Tom Meeker is a handsome rookie priest stranded in a dying rural parish. Vidal Stump is a proud, gay half-breed with a criminal record and unlawful desires. Father Meeker must choose between his sacred vows and his secret attraction to this Fancy Dancer who lures him into forbidden love.
First published two decades ago, this provocative, hard-hitting novel was the first bestseller to portray a gay priest and to explore gay life in a small town.
Patricia Nell Warren is the landmark author of some of the most popular gay novels of all time. Each of her books has been a milestone in America’s understanding and acceptance of GBLT themes. Her most beloved work, The Front Runner, has sold an estimated ten million copies in ten languages. The first modern story about gay love to become an international bestseller, Warren’s celebrated saga of an ex-Marine track coach and his Olympics-bound athlete has engaged and inspired both gay and mainstream readers for over a quarter of a century. Warren’s novels have also sold heavily to libraries and are used in numerous college courses. Wildcat Press is Ms. Warren’s exclusive imprint, offering some of the best in enduring gay literature. Established in 1993, the dynamic independent publisher has released both past and present bestsellers, winning it critical acclaim. Current titles include, The Front Runner, Billy’s Boy, Harlan’s Race, The Fancy Dancer, The Beauty Queen, One Is The Sun, and The Wild Man. Dedicated to furthering free speech, Wildcat Press has been one of the plaintiffs for the ACLU in several recent landmark lawsuits, two of which went to the United States Supreme Court. Wildcat maintains that we are all one community regardless of race, creed, or sexual orientation, and that tolerance brings understanding and acceptance.
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Patricia Nell Warren has written and published professionally since 1954, at age 18. In 54 years, her subjects have ranged from women and Goddess Earth to human rights, from gay life and mixed-blood people in American history to wildlife, the environment and current events.
Now 73 years old, she was born in 1936 and raised on a Montana ranch. She worked as a Reader's Digest book editor for 15 years, on both the magazine staff and the Condensed Book Club.
Today Warren lives in Los Angeles, where she co-owns an independent book-publishing and media company, Wildcat International, in partnership with media specialist/writer Tyler St. Mark.
Fiction
Since 1971 Warren has published eight novels -- several with mainstream publishers (Morrow, Bantam, Ballantine, Dial Press, Penguin) and several under her own independent imprint, Wildcat Press. The Front Runner, Harlan's Race and Billy's Boy are a landmark series that follows an evolving family through 20 years of gay life. Her most recent gay-themed novel is The Wild Man, a bestseller that came out in 2001.
She also published two mainstream novels, The Last Centennial (1971) and One Is the Sun (1991), as well as four books of Ukrainian poetry.
Warren's best-known fiction work, The Front Runner, was first published by William Morrow in 1974, and became the most popular gay love story of all time. The book has sold an estimated 10 million copies worldwide and been translated into ten languages, the most recent being Italian.
Film rights of The Front Runner have been in development for some years, and recently received a great deal attention as one of "Hollywood's unmade gay films" during Brokeback Mountain's run-up for the Academy Awards.
Currently Warren is working on a new novel titled Wrong Side of the Tracks.
Nonfiction
Warren's newest title is her first nonfiction book. It's titled The Lavender Locker Room, an anthology of nonfiction articles about gay pioneers in sports history, that appeared on Outsports.com. Published in 2006, it was an Amazon history topseller, won the Independent Publisher Gold Medal in the gay-lesbian category, and was a finalist in the Benjamin Franklin Awards.
Warren's articles and op-eds have appeared in a variety of mainstream publications, including Atlantic Monthly, Los Angeles Times, Reader's Digest, San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, Modern Maturity, Persimmon Hill, New York Press, Des Moines Register, Mythosphere, Corporate Africa. She has also published in various leading gay publications.
For A & U Magazine she writes a monthly column on the politics of AIDS and public health. Online, she blogs at The Bilerico Project, the most popular and politically vociferous glbt blog on the Web, as well as the Huffington Post.
She is also writing further sports profiles for Outsports.com and Lavender Locker Room II.
