Unsuitable is likely to surprise and enlighten even readers with an extensive knowledge of the history of women-loving women. It would make a great basis for a documentary film.

Alexander’s book is the first full-length biography of Billie Holiday since Donald Clarke’s Wishing on the Moon (1994). Holiday herself wanted to title her autobiography “Bitter Crop,” the last two words of her signature song, the still shocking “Strange Fruit.” Focusing on the last year of her life as a unifying thread, Bitter Crop shifts backward and forward in time, moving briskly through the singer’s life.

Isherwood’s early life resembles a Masterpiece Theatre period drama.

Winter Kept Us Warm is long overdue for a reassessment. As Canadian film historian, critic, and gay rights activist Thomas Waugh told Dupuis: “It’s so important for a film like this to be preserved, because it really speaks to what it was like to be gay in this time and place. It’s a way to pass on to future generations who have no other way to access it.” Happily, you can judge for yourself: the film is available for viewing on YouTube and on Internet Archive.

PERHAPS there is no one as romantic, or as wistful, as a poet in old age. Likewise there is nothing that spurs a poet’s ruminations so profoundly as loss. Three new collections explore old age and loss in various ways (one in an almost uncategorizable way), each with varying degrees of effectiveness.

The Wildes: A Novel in Five Acts, focuses on Oscar Wilde’s long-suffering wife Constance and their two young boys, Cyril and Vyvyan, as they cope with Oscar’s philandering and the aftermath of his trials and exile.