Armistead Maupin

Armistead Maupin is a well-known American author, best recognized for his Tales of the City series. He was born in Washington, D.C., in 1944, but grew up in Raleigh, North Carolina. Maupin's interest in storytelling started at the early age of eight, and he pursued this passion throughout his life. He attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he wrote for The Daily Tar Heel.

After graduating, Maupin served in the Mediterranean as a naval officer and in Vietnam as part of the River Patrol Force. His diverse experiences in the military would later provide rich material for his writing. Upon returning home, Maupin worked as a reporter for a newspaper in Charleston, South Carolina, before moving to San Francisco in 1971 to work for the Associated Press. It was in this liberal and tolerant city that Maupin felt inspired to publicly come out as homosexual in 1974. Two years later, he launched his groundbreaking Tales of the City serial in the San Francisco Chronicle, which was the first fiction to appear in an American daily for decades.

Maupin has written nine novels, including the six-volume Tales of the City series, Maybe the Moon, The Night Listener, and Michael Tolliver Lives. His work has been adapted into three successful miniseries and a feature film. Currently, he is working on a musical version of Tales of the City with Jason Sellards and John Garden of the pop group Scissor Sisters. Maupin resides in San Francisco with his husband, Christopher Turner.