenes) but good to find out what everyone was up to years later.”
Cynthia J wrote this review Tuesday, September 30 2008. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
4 of 5 members found this review helpful“It’s not necessary to have read Tales of the City, et. al., to appreciate Michael Tolliver Lives, but it adds immeasurably to the poignancy of the proceedings. Maupin wields his wry and rueful sense of humor to great effect here, as our old friend “Mouse”, HIV-positive, in his late fifties and blessed with a lover with a “daddy” fixation, gives us a crash course in how to age gracefully (and gratefully). The book is full of old familiar characters (emphasis on the "old") and there are some truly moving moments, and many guffaws, along the way.”
Lord Manleigh wrote this review Saturday, September 6 2008. ( reply | permalink ) Was this review helpful? Yes | No
