San Francisco in the Raw
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Folsom Street Blues: A Memoir of 1970s SoMa
and Leatherfolk in Gay San Francisco
by Jim Stewart
Palm Drive Publishing
213 pages, $14.95

SAN FRANCISCO’S South of Market, or SoMa, is a large swath of several blocks that runs parallel to the city’s main thoroughfare, Market Street, much of it in the shadow of downtown and the financial district, and ending somewhere near the Bay Bridge, just a few blocks from the waterfront. No one really agrees on SoMa’s exact boundaries, but few dispute its unique position in gay history. The word “neighborhood” doesn’t quite apply, even in light of longstanding redevelopment efforts and more recent tech-industry-fueled gentrification.