Publishers Weekly
The rediscovery of the previously unpublished title work is the occasion for collecting Vidal's short stories-all eight of them-for the first time. That piece, which closes the collection, features an episode from Tennessee Williams's childhood in which the young playwright decides to pre-empt sin through suicide, a decision complicated by knowledge that his uncle is being blackmailed for sexual misconduct with a minor. Discretion kept this story from Vidal's 1956 collection A Thirsty Evil, but it's clearly continuous with the seven others, many of which also contain homoerotic elements and a tone of tart disillusion: in "Three Stratagems," a suave young man suffers an epileptic seizure before he can sell his body; in "The Zenner Trophy," a prep school athlete is expelled for an affair with a male classmate. Mortality and shades of E.B. White's famous distortions of time enter as well, as a middle-aged man runs into himself as a boy ("A Moment of Green Laurel"), and another spends a night in his childhood bedroom ("The Ladies in the Library"). Vidal's short-form execution is strangely ineffective: he often locates action off the page, then labors to bring the information into the story cleanly. But readers will recognize the frosty vision and frequently artful prose of the essayist of United States and the novelist of Myra Breckinridge. (Sept.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal
This volume collects the short fiction of Vidal (Imperial America), including the recently rediscovered story from which the book takes its title. All eight pieces date to the author's early career and, with the exception of the title story, were previously published in 1956. Diverse, engaging, and full of surprising twists and turns, the stories take the general theme of homosexual encounter from various points of view. The writing is crisp; the images, crystal clear and often breathtaking. In "The Zenner Trophy," two young men are expelled from their boarding school when caught in a homosexual act. In "Ladies in the Library," three ladies (or are they Macbeth's three witches?) appear to cause the death of a previous owner of the house in which they are taking tea. In "A Moment of Green Laurel," the protagonist meets his earlier self in the park. The final story, "Clouds and Eclipses," remained unknown because it was based on a true story involving the family of Tennessee Williams. Williams had requested that the story not be published until all the family members involved were deceased. Vidal is best known for his novels and essays, but his short stories are of equal excellence. Highly recommended. [See also Vidal's forthcoming memoirs, Point to Point Navigation (Doubleday). Ed.] Joanna M. Burkhardt, Univ. of Rhode Island Coll. of Continuing Education Lib., New Providence Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
Eight elegantly styled but listless stories of gay life from the late 1940s to the mid-'50s. There's an air of nostalgia to these half-century-old tales, which frequently touch on the theme of childhood innocence lost. "Three Stratagems," set in Key West, is related in two distinct voices: that of a young male prostitute looking for the perfect fool, and of the rich, middle-aged widower who falls for him. Michael is well-mannered enough to be taken for a Princeton graduate, but experienced enough to recognize that plenty of people "enjoy their own degradation." Mr. Royal, who meets Michael on the beach and asks him to dine in his hotel suite that evening, senses he's on the make but wants desperately to believe that this attractive young man is for real. "The Robin" brings the narrator back to the time he was a nine-year-old D.C. schoolboy enthralled by torture and violence, while "A Moment of Green Laurel," which takes place during a presidential inauguration, follows the adult narrator's wistful return to his childhood home in Washington, now occupied by another family. In "The Zenner Trophy," a scandal involving two boys at an exclusive prep school threatens the buttoned-up administration, though it hardly fazes the star athlete in question, whose intrepid determination actually shames his interrogating official. The longest story, "Pages from an Abandoned Journal," chronicles the narrator's fashionable travels among pockets of gay friends in Europe and his strange, unsettling acquaintance with legendary "courtesan" Elliott Magren in Paris. The previously unpublished title story chillingly delineates a 14-year-old boy's resolve to kill himself and thereby attain sainthood. Whileoccasionally truncated, these stories showcase Vidal's stylistic authority.
