By John Dixon

Published: 2026

The narrator is still bound by the umbilical cord. He is unable to establish his identity or settle in a job. 

Adventures happen to him. Down and up the social scale. He thinks he is the prime mover - until he meets his match and is brought to heel.

Paperback, 189 pages

ISBN 978-1-918378-00-9

UK delivery: £14.24 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £19.79 (inc p&p)

An anthology edited by Stephanie Dickinson and Peter Scott-Presland.

Published: 2026

• Paradise Press' most ambitious anthology to date.
• Sequel to the hugely successful Flash Dances.
• 180 stories.
• Over 40 LGBT+ contributors world-wide.
• 288 lavishly illustrated pages

Paperback, 280 pages

ISBN 978-1-904-58500-8

UK delivery: £13.25 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £15.95 (inc p&p)

By Peter Scott-Presland.

Published: 2026

Murder in Ancient Egypt

Ancient Egypt, 164 BCE. Nephoris, the wicked stepmother of twins Taous and Tages, murders their father so she can marry her Greek toyboy. 

Cast out, the twins are thrust into the strange enclave of Saqqara, the ancient burial site, where the Serapion temple priests and holy vestals worship the holy Apis-Bull God. Meanwhile, Nephoris is on their trail, determined they will not live.

A libretto in verse to music by Peter Murphy, based on a true story, as told in the Channel Four series, Ancient Egyptians. A rare excursion by Peter into the twilight world of heterosexuality.

Paperback, 94 pages

ISBN 978-1-90-458596-1

UK delivery: £8.00 (inc p&p)

By John Dixon

Published: 2026

A Common Pursuit is a wonderful portmanteau of a book. It contains a history of queer male life and sexual desire of fifty years ago. 

What elevates it for the contemporary reader is the celebration of the openness across race, class and appearance that cruising. in streets, cottages, parks, and random shrubbery, offered many gay men. 

Dixon is vividly aware of the inequalities, and confesses to his own, but his diaries are a reminder, especially in these times of vitriolic anti-queerness, of the potential of sexual desire to foster openness and community.

Michael Bronski, Professor of Gender and Sexuality, Harvard University, author of A Queer History of the United States.

ISBN 978 - 1 - 904585 - 80 - 0

Paperback, 67 pages

UK delivery: £10.40 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £14.65 (inc p&p)

An anthology edited by Hastie Salih and David Flybury.
Published: 2025

The shifting sands of transformation are the heart and soul of Queer identity.

From quiet disclosures to bold leaps; from the excitement of new love to loss and heartbreak; through gripping storytelling and powerful voices, this vibrant anthology invites you to witness the courage and beauty pulsating through every moment of unforgettable change.

ISBN 978-1-904585-93-0

Paperback, 301 pages.

£14.99 (inc p&p)

An anthology edited by Stephanie Dickinson and Peter Scott-Presland
Published: 2024

This anthology has now been published and contains more than 100 tales by thirty queer and queer-friendly writers, including at least five published novelists, an award-winning playwright and eight debutants.

Flash Fiction lives, breathes and dances across the page in stories from eight words to 1,000. Funny and fire-breathing, sad, savage and sexy. 

If you don't like one story, there'll be another along in a Flash! Which, among other things, makes it an ideal toilet book!

ISBN 9 781904 585985

Paperback, 231 pages.

£13.99 (inc p&p)

Reviews

"A real mix of fab short stories and poems, written by a variety of up and coming LGBTQ authors. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry and love the anthology."

"Flash Dances is an absolute gem of a book. This collection of short stories by queer writers is funny, heartwarming, and packed with all the feels. The stories are clever, authentic, and so full of life it’s impossible not to connect with them. If you love sharp writing and emotional depth with a side of sass, this is a must-read. You won’t regret it!"

By John Dixon

Published: 2026

This re-issue of John Dixon’s first poetry collection contains a sequence of short poems charting a brief affair – outside casual to come-back overnight, a return visit to live-in, further exploration and much uncertainty – and back to casual.

Fifteen other poems on a wide range of topics complete the collection.

"These are apparently simple poems and very accessible but it’s the art that conceals art. There is, as the title suggests, regret and loss, but also a very engaging wit and a great sensitivity to nature."

Peter Scott-Presland
Author of 'A Gay Century' and 'Amiable Warriors'

ISBN: 978 1 904585 992

Paperback, 65 pages

UK delivery: £9.00 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £12.80 (inc p&p)

Short verses by Michael Harth & edited by John Dixon and Jeffrey Doorn

Published: 2021

Michael Harth (1926-2016) was a prolific writer in several genres, songs, revues, a full-length novel, an appreciation of pianist/composer Billy Mayerl, even a science fiction musical as well as three volumes of short stories.

His lyrics are clever, quirky, often satirical. This book presents 36 of his previously unpublished song lyrics. A companion collection of short stories was published in 2019.

ISBN 978-1-904585-91-6

Paperback, 84 pages

UK delivery: £8.95 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £12.75 (inc p&p)

A novel by Elsa Wallace

Published: 2015

I cannot remember when I did not know I was different. Even this old part of the palace was richly endowed with sculptures, pictures and tapestries, some of which presented naked figures of women and girls to show me my difference.

And then I knew it had always been the case that while Lumika and Aigret undressed freely before me, my clothes were always changed beneath a shift and I was even bathed in this shift. 

When I once queried the inconvenience of the arrangement Lumika said roughly, “You know why. Are you like that statue there? No. You are of a different kind that may not be seen.”

The first part of the history is told by Lord Hyaena’s resourceful and audacious successor. The second is Lord Hyaena’s own account of his love for and loss of his ally, a lord from Orinna.

