Arabesque: Gothic Stories and Retold Folktales on Gay Themes

by Lorena Manuel

For the first volume of the Arabesque series, Lorena Manuel has created six stories rich in ornate and fantastic imagery. Familiar and obscure folktales, myths, and legends are retold as metaphors that provide an alternate view of burgeoning love between boys. World-weary knights, mournful goddesses, mad queens, and ghostly shadows become catalysts for the baffling and oftentimes painful journey of self-discovery among gay youth. Hermitic lunatics and murderously obsessive lovers delve into the darker themes of homoeroticism. Dragons, abandoned statues, vainglorious fathers, spectral guardians, and sinister servants add to the colorful backdrop through which heroes must fumble their way. Alternately tender, satirical, and scathing, written in a style that’s distinctly baroque and vivid, Arabesque offers readers of gay fiction an experience both unique and universal.

136 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004