David Leavitt's first collection of stories, Family Dancing, was a finalist for both the National Book Critics Circle Award and the PEN/Faulkner Prize. He is also the author of "The Lost Language of Cranes", which was made into a film by the BBC; "Equal Affections"; "A Place I've Never Been"; "While England Sleeps", which was short listed for the Los Angeles Times Fiction Prize and "The Page Turner". With Mark Mitchell he is a co-editor of "The Penguin Book of Gay Short Stories" and co-author of "Italian Pleasures". A receipient of John Simon Guggenheim Foundation fellowship and a fellowship from the National Endowment from the Arts, David Leavitt lives in Italy.

In 'Saturn Street' a disaffected screenwriter in Los Angeles volunteers to deliver lunches to homebound AIDS patients and falls in love with one of his clients. In 'The Wooden Anniversary', Nathan and Celia - characters familiar to readers of Leavitt's short story collections - reunite awkwardly, at the cooking school Celia runs in Tuscany, after a five-year separation. And in 'The Term Paper Artist', a writer named David Leavitt, hiding out at his father's house in the aftermath of a publishing scandal, experiences literary rejuvenation when he agrees to write term papers for UCLA undergraduates in exchange for sex. Comical, lyrical and speculative, in these three innovative novellas David Leavitt explores the themes of escape, exile and homecoming with a keen eye for human weakness - and strength. (Amazon)