And the Band Played On question

Jonathan Engel wrote The Epidemic: A Global History Of Aids. It does cover some of the same ground that Shilts does and goes further into the era of the first treatements including AZT and other similar drugs and the issues medical and social that came with them.

Engel also explores more of the longer term backlash since he was writing decades after Randy Shilts.

No exploration of this tragic topic and the impact the few years of the inital era has left is complete without Tony Kushner's Angels in America, Part 1: Millennium Approaches and Angels in America, Part 2: Perestroika.

If you ever get an opportunity to see Angels, go. Don't worry that you will spend hours, you won't notice if the production is even vaguely well staged.

This is a topic that has all but faded from public view due to better medicine and apathy. So many of the great voices and champions died. Including Shilts who always intended to write another book on this particular focus and sadly did not.

A book that is a 'celebrity' type work but is an important part of the story is the Magic Johnson book My Life. It has self serving commentary and much of the book is not about AIDS. But it is important to remember that when Magic had to retire from the NBA, this produced an earth shattering change in the general public. I think there is a better story about Magic but I can't find the book I'm looking for with a quick search.

There are many other works from good to bad but start with the underlying background with the first three for both the facts and personal horror and then branch out.

Anything by Paul Monette, a truly elegant writer, is good because of his memoir style. Neil Miller's "Out of the Past" is a wonderful history, but no one can match what Randy Shilts accomplished, eh? I love his books as well. (He has one about the military -- "Conduct Unbecoming.") Also, I agree about "Angels in America." Now I'm going to persue your question: where is the next history??

might i add my opinion..another paul monette...try last watch of night..series of essays not just about the epidemic but about where we were and where we are in teh GLBT struggle...i continue to be concerned that we are not aware of our history and that it will be lsot...

You might want to check out Lisa Biagiotti's excellent documentary film deepsouth, about the current AIDS epidemic in the US's deep south. It will be screening in 100 locations across the country on World AIDS day this December.

It's an excellent look at the present of the ongoing epidemic--the new infection rate in the southern US is among the worst in the world.

http://www.deepsouthfilm.com/

I might recommend Edward Hooper's "The River" which is about a theory that HIV/AIDS might have come from oral polio vaccines conducted in the Congo River region of Africa. The theory itself has been debunked, but the information about people who are now known to have been infected with HIV long before the first case study is fascinating, and the history of the polio vaccine and the competitions within that culture are thought-provoking. Again, the theory has been invalidated but there's still some very interesting stuff in the book.

For a (fictional) snapshot of the landscape in 1990s New York City, I like any of Sarah Schulman's novels, but particularly, PEOPLE IN TROUBLE. It is not specifically about AIDS, but more about the gay/lesbian non-affluent community and day-to-day life in the streets. Her main character has more compassion for the homeless than is typical in fiction.

My Own Country by Abraham Verghese.