“Short and strange, this hypnotic novella is engrossing, wild and curiously beautiful.”
Gay Times

ISBN: 978-1-904585-77-0

Paperback, 80 pages

UK delivery: £5.99 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £8.79 (inc p&p)

e-Book, 80 pages

An anthology edited by G Abel-Watters

Published: 2011

Who did your mother warn you about? Friends who are not all they seem. Suspicious neighbours, or that black sheep relative? Dirty old men, or young men on the scrounge? Falling in with criminals and drunkards, or coming to the same bad end as your sister? Foreign tourists, or the clan in the next valley? Or just People Like That?

All these and more are present in this collection of stories by lesbian and gay writers. There are people who listened to their mothers, and some who should have done. There are tales of life today, and little pieces of our history. Will you dare to show it to your mother?

G Abel-Watters is also the editor of Queer Haunts.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 12 1

Paperback, 254 pages

UK delivery: £10.39 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £15.19 (inc p&p)

By Michael Harth, edited by John Dixon and Jeffrey Doorn

Published: 2019

This volume presents nineteen stories elected to illustrate the wide range of Michael Harth’s work.

“These bawdy tales stretch the form, teasing the reader with wishful fantasy, playful naughtiness and unlikely turns.”
Les Brookes, author of Gay Male Fiction Since Stonewall

“Able to sketch a plot or a situation deftly and to drop in some vivid dabs of colour”
Adam Mars-Jones, novelist, and critic.

“Tales of the erotic unexpected, a potent mixture of fantasy and the fantastical, magic and the surreal, wish fulfilment, and humour in unlikely places.”
Jeffrey Weeks, historian, and author of Coming Out.

ISBN 978 1 904585 909

Paperback , 268 pages

UK delivery: £10.39 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £15.19 (inc p&p)

Edited by Jeffrey Doorn and Adrian Risdon

Published: 2010

I hunted the pearl of great price
That I’d read about in a story

In this anthology, published to mark Gay Authors Workshop 30th (pearl) anniversary, 14 poets prise open the oyster of life in search of riches: love, sex, food, days at the beach, journeys through nature, cities and time.

“The world’s your oyster,”
Said Grannie in her pince-nez
Her twin-set and pearls.

These 30 poems peer into the lives of isolation and communion, explore relationships open and closed, tenuous or tenacious.

Like a mollusc I was clinging to my rock,
Feeling safe, enclosed within my brittle shell

You may find some verses luminescent, others opaque, some highly polished, others gritty. All are linked by the thread of imagination. Open us up. You might discover treasure. In any event, where else can you find oysters and pearls at this price?

ISBN: 978 1 904585 13 8

80 pages

UK delivery: £5.99 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £9.79 (inc p&p)

By John Dixon

Published: 2024

This is John's second poetry collection, following Seeking, Finding, Losing (also Paradise Press). 

"These poems deftly use form, humour and lived experience, explore family relationships, irreverent pick-ups, longer and more questioning liaisons, gay history, a few bucolics and art observations. 

The sections are divided by Dixon's wry haikus, giving a moment to pause and reflect on what's in store.

Why hide it, sir? Why not make a feature out of it?

This barber's refrain feels like the coming-out anthem for this whole wonderful collection. Within these compact, colloquial lines runs a serious wisdom that looks back to previous generations with poems that are both fresh and memorable” - Chris Beckett, poet and translator, author of Ethiopia Boy.

“A remarkable collection, as if in the company of an articulate, witty and wise friend who was happy to share his thoughts and experiences with me” - V.G. Lee, author of Always You, Edina.

ISBN 978-1-90-458579-4

78 pages.

UK delivery: £9.50 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £12.50 (inc p&p)

A novel by Leigh V Twersky

Published: 2024

Olympia Heights is set in a future corporate world, where only money and celebrity count, C-class people dread disemployment and D-classification, and homo 'niceboys' get metamorphosed into 'sphecos', a hybrid wasp-man auxiliary police force with crime-busting assets.

It is the story of one spheco's quest for identity, lost family and proscribed love and also the tale of a woman's struggle to survive on the outlawed fringes of a society, where the revelation of a dark secret threatens to tear her life apart.

Homophobia and genetic cleansing. Pre-mortem funerals and putting the 'quality' into equality.

Welcome to BestcoeBritain.

ISBN: 978-1-904585-95-4

Paperback, 432 pp

UK delivery: £13.49 (inc p&p)
EU delivery: £17.49 (inc p&p)

Anthologies by a variety of GAW members

Edited by Jeffrey Doorn

Published: 2023

The places we remember as significant in our lives helped shape who we are and how we relate to the world.

This anthology of nineteen prose, and poetry pieces by fourteen authors, recollects such places now lost, either though physical alteration, changed character, redevelopment or demolition.

Some may remain but are no longer gay or gay-friendly, others replaced by online platforms. It is important to recall and record these markers of our history and heritage. They form part of our legacy to younger and future generations.

ISBN 978-1-90-4585-94-7

Paperback, 132 pages.

UK delivery: £10.39 (inc p&p)
EU delivery: £13.74 (inc p&p)

A novel by David Gee

Published: 2014

‘If only, Evelyn would think later, if only there hadn’t been the bother in Cuba; if only she hadn’t knocked the Horseman of the Apocalypse off his motorbike, the week might have turned out very differently. ’October, 1962. The world goes to the brink. Not only in Cuba.

As US warships set sail to establish President Kennedy’s Cuban ‘blockade’, Londoners Andrew and Evelyn motor down to the Sussex coast. At a country crossroads their car collides with a motorcycle ridden by the sinister Pilgrim.

Evelyn is the wife of a Bond Street jeweller; she knows what an orgasm is but hasn’t had one. Andrew is a graphic artist and womaniser, haunted by his gay past. Laurence, their host in Bexhill, is an ex-lover of Andrew’s; his teenage daughter Sarah is impatient to lose her virginity.

While Kennedy and Krushchev nudge the world towards a nuclear precipice, Pilgrim drives these middle-class misfits to a brink of their own. Their cosy Terence Rattigan lives get a Joe Orton makeover in this dark comedy-of-manners with a gothic twist.

