Bears on Bears: Interviews and Discussions

Revealing, challenging, often humorous, Bears on Bears is an acclaimed, groundbreaking collection of one-on-one interviews and small group discussions that examine the homomasculine subculture called Bears. In these 30 wide-ranging, groundbreaking interviews, more than 60 gay and bisexual men expose their furrier side in their own words. They reveal their experiences as gay, bi, and trans Bears and Bear-lovers who find their physical image and personal lifestyle at odds with stereotypically ephebic, effeminate, fashion-obsessed gay male culture. Finding intimate affirmation within the increasingly international Bear brotherhood, they discuss coming-out as Bears and the early history of Bear subculture.Contributors include comedian Bruce Vilanch, “Survivor” Richard Hatch, model Jack Radcliffe, and authors David Bergman, Michael Bronski, Jack Fritscher, Wayne Hoffman, Arnie Kantrowitz, Richard Labonté, Dr. Lawrence Mass, Eric Rofes, Mark Thompson, and Les K. Wright.Praised by Andrew Sullivan on Salon.com as “the invaluable book” on Bears, the revised edition of Bears on Bears features additional interviews with filmmakers Kevin Bowe and Dan Hunt, radio personality Larry Flick, author Jonathan Cohen, and Metropolitan Community Church founder Rev. Troy Perry.Bears on Bears confronts conventional images of male beauty and contemporary concepts of masculinity in a moving and colorful portrait of a men’s community that makes for fascinating reading on many levels.

Ron J. Suresha, an award-winning author and editor of more than a dozen books, was named "2008 Bear of the Year" by TheCompleteBear.com, and is considered a Bear community Pioneer. He has been involved with Bear communities since the late 1980s, when he lived in San Francisco with Chris Nelson, one of the creators of Bear magazine, and created signs, graphics, and promotions for the Lone Star Saloon. He is the senior editor, with Pete Chvany, Ph.D, of the 2005 nonfiction anthology, Bi Men: Coming Out, and solo editor of the 2006 fiction anthology, Bi Guys, both of which were named finalists for the Lambda Literary Awards. Suresha edited another special issue for Journal of Bisexuality in 2010 on Bisexual Perspectives on the Life and Work of Alfred C Kinsey, also a Lambda Literary Awards finalist. He authored with Scott McGillivray a 2012 pictorial book with essays, Fur: The Love of Hair, winner of a Rainbow Book Award. Suresha, who has published two award-winning books of folklore, also writes and edits fiction under the pseudonym R. Jackson.