Paul Burston
Paul Burston is a Welsh journalist and author. Born in York and raised in South Wales, Burston attended Brynteg Comprehensive School and studied English, Drama and Film Studies at university. He worked for the London gay policing group GALOP and was an activist with ACT-UP before moving into journalism. He edited, for some years, the gay and lesbian (later LGBT) section of "Time Out" magazine. His first novel "Shameless", published in 2001, was praised by "The New York Times". Burston's novel "The Black Path" was published by Accent Press in September 2016 and was long-listed  in a "Guardian" "Not The Booker Prize" feature article. He is the founder and host of award-winning LGBT literary salon Polari, which began in a bar in Soho before moving to the Southbank Centre. He is also the founder of The Polari Book Prize for new and established LGBTQ+ writing, which is now based at The British Library. By October 2018, five novels and two short story collections by Burston had been published. In that month, "The Bookseller" reported that his sixth novel "The Closer I Get" was published by Orenda Books as part of a two-book deal . "The Closer I Get", published in July 2019, was partly inspired by the author's experience of online harassment. In December 2021, The Bookseller announced that his memoir We Can Be Heroes would be published by Amazon imprint Little A in June 2023.