Connor Lee

A perceptive review of a complicated masterpiece by one of my favorite authors. I would also recommend a slimmer volume called "The Last of the Wine" also by Ms Renault. It is a male romance in Greece before Alexander.

As some one who had a small (27 ft) mono-hull on San Francisco bay for 19 years, I spent 18 of those years drooling over catamaran spec sheets. As a ready made stage for part of the story, it is solid "world building" for the many who have no real life experience with the diverse and often complex subsystems necessary to keep a boat functioning and a relatively safe environment. And yeah, I want to see Trevor hookup with someone.

I am only up to chapter 14 and having a great read. But as a long term tech writer (proof reading and that sort of stuff) I have to ask why do I keep seeing "cloths" where I expect to see "clothes?" Is that a British thing? It doesn't show up in my Pocket Oxford dictionary. Again a great read.

I read Maurice when it was first published in 1971 after Forester had died and about 60 years after it was written. After he died and after 60 years. I don't blame him for hiding. He wrote it less than 20 years after Oscar Wilde went to prison. Even today there are situations where the closet is the safest choice although it distorts any other relationship. Despite much progress in recent years I remain wary that the veneer of rational civilization is very thin. I would put Mary Renault's The Charioteer published in Britain 1953 and US 1959 as the first positive "main stream" Gay novel. It is a WWII novel about soldiers and sailors that skirts the tragic ending right up to the final pages. She had a successful career after its publication with ancient Greek historical novels including Gay characters which allowed President Kennedy to say she was his favorite author. Although many might discount them, I would put Richard Amory's Song of the Loon late 1960's trilogy as perhaps the most widely read gay positive books of that era.