The Story of the Night

by Colm Tóibín

Richard Garay lives alone with his mother, hiding his sexuality from her and from those around him. Stifled by a job he despises, he finds himself willing to take considerable risks. Set in Argentina in a time of great change, The Story of the Night is a powerful and moving novel about a man who, as the Falklands War is fought and lost, finds his own way to emerge into the world.

Genres: Fiction, LGBT, Queer, Historical Fiction, Gay, Irish Literature, Historical

311 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Colm Tóibín FRSL, is an Irish novelist, short story writer, essayist, playwright, journalist, critic, and poet. Tóibín is currently Irene and Sidney B. Silverman Professor of the Humanities at Columbia University in Manhattan and succeeded Martin Amis as professor of creative writing at the University of Manchester.

Reviews

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

“I wanted them to know that I was all right now, after years of not being all right…”

This is the third of Colm Tóibín's novels that I have read. I have already purchased another and added it to my “to read” pile. I can’t really articulate why he is so good, except to say that his brilliant use of small detail and the everyday bits and pieces of life just builds and builds until you are caught up in a reality that completely envelopes you. It captures you because the emotions are so real, honest, and often times for me, too close for comfort.
“The Story of the Night” is the first of Tóibín's novels that I have read that has a male protagonist. Side note, Tóibín writes woman very well. Many of my female friends have confirmed that observation for me. In this text we get the story of Richard Garay, a semi closeted Englishman raised in Argentina. The story spans the time of the generals to the late 80s, maybe early 90s. But the book is written in a tightly constructed manner and the author manages to cover a lot of history and events without getting bogged down in them, and we experience them through the prism of the life of the protagonist and how they affect him.
This novel is at its core about a person living, and loving. There are not great big “events” or eureka moments. The story is just about one man’s life, a life in a tumultuous time, but a tumultuous time and place that he seems to float in and around of without being all that affected by it. Richard wants love; he wants the ability to be who he is, and to be happy within himself regardless. That is universal stuff right there.
Considering the period and subject matter, AIDS is almost an obligatory aspect of the story, and this novel is no exception. But the entire text is rendered in such a straightforward manner that this part of the story does not seem contrived, but almost inevitable. And maybe it was?
“The Story of the Night” is a story about a man. Not an extraordinary man, just a man. He experiences some interesting things in his life, as history and time and place and the people he encounters swirl around him. Like most life, it just happens before you really get a chance to notice it.
This man lives, he hurts, he loves.
I do that too.

[GTF · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was interesting that this story was set in South America as opposed to Ireland which I know is where most of Tóibín's novels are set. Even though I didn't have any knowledge on the historical events that occurred throughout the time of the story, I didn't in any way feel like I was losing track of the story. Tóibín keeps you up to date!

One of the things I appreciate most about this book is the characterization. It is not easy to write intelligent and introverted characters such as Richard, nor is it easy to write shrewd and charismatic characters such as the diplomatic couple who were Richard's best friends. The mingling of the characters had that sensationalised edge to it. You actually become enthralled by the drama of who has eyes for who, who's the dark horse, who knows what secrets, who is trusting in who etc.

I also liked how Tóibín didn't hold back on details relating to sexuality, drugs, aids and reality in general. If you are going write a story of this kind - put it all out there! Don't swerve from topics that are uncomfortable to write about.

[Barry Pierce · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not in a million years would I have put this novel in Colm Tóibín's bibliography. It isn't set in Ireland, there isn't a woman running way from something, and it's received little-to-no awards. However, and I may be premature in this decision, I think this might be Tóibín's masterpiece.

Split into three parts, we follow Richard's journey from Argentina during the Falklands War, through the entire decade, up to the AIDS crisis of New York in the late 80s. It goes from Giovanni's Room to Angels in America and it thoroughly deserves those comparisons. The Story of the Night is the unknown Irish classic. Richard's story is memorable, funny, and utterly heartbreaking. One could suggest that it droops a bit in the middle but its overall mastery makes up for that. This is one of the best books I've read this year. It's just wonderful and it will break you. So look forward to that.

[Raul · Rating 3 out of 5]

In a way this book felt like it began in the second half. The first half is mostly the narrator recounting his childhood and describing Argentina's political and economic state in the 80s, which was somewhat dull.

