Rating: 
Summary: What I read while walking the dog
Review: I have not often been so uncomfortable reading a novel. On the surface, the book is about a writer and his relationship with an abused and ill teenager who exists only in a draft novel and as a disembodied voice over the phone line. In fact, it's really about a writer struggling with his recent and bewildering break-up, with his own middle-age and his blossoming self-awareness and dawning humility. I squirmed, put the book aside, did the dishes, read, walked the dog and picked it up again to get through it headlong and finally. I liked that that the protagonist is not very endearing. He's intelligent and sweet (Maupin could not write a bitter character!) of course but he's also arrogant, pushy and relatively unaware of the feelings, needs and efforts of the people who love him. There are truly wonderful but brief depictions that moved and interested me: his lover Jess, the aged dog Hugo, the bi-sexual truck driver and especially the writer's mother. Unfortunately, not being a story about these interesting people, we are constantly drawn back to this hammering saga of a writer struggling with his own humility and powerlessness. This is too much personal surgery out of which to make an interesting novel.
Rating: 
Summary: The Night Listener
Review: I really didn't get what the rave reviews were about. Never read Maupin's books and probably never will again if this book is typical of his writing. I found it a mundane, self-indulgent rant describing in all-too-great-length the main character's personal hurt of losing his lover and his all-too-improbable relationship with a young boy. I never got a sense of why these two characters would ever have enough in common to become friends. I skipped through most of the trite, trying conversations between the main character and his father, his accountant and most of all the thirteen year old boy. I did like the story of the jeweled elephant though.
Rating: 
Summary: A page turner
Review: It never ceases to amaze me that when Mr.Maupin writes a book I get involved in it to the point of addiction. I can't stop reading it, until...alas, it is all gone. I've taken to re-reading his other books, as the characters are so enjoyable to me. In this particular book, I can't get over how real the feelings that the main character randomly thinks about while trying to justify the demise of his long-standing relationship. After many failed relationships, for me, these addled ramblings were too close to home, but the end justified the means. Thank you once again Mr. M, for making a reader out of me. Harry Potter, move over.
Rating:
Summary: Fiction within Fiction!!!
Review: Maupin is such an expert at blurring the lines between the truth and fiction. Can this be based on his own life, or is it just more fiction and not really fact? We really don't know when we are done reading this book, but what a wonderful experience it is. Maupin's books are always full of surprises, and this one is no exception. If you want closure when you read this book, you are going to be disappointed. However, that can be good because when you're done reading this book, you're going to be really thinking and wondering for a long time about the details of this story, and that's the sign of a great book that you're not going to forget. There is nothing predictable here, and I promise you that you won't be able to put the book down till you're finished. I didn't. It's a very touching story, full of emotion, and lots of love. Gabriel Noone's emotional relationship in helping an ailing thirteen year old boy, Pete Lomax, who has suffered terrible abuse by the hands of his parents, is a very moving story. Armistead Maupin is one of the best authors we have today. I always look forward to his next book. Now I just want to know when the movie will be released!!!
Rating:
Summary: It was OK
Review: As someone who has never read another of A Maupin's books and has no knowledge of him whatsoever other than a recommendation from the NY Times Book Review, I can honestly say that this book was OK. I thought for a moment mid-way through that I had abandoned my vow never to read anything remotely "feel good" and was relieved when I was mistaken. But I just don't get the raves. Perhaps if I was a long-time fan I'd feel differently.
Rating:
Summary: Beautiful, Facile Writing
Review: I have not read any of Maupin's other works, but was delighted to discover his beautiful prose style, and his facility with language and characters. The elements of aging, the ambiguities that exist after a breakup in mid-life are smoothly woven into a suspenseful story. Beautifully written.
Rating:
Summary: A Tale of Mystery, Maupin Style
Review: This story is almost meant to be heard, not read. Maupin gives a beautiful performance both as a writer and as a storyteller. The text transports you into the world of Gabriel Noon, a character that resembles Maupin in many ways. The mystery to be solved is quite original, interesting and provoking. This book is definetly not Tales From The City, so don't expect it (although some of the characters are present). It is a universe of its own, and damm good. I recommend it 100%
Rating:
Summary: EXCELLENT Book - Great read!
Review: Although this book is ~300 pages, it's surprising how quickly I completed it. This book is an incredible read. Maupin is excellent at describing detail without boring the reader. While this book does deal with gay themes, that is certainly not the focus of the book. The style of this book is clear and yet sophisticated. It's been a long time since I have stayed up past my bedtime to read a book - but in this case, I just couldn't put it down. I definitely recommend this book to anyone - and especially those that haven't read a book in a while. You won't be disappointed!
Rating:
Summary: An Affirmation of Life and Love
Review: Eight years is a long wait, but Armistead Maupin fans finally have a new, must-read novel from the Tales of the City master. Now, in a "sadder but wiser" way, Maupin confronts maturity. Some readers may miss the glory days of Barbary Lane characters known and loved throughout six earlier novels. But like Maupin and his characters, his early readers have grown older. "The Night Listener" is a long overdue sequel from this modern-gay Dickens. The similarities to earlier Maupin books are the things we've come to count on--authentic dialog, a unique marriage of pace and plot that keeps a sometimes melancholy tone urging toward an inevitable coming together, and the satisfaction following the climax when all is done and said. This Tantric plot manipulation derives partly from Maupin's transparent love for his characters, his acute sensitivity to their fundamental humanity, and his own magnanimous spirit, tolerance, and affirmation of life in the face of crisis and loss. His novels define what gay pride is about. "The Night Listener" addresses issues we care about--the disillusionment, denial, and loneliness when a long-term relationship ends; aging, and how we face it; the paralysis after loss, which Gabriel experiences as writer's block. Encouraged and fortified by his ex-lover, Jess, and by the new purpose he finds as surrogate dad to a dying 13 year old victim of unspeakable parental abuse and AIDS, Gabriel gropes his way back from despair to a larger, redeeming love. Maupin has penned his darkest book to date--an admittedly autobiographical one seeded in his breakup with ex-lover Terry Anderson--a book as tender as any writing he's ever done, told with page-turning suspense and trademark humor. If Gabriel Noone's willingness to believe the fantastic is problematical, he comes by his gullibility honestly as a sort of innocent. His relationships with his own father and with his would-be son play variations on the "child is father of the man" theme. But the end of the romance need not be the end of love. Maupin frames Gabriel's story with Keats' "I am certain of nothing but the holiness of the heart's affection and the truth of imagination." In an Afterword he reminds us how inseparable the two really are.
Rating:
Summary: A big disappointment after a long wait
Review: Okay, so I didn't expect him to return to the folks at Barbary Lane (but it would have been great). I just wasn't ready for this thinly disguished memoir and mess of an unsolved mystery. The author was not ready for his close-up Mr. DeMille! His sycophantic friends and ex-lovers should have told him to write a memoir (or a diary it seems), or write real fiction with an original mystery. I am sad and sorry to pan this book as I will always love Armistead Maupin for the pleasure he gave me in the series. Go back to storytelling please.
|
