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Overview
Fiction. LGBT Studies. Introduction by Bruce Benderson. The borderline lifestyle of twenty-year-old Christian White is a carnival of drugs and sex, accessorized by designer clothes and frequent stealing or scamming. Underneath the decadence are haunting memories of childhood abuse, the death of a brother and a father's criminal past. Expecting to make a fresh start, Christian relocates from San Francisco to New York, just as his friends are being rounded up by the police; but life only spirals farther out of control in the new setting. Instead of drugs, Christian's existence is beginning to center around sex. He has let himself slip into prostitution, and he may have even played a part in the murder of a successful architect, although he can't remember the evening entirely. It has become increasingly clear to Christian that the only way to save himself is to come to terms with the past, no matter how painful—or how dangerous—the trip.
Editorials
Publishers Weekly
Stoddard's debut unconvincingly follows 20-year-old Christian White's downward spiral into a haze of drugs, petty crime, and hustling. Forced to leave home by his deeply religious mother, his childhood compromised by a father incarcerated for murder and a brother killed in a hit-and-run accident, Christian moves to San Francisco and becomes the boy toy of Cale, a well-to-do gay methamphetamine dealer, but ends up on the run in New York, possibly as a murderer. Seems Christian can't quite remember how he woke up in the bedroom of a dismembered man. Memory loss is a recurring theme, which allows the author to overuse the predictable literary device of abrupt flashes of insight by the suddenly enlightened character. There are also strange jumps and gaps in the story that are lightly sketched over or unexplained. Christian is a "great poet," yet we never once encounter any of his poems. The novel apes Hubert Selby Jr.'s Requiem for a Dream, but lacks Selby's interesting characters and accomplished prose. Clothing labels get more attention than character development, and despite his suffering, Christian comes across as self-absorbed, vapid, and materialistic. (Jan.)Publishers Weekly
Stoddard's debut unconvincingly follows 20-year-old Christian White's downward spiral into a haze of drugs, petty crime, and hustling. Forced to leave home by his deeply religious mother, his childhood compromised by a father incarcerated for murder and a brother killed in a hit-and-run accident, Christian moves to San Francisco and becomes the boy toy of Cale, a well-to-do gay methamphetamine dealer, but ends up on the run in New York, possibly as a murderer. Seems Christian can't quite remember how he woke up in the bedroom of a dismembered man. Memory loss is a recurring theme, which allows the author to overuse the predictable literary device of abrupt flashes of insight by the suddenly enlightened character. There are also strange jumps and gaps in the story that are lightly sketched over or unexplained. Christian is a "great poet," yet we never once encounter any of his poems. The novel apes Hubert Selby Jr.'s Requiem for a Dream, but lacks Selby's interesting characters and accomplished prose. Clothing labels get more attention than character development, and despite his suffering, Christian comes across as self-absorbed, vapid, and materialistic. (Jan.)Book Details
Published
July 7, 2010
Publisher
Triton Books
Pages
230
Format
Hardcover
ISBN
9780982807415