What was most interesting about this book, is how well Tóibín writes of queer sexual "code of conduct" in societies that are repressive towards queer individuals (certainly not exclusive to these places). A language in which gestures and silences are more important and informing than words could possibly be. In places where individuals do not have the luxury of being upfront and bold in their flirtations/proposals, a glimpse, becomes a glance and becomes a look, THAT look.

Being set in the 1980s the book also touches on the AIDS crisis. I'm aware that there are people that find writing about it difficult to read so this is a warning of sorts. Although I personally believe that there can never be enough books/films/shows/songs about it. So that young queer individuals that were either too young to remember or were not yet born, can also be aware of the pain, neglect and suffering that was endured. Of course we are aware that had we been in the same circumstances, there's nothing that would have made us any different from sharing the victims' dreaded fate. That and the endless despair and death, I think, is what is most frightening. But with any event that has been traumatic to a community, the tragedy suffered is inescapable and Tóibín does remarkable work writing of it with touching humanity.

[George Ilsley · Rating 5 out of 5]

A dismal cover, murkier than the one I selected here, the image darker and even more obscure. This appears to be Toibin's third novel, published in 1996. I only just stumbled upon it.

Richard is born in Argentina; his mother was British and his father Argentinian. Richard is between worlds, speaking English and Spanish; he is also gay. He is at the same time an insider and an outsider. His life in Buenos Aires is both surface and depth; he is seen in a suit and tie and he contains secrets.

Not until he expands his horizons on a vacation to Europe with a privileged young man does he start to see Argentina in a new light. He lived through "the time of the Generals" yet saw nothing; everyone kept their heads down.

Later, during the Falklands war, his duality is highlighted by others who suspect that because of his British mother he might harbour divided loyalties—he does not, but these questions invite his own doubts about the reliability of information provided by politicians.

I was impressed by this novel, and felt immersed in the world of the characters. Richard becomes good friends with a couple at the U.S. Embassy—a charismatic enigmatic duo who present their own ambiguities. As a consultant and translator for international oil money, Richard is neither part of the local government nor is he entirely independent. He sees privatization as a loss of sovereignty disguised as economic development yet he earns a good living as a go-between. He is both a local and an international traveller.

The last 140 pages I read in one horrified gulp unable to put the book down.

[Jennifer (formerly Eccentric Muse) · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was really three books in one:

1) Richard Garay lives with and cares for his domineering mother until her death, and then attempts to make his own way as a gay man in macho, politically volatile Argentina in the mid-80s.
2) Richard gets involved with a family, the patriarch of which seeks to become President of Argentina, and takes a job as a translator thanks largely to the influence of two American CIA agents who are working behind the scenes to "democratize" Argentina in the post-Falklands period of disappearances and human rights abuses.
3) Richard falls in love with the son of the presidential hopeful, Pablo, who has returned from living in San Francisco with a number of secrets, which he keeps from his parents and from Richard himself.

Gay men in Argentina in the 80s. The downfall of the Generals and the rise of HIV/AIDS. Unfortunately, none of these stories is well linked, and the political one in particular is undeveloped. Richard is not a very compelling character, although there were some interesting parts early on as he navigated the very complicated relationship he had with his mother including coming out to her in the time before her death. And while Richard's and Pablo's love story is more developed - especially the rather surprising ending - overall, I would have preferred less gay sex and slightly more Argentinian politics, and a more coherent relationship between the various plot lines.

[Teresa · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 and 1/2 stars

Engrossing, compelling story (with some interesting set-pieces) that, more than once, seems to be going one way and then takes you another. I don't think, as a whole, it's as good as Toibin's later works; but it's just as readable.

I enjoy reading all the works of favorite writers and seeing their development. I found this one better than his earlier The South, and it's also interesting to see how this one probably led to his next one, The Blackwater Lightship, which I loved.

[P. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Colm Toibin is a very reliable novelist when it is good, immersive novels that you are after. His streams of consciousness are always calm and steady (unlike the unhinged literary experiments all too common in contemporary novels), delicately balancing the inner and outer lives of his characters. This is the first novel of his I'm reading that is about a gay man, and I wish he'd write more of such books. I came to know about the Falklands war while reading David Mithcell's Black Swan Green recently, and I picked this one up hoping to learn more about Argentina's intrinsic conflicts that led to the war.