"Sexual intercourse began in 1962," says David Gee. "Philip Larkin was out by one year. Anyone who was alive at the time of the Cuban Crisis will remember the feeling that with the world on the brink of thermonuclear extinction, there might only be time for one last fling. The four people in The Bexhill Missile Crisis don’t choose the wrong partner for this fateful fling; he chooses them".

ISBN: 978 1 904585 596

Paperback, 224 pages

UK delivery: £11.49 (inc p&p)
EU delivery: £15.49 (inc p&p)

The Campaign for Homosexual Equality was the largest ever LGBT+ organisation in the UK. Thousands of people discovered their sexuality through CHE; it was the engine of social change for twenty years and spawned counselling services, phone helplines, gay centres and campaigns for equal rights in all areas of society. 

The Amiable Warriors project is a four-volume history of this shamefully overlooked pillar of our history.

By Peter Scott-Presland

Published: 2015

From a Manchester support group rallying Northern MPs to implement the Wolfenden Report, to the beginnings of a national organisation, Amiable Warriors I follows the fortunes of the ex-mineworker Allan Horsfall and two teenagers Martin Stafford and Paul Temperton fighting religious bigotry in an effort to start Esquire Clubs.

When that was blocked, they set up local groups all over the country and pioneered the idea of 'queer space' being something that groups of homosexuals carried with them. A plethora of fascinating characters - Brian Sewell, Ray Gosling, Meg Elizabeth Atkins - in a racy, readable style. 

'A bit like being immersed in a great Victorian novel' - Jeffrey Weeks.

This will be split into two volumes in the revised reissue in due course.

ISBN: 978-1-904585 -75-6
Hardback, 640 pages 2015

UK delivery: £30 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £40 (inc p&p)

ISBN: 978-1-904585-85-5
Paperback published in 2026, 640 pages

UK delivery: £20 (inc p&p) 
EU delivery: £25 (inc p&p)

By Peter Scott-Presland

Published: 2026

Another eye-opener from award-winning writer Peter Scott-Presland charts the rise of CHE against the currents of the time, and particularly against its more flamboyant but shorter-lived little sister, the Gay Liberation Front. 

Upsetting all received notions of our origins and history, this is Queer history for everyone. 

'Richly illustrated and written with wit, wisdom and compassion' - Professor Matt Cook.
'A damned good read' - Peter Tatchell.

ISBN: 978-1-904585-9-78
Paperback, 392 pages

UK delivery: £15 (inc p&p)
EU delivery: £18 (inc p&p)

Short stories by Martin Foreman

Published: 2002

Sometimes you sit, watch the trains, the sunset, the rain. Sometimes you talk. Tell your story if you’ve a mind to. Trouble is, memory changes things.

Things you want to forget. Things you want to remember that never happened. Happens to everybody. Gets so, nobody’s story’s true. Not yours, not mine. But it’s all we got.

Martin Foreman‘s latest collection of short stories comprises first person narratives spanning the globe from Rio de Janeiro to Los Angeles, Africa to Nepal, London to Siberia. 

Men and women from teenagers to grandparents each speak in a distinctive voice and with intense emotion as love and sex, violence and humour, anger and pathos meet in this kaleidoscope of human comedy and tragedy.

“The youthful yet already impressive Paradise Press publication goes from strength to strength with his collection of first persona narratives, each containing a strong, distinctive and powerful voice, leading the collection as a whole to never be anything less than diverting.”Gay Times

“Engaging, told with style”Gay Scotland

“Mr Foreman’s style has evidently had a lot of attention lavished on it, not to mention careful study of the human race in its multiplicity of forms”
Tregolwyn Book Reviews

See Martin Foreman for more information.

ISBN: 978 0 9525964 7 9

Paperback, 152 pages

UK delivery: £10.49 (inc p&p)
EU delivery: £14.49 (inc p&p)

Edited by John Dixon and Jeffrey Doorn

Published: 2014

Coming Clean is a poetry anthology from Gay Authors Workshop, and the most ambitious so far. Celebrating their 35th (Coral) anniversary, there is no theme, though the title, Coming Clean, could apply in one way or another, owning up or writing honestly to most of the poems included.

The 90 poems by fourteen poets recall childhood innocence, adolescent yearning, sexual encounters, troubled relationships, demons, dominance, deprivation, ageing, loss, doubt, and faith.

Haikus, prose poems, song lyrics, Spencerian Stanza, performance pieces, the variety of forms is as diverse as the themes and subjects. Abstract or concrete, the verses conceal and reveal, whether hidden objects or identity lost in time. Serious, amusing, light, dense, naughty or downright raunchy. There’s something for everyone.

It includes a short selection of poems by the late Ivor Treby, an early gay literary activist and member of GAW.

“An accessible and engaging anthology containing an impressive variety of poems, both in form and content. The standard was impressively high and I discovered some absolute gems”
V G Lee, author of several novels and volumes of short stories, including Diary of a Provincial Lesbian and Always You, Edina.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 69 5

Paperback, 128 pages

UK delivery: £8.39 (inc p&p)
EU delivery: £11.74 (inc p&p)

By John Dixon

Published: 2024

Whispering Campaigns is John Dixon's second volume of short stories. Twenty-four, some very short, on a variety of topics and in a variety of styles and forms - SF, historical, monologues, dialogue, dystopia.

