Sad news! Armistead Maupin, author of the Tales of the City novels among others and a writer more fully identified with San Francisco than any other living writer we can think of (don't say Danielle Steel), has decided to move to New Mexico! Leah Garchik breaks the news today, saying that Maupin, 68, and his husband Christopher Turner are packing up to summer in Provincetown before taking a cross-country journey that will ultimately land them in Santa Fe, for good.

The onetime Chronicle columnist, whose columns about an ensemble cast of San Franciscans were eventually put into book form and then mini-series and musical form as Tales of the City, says that he and Turner are "both craving a little more space and some nature," and they'll be taking their Labradoodle with them and settling in a new place with "a different magic from San Francisco."

He's currently working on another Tales book, The Days of Anna Madrigal. Also, he'll be at Burning Man.

Anyway, we suppose everyone has to retire at some point. But this is depressing.

[Chron]