Film Development
As a result of interest in movies based on her novels, Warren has moved into active development herself as an executive producer, in partnership with Greg Zanfardino of Moniker Entertainment.
At present, she has several docudrama projects on her slate, including an Australian group's novel search for the wreck site of Amelia Earhart's aircraft in Papua New Guinea.
Activism and Politics
Warren's political activism started during the 1960s, with efforts -- while still a Reader's Digest editor -- to have American media recognize the individuality of Ukrainians and other ethnic groups in the USSR.
In the 1970s Warren was the plaintiffs' spokesperson for Susan Smith v. Reader's Digest, a landmark lawsuit that resulted in a class-action victory for women. As a former amateur athlete, Warren helped lead a group of women distance runners who forced the AAU (Amateur Athletic Union, the then governing body of amateur sports in the U.S.) to change discriminatory rules in the mid-70s.
More recently, in the free-speech realm, Warren has been a named plaintiff in both federal lawsuits over Internet censorship -- namely ACLU v. Reno (which went to the U.S. Supreme Court and resulted in a victory for the plaintiffs) and the more recent ACLU lawsuit over the Child Online Protection Act (COPA), which was also struck down as unconstitutional.
Her most recent political step was her first time out as a candidate in 2007. She ran for city council in West Hollywood, CA, on a platform that included a goal of WeHo being the first in the country to offer universal single-payer healthcare to its residents. She lost to an incumbent, but ran a creditable campaign and got 23 percent of the vote.
As recognition for her activism and contribution to public, Warren has won a number of awards, including New York City's Public Advocate Award and the Barry Goldwater Award.
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More information on Warren can be found at : www.wildcatpress.com and www.patricianellwarren.com.
The first time I read this book, I was a confused struggling young man trying to make sense of his sexuality...much like Tom Meeker only without the collar. Now, 24 years later...I'm the priest still struggling to make sense of his sexuality and of love. This book, so poingantly describes the struggle that many of us in the priesthood must contend with as we live closeted lives. Unlike Tom Meeker, I chose to leave rather than stay...but there are many more who have been able to endure issues that Patrician Nell Warren so very accurately and sensitively wrote about in the book. While it is listed as "fiction", there is more truth in these pages than meet the eye. It touched me as well being a native american as I could grasp the world of Fr. Tom AND his lover, Vidal. TEN stars...not just FIVE.
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As a gay jewish man, I was intrigued by this book by PatriciaNell Warren. The love that the priest finds with the title character,The Fancy Dancer (you'll have to read it to know what it means - I'm not saying), is so overwhelming that it reminded me of my own coming out a few years ago. While it is not a celebratory happy ending, the book leaves you with the feeling that the men involved here are on teh right track. I have to admit, I'm hoping Ms. Warren revists these characters and writes a sequel like she did with The Front Runner series.
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In 1954 I was stationed with the U.S. Navy in the Washington, D.C. area. While I was on duty one rainy evening in August, a captain in the Medical Corp. was billeted in the brig awaiting trial on charges of having sexual relations with an enlisted man. This medical doctor had been in the Navy for most of his adult life. He knew the consequences if he was caught in a homosexual act. Instead of waiting for the trial, the dignified doctor lay down on his narrow cot, poured lighter fluid over himself and lit a match. When I saw his charred body, brig personnel had carried his remains to the sidewalk where a damp summer wind carried the stench over the whole Naval complex. As I stood over the charred bones, I wondered what caused a man to commit an act that would cause him if caught to take his own life. Also, I made a vow that evening that if I could do anything to change public opinion that caused this decorated captain to take his life. I would.
Patricia Nell Warren, authoress of the Fancy Dancer, has given me a keen insight into a young priest who risked being defrocked because of his touching love for a degenerate young man. This story appalled me at times, but yet I thank a writer who tells a touching story, in a manner that made it impossible to put the novel down before I read the last word. Patricia, thank you for giving me an understanding insight into the Gay lifestyle. Luther Butle
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