"This amazingly diverse collection of stories is sometimes fantastic and dreamlike, sometimes surreal and nightmarish, often playful and satirical, and always transgressive."  Les Brookes, author of Gay Male Fiction Since Stonewall

"Nothing about Dixon's work could be called light or superficial. He cuts deep. Expect the unexpected! A highly observant writer with a unique take on life. A diverse and compelling collection!"  VG Lee, author of The Comedienne: Always you, Edina: Mr Oliver's Object of Desire

"An impressive breadth of narrative styles, humorous, macabre, satirical, violent, and often delightfully bizarre. This is not a book for the faint-hearted. Many of these stories are genuinely subversive."  Tim Blackwell, author of The Bingo Caller & other stories

"John Dixon's glittering collection of bonbons offers tales for all tastes, some funny, some creepy, some tragic. And some downright filthy. He does so in elegant, detached prose. Always there is an arresting phrase to pull you up short."  
Peter Scott-Presland author of A Gay Century and Amiable Warriors, a history of the Campaign for Homosexual Equality

ISBN 978-1-904585-78-7

Paperback , 220 pages

UK delivery: £12.49 (inc p&p)
EU delivery: £16.49 (inc p&p)

A collection of short stories by Elsa Wallace

Published: 2013

Who would have heard any cries from the attic window at the back? No-one had heard them since but Fiona, trembling in her bed, those dreadful hoarse pleadings and sobbing, hysterical sometimes.

It was like a man but also like a child, the noise rose and fell, on and on, sometimes muffled, sometimes sharp, sometimes howling and growling in a sort of madness. Once a sickening laugh came down those stairs. Once or twice she was sure it had called her name, and then “Mummy, mummy” it had said quite clearly.

She was terrified of it. What could it be? She ought to be sorry for it but it sounded so bizarre and she couldn’t imagine the being behind it. Was it a man or was it a child or something of both?’

Ghosts and Gargoyles is the second collection by Elsa Wallace, the author of A Short History of Lord Hyaena, Merle and The Monkey Mirror.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 43 5

Paperback, 144 pages

UK delivery: £10.49 (inc p&p)
EU delivery: £14.49 (inc p&p)

A collection of short stories by Michael Harth

Published: 2003

There was somehow an atmosphere about it, almost as if it was waiting for something to happen, and as Gary stepped into the hollow he could feel the air crackle. 

He knew he was dicing with danger, but something over and above any fears drew him on till he was standing in the centre.

A collection of frightening, humorous and challenging fantasies, featuring weretigers, vampires and other creatures that live in the shadows of our present day.

“There are good things in The Physent. The ‘spook’ stories are imaginative, and stray into territory familiar from the tales of M R James and H P Lovecraft, but generally also possess a sexual frisson.”
Peter Burton, Gay Times, December 2003

ISBN: 978 1 904585 03 9

Paperback, 146 pages

UK delivery: £10.49 (inc p&p)
EU delivery: £14.49 (inc p&p)

Edited by Stephanie Dickinson and Pat Dungey

Published: 2018

An anthology of poetry and prose celebrating women’s loves, lives and landmarks.

Fourteen women have contributed to this anthology. We share our experiences of love and life, and the landmarks that mark our progress through our lives in our own very varied styles, using poetry and prose.

“We want to tell you how contains deeply heartfelt, pain-fully honest, and beautifully written pieces of writing. For those who have ever lived with hope or regret, you will find your own story amongst these pages.”
Clare Summerskill

ISBN: 978-1-904585-89-3

Paperback, 144 pages

UK delivery: £11.49 (inc p&p)
EU delivery: £15.49 (inc p&p)

Masculinities and the Victorian Stage

By David Haldane Lawrence and edited by Ross Burgess

Published: 2014

The rich tapestry of life in and around London theatres in the Victorian age. Oscar Wilde and his first-night supporters with their green carnations, soon to be dispersed when disaster struck; ‘Fanny and Stella’ parading in full drag, and their triumph in court; Sir Henry Irving and his close male friendships. Plus the many ways that the theatre impacted the lives of men, as actors, musicians, dramatists, and men behind the scenes and in the audience.

Diverse Performances is a comprehensive survey of the role of men in the Victorian theatre, with insights into the behaviour of ‘swells’ in the audience, the unhealthy conditions backstage, the techniques of lighting as gas jets were replaced by limelight and then by electricity, the struggle of playwrights to earn a decent living, the portrayal of soldiers sailors, and working men in popular melodrama, and the struggle for actors to be considered ‘respectable’.

David Haldane Lawrence was working on this book, an expansion of his PhD thesis, up to his untimely death in 2009. Ross Burgess has thoroughly revised it, combining what appeared to be the best sections of David’s various drafts, and prepared it for publication by Paradise Press.

ISBN: 978-1-904585-74-9

384 pages, with 59 illustrations, full references and select bibliography.

Cover design by David Tilbury and foreword by Jeremy Kingston.

UK delivery: £16.55 (inc p&p)
EU delivery: £26.55 (inc p&p)

A novel by Elizabeth J Lister

Published: 2015

In this fifth and last book in Elizabeth J Lister’s series of lesbian romances, the characters are caught up in the destructive consequences of homophobia. Can relationships survive its devastating effects?

Elizabeth J Lister aims to present in a positive light the everyday thoughts and actions of homosexual men and women as they relate to their families, people within the workplace and society, and particularly when they fall in love.

ISBN: 978-1-904585-76-3

e-book, 242 pages

A novel by Elizabeth Lister

Published: 2013

At the age of 24, Tracy Manners is arrested for attacking her girlfriend. 

It is the first time, a matter of lost tempers, but it is likely to mar the rest of her life and mark her as a criminal in both her social life and employment.

Entering jail as an angry, sexually-charged young woman, it is Tracy’s years behind bars and the time after her release, plus years of kindness and hard work, sexual abuse, unexpected friendships and ultimately, love, that help her to grow into a person worthy of respect.

ISBN: 978 184963 742 8

e-book, 213 pages

A novel by Elizabeth Lister

Published: 2012

In My Life Outside, the second book in Elizabeth Lister’s trilogy, spirited, sexy ex-prisoner Helen Burns determines to make a career and home for herself. She resumes the life of work and study that was interrupted by the accidental death of a friend, for which she was held responsible.

