Chamblee54

This is a repost from 2017. It was a simpler time. Looking back six years, we had it pretty good in 2017. Our biggest problem was an orange haired idiot in the White House. In three years we would melt down over Covid. In five years Russia would invade Ukraine. In six years, Israel would crank up the lawn mower. In these six years, the national debt has gone from $20t to $34t. That is a $14t increase in six years. By comparison, the total debt in 2011 was $14t. America has borrowed more in the last six years, than it did in 235 years previously. … So much for today’s fantasy. This repost is a book report of More Tales Of The City, another fantasy from a more innocent time. MTOTC took place in the San Francisco of 1977. Talk about not knowing when you had it good. … Whales of the city is about books four and six of the Tales of the City series. In this report, your humble scribe realizes that he has yard sale copies of books two and three, but does not know if he read them. He soon learns that he had not read those two books.
More Tales Of The City, book two of TOTC, is the subject of today’s book report. It begins with Micheal Tolliver’s Valentines Day Resolutions for 1977. “3. I will stop expecting to meet Jan-Michael Vincent at the tubs. 4. I will inhale poppers only through the mouth.” Cruise ship people wonder why Michael wore a T shirt advertising Crisco.
MTOTC occupies a totally different world from the 1988 scenery of Sure of You, book six. Consuming these stories out of sequence can lead to some head scratching. Either Armistead Maupin could see the future, and had a perverted sense of humor, or synchronicity is real. SPOILER ALERT Things in various parts of TOTC will be discussed below. If you are spoiler sensitive, you can just skip over the text, and look at the pictures. These images are courtesy of The Library of Congress.
The end of MTOTC shows Michael Tolliver and Mary Ann Singleton bemoaning the departure of Burke Andrew. Mary Ann met Burke on a cruise ship. They had their moment, and Burke got a job in New York. Micheal goes back to his southern queen roots, and quotes Scarlett O’Hara… tomorrow is another day. Fast forward four books/eleven years. Burke is a married New York hotshot. He gets Mary Ann to leave San Francisco, finally, and move on to national stardom in the Big Apple.
86 is an expression meaning get out of here. On page 86 of MTOTC, we see this 1977 comment: “There are – and this is conservatively speaking – one hundred and twenty thousand practicing homosexuals within the city limits of San Francisco. … Those one hundred and twenty thousand homosexuals are going to grow old together, Arch. ….Think of it! The first gay nursing home in the history of the world!” The Arch mentioned in this sales pitch is Archibald Anson Gidde. He will die in book six. The obituary will use a euphemism.
A lot of those 120K P.H. were going to die between book two and book six. One of them is Dr. Jon Fielding, an on-and-off bf of Michael Tolliver. The two re-connect on the same cruise ship that facilitated Mary Ann’s romance. On page 109, Michael is fantasizing about having a decadent funeral. Jon listens appreciatively, then says “Don’t die, O.K.? Not until I’m through with you.” In less than five years, Jon will be through with Micheal, and everything else.
MTOTC is a fun book. It is not a documentary. A few of the plot twists will stretch your credibility. It is escapism, and is set in a more innocent era… back when things were still fun. Before we go, we need a couple of one star comments. Robert S. Marrinon “While Tales of the City had redeeming love and touching stories, “More Tales of the City” was simply filthy. I can see why it sold for one cent.” Rozanne “I can’t believe I read another book by this guy. He’s pretty awful.”