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For almost four decades, Michael Connelly has set his characters loose in a city of big dreams and lucky breaks. Now they’re facing an altered landscape. So is he.

A major figure in independent publishing, he promoted Henry Miller’s once-banned book and helped make “A Confederacy of Dunces” a best seller after the author’s death.

By day, he helped run an autism center he opened in a suburb of Paris. In the evening, he delighted audiences as a clown named Buffo. In between, he wrote novels.

The travel writer and essayist discusses his new book, “Aflame,” about his stays at a California monastery.

These lurid paperbacks offer today’s readers a portal to an early, furtive era of queer expression.