Will this lovable character have the courage to recover from setbacks, re-gain her confidence and find fulfilling love? Homophobic parents and neighbours and a manipulative lover are of no help. Her sex life leads to an unforeseen conclusion.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 37 4

e-book, 204 pages

A memoir by Donald West

Published: 2012

Donald West, psychiatrist and criminologist, published a book arguing for tolerance at a time when gays in the UK were social pariahs and legally criminals.
Now, over fifty years later, he can write openly as a gay man describing his simultaneous pursuit of a secret, fraught love-life and a precarious professional career. In investigations of the paranormal, researches into the roots of delinquency, studies of sexual crime and of society’s response to sexual abuse, he advances some unpopular ideas.

Although influenced by his life among a sexual minority, he tries to reach his objective, evidence-based conclusions. His stories of forced secrecy and threatened exposure reflect difficulties of the past that have not completely disappeared in supposedly more enlightened times.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 23 7

Paperback, 227 pages

A memoir by Joseph Hucknall

Published: 2013

A Life’s Tales is the story of a life lived in a vanished age, a life lived with compassion, insight, ambition and an adventurous spirit, a life fighting against discrimination against gays, and a constant search for self-improvement.

Starting in 1935, when the author was six, these intimate, sensitively written, and engrossing memoirs span 77 years of social change, ranging from the poverty of a northern industrial childhood, shared with eight siblings, through the war years, to an adolescent awakening of homosexuality. 

This was followed by conscription into the Army, progression through the Woolworth company until its meltdown and into a period of creativity and ongoing self-discovery.

Told with wry philosophic humour, the story is episodic and follows a revealing journey through family life and struggle, homosexual experiences and, the challenge of leading a double life to ‘coming out’ as a gay man and the eternal search for a loving relationship.

“A fascinating account of Joe Hucknall’s upbringing in working class Barrow, and his struggles as a gay man in post-war Britain. Very enjoyable and highly readable. It’s a pity Hucknall took so long to pursue his teenage ambition to become a writer.”
Michael Crick, Biographer & Political Correspondent Channel 4 News

“A revelation and a thoroughly enjoyable read.”Mick Hucknall, Singer & Songwriter

ISBN: 978 1 904585 49 7

Paperback, 240 pages

A novel by Christopher Preston

Published: 2014

In 2284 utopia or dystopia? That depends on your gender and sexuality. Climate change and a fertility virus have transformed the world and women are now in charge.

Pitto Kucera, the only son of a wealthy and powerful family of women, turns nineteen and begins his life as a sex worker. Can he avoid the law and succeed in finding his father and a new way of living?

ISBN: 978 1 904585 62 6

e-book, 304 pages

A novel by Michael Harth

Published: 2013

Scott works as a male escort in London, but is dissatisfied with his life. A new client, Gordon, proves to act as Guru to a number of disciples, and he agrees to help Scott sort himself out.

Some months later, Scott accompanies him to a Greek island where Edwin, the son of a wealthy businessman, is paying Gordon to hold a series of seminars, but some inexplicable happenings bring these to a premature close.

On their return to England, Scott finds Gordon disturbingly different, and when Edwin starts to promote him as a public figure with a message for the world at large, he tries to interfere. This proves more dangerous than he had anticipated.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 65 7

e-book, 163 pages

A novel by Elizabeth Lister

Published: 2012

Dee Livesey’s long term relationship is challenged by the increasingly unsettled situation between herself and her now retired partner, Jane Pennyfields. Her friends Helen and Annabel return from Paris to live in England. Difficult times are ahead for all four friends.

In this third story of her trilogy, Elizabeth Lister presents issues that are not just the substance of heroines and fiction but problems that have to be tackled by women in all walks of life.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 48 8

Paperback, 224 pages

A novel by Rod Shelton

Published: 2012

There must be a small fortune in here, he thought as he stared at the contents of the bank box. Why didn’t I know about this? Hundred dollar bills too; still legal tender. He bent over. 

Who said money doesn’t smell good? Nice choice matey boy, whoever you are. Pity you didn’t come back. He rummaged around a bit and his hands came across a lumpy envelope. ‘Everton?’ he read. ‘Who the hell is he?’

Shortlisted for ‘gay mystery’ category in the Lambda Literary Awards 2013.

In this pacy and funny thriller, we follow the fortunes of Everton Jones, a mixed race gay boy from Dudley, as an inheritance left hidden in a bank vault by the Central African father he never knew leads him into a race against time to find out how his father stole Emperor Bokassa’s diamonds and, more importantly, where he hid them before Bokassa’s remaining followers, his ‘Apostles’, get there first.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 41 1

e-book, 304 pages

A novel by Elizabeth Lister

Published: 2012

Eight o’clock in the evening an old woman is seen lying on the front lawn of the Livesey residence. The bedroom window above is open.

Dee Livesey, unhappily married mother with two young daughters, is suspected of having pushed her mother-in-law to her death and she’s remanded in custody.

Her unexpected adventures start when she meets her fellow prisoners; women who are not heterosexual. Elizabeth Lister is distanced by age from those of her experiences which she fictionalises in this, her first novel.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 24 4

Paperback, 184 pages

A novel by Winston Green

Published: 2011

A semi-fictional no-holds-barred account of an affair between a British-Caribbean and an African man, charting the gradual decline in the relationship as differences in outlook and sexual mores come to the fore. 

They met at a sex party. It was meant to be sex, no strings, just an arrangement of mutual convenience. Neither of them planned on a relationship: however something changed the dynamics.

Both realised they wanted more from each other but were afraid to admit the rules had now changed. Can they make the transition from sex-buddies to having a relationship? This book by a new young black writer charts with brutal honesty the ups and downs of a relationship hidden by a mask of emotions.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 17 6

Paperback, 94 pages

An anthology edited by G Abel-Watters

Published: 2003/2013

There were only a few dozen words on the page, and he soon came to the end of them. He didn’t want to turn the page, but he could feel himself being urged to do so. The struggle was sufficient to wake him; he was sweating, and still had a lingering sensation of dread.

