Drew Payne

I think the fact that they got back together in 1991 and were together for the rest of Kramer's life is far more interesting then the plot of this book. I wish he had written about that relationship, with the insight he showed in The Normal Heart and The Destiny of Me. Thanks for the details.

I first read it as a teenager and, though all the sex scenes made a "big" impression on me, I found I couldn't identify with any of the characters and the ending left me so down. It was just as negative as what the homophobes, back then, were telling me gay life would be. I sort-of re-read it for this review (well I skipped through it) and sadly found my memory of it wasn't wrong. I think Kramer always wanted to be one of the hot gays EVERYONE wanted to shag, and Heaven knows he wasn't. I also think he was a much better playwriter than he was anything else, he wrote two great plays (to my knowledge, because I haven't read his first one) and two great screenplays, but maybe that was because he HAD to work with other people to have them produced, the final draft wasn't just down to him. One interesting thing I found out, only just before he died, was that his partner for the second half of his life (long after this book was published) was the man who was the bases of the super gay hunk Dinky Adams, in this book, who the central character didn't end up with.

Thank you for this. This all happened 19 years ago which has made it easy to write this, what made it difficult to write was that I didn't know where to start it and what to do with it when I'd written it. I wrote an essay about my mother in the week between her death and her funeral, but I never wrote anything about my father. I always felt awkward about not having written about him. If I had written it, what would I have done with it? The piece about my mother sat unused on my computer for years and years. Then I started this blog. When I posted the piece about my mother, I got such good feedback that I knew I had to write about my father too. With him there was so much to write about. I wanted to write about what grief did to him, how strange and useless I felt because I'm a nurse and yet there wasn't anything clinical for me to do, that really dumb thing the vicar of my sister's church said and what my father was waiting for. When I remembered how quiet his room was at the hospice, and I remembered the few sounds in it, then I had my way into writing this essay. I wrote it in one afternoon. I thought it was egotistical to write about myself, thinking that I was so important and interesting that people would want to read about me, which isn't the case. I'm not that interesting and I'm certainly not important. But what I found out was that people have been through the same things as me, and that recognition speaks to them. That's so humbling. But I only write about things that I've come to terms with, that no longer hurt me. There are still so many things that I won't write about because they still generate too many emotions for me. My father and I had a complicated relationship. Since his death I've had plenty of time to think about it. I've also been able to talk with Martin, my husband, and my brother, who had a very different relationship with him, about my father. This has all helped me to understand so much about what happened. That has helped so much. Life can be so complicated.

The events here took place 19 years ago and yet I can remember it like it was yesterday, sitting there in that hot quiet room. I hate the attitude that says "you'll get over it", but I have found that I've accepted it and that adversaries and memories don't hurt as much, I've stopped constantly questioning myself that I should have done things differently. I can now enjoy the memories of my parents, good and bad.

Thank you, it wasn't easy to write because I kept putting off doing it, but I also felt rather guilty for not doing so because I had written an essay about my mother but not about my father. So when I started this blog I set myself the deadline of writing this, of giving my father the essay I'd given my mother. My memories of my father are mixed but he was a complicated human being and had his faults as well as his virtues. I will be writing some essays about him and my mother, it is my way of keeping them alive and honoring their memories. On the surface they lead such simple and quiet lives, but once I started to look further their lives were anything but simple. They have already given me so much to write about.

That is the perfect description. Here people are given everything they think they need to be "happy" and it is used as a cage to imprison them. This is a more subtly disturbing dystopia than 1984. I am so envious of you though, I never read anything as exciting as this and 1984 at school, we did "the classics".

Thanks for the feedback. There is so much more to Liam's story and I am enjoying writing his relationships with the other characters, especially as I know where they are heading, plus some characters can say what I believe and know. I just need to get on and write more, which has been so delayed by my stupid asthma. Plus I am going to bring back an old character for a bit of a cameo appearance.

Thanks for the feedback. Yes, Liam is worrying what people would think of him if they know all about him but he isn't blaming himself for Britney being shipped out of the hospital. He is moving forward, but slowly because he has had years of abuse and neglect to overcome, and no road is smooth and straight.

