Ricky

certainly one of the better written books I've read in a long time. sometimes I yearn for good prose and I liked the prose in this book. I've often wondered why we as a culture talk so little about child sexual abuse in any realistic way since statistics seem to suggest that it's very common. initially when I was reading this book I was happy to see it discussed but pretty quickly I realized the reason we never talk about it is because it's very uncomfortable. It ended up feeling very painful at times, a kind of painful that I hadn't felt since reading A Little Life, but fortunately it's not quite as punishing as that book. It's kind of like if you took that book and you transposed it to British aristocracy and put it in a blender with a queer romance. I really loved the first 3/4 or so of this book, but there are some aspects that I didn't really understand I suppose. as the book goes on we get more and more seeming digressions about the protagonist's late uncle who died prematurely of AIDS. honestly I'm not sure what to make of these constant stories that we hear about this uncle. I appreciate that we kind of moved toward a bit of hopefulness though.