But, everything in this novel is seen from a distance, narrated with a casual remove. We are detached from the protagonist's true emotions; we are detached from the political history; we are detached from the transformations after the war. We want blood, we get bone. The protagonist doesn't make things happen, he waits for life to happen to him. It might be the reason for the detachment, in which case Toibin achieves what he intended with brilliant ease. The protagonist is half-English in Argentina and that helps with his there-but-not-there act. In this laid-back manner, we learn of the protagonist's childhood, his family, his coming of age, and his sexuality. In its course, the novel meanders along the birth of democracy in Argentina and the initial years of the AIDS crisis. There is an exciting love story and it doesn't take itself very seriously either. I loved that the story was about a simple man who doesn't have many ambitions and remains largely unaffected by the outer world.

I know Argentina mostly from movies - Marco Berger's movies that sublimate sexual tension (Un Rubio being the best example); the uproarious Wild Tales; Wong Kar-wai's surprising Happy Together where two men from Hong Kong end up in Argentina burning the course of their tumultuous relationship; The Secret in their Eyes that didn't quite live up to its reputation, and from very few novels: I can only remember the intriguing and beautiful Adventures of China Iron which is about the very making of Argentina. I am always fascinated with remote, sparsely populated geographies, and Argentina appeals to me immensely.

I loved how the novel combined Argentina and Colm Toibin and a gay protagonist, and it was a languorous stroll through Argentine history and life.

[Nick · Rating 2 out of 5]

Colm Toibin is much-loved and I must say that I admire the breadth of vision, Ireland to Brooklyn to Argentina to Scientology to an alternate to the Gospels. "The Story of the Night" reads, to me, like a sequence of four themes featuring the same narrator, a gay Argentine of the seventies and eighties. The first segment is a youth reminiscent of Borges, not in writing but in the household reverence for English despite living in Latin America; the narrator's mother was British. Family business dispatched in that section, the reader is escorted to the Argentine military dictatorship and its humiliation in the Falklands. The long third movement focusses on the post-junta privatization and the American involvement in it, before swerving to an AIDS tragedy in the final pages. The first and last sections are most involving, although the beginning gives us a dispassionate and self-involved narrator, close to his mother (of course) but aimless and untouched by human connection until a couple of American handlers make him wealthy as a translator for technical types during privatization. On the central two sections, I must plead guilty to prejudice; I knew victims of the Argentine and Chilean dictatorships--obviously not the ones thrown from Argentine airplanes--and I have read enough about the era (including Nathan Englander's fine "The Ministry of Special Cases") to wonder about a novel where it is checked off as part of the background history. A more probing look at what it meant to be an English-speaking Argentine--especially a gay one--during that awful period, including a war against Great Britain, would also have been interesting (perhaps only to me). I know less about the privatization in Argentina than I do about the great contemporaneous sell-offs in Mexico and Russia, where inefficient socialism was transformed into inefficient capitalism; here, it is simply backdrop for the Americans fiddling around in Argentine economics, politics, and sex. I think perhaps the disconnect between the novel and the great passionate issues of the times has to do with the narrator, who is on stage for the full novel yet never quite became flesh for me, or perhaps, once he lost his mother, never seemed to become an adult with a full range of attachments and emotions. It is difficult to fully engage with the tragedy of a character who himself seems so little interested in the tragedies of others.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Colm Toibin is one of my favorite Irish authors writing today. Among his books that I've read to date ("The South", "The Heather Blazing", "The Blackwater Lightship", "Mothers and Sons" and this one - I haven't read "The Master" yet), "The Story of the Night" is my favorite.

Set in Buenos Aires during the Falklands war and its aftermath, the novel tracks the development of Richard Garay, a gay schoolteacher, the son of an Argentine father and English mother. At the novel's opening, the generals are still in power, and Garay is closeted and emotionally stunted. Toibin, who covered the trial of General Gualtieri as a reporter, is extraordinarily effective in conveying the sense of menace that prevails, and the way people are forced to hold their emotions in check in order to survive.

The Falklands are lost, the generals lose their hold on power, and the story traces Richard’s gradual emotional development in parallel with the opening of Argentine society. The aspect of Toibin’s writing that I like best is his extraordinary emotional intelligence, which he deploys here to full effect, in a sensitive and moving account of Richard’s story. Richard is a complex, and not entirely sympathetic, character, but Toibin draws us in to his story, and makes us care deeply about his fate.

An evocative and moving story, which I highly recommend.

[Darin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I will read (and I *will* read) anything written by Colm Toibin. The writing is unpretentious and largely unadorned, but beautiful nonetheless.

