What if your love was illegal? What would you do? It’s 1945 and Juliana wants to be a star and she has the singing voice to do it. Alice (Al) is determined to make Juliana into the star she wants to be.The worst thing that could happen to Juliana is to be discovered as gay.The worst thing that could happen to Al is to lose Juliana.Al must guard their secret at all costs.Will the gossip columnists … costs.
Will the gossip columnists and the new laws destroy them?
If you like stories about 1950s Manhattan and behind the scenes drama in theater and nightclubs you’ll love, Olympus Nights on the Square: Book 2 of the Juliana Series. You can enter the series at any point. It’s sexy, funny and deadly serious; it’s full of mobsters, the FBI, McCarthyism, gay bashing, lesbian pulp, a beginning awareness of transgender persons and “cures” for homosexuality. A lot like now.
You can read Book 2 first and still follow the story
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I received an advance ARC from the author for my honest review and I purchased it from amazon.com.
Something I like to do to support my favorite Indy Authors.
Olympus Nights on the Square is historic read, that expertly researched, an educational read even as much of what Vanda writes about telling lesbian/gay history, how they were lumped as Communist’s or thought that they be criminals, drunks or that lesbians would be killers. I wasn’t a ware of it and it makes the read all that more important to read.
I liked Vanda’s writing style, she writes an engaging story, she puts the reader right in the pages, has unforgettable characters, your at the Copa drinking a martini, watching Juliana singing on the stage, sitting at the bar drinking a beer at the Olympus and reads like a play or a movie even.
Even if your not into the reading LBGT books, but like reading post World War 2 books, the author keeps it relatively clean, scenes change before they get to graphic and think you like this one.
She writes it for the time period of post War World 2, the late 40’s, early 50’s, the racial wordings are done in a way that to me wasn’t offensive and found the psychology used in the institutions to be more brutal to read.
The method they used to try to cure Scott’s being attracted to men, was pretty scary reading, can’t believe even at that time that a Psychologist or anyone in the Mental Health profession would think that it would actually work.
I liked that it’s set in New York City, like how Vanda took actually history regarding the celebrities from that time period, added real places, and expertly blended it with her fictional characters.
My favorite character is Alice ‘Al’ Huffman, she’s grownup into a tough, strong women for that time period, found her place in the City and the opposite was what you usually read about women characters from that era.
Definitely give this one a try, you might just end up liking it.
I am in love with these characters! I knew I was smitten when I was thinking about the characters as though they were living, breathing friends of mine. I have friends who were in NYC during the time period of this book, the stories they tell.
I can tell Vanda was a playwright, her characters conversations are so natural, smooth, flowing. I hear them speaking, accents and all. Wish I had been in NY when they were performing, reading these books.
Loved this book! Given all that happened to Al in the first book, this one really showed Al’s growth from her “country girl” persona. She quotes magazines less and instead starts to rely on her experiences. It’s really fun to read her confronting what she thought she knew about the world versus what she’s actually experiencing. And then her internal struggle to unlearn really ignorant things about the very people she spends all her time with really grounds the book. You really feel like you’re watching her grow in a positive way and soon she starts making her own decisions instead of constantly relying on others to do that for her. Also her foray into club management keeps you on your toes. My word! You’re never really sure what to expect but man, you are NEVER disappointed!
I couldn’t get into the book. It didn’t keep my interest
A disappointing follow-up to Julianna.
This series has been very interesting as it is fictional characters,based on reality. It really opened up my mind into just how terrible life was, and scary, for gays and lesbians.
This is part of a series of books that I have read must’ve been really scary to be in the LGBT generation of the 40s and 50s . A recommended read the series