Scary, friendly, vengeful, sexy many types of ghosts appear in this diverse volume of stories. There is a spirit far from home and one who doesn’t want to leave home; there are ghosts who do favours or expect favours from humans, ghosts who tell their own story, and a spirit who wears a green lace negligee.

In Queer Haunts you will find something for every mood, from chilling to charming, moving to amusing. Some of these tales link back to ancient legends and times gone by, others are firmly in the modern world where ghosts can jet in and carry a mobile phone.

The stories in this collection have all been written by gay and lesbian authors, and all speak in some way of gay experience. It reflects their diversity in its diverse collection, and the diversity of the readers to whom it will appeal. In fact, everyone who loves a good story or a good ghost. So wedge those rattling windows and creaking doors, curl up by the fire and enjoy.

“As is the case with all anthologies, the stories are of variable quality; the most effective being those that sensibly utilise the form by restricting locale and number of characters to a minimum. Jeffrey Doorn’s 'In the Catacombs' and 'Journey Round the Circle Line', for instance.”
Peter Burton, Gay Times, December 2003

ISBN: 978 1 904585 58 9

Paperback, 198 pages

A short story by Elsa Wallace

Published: 2015

“We don’t mention the beech wood”, says Herman, but much else is mentioned in these three sets of stories about developments in gay lives.

In Kissyface, Hein encompassed by sexuality asserts he is non-sexual, and Liesl reports to her school that she has two fathers and two mothers.

In On the Copperbelt Clare is drawn to nuns and Roland is obsessed with a dead German; if it had stopped at that, how happy his mother would have been.

In Music at the Buchanans, Janey loses a job through intimacy with an employer’s wife but finds a better, and the usually wordless Mr Marrant vows that his next kiss will be “Not like a savage or, worse, a Frenchman, but, slowly and gently, I will speak to him in my kissing.”

ISBN: 978-1-904585-73-2

Paperback, 203 pages

By John Dixon

Published: 2013

Nine stories, varied topics, forms and lengths.

The Carrier Bag is a Bridport prize-winning story, of which Margaret Drabble said “A tale for our time, which satirically contrasts a wine bar squash playing set with a representative member of the underclass. A fine use of dialogue here, from a writer who has his ear to the ground.”

In Across the Corridor - and Down a Bit a knowing holiday diarist unfailingly gets it wrong. Little Gems is a mother’s monologue on her three daughters. The Untoward Invention is a political satire telling how an invention of potential use in waste disposal is seconded by the War Ministry.

In Coping a parent reacts to a marriage guidance counsellor’s trite recommendations. The Heights concerns a Christmas postman who is given a round no one else wants. Well our feeble frame tells of the Damascus Road incidents of a middle-aged woman on holiday in Jordan.

Consequences asks if apparent results are so easily traceable to assumed causes and is the erratic diary confessions of an employee losing control.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 40 4

Paperback, 200 pages

A short story by Elsa Wallace

Published: 2011

“Don’t look in the mirror at the Hesselmans”, said my aunt Sybil. “It’s an unlucky mirror. It’s the one the monkey looked in.”

Fourteen stories dealing with areas where human and animal lives meet, for good or ill, some set in Africa, some in UK.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 169

e-book, 144 pages

A short story by Ian Stewart

Published: 2002

Ajax is back home on the dawn-flooded doorstep. Glare rising sun and crisp golden glow radiating the frightening, unpredictable barrage of whooshing lorries and traffic. 

All of a sudden, it’s that man dimly-remembered out of some forgotten morning’s swirl of the ordinary, a bearded face seen but once on an early bus.

Ajax blunts a noble tradition, stoner Jeff spots flaws in the mad professor’s scheme, Sharon lives her Art and a sickly lad wanks himself to immunity in these cinematic, themed stories, deftly reckoned by a fellow who’s well been around.

“Ian Stewart‘s Cocksuckery is far more thoughtful than its title might suggest. His writing is unusual with surreal twists and an introversion that is both intimate and seductive.”
Gay Times

ISBN: 978 0 9525964 4 8
e-book, 188 pages

By Martin Foreman

Published: 1994

I lay in bed, alternately pushing the covers away and pulling them over me, sure he was in the room sitting in the armchair by the door as he sat every day on the beach. .

I saw his hat, a homburg as neatly creased as his jacket and trousers, his moustache, thick, black and grey, stretching over his lips and onto his cheeks like my father’s, and, half-shaded, his eyes, dark, clear, strong, lying below brows that curled into a frown.

It was not so much his face I saw as the face of all men, the face of my father when I had done something wrong.

This collection of fifteen short stories displays a counterpoint of different voices, each with a ring of authenticity. Some reflect the shifting kaleidoscope of gay reality in 1990s Britain: the sexual compulsion of Room With No View, the high-energy rhythm of Discotheque, or the cynical manipulation of Simon’s Dinner Party.

Others take us to wider horizons. To Brazil and off into landscapes of allegory and myth. Finally, in the masterful title story, we hear the voice of Thomas Mann’s silent Tadzio as he relates his encounter in Venice with the writer Aschenbach.

“Accomplished, literate, dignified, deeply felt.”
Times Literary Supplement, London

“As delicate and haunting a piece of prose as I’ve read all year”
Him (now Gay Times)

“Martin Foreman has an uncomfortable, probably accurate view of the human condition. An excellent book.”
IQ

ISBN: 978 0 85449 185 8

Paperback, 186 pages

Published: 2003

“You can’t blame Colin for that, mother”, Melvin interrupted. “I’m at my physical peak just now; surely you wouldn’t want me to waste it?”