The following two days felt calm on the ward, and he found himself relaxing back into it all. The ward was still running on its usual routine. He spent his days in the Education Centre, in his afternoons he met with Aiden or sat through the Group meetings, and in his free time, he hung-out with Chrissy and TJ. Chrissy made most of the conversation with TJ shooting his comments into whatever she was saying, but he enjoyed listening to them. They did involve him in their friendship and, though it

I read this novel when it first came out in paperback, I think back in 1987, but it left such an impression on me. The son's sexuality causing such a drama within his family but it wasn't because of the usual theme of homophobic parents throwing him out of the home. At the end of last year, I set myself the project of reviewing as many of the books I've read as I can, and I've read a lot of them. I will checkout Christadora, by Tim Murphy. Posting these reviews, I've had lots of people recommending books to me. The only the problem is that I've a Kindle full of books I want to read too. So many books and so little time (!!).

I wouldn't say Christie had a formula, though she had a lot of tricks she used. Her books are game between her and her reader, can the reader guess the murder before she reveals them (I learnt so much about plotting from her). Though The Sittaford Mystery is by no means is her best, it isn't as bad as The Mirror Cracked From Side to Side. It had a good premise but the execution of it was so poor, Miss Maple was kept away from all the action. Sayers doesn’t seem to being forgotten, not when all her books are still in print, not just e-books, and so many Golden Age fans still rave about her.

I've read The Nine Tailors and it is certainly her best novel but I find so many problems with her books. I always found the biggest problem at the heart of her novels was Wimsey himself. Sayers was obviously very enamoured, if not in love, with him, but I've always found him such a weak character. He's stereotype of "aren't the aristocracy wonderful!" I just found her plots and characterisation so lacking. So often there was no mystery to who the murder was and so often their motivation was unrealistic, even pitiful. Her descriptive powers were one of the best of most Golden Age writers but for me it is plot and characters that make a book readable. So many people still say that Sayers is the best Golden Age writer and I cannot see why. My favourite crime writers do remain PD James, Ruth Rendell and Joseph Hanson, and I owe a debt to Agatha Christie for teaching me to plot. I know not everyone will like the same writers, if we did this world would be a horrible dystopia, but I just find Sayers so lacking.

I was reading about the shelving of Australian religious discrimination bill last night and I did feel a sense of relief. It did look a really poisonous bill. I'd read of everything you said and it scared me. It's a horrible example to the right-wing pashing back against hard won equality. In Britain we are seeing a hard push back against attempts to make conversation therapy illegal, and our government is listening to them. Hard won equalities can be lost and I see so much pushing back, around the world. In America there is so much push back against many freedoms. I worry about this because, in the Western World, so many right-wing groups are in contact and are after the same things. If it’s successful in one country then we can expect to see attempts in other countries. The raise of populist politics bears this out. Our stories are so important, they show the direct effect of prejudice, and we need to keep telling them. When this essay happened, gay sex had been partly decriminalised 18 years before in England but still so little had changed. I worried about posting this essay, I worried it could get back to the people mentioned in it (even though I changed all their names), but all the feedback I've had has been so positive that I no longer worry about it. If they do read it, I now really wonder what they'd say. Thanks for your feedback, it has helped make up my mind. I will be writing and posting more essays about my coming out, I know I need to tell that story.

Gary, Thank you for your comment, though I know it wasn't easy for you to live through that homophobic nightmare (which had changed little when I hit my teens), but your comment means a lot to me because it shows me it was right to post this essay. I worried before and after posting this, if I was doing the right thing. Your comment and a personal message I received, showed me it was the right thing. I've decided to write essays about those pivotal moments from my life, especially about my coming out journey. I don't want it to be a pity party but I do want to write about where I came from to get me to where I am now. Thanks for the feedback, it means a lot.

Liam is learning as he grows up. The first time he was confronted by a bully, Rhys Clarke, he'd fallen into that old school-child lie of don't tell the teachers, don't snitch, and that didn't end well. Here he's confronted by Britney and he tells the truth, eventually, which drops Britney in trouble and not him. And as a reward he starts to make friends. He's a teenager and he's growing up, he's too bright not to learn from events.