[m. · Rating 2 out of 5]

Styleless writing and lack of emotional engagement finally became too much to bear. It was like reading about a damp cardboard box given human form.

[Simon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Charming and sad, but a little bit dull in places.

[Salla · Rating 3 out of 5]

the first half or more was dull, the rest example of Tóibín's mastery in writing about people, their relationships and sicknesses tied to the age of closed societies and communities. should have also remembered that he likes to write open endings, which I usually don't enjoy but find it in these book fitting.

[Grady · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Timelessly Important Yet Also A Timely Novel

2005 and Argentina has just revoked amnesty for those responsible for the brutality and occult treachery of the Dirty War that ended with the overthrow of the military junta with the British defeat of Argentina's forces over the Falkland Islands. And it is during this closure of a long suppressed circle that Colm Toibin's superb 1995 book THE STORY OF THE NIGHT comes back into circulation. By all means read this book now not only to celebrate Toibin's genius but also to gain valuable insight into a political intrigue that has smoldered in Argentina for the past thirty years!

Toibin conjoins the tale of a young lad Richard Garay, the son of a haughty British mother and an Argentine man whose childhood is disrupted by loss of income and instability of social presence, with the general social and political upheaval in Argentina). Richard moves from poverty and the death of his parents to teaching English in Buenos Aires and eventually comes into contact with an American couple Donald and Susan Ford who draw him into their hazy presence in the realm of political coups as an interpreter. Through them he works to gain acceptance of the powerful Canetto family: the father wants to become President of the nascent democracy after the Falklands War has rid the country of the Generals. Richard is a man in conflict: he envies the wealthy, he is gay, and he embodies the state of mind of surviving with a day persona of longing for order and rank which is antagonistic to his night persona of craving passion.

Through a series of twists of fate Richard gradually comes into money by way of the prelude to oil privatization and after unsatisfying attempts at mating he finds love in Pablo Canetto, a handsome man who has likewise hidden his true identity from his family by fleeing to San Francisco's atmosphere. The development of this profound love between Richard and Pablo, threatened as it is by nearly every aspect of life in Buenos Aires, forms the substance of this novel, that substance eloquently exploring the spectrum of love and loss as beautifully as any romance in literature.

Colm Toibin is a master storyteller and one who has obviously scrupulously researched the time frame he has chosen for his novel. Every character is painted well, there being no extraneous moments that are not additive to the story. Toibin's prose is liquid and ravishingly beautiful and he is unafraid to present intimate physical encounters, knowing exactly how much to say without offending the senses of anyone. This richly historic novel ends in a microcosm of a romance: the 'desaparecidos' of the dirty war are mirrored in the equally plangent wake of AIDS.

The story is superb, the introduction to a heretofore vague history of South American coups is fascinatingly related, and above it all is the magic of Toibin's impeccable prose. This is a book to read again and again. Highly Recommended. Grady Harp

[Liam Ostermann · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I read this novel for the first time, early 2000s?, I thought it was a great novel. On each subsequent rereading (2010 and 2020) while I still liked the novel my surety of greatness declined. I wouldn't say it is bad, I am just not sure if it will outlive its time.

When I first read the setting, Argentina post the Falklands war but also dealing with the dirty war that preceded it, was something that was common knowledge for my generation. What had happened in South America from Allende in Chile through to the Sandinistas in El Salvador was the backdrop to our growing up. It didn't need to be explained. By the time I read the novel again during the COVID lockdown in 2020 I realised that so much of the setting would mean nothing to younger readers. This is a challenge novels face when inspired by current political, social or cultural circumstances and it takes an exceptional novel to rise above and transcend the immediate. But not everyone can be a Miguel Ángel Asturias (The Green Pope), or Augusto Roa Bastos (I the Supreme) and even novels I love like 'Terra Nostra' by Carlos Fuentes now show their roots in a particular era.

On top of everything else 'The Story of the Night' is an AIDS novel in which AIDS plays both an essential plot element as well as carrying a weight of metaphor and meaning. Unfortunately that is another element that is fast being lost to history. I will be honest I can't read HIV/AIDS fiction from this time because I am torn between my emotional response to that history and aesthetic response to so much of the writing which I find predictable, dull and transient. I don't know if any of the literature that came out of the AIDS era will survive as literature (as reportage, document or memoir is something else). I would compare it to novels about the Vietnam war it is authors like 'The Things They Carried' by Tim O'Brien or 'The Sympathizer' by Viet Thang Nguyen that speak to us, not what was written the time.

