• Co-op available
• Print galleys available upon request. E-galley on Edelweiss.
• Tour info: Commemorative group events planned in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area. 
• National media campaign: Pursuing excerpts, reviews, features, and interviews with radio, newspapers, magazine, literary journals, websites, and blogs interested in LGBTQ+, Latinx, and literary works. 
• Online/social media campaign: Includes City Lights’s robust and active social media: Instagram (58K followers), Facebook (60K followers) and Twitter (132K followers)
• Promotion through forthcoming author web site
• Bookseller promotion: We’re pursuing nominations for IndieNext.

A newly discovered manuscript of unpublished work by one of the most important Chicanx voices of the last thirty years.

“Before he died in 1996, Cuadros left behind this remarkable gift. . . . this intense work depicts the rejection . . . often faced in Latino families, the empowerment spurred by sexual freedom, the menacing impact of the epidemic and the personal toll on Cuadros and his friends.”— Los Angeles Times on Gil Cuadros’s City of God, honored as an “Essential Los Angeles Book,” April 2023 

Gil Cuadros was a groundbreaking gay Latinx writer whose work explored the intersections of sexuality, race, and spirituality. Diagnosed as HIV positive in 1987, he channeled his experiences into City of God, published by City Lights in 1994. Driven by the raw emotions of living with a life-threatening illness, his lyrical intensity and unflinching honesty shined a light on marginalized communities and familial expectations. In the thirty years since, City of God has gone on to become a classic of Chicanx literature.

My Body is Paper is a recently discovered treasure, an unpublished body of work that is destined to capture the attention of an entirely new generation of readers. Although written more than a quarter century ago, these captivating stories and evocative poems leave an indelible mark, speaking to issues we grapple with today—sex, spirit, family, religion, culture of origin, and the betrayals of the body. Cuadros fearlessly sheds light on the indifference and cluelessness of the healthcare system toward people from marginalized communities: the trauma of HIV/AIDS still reverberates for those afflicted with our most recent plague. Family and church may be the first experiences of love and community, but too often try to tamp us down, leaving a trail of profound mistrust. Sex can free us, and can wound us, and we may welcome both. Cuadros dives into these complexities with a resilient spirit, animating the everyday and the imagination, showing us that we too can survive these times—and beyond.