His mother pointed out with dignity “There is such a thing as self-control.”

“But what would I be controlling it for?” Melvin asked.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 02 2

Paperback, 166 pages

Out of print

A memoir by Andrew Cooper

Published: 2017

The journey of self-discovery is seldom simple. Frequently the most unexpected things can reveal themselves. Two Lives tells of Andrew’s journey through gender confusion and his wish to be a woman.

A chance tea-time conversation leads to an exploration of reincarnation and the resolution of his dilemma. Includes 16 pages of photographs, some in colour.

ISBN: 978-1-904585-88-6

Paperback, 96 pages

Out of print

Edited by John Dixon & Jeffrey Doorn

Published: 2016

A Boxful of Ideas is an ambitious anthology from Gay Authors Workshop. A varied line-up of short stories, poems, essays, extracts from novels and a new take on current and abiding topics.

A Boxful of Ideas is an ambitious anthology from Gay Authors Workshop. A varied line-up of short stories, poems, essays, extracts from novels and a new take on current and abiding topics. Authors featured in this anthology include:

• Jeremy Kingston, former theatre critic of The Times.
• Greg Woods, Emeritus Professor of Gay and Lesbian Studies at Nottingham Trent University.
• Chris Beckett, prize-winning poet and author of Ethiopia Boy.
• V.G. Lee, comedian, novelist, winner of the Ultimate Planet Award for established writers.
• Donald West, psychiatrist, author of one of the first British books on homosexuality.

Seventy-five works by thirty authors – a full box indeed!

ISBN: 978 1 904585 862

Out of print

A novel by Timothy Graves

Published: 2015

When Mahvand Amirzadeh, a young gay comics artist, encounters Belial (aka Jean-Baptiste Lebeau-Chevalier) at a literary soiree in the East End, his artistic journey takes an unexpected turn.

Mahvand is lured into the dark underbelly of London’s conceptual art scene and enters into a Faustian-like pact with Jean-Baptiste. But what is Jean-Baptiste’s true nature? And how far will Mahvand go in his quest to become a celebrity artist?

Pharmakeia is a darkly disturbing tale interwoven with humour and light from Candy Darling, the Geordie transsexual who works below Mahvand in the basement sex shop, to Gracie, Mahvand’s cockney-rhyming, Tarot-reading Gran.

ISBN: 978-1-904585-84-8

Paperback

Out of print

An anthology edited by Michael Harth

Published: 2013

How are our lives affected by our erotic impulses? Which impulses and to what extent? Does the particular strain of eroticism that obsesses us at the moment put other people off? And do the varieties of eroticism others enjoy make us curious to join in or more likely to turn tail? 

Here are twenty-seven stories by seventeen authors, each with a different take on the theme.

“The adventure with the window-cleaner had not in any way sated her appetite”
The Juju

“He was so good at what he did that if I weren’t really completely straight I could have been hooked.”
A Handful of Keys.

“Is you goin’ to let me go, girl?” she’s smiling.” 
Life’s like that.

“Now it was once again the fourth weekend of the month, when his rule was to say yes to any offers that might be made to him.”
Leaving It to Chance

“You have curves like a Jaguar. You’re in peak condition. Run in and at maximum performance. What more could you want?”
Foucault’s Nightmare

“The only feature by which I might have been able to recognise him was not on display”
The Bat

“The two drinkers on the bar stools ordered more pints and started a whispered discussion about the couple.”
Judgment Day

“Once he’d got the keys of the car he would load up everything he’d accrued and disappear”
Into the Woods

“To him the generally held notion that there should be some sort of commitment to the person with whom one had sex was a kind of mass delusion”
Getting Laid

“I emphasised at the time that I was a complete novice”
Fantasies

“You are not rough enough for me. And I was told you were picked up fresh from the streets!”
I Go Private

“He was neatly dressed in trousers and a jacket, which normally acts as a warning signal to me”
Cruising

“It was time to help George discover what he really wanted.
The Under-gardener

“His clients had been known to come to blows when arguing whose turn it was for whom”
Expansion

“Twenty years ago or so, when I was really pushed for cash, I went on the game.”
A Question of Taste

ISBN: 978 1 904585 46 6

Paperback, 272 pages

Out of print

Edited by Michael Harth

Published: 2012

This selection of 28 titles by eighteen different authors covers a variety of forms: short stories, excerpts from novels, work in progress, some non-fiction and the odd poem.

The majority have a decidedly gay or lesbian outlook, with a variety of settings, genres and time-scales, but the emphasis throughout is on entertainment.

“You know, those pills, the ones they’ve just invented that turn gay people straight.” Whose Pills

“How do you come to know he’s gay?’ I wanted to know, worried for my son’s moral welfare, even though certain signs have made me feel it’s something of a lost cause.”
Next Door

“I had every intention of jumping. Why else would I have been all the way up there?”
Heads You Win

“Did you hear that?” Elaine whispered. “Did you hear what that Oscar Wilde said?”
A Queens’ Night Out

“The zombie obeyed her slowly, frowning slightly in a puzzled way but moving with surprising grace. My God, and after all I paid for him, Miss Silver exclaimed.”
Caveat Emptor

“I’ve never actually faked an orgasm, but I’ll admit to overacting on occasions.”
Bad Sex

“You were an officer, I bet?”
‘Yes, but I was friendly with the crew.”
The Mad Hatters

“No,” said Alistair, “the pleasure gardens tempted me. Blond, twenty-two, torn jeans. Need I go on?”
On Hold

“So on his next visit, when his attention was distracted by fleshly matters, Madame H kindly arranged to have him slipped a Mickey Finn.”
Penance

“One of the men had dressed as Santa and all had gone well as he circled the room until he reached our ladies who, as if they had taken him for a stripper, urged him to get them off.”
Drop-In and Come Out

ISBN: 978 1 904585 473

Paperback, 208 pages

Out of print

A novel by Timothy Graves

Published: 2010

David Underwood, a hopeless romantic and regular on the drug-fuelled gay scene in London, meets Yossi, an Israeli Jew, at a nightclub. A long distance relationship develops and David begins to uncover the truth behind Yossi’s tragic past.