I am giving the novel four stars because there are elements of it that remain fixed in my memory, though they tend to be from the early parts of the novel dealing with the main character, Richard Garay, and Argentina before the FalklandsWar which stand out.

[Cristhian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Never in my life have I felt so attacked by a book like when I read "The Story of the Night". This book hit home way too close.

You know how books - as many other things - come into your life in certain moments and in certain situations that just make you believe there's something out there that actually watches over you? Well, me runing into this novel by Colm Tóibín was an experience like the one I just mentioned.

One wouldn't need to know, but I started reading this as a way to get off my mind some things that had happened to me in recent days. As soon as the plot started to develop, I could only think of Tóibíns impeccable way to narrate the story of a gay man. The way in which the author actually can portray the development of a gay personality goes beyond him being gay himself. Yes, he may have used his personal story to create a character, but the wording of the whole experience is just as outstanding as Tóibín did when writing Eilis Lacey in "Brooklyn".
"Story of the Night" is filled with moments that many gays have experienced. And I need to actually put it like that - reading the novel is an only gays event - because, as a reader, one can embrace the experience the narrator is telling with those key moments one has gone through in one's life.

Long story short, "The Story of the Night" has -yes- sex, love and deception. But it is more than that. It actually has characters which sexuality does not identify them wholly. Gay characters that are not gay for the sake of them being gay. Yes, they are gay, but that becomes just a narrative device in order to add drama á la Tóibín to the plot.

So, if you wanna read some socio-political gay working his way to the top in Argentina, then this is your next book to read. Now I just gotta decide which one I loved most, this or "Brooklyn".
Xoxo

[Alicja · Rating 5 out of 5]

rating: 5.5/5

My initial reaction: "Brilliant, emotional, and will leave you, well, utterly speechless. Just... WOW!"

As Argentina is going through political upheaval, so is Richard. Strangled by his job and lack of love life, he takes risks and grows just like this new Argentina does. He finds himself in a new career and in a new love.

The melancholy, trance-like prose beautifully illustrates how Richard drifts through life being a part of it yet apart at the same time. He is lonely and detached but manages to hang on to enough life to carve for himself a place within the political atmosphere of Argentina post the Falklands loss and the fall of the generals. The novel is vague about the specifics of the political atmosphere but it parallels beautifully the changes in society to the changes within Richard.

Richard is a complex character, growing and becoming more confident and self-assured as he finds his way in this new society.

Surprisingly, this is also a deeply emotional love story. Through the first half the book it looks like Toibin is setting up political intrigue but then Richard's life takes an unexpected turn (as life tends to do) and he falls in love with Pablo. The characters are presented emotionally coarse yet gentle. It is stunning just how Toibin is able to thrust us into this raw reality where the emotions bombard the readers, sometimes unbearably. And through tragedy they are able to find the very soul of humanity, love.

[Doogyjim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Toibin's third novel was his first openly 'gay' novel and I wonder how much he felt compelled to tackle the subject of AIDS. It was published in 1996 so maybe there was a sense of obligation on his part. Reading it in 2006, I couldn't help sighing a little with a sense of deja vu when the topic reared its head at the end of the book - which is, admittedly, an unfair reaction.

The novel blends confession, love story and the sort of ambassadorial intrigue that Graham Greene went in for. In fact, I was disappointed that the whole plot revolving around the Americans seemed to disspiate at the end. Clear parallels are drawn by the author between Richard's life and that of Argentina as both he and his country nervously emerge from under the shadow of others: his mother in Richard's case and the Generals in Argentina's. Only then can they emerge truly as themselves.

Toibin's prose, I think, is at home in the countryside and there's something moving in the way his precise prose described landscape without embellishment in The Heather Blazing; I think he's less successful when describing Buenos Aires. But it's still a complusively readable novel as well as being melancholy and rendered with an acute, sympathetic eye.

[Doug · Rating 2 out of 5]

A very slow moving and disjointed novel. The first three-fourths are primarily about a young half-British Argentinian's efforts in working for the privatization of the oil industry back in the mid-80's, which is pretty tedious and dull. Then the last fourth morphs into a pretty standard AIDS novel. Back when it was published (1998) it was considered daring, and it even won an award or two, but time has not been kind to it. A major disappointment from an author whose other works I've admired.

