Beloved Disciples

A dazzling gay love story where devotion sparkles in memory, obsession dances on the edge of reality, and a young man discovers the power of first love.

Simón fell in love the first night he stepped into the only gay club in his unnamed coastal hometown. Albi fell too, despite Simón's quirks--the way he blinks to capture a memory, the way his hands fly when he talks, his inescapable toomuchness. Their first kiss comes on the beach, beneath mango trees. Blink. A season on their secret shore. Blink. The hidden garden Albi tends behind the rectory. Blink. Candles on a coconut cake for his twenty-sixth birthday. Blink. Blink. Blink.

But when Albi dies unexpectedly, Simón is left wandering in memories that feel more alive than the present. Friends and family--his Tía Cachita, best friend Lenita, and estranged mother--come to pull him back. He must choose: remain faithful to a love that haunts him, or rebuild a world without Albi.

With prose "that reverberates with heartfelt intensity, blurring the line between the erotic and the tender, the dreamlike and the real" (Saleem Haddad, Guapa), Elías' debut novel celebrates the intensity of first love, the endurance of devotion, and the search for found family.

Mario Elías is a multidisciplinary artist of Cuban and Syrian descent based in Chicago. His work spans fiction, nonfiction, photography, painting, and printmaking, often exploring themes of identity, memory, and cultural inheritance. His book Queering the Male Gaze reimagined masterpieces of the classical and modern canon through essays and self-portraiture, giving voice to the often-overlooked queer and female figures who shaped them. His visual work has been featured in Vogue, San Francisco Magazine, and Dazed, among others. His portrait collection, Perennial Beauty, was the inaugural show for Golden Gate University's Social Impact Artist Series. He is the founder of The KindaSuper Project, a philanthropic initiative offering free photography and video services to underserved communities. The project has partnered with wildfire survivors, immigrant families, women-of-color-led small businesses, and wildlife rescue organizations.