But what will happen when David’s ex, Ahmed, who is under intense family pressure to marry, makes a sudden reappearance? And how does the terrorist atrocity of 7/7 mark a turning point for the lovers? Will David find a way to be with Ahmed or will he start a new life in Israel with Yossi?

“This has to be one of the most ambitious novels ever written, dealing with everything from illicit Muslim homosexuality and hate crime to GHB abuse and international terrorism. Graves is a writer to watch.”Attitude

“Homo Jihad is an impressive debut from an exciting new voice in gay fiction.”
Time Out

“Homo Jihad is a high-octane account of a gay love affair set in a world of chemical highs.”
Paul Burston, author of The Gay Divorcee

“Homo Jihad is a compelling gay love story which, in many ways, captures the zeitgeist of our times. Powerful stuff! A real page turner.”
Amjeed Kabil, author of Straightening Ali

ISBN: 978 1 904585 15 2

Paperback, 300 pages

Out of print

A novel by Rex Batten

Published: 2006

In the early 1950s the Home Secretary, Sir Daved Maxwell Fyffe, claimed he would 'Rid England of this Plague' - the plague of homosexuality.

Paradoxically, it was the reaction to the zeal with which the Establishment carried out the Home Secretary's behest that resulted in the setting up of the Wolfenden Committee when the first steps were taken to rid England of the plague of Homophobia.

That period is the setting for Rex Batten's novel. “I wrote it as fiction, to give me more scope, and a wider perspective, in creating the atmosphere and feeling of that era.”

Despite its fictional form, it has been widely used as a textbook example of the climate of fear and its consequences in the 1950s.

ISBN 978 1 904585 08 4

Paperback, 320 pages

Out of print

By Jeremy Kingston

Published: 2001

This is Jeremy Kingston’s fourth collection of poems, and the second published by Paradise Press. 

Using a wide range of verse forms, rhymed and unrhymed, the 37 poems express feelings about erotic encounters at home and abroad before moving into darker areas of betrayal, revenge and the power and dangers of myth.

Topics cover childhood and family memories and relationships straight and gay. Jeremy reads new interpretations into photos, paintings, and myth.

He deals with politics, war, and religion, always quizzically and often using some little-known fact or unusual angle to make a telling and thought-provoking point.

A theatre critic on The Times for more than 20 years, two of his plays were performed in the West End. He has written two novels and two children’s book. 

His poems appeared in the Paradise Press anthologies, Coming Clean and A Boxful of Ideas and his previous volume, Risking It, was also published by Paradise Press. 

Out of print

A novel by Martin Foreman

Published: 1990

The attraction of sunshine, warmth and clear skies on a day when he did not have to teach, was weaker than that of sleep. 

He turned onto his side, withdrew his head beneath the covers and hugged the pillow as he would have hugged Robert, as he had hugged Carl and Gene and others before them.

The action was as momentarily satisfactory as a reflex, but the pillow’s softness, its smallness, its lack of smell and resistance, soon irritated and he pushed it away.

Martin Foreman‘s first novel charts the course of two days in the life of a gay man in his twenties who is facing a crisis in his current relationship. Interwoven with the tensions between Mark and Robert are Mark’s memories of two previous lovers; Gene, an introverted and self-sufficient painter who lives in Paris, and Carl, a barman whose demands as a lover become almost too much for Mark to bear.

“Absorbing first novel”
Gay Times

ISBN: 978 1 870188 15 9

Published by Third House and distributed by Paradise Press.

Paperback, 172 pages

Out of print

By Ivor Treby & edited by John Dixon

Published: 2007-2012 & 2014

Ivor Treby was an early gay literary activist who first published his poems in the late 1970s and early 1980s in small gay magazines in the UK, USA, and Australia, where he also gave readings at gay venues.

He wrote four volumes of poetry but gave up to concentrate on research into Michael Field, the pseudonym of the lesbian poets, Edith Cooper and Katherine Bradley. Ivor resumed writing in 2007 and at his death in 2012 left 68 poems, published here for the first time, with an introduction by John Dixon.

“Ivor Treby was a pioneering gay activist and an early advocate of the importance of gay literature, that is to say, fiction and poetry written by openly gay writers for a gay audience. This was one of the ways in which we created a sense both of a community and of a culture. His was a distinctive voice, and we feel its loss.”

Peter Scott-Presland, author of Amiable Warriors: A History of the Campaign for Homosexual Equality and Its Times

ISBN: 978 1 904585 70 1

Paperback, 192 pages

Out of print

By Michael Harth

Published: 2002

“Well, at least let me have Marcus again” pleaded Simeon.

“You know perfectly well it’s your turn to see Donald this week. I’m sure I don’t know why everyone keeps asking for Marcus.”

“It’s his attributes, that’s what it is. When you get to my age, it becomes important.”

Male au-pairs, sex services for OAPs, abduction by aliens, a sex contest between two schoolboys, and a picnic that goes wrong, are among the themes in this light-hearted, picaresque collection of stories.

ISBN: 978 0 9525964 3 1

Paperback, 148 pages

Out of print

By Jeremy Kingston

Published: 2016

Risking It is Jeremy Kingston’s third poetry collection. Using a variety of verse forms, rhymed and unrhymed, they express feelings to do with erotic encounters at home and abroad before moving into darker areas of betrayal, revenge and the power and dangers of myth.

The tone now ranges between sorrow, mirth and resignation, at times managing to combine all three while also exploring the delights of metaphor, in language and among orchids.

ISBN: 978 1 904585 87-9

Paperback, 64 pages

Out of print