Outlaw: The Lives and Careers of John Rechy

When it first appeared in 1963, John Rechy’s City of Night was greeted with equal parts fanfare and horror. The unapologetically sexual story of a young gay hustler was praised by critics but shocked some readers with its frank treatment of an underground world most pretended did not exist. Equally unsettling was that the novel was largely autobiographical. That a street hustler had gained such literary fame and widespread acclaim was disturbing to many, but Rechy continued to publish explosive novels, including Numbers, The Sexual Outlaw, and Rushes – even as he continued to hustle seedy Hollywood Boulevard – and soon became an integral part of the new literary elite that included Gore Vidal, Norman Mailer, and William Burroughs. In this biography, Charles Casillo offers an absorbing picture of the outlaw writer, exploring the contradictions and ironies in Rechy’s “several lives” as author, university professor, and inscrutable hustler. Working closely with Rechy as well as his family and those who knew him during his various incarnations, Casillo presents the first uncensored portrait of a complex man who found sexual liberation through prostitution and used it to create a compelling and influential literary legacy.