[Flo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mixed feelings about this one. I really loved 70% of it, but even if I can see what Colm Toibin wanted to do with the end, I cant accept how it was put into scene. The novel has the quality of being quite unpredictable. Almost half of the novel I didnt know where it wants to go, but still the end was too much. I can make excuses about it, I want to pretend that the journey remains beautiful, but no. I HATED THE END. The more I think about it, I cant accept it. So I'm going to stop here.

[Gerbrand · Rating 4 out of 5]

11 Had it ever occurred to me, she asked, that he was homosexual? I had never heard her say the word before, and she pronounced it as though she had recently learned it. She looked at me sharply. I looked straight into the glass of the window and saw her shape in the armchair. No, I said to the glass, no, it had not occurred to me. Well, I think he is, she said, and I think it is something you should consider before you become too friendly with him.

Dit boek kwam uit in 1996. The Guardian publiceerde onlangs een ranking van Toibín’s boeken en deze roman stond op plaats 4. Nummer 1 was The master, een non-fictie roman over Henry James.

Toíbin was een aantal jaren correspondent in Argentinië, het land waar dit verhaal zich afspeelt.

259 Argentina after the humiliation of the war and the disappearances would have done anything to please the outside world, and privatization was the price the outside world required. Everything the country had that was valuable would be sold, and this would tie Argentina to outside interests so that it would never be able to behave badly again.

De hoofdpersoon is Richard Garay. Een jonge homoseksueel. Zoon van Britse ouders die zijn geëmigreerd naar Argentinië. Hij begeeft zich als vertaler in Amerikaanse kringen die zich bezighouden met de privatisering van onder andere de olie-industrie. Het zijn de jaren ’80. Het boek bestaat uit 3 delen waarvan ik het 3e deel ver weg het beste vond. Dus even volhouden. Met name de scene in het ziekenhuis is geweldig goed.

Toíbin is gewoon een goede verteller. Als Richard verliefd is dan lezen we:

191 From the time we left the apartment and set foot on the street, I had a feeling I’d never had before. I hesitate to call it love, but it was in my body as much as in my mind, a strange ease and feeling of happiness, a sense that I did not need anything more than this, that this would do me for all of my life. I wondered was this how other people felt, was it something which people took for granted and did not usually mention, was it something all the couples who were walking in the city on this Sunday night felt? Was I the only one who had never felt it before?

[Kweeby · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this because I’m obsessed with John Boyne and Douglas Stuart and they both recommended it. Like their books it is a good blend of what makes life beautiful and awful. It’s divided into three parts and I felt the quality of each part varied significantly. I adored part 1, didn’t care much for part 2 (I wish Susan and Donald would’ve effed off), and loved most of part 3 but was also put off by some of it. The overall love story was good, but I felt there were too many side plots and I never felt like I fully understood any of them, and also never got any closure. It very much felt like a look into these characters lives that just suddenly ends, and you’re left to imagine what happened next. Every character is strange in a way I can’t explain but it made me difficult to connect with them.

[Greg · Rating 3 out of 5]

"I still believe that they [American Diplomats] were involved in every cent which the United States
put into...the [Argentine] election," thinks Richard, the narrator of the story set in 1996. But they pay him big bucks to take some risk, and he is pretty much aimless and drifting. But Richard has taken another risk: he is gay and has had unprotected sex for years. Will the Argentine government bring him down? Will Aids? Will both? Or will he get away with everything? Good stuff, good enough for great novel, but the plot lines just don't coalesce. Some characters drift way into the ether and we never know if the did indeed get away with election tampering, while other characters are impacted by AIDS to the point of death. But this feels like 2 (or more novels) and things never come together. Maybe that's the point. I liked this book, I found the election tampering fascinating, and I didn't like a single character in the story. Maybe that was the point also. I can't fathom how some people just take every risks that comes along, no matter what.

[mippers · Rating 5 out of 5]

absolutely chowed down on this…. bought bc irish author while in ireland and Gay, it also randomly took place in argentina

not a perfect book but i couldn’t put it down, loved the characters so much (gay, troubled, diva-ish, loved to kiki with their hot girl bestie, occasionally horny)

very unsure of if colm toibin actually spent time in argentina or just like did a lot of research?? wild

[Dennis · Rating 4 out of 5]

A warning to all fans of Coim Toibin: this is not your typical Coim Toibin novel. There are no strong female characters, nor any historical characters except as reported in news events. Ireland is never mentioned. So, if that’s what you’re expecting, expect no more because none of that’s here.

