Backslide

What has brought best-selling lesbian novelist Virge Young to this day–to an intensive care unit where she hovers between life and death from a gunshot wound? The road begins in 1969. Virge is thirteen. Dominant in her world are her inflexible, dogmatic father, her rebellious brother, and a mother who tries her best to run interference among all of them. Ricki Ann is Virge’s best friend–more than her best friend. Complicating matters between them are a profoundly conflicted young man named Ronnie Lane; Virge’s secret African-American friend Mel; and a fire and brimstone preacher named Pastor Bob. Also impacting young Virge’s life are holocaust survivor Mrs. Rosenbaum, notorious Great Aunt Belle, a girl named Leigh Ann–and other memorable figures you’ll come to know along Virge’s road to identity and self-affirmation, especially a woman named Ruth.

Backslide is about love and forgiveness and the capacity for growth and acceptance; Backslide is about courage in the face of relentless opposition.

Backslideis above all a great story told with sublime artistry, with tenderness and depth. Backslide is destined to be a classic.