People have been telling Liam of the need to make friends and slowly he is realising why. Aiden is such a good and natural nurse, and here he shows it. I based him on someone I met a very long time ago. He was a mental health nurse and always knew exactly the right thing to say. I used to envy him that skill. (I do rather like Aiden)

Suddenly he had someone at Nurton Cross who was interested in him, with whom he had made a connection. Aiden and Dr Sayeed both kept saying that he needed to make friends, but Britney was not a friend he wanted. She seemed to treat him as her own personal pet. She’d demand that he do things for her - fetch her this, or bring her that, or else he would have to listen to her as she complained and moaned in her latest monologue about how poorly treated she was by the whole world. Over the foll

It is a double-edged sword, great inspiration but way too distracting. At the moment there is a very frustrated woman trying to exercise a large dog on the grass but the dog just wants to sniff at the grass, instead of chasing the ball the woman has brought.

Liam is faced with another bully, this one is more manipulative, but he is in a very different situation. There is hope at the end of the tunnel.

Britney is a text-book psychopath (I got so much inspiration from a text-book) and that's why the nurses don't like her, but she's a trouble-causer because she has no value for anyone else. Liam is just another one of her victims, in a long line of them.

He’d hated The Group since the first time he’d had to attend it. During his first Group there had been a discussion about masturbation, though it had been dominated by one girl complaining loudly that the boys all did it. He had not said a word but silently he’d begged the universe to allow his chair to just swallow him up and take him away from there as embarrassment flooded his mind. The ward’s patients were divided up into two groups, seven patients in each. The one Liam had to atte

I first read it as a teenager but I re-read it this summer, and it really stands up well. The post-war setting is used so well in her plot, and its one of her best plots.

This story is set in Britain and here we can't ask a judge to recuse themselves. The judge could only be removed from a trial, and before it starts, if there is a direct conflict of interest. In Britain, our judges are there to ensure the law is followed, they have a lot less power than American judges do, and it was through legal arguments, at the beginning of the trial, that Mrs Stewart-Graham’s bullied defence was excluded, though the judge was far too involved in that argument. At this point, Liam is a shy and very introverted thirteen-year-old. Mrs Stewart-Graham was right not to have him give evidence. He would have come over as stumbling and inarticulate, with one word answers or even silence, which would have only made him look more guilty. Also, Mrs Stewart-Graham could not introduce the evidence that Clarke bullied him by the backdoor, because even if Liam mentioned it on cross-examination, the judge would have had the jury removed and again told off Mrs Stewart-Graham. The ruling at the beginning of his trial meant she couldn't use the bullied defence, or even try and get it in by the backdoor. (I based this all on two real trials, but I also had help from John Mortimer's Rumpole stories) There are a lot of grounds for appeal against this trial, not least for Judaical over-reach, but Liam is a minor (though he is tried as an adult, another point I wanted to make here) and they will need his mother's consent for this. When we met his mother in person, her refusal will make sense. Also, Liam did kill Clarke and, just for a moment, he enjoyed the power he had over his bully. I didn’t want this story to be a simple black-and-white story, but one of the things I did want to write about is the way children are not treated well by our criminal justice system because it is set up to handle the crimes or adults, not children. A child like Liam cannot participate in his own defence.

Glad you're enjoying my story and thanks for the feedback. I always get mixed up with all the different Kings of England, all those men with the same name. Strange that I never get the Queens mixed up (!!).

Thank you. I've been reading parts of this story to my writers group and when I read the first appearance of Liam's mother there was very strong reactions to her, but one person said that she was a very damaged person, and she is. Unfortunately, Liam's mother has turned her hurt outwards and blames everyone around her. She is really in need of psychiatric help but I don't know if she would every take it, she doesn't see there's anything wrong with her, its other people who are the problem. Often the problem with people like Liam's mother is that they can't see the harm they are doing, but I know the perfect cure for Liam but... No spoilers though.