About The Man in the Gray Flannel Skirt:

Before he became "one of the most recognizable and iconic unknowns on New York City's literary circuit" (New York Observer), Jon-Jon Goulian was a hyper-neurotic kid who felt out of place wherever he turned, and who, in his own words, was forever on the verge of "cracking beneath the pressures of modern life." From his fear of competition, to his fear of pimples, to his fear of sex, to his fear of saturated fat, the range and depth of his childhood phobias were seemingly boundless.

With two older brothers, so proper and successful, providing a sterling example he can never live up to, and with his stern grandfather, the political philosopher Sidney Hook, continually calling him to account for his intellectual failure, Jon-Jon—feeling pressed against the wall, wracked with despair, and dizzy with insecurity—instinctively resorts, for reasons that only became clear to him many years later, to a most ingenious scheme for keeping conventional expectations at bay: women's clothing! Ingenious, perhaps, but woefully ineffective, as Jon-Jon discovers, again and again, that behind his signature skirt, leggings, halter top and high heels, he's still the same little boy, as terrified of life as he always was.

In this hilarious and heartfelt coming-of-age story, Jon-Jon's witty and infectious voice shines through, as he comes to terms with what it means to truly be yourself.

About the Author:

Jon-Jon Goulian grew up in La Jolla, California, where he wore a skirt to his high school prom. A grandson of political philosopher Sidney Hook, he attended Columbia College and NYU Law School. After clerking for a federal judge in North Carolina, he decided to leave the law, and gave all his suits and ties to his two older brothers. For the next thirteen years or so, as he groped for a larger purpose in life, he flitted from one job to another, the most respectable of which was a two-year stint as an assistant to Robert Silvers at The New York Review of Books. This is his first book.