"The Friend" by Sigrid Nunez

 A teacher of creative writing inherits a dog from a life-long friend and colleague who has committed suicide. The book, not so much a novel as a gentle ramble, follows the developing relationship between woman and dog as she learns to care for it (a great Dane is an small apartment) and simultaneously to grieve for her friend.

The book has some advice on writing:

• "Because it's all about the rhythm, you said. Good sentences start with a beat." (Pt 1)
• "The mother's old fur coat is the kind of detail writing teachers like to point out to their students, one of those telling details ... that are found in abundance in life but are mostly absent from student fiction." (Pt 1)
• "It's become entrenched, hasn't it. This idea that what writers do is essentially shameful and that we're all somehow suspect characters. ...Can you imagine a dance student feeling that way about the New York City Ballet? Or young athletes despising Olympic champions?" (Pt 11)
• "To become a professional writer in our society you have to be privileged to begin with, and the feeling is that privileged people shouldn't be writing anymore ... because that only furthers the agenda of white supremacy and the patriarchy." (Pt 11)

It also has some poignant insights into live, death and the love of dogs:

• "The dead dwell in the conditional tense of the unreal." (Pt 1)
• "That's what age is, isn't it? Slo-mo castration." (Pt 1)
• "Graffiti on Philosophy Hall: The examined life ain't worth it either." (Pt 3)
• "He doesn't like having his paws touched, though the brat in me keeps trying." (Pt 7)

A meander through life and death, dogs and writing. March 2021; 212 pages

This review was written by 
the author of Motherdarling

"Dead Boys Can't Dance" by Michel Dorais

Written by the man who also wrote Rent Boys, this is a sociological inquiry to understand why the rate of suicide amongst homosexual male youths is sixteen (sixteen!) times higher than for their heterosexual counterparts.

He suggests that there are two scenarios for gay boys: they can be identified as gay early on by other people because of their behaviours. One respondent stated: "At the age of six, I was being called a fag. I was already the school fag. Others therefore knew what I was before I did." (p 33) Others come out or are outed when they are older.

Dorais identifies four "adaptive scenarios in response to rejection" (p 37):

• "The Perfect Boy wishes to live up to expectations ... he will not reveal his homosexuality to others ... his great fear is the anticipated embarrassing event that will compromise him." (pp 37 - 38) For Jean-Francois this happened when his mum read his diary. His parents ostracised him. "They no longer celebrated his birthday." Wow! That's rejection! (p 39) The Perfect Boy scenario tends to end in one of two tragic ways: "The young man reveals his homosexuality and the responses are disbelief, followed by the general dismay of all around him. He is perceived as a traitor and also as an intruder who has been lying about his real desires. He feels, with reason, that he is not understood, and that he is being judged and rejected." (p 40) Alternatively "Instead of revealing his homosexuality, the young male attempts suicide so that he will take his secret with him and hide forever the desires perceived to be so shameful." (p 40)
• "The Token Fag ... pegged as homosexual at an early age ... the object of ridicule, harassment, and psychological and/or physical violence. Given the inaction of adults when faced with his abuse, he feels powerless in these situations, and he will sometimes consider his fate to be sealed." (p 41) One said "I wanted to be between the paint and the wall because I wanted to be invisible." (p 41)
• "The Chameleon's varies from being one who pretends to be and at other times is an imposter. ... This situation reaches crisis levels when he no longer wants to be a part of the masquerade that is suffocating him. ... Arriving at a balance between his secret inner life and his everyday life is difficult for him, and the older he gets, the more he fails to see how to escape the situation ... I felt that I was human garbage because I was gay. ... I was a monster, someone who should not exist: human garbage." (pp 44 - 45)
• The Rebel rejects homophobia and develops a resistance but in one case the rebellion led to drug addiction.

There are some telling insights:

• "Claude found himself on the street with only the clothes he was wearing ... It was therefore in silence, destitution and solitude that he began to cope with family rejection." (pp 52 - 53)
• "My mother, I saw her as a saint. ... When I told her I was questioning the possibility of being gay, she said: 'You better leave now. I don't ever want to see you again.' It's not easy at sixteen to find yourself alone and having to somehow survive. I will always remember that." (p 55) 
• "I slept in saunas and under balconies." (p 66)
• "My parents were fervent believers. ... God rejected and hated gays. A god of love, so it seems." (p 69)
• "It would seem that compatibility is impossible between religious beliefs and homosexuality for those interviewed young men who described themselves as believers, or as having been so. The journey to acceptance of being gay must pass through religious rejection, they say." (p 69)
• "Being treated as a fag is the worst thing that could happen to a boy's status as a male." (p 79)
• "To flourish, human beings must perceive themselves to be part of a whole greater than self." (p 87)
• "Suicide is a final solution to a temporary problem" (p 105)

Ways in which gay men can be resilient (p 85):

• "A healthy determination to criticize and contradict the opinions of others ... I have the right to be different"
• "A sense of humour when facing adversity ... a creativity that permits one to dream as a way of compensating for reality"
• "Well-established significant relationships"
• "The awareness or even the celebration of one's potential in spite of degradation by others."

A fascinating book. May 2017; 114 pages

This review was written by the author of Bally and Bro, Motherdarling  and The Kids of God

"Lost at sea" by Jon Ronson

This is another selection of Jon Ronson's articles about weird people. Ronson talks to robots, investigates attempted high-school shootings in an Alaskan town obsessed with Christmas, goes to a UFO convention with Robbie Williams, investigates mysterious deaths and suicides (there is a shocking piece about people who 'fall overboard' from cruise liners) and Jonathan King's conviction for sex crimes.

The brilliance of Ronson is the way he writes about extraordinary people and events in humdrum and banal terms. When he is with a group of Real Life Super Heroes confronting drug dealers he uses very short sentences to describe an incredibly exciting moment. He points out that he is wearing only a cardigan. After the event he tells the vigilantes that he is going to bed. The juxtaposition of the special with the everyday makes Ronson's writing fascinating, exciting and funny.

I was a little concerned that he repeats the story of Kitty Genovese who was killed in 1964; he states that "at least thirty-eight bystanders saw her lying there and did nothing." This repeats an urban legend started by the New York Times. Closer investigation, for example in Superfreakonomics or even wikipedia suggests that there were about a dozen witnesses of the attack, most of whom heard something (they certainly didn't see her lying there') but only two were aware that it was more than a quarrel. Even Ronson doesn't always get it right.

But

I'd read many of the stories in previous Ronson collections. Of the 26 stories I have read at least 7. That is more than 25%. The purchase price was £8.99 so I reckon that Ronson owes me at least £2.25.

I mean, what did he gain? 26 stories are a lot; he could have published a book with only 19 stories in it and I would still have been willing to pay £9 and enjoyed the 19 new stories. But now I feel cheated.

There is some small print on the title versa page which acknowledges that "portions of this book have appeared previously, in slightly different forms, in Out of the ordinary, What I do..." both of which I have read. So I can't say he didn't warn me. But he himself contains about the small print used by credit card companies which he calls the "tiniest of letters .... infinitesimal print." Perhaps someone who crusades on behalf of the weak and the gullible will be concerned with the reactions of one of his readers: I felt cheated.

I've now bought 5 of his books. Perhaps I won't buy any more.

June 2013; 471 pages but you don't have to read all of them if you've read some before.