This is the story of a gay man in Buenos Aires born of an Argentinian father and English mother, stretching from just before the Falklands War (o Guerra de las Malvinas, si prefieres) to the early days of the AIDS crisis. Due to being bilingual, he is called on by the US government to help install a post-dictatorship, America-friendly leader, but there is a love story in the works, too, as he cruises for sex in steam baths and has an unrequited crush on a very heterosexual friend. (Those who are a little squeamish with the homoerotic are forewarned.)

In this sense, it reminded me a lot of Alan Hollinghurst’s Booker Prize-winning novel, “The Line of Beauty” about a closeted gay man in the inner circles of politics, only on the other side of the Atlantic. It develops on similar lines as there’s the unrequited crush on a close friend, the seduction of being close to power, and looking for love in a time of AIDS. If it’s missing anything, it’s that the principal character seemed a bit closed and reserved to me, possibly something he learned as a reaction to an unhappy mother and dealing with his father’s relatives, both forced to grovel after the money runs out. His part as translator and intermediary with the Americans plays out very well, I thought, as does his search for love, which he never quite admits to, but again he must be reserved and discreet as it’s a homophobic society he’s dealing with and one misstep could bring all kinds of problems for him. I liked the book very much, especially as it was different from other books by the author, and I’d recommend it.

[James Barker · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book started strongly- the protagonist's relationship with his mother was explored with sensitivity and depth and I found it intriguing. But Toibin passes over this quickly, intending to produce something epic, a novel covering the whole of the Argentinian 1980s, nodding a hat at the age of dictators and the disappearances, the Falklands War, the selling-off of the oil fields, and- because this is a GAY novel- AIDS, of course. Because-sigh- writing a gay novel without AIDS would be the same as writing about the 1940s and not mentioning the Holocaust. I find it very, very tiresome as a gay man. Does a plague on a gay house- a plague that, in fact, turned out to be directed as much at the straight community, it was that undiscriminatory- preclude other subject matters, other endings than the inevitability of sickness?

Toibin's style in this book is described as starkly beautiful but I found it rather dull, full of extraneous detail that added nothing. I had no idea when I read the book that the writer is gay himself- the descriptions of encounters between men (invariably 'beefy' or 'tall') are dry and sex-less so I presumed him a straight man trying to write himself into a plethora of gay characters. But no, Toibin is gay, and that was the surprise of my month. Where was his love for these characters, where was his own passion? The half-English, half-Argentinian lead, Richard, had no Latin spirit. He may as well have been an accountant in Wilmslow.

[WndyJW · Rating 5 out of 5]

wow. I'm hesitant to start another book because I'm not ready to let this one go. This is one of the most intimate, raw stories I've ever read. The story of Richard Garay, told in first person, flows from the first sentence. It's a moving love story and the story of a man's life with the political changes of Argentinia shortly after their Falkland Islands war England in the backdrop. You will know and care about Richard and Pablo and be sorry that you can't keep in touch with them when the story ends.

[Suki Fleet · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deeply affecting.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Setting: Argentina (mostly). The narrator, Richard Garay, is English-born but had living in Argentina since he was a small child - his mother is English, his father Argentinian. After his father's death during his childhood, he and his mother live in a crumbling apartment on the charity of his uncles. As he grows up, Richard becomes more and more aware of his homosexuality but hides this from his mother and largely the world around him. When he becomes an adult, he ends up teaching English at a local college and university part-time and also takes on private tuitions. After his mother dies, Richard lives on in the apartment alone and, mourning the Argentinian loss in the Falklands War, decides to change career path. Using his translation skills, he is introduced to an American couple who he believes to be CIA agents and who are attempting to assess candidates for future democratic elections in the country following the overthrow of the generals. As his skills and influence increase, Richard finds himself much in demand by visiting dignitaries, IMF assessors etc. and becomes quite wealthy. Through these contacts, he believes that he has found the love of his life....
A typically-wonderful piece of writing from the author, whose books I nearly always like, that draws you into the life of the narrator such that you can't help but feel great empathy with him. There are some quite graphic sex scenes which some readers may not find to their taste but, for me, they all add to the richness of the story and its characters - 8/10.