Gay Authors/Books that Inspire Me: Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote

In autumn 1943, the unnamed narrator (a gay writer, so we assume it’s Capote himself) befriends Holly Golightly. The two are tenants in a brownstone apartment in Manhattan’s Upper East Side. Holly (age 18–19) is a country girl turned New York café society girl. As such, she has no job and lives by socializing with wealthy men, who take her to clubs and restaurants, and give her money and expensive presents; she hopes to marry one of them. According to Capote, Golightly is not a prostitute but an "American geisha”. 

Holly likes to shock people with carefully selected tidbits from her personal life or her outspoken viewpoints on various topics (patterned after Christopher Isherwood’s Sally Bowles in The Berlin Stories). Over the course of a year, she slowly reveals herself to the narrator, who finds himself fascinated by her curious lifestyle.

No writer creates more interesting characters than Capote. He strikes the notes between quirky, uncommon people and their actions and simple touching stories. His characters aren't quite lovable (not people you would want to invite over to dinner with the folks) but they are nevertheless very human and often touching, not off-putting. Breakfast At Tiffany's is much grittier than the rather sanitized Audrey Hepburn-George Peppard film version.