Julia Glass's Three Junes
This novel is a tryptich of three stories in which the center panel is given to Fenno, a Scottish gay lad with whom I fell in love. Manhattan with its artistic riches and out-there gay scene is fascinating through his eyes as he stumbles through its nooks and crannies, tries to make sense of it all, and find his place in it. He never does, not quite; and, in that sense, his life is not a success. And yet it is--in fact, wildly so.
True, fate does not provide Fenno with the standard packages: a straightforward career path, a life-mate, children; so on the surface he's the stereotypical gay misfit. Or perhaps "emotionally constrained" as the New York Times claimed, lacking defined outlets for his passions.
He's neither. His life is an assortment of colorful patches in a brilliant quilt. His many friends fill him with feeling: Mal, the hilarious and acerbic gay man with HIV for whom he cares to the bitter end; Mal's quirky but delightful Catholic mother who virtually adopts him; his young nieces in Scotland who have etched their way into his heart as he has into theirs; a strapping but vapid Midwestern artist who becomes his sex buddy; a young pregnant mother he accompanies in her tumultuous journey into parenting; Fern, with whom he profoundly connects at the novel's end; and, of course, a lovable collie and a very smart and affectionate parrot.
True, Fenno agonizes over every thought and feeling as he moves through the story, and that trait could paralyze. But, in fact, this agonizing makes him endearing, vulnerable, and, to my strange way of thinking, sexy.
Fenno is like many people I have known, both gay and straight--folks who can't quite follow any standard recipe for what is thought to be a full life. But those recipes are far too bland anyway. And so out of the many disparate ingredients fate gives them, these people manage to create lives that are as magnificent and rich as they are unconventional.
Bravo for them, and for Julia Glass for capturing their excellence in this beautifully written tale!
