Meet Beebo Brinker, the most popular book of The Beebo Brinker Chronicles, a six-part lesbian pulp series (1957-1962), a.k.a. the super sexy dime store novels of the mid-20th century where the queers usually die…but(!) Beebo doesn’t. Bannon writes of the iconic, tall, hot, mildly-unhinged Beebo as she tries to make a life for herself in late 1950s Greenwich Village, New York City. After being chased out of her conservative Midwestern hometown at only 18 for cross-dressing at a fair, Beebo turns her humble beginnings on their head.

Our hero Beebo wastes no time becoming the hottest butch in the city, aided initially by a semi-closeted gay man who takes her to The Colophon, her first lesbian bar. While the Colophon is where she has her official gay awakening, it is not the central point of her gay chaos. Rather, it is her status as “pizza delivery dyke”--a perfect turn of phrase penned by Autostraddle’s own Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya. Through her pizza delivery job, Beebo meets 1) her sexy archnemesis, Mona, 2) her will-they won’t-they lover Paula, and 3) her tragically unattainable movie-star girlfriend Venus Bogardus. Throughout all this, The Colophon shimmers behind the scenes as the catalyst into Beebo’s self-acceptance and ensuing queer chaos.

Stay tuned!