For readers of Armistead Maupin’s Logical Family , a heartfelt coming-out and coming-of-age story of a young man uniting his divided self and finding proof of eternal love’s existence. When society is primed to regard you as an outcast even before a sexually transmitted disease starts killing your gay brothers, coming out of the closet is hard enough—but even that is only the first step. Afterward, it can be challenging to cultivate self-respect, let alone find the lasting love you deserve and the home you crave. In this earnest, hopeful memoir, Brooks Kolb explores the conflict between his personal and professional identities as he traces his round trip journey from Seattle to Paris, Philadelphia, London, and San Francisco against the backdrop of the 1970s sexual revolution and the devastating AIDS pandemic that followed. During his travels, Brooks becomes a landscape architect, comes out of the closet, crosses racial barriers to win lasting love, loses that love, and finds belonging. Along the way he learns that freedom demands that one construct their own morality in the face of social ostracism, that loss is an inherent attribute of love, and that the need to belong can be just as urgent as the need for love. Heartbreaking but ultimately inspiring, Landscape in Lavender will charm readers across generations—LGBTQ+, cisgender, and straight alike—who struggle, or have struggled, to live a truly authentic life. " Landscape in Lavender is more than a story of one man’s sexual self-discovery; it’s the story of an entire era in America. Told through the prism of Kolb’s honest and candid voice, it explores what change really means, and how difficult and rewarding it can be. No matter who you are, you’ll see yourself in this wonderful, entertaining, and inspiring memoir." —William Kenower, author of Fearless Writing and Everyone Has What It Takes "In this honest, heartwarming, and heartbreaking tale, he [Kolb] beautifully captures what it was like to be gay during the AIDS era. I cheered, I cried, and those two things made this memoir one of my favorites of all time." —Valerie J. Brooks, author of 1 Last Betrayal Brooks Kolb was educated at the American College in Paris, University College London, and the University of Pennsylvania. At Penn he trained under Ian McHarg, famed author of Design With Nature , and with Laurie Olin, subject of the 2024 documentary Sitting Still . After coming out of the closet, he moved to San Francisco, where he witnessed two key periods of gay history: the post-Stonewall era of sexual liberation and the tragic AIDS epoch. The principal of Brooks Kolb LLC Landscape Architecture and an avid swimmer, Brooks lives in Seattle with his husband, Dennis, and their dog, Stella.