Created by Lev AC Rosen
“Ruby is the most welcoming queer bar in San Francisco. Except maybe for me. News has trickled out about me–the gay P.I. with the office above the Ruby–but with it so has my past, and no one at a gay bar wants to get too close to a cop, even if he was kicked off the force for being caught in one.”
— The Bell in the Fog
So, yeah, EVANDER MILLS was a San Francisco cop, until he was caught up in a raid on a gay bar.
Oops.
Okay, so it was 1952, but still… that’s little consolation to “Andy.”
So when the widow of the late Irene Lamontaine, head of the famous Lamontaine soap empire and matriarch of one of the city’s most sexually open-minded families, throws a lot of money at the suddenly unemployed Andy to look into Irene’s suspicious death, he jumps at the chance.
It’s not like he’s got many options.
And that’s how he gets into the Shamus Game. He even nabs an office above the Ruby, the swingingest, most open queer bar in town.
It’s just too bad that much of the city is homophobic (1950s, remember?), and the queer community doesn’t trust him, what with him being an ex-cop and everything. Which means he can’t be too picky about the kinds of cases he takes…
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lev AC Rosen is an American author who writes YA and mysteries. The first novel in his Evander Mills series began with the Macavity Award winning Lavender House, and his most recent young adult novels are Emmett, Lion’s Legacy, and Camp. His books have been nominated for Anthony and Lambda Awards and have been selected for Best of lists from The Today Show, Amazon, Library Journal, Buzzfeed, Autostraddle, Forbes, and many others. He lives in NYC with his husband and a very small cat.
UNDER OATH
- “Lev AC Rosen’s lushly rendered mystery, Lavender House, sets the detective novel on its head. There’s the dishonored policeman sitting on a barstool in 1950’s San Francisco and the elegant woman who slides in next to him with a job. But this femme’s wife has been murdered, and the day-drinking cop has been brutally ousted from his job for being gay. Rosen’s smart, bittersweet tale plays with the oldest truth of all: the price we pay for our identity in America.”
— Walter Mosley - “Movingly explores the strain of trying to pass as straight at a time when living an authentic life could be deadly.” –New York Times Book Review on Lavender House
- “Lavender House… is a new take on a Golden Age crime novel. Its 1950s setting is richly cinematic, with gin martinis, bananas foster and a fantastic mid-century soundtrack… Everything about the crime ― the perpetrator, the victim, the motive ― has a deeper meaning.”
— Washington Post
NOVELS
- Lavender House (2022) | Buy this book | Buy the audio | Kindle it!
- The Bell in the Fog (2023) | Buy this book | Buy the audio | Kindle it!
- Rough Pages (2024) | Buy this book | Buy the audio | Kindle it!
Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.
