Significant Others (novel)

infobox Book |
name = Significant Others
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption = 1st edition cover
author = Armistead Maupin
illustrator =
cover_artist =
country = USA
language = English
series = "Tales of the City"
genre = Novel
publisher = HarperCollins
release_date = 1987
english_release_date =
media_type = Print
pages = 274
isbn = ISBN 0-060-96126-0
(1st edition)
preceded_by = Babycakes
followed_by = Sure of You

"Significant Others" is a 1987 novel by Armistead Maupin, the fifth book in the "Tales of the City" series. It originally was serialized in the "San Francisco Examiner".

Much of the action is set in the Russian River area north of San Francisco. Here, successful businessmen from around the globe gather at Bohemian Grove for a three-week encampment of male bonding, while downriver from them events at Wimminwood, a lesbian music and arts festival, threaten the relationship of DeDe Halcyon-Day and D'orothea Wilson.

Returning characters include Mary Ann Singleton, who is having difficulty balancing her commitment to her career as a local talk show hostess with her obligations as a wife to Brian and mother to Shawna, the illegitimate child of her friend Connie, who entrusted the girl's care to Mary Ann on her deathbed; Michael Tolliver, the romantic gay man who has tested HIV-positive and is taking AZT to combat the threat to his immune system; and Anna Madrigal, the transgendered landlady who mothers her tenants at 28 Barbary Lane on Russian Hill.

New characters include Thack Sweeney, who meets Michael during a tour of Alcatraz; Wren Douglas, a plus-size model whose best-selling self-help book offers hope to overweight women; and Booter Manigault, DeDe's stepfather and a member of the Bohemian Club, who accidentally stumbles into Wimminwood and is held captive by one of its more militant organizers.