Life Drawing

the long version

From Amazon.com reviewer: There are two "losses" here: the author's loss of his first love, a kind man named James, to impulsive infidelity (the author's); and the world's loss, that of author Michael Grumley, to AIDS, ten years ago. This autobiographical novel is many things: well-written, simply told, generous to his quite wonderful family and the place he grew up in. It's also heartbreaking because the reader knows from the outset that Grumley has died of AIDS; the introduction is a beautiful one, a eulogy really, by Edmund White. A good book for gay teenagers -- the observant and comforting portrayal of childhood, adolescence, and (blissfuly untormented) emerging sexuality amidst the comfort of a good family is refreshing and heart-warming. The descriptions of nature, people, and New Orleans are precise and seem effortlessly well-wrought. The requisite trip to early- 1960's California is (sanely) made brief, and Grumley returns home to Iowa none the worse for wear -- and ready to take on his future. I really liked this man and the story he tells, and it breaks my heart to know that's he's gone.