Now is the Hour by Tom Spanbauer

[Octobercountry]

Now Is the Hour by Tom Spanbauer.

Rigby John Klusener is hitchhiking to San Francisco. The year is 1967, the town is Pocatello, Idaho. Fresh out of high school, Rigby John is leaving behind his bohemian ex-girlfriend, his prayerful mother, his distant father, and the hay dust of his harsh farm town Catholic upbringing. As he stands by the side of the road desperately waiting for that one ride out, he reflects on the events that brought him there: the discovery of love, friendship, literature, and all the small joys that set him free.

At once a tale of sexual awakening, racial enlightenment, and personal epiphany, Now Is the Hour is the disarming and sweetly winning story of one unforgettable teenager who dares to hope for a different life.

I have to say, I was extremely impressed with this novel---one of the best books I've read for a while, and one of the top ten gay-themed books I've read in the past year, in fact.

I could certainly identify with the rural farm setting of the novel---the narrator's early life really is not very different from my own. The haymaking season/process figures prominently in this novel, and man---I was totally there in spirit, as I was reading! (I hated the summer holidays while I was growing up---every summer was an absolute misery. From the beginning of the season to the end, it was work all the time---the haymaking never seemed to stop, from the time school let out for the season until the "holidays" came to a close. Such backbreaking, exhausting, uncomfortable work---wow, I hadn't remembered it all so clearly for ages....)

Whoops, I seem to have gotten slightly off-track there in my stroll down memory lane! While my own childhood was perhaps less than ideal in a few ways (but then---whose wasn't?), at least I can say that my mother was nothing whatsoever like poor Rigby John's---yikes, I'm grateful for that....

This is a fantastic book---recommended.

Now Is the Hour

[PaperMoon]

This book gives us one of the most incredible teenage gay voices I've read. Once you get past the initial writing 'voice' of young Rigby John - you'll be hooked! I was mesmerised by the unfolding story of a small town, farming community with a deeply religious Roman Catholic setting for Rigby John.

The story starts with him leaving home at 17 and hitch-hiking alone on the highway towards California in the late sixties? before taking the reader back a full year to what happened to Rigby John to get him to that bleak but brave point in his life. We get introduced to his deeply enmeshed family (consisting of an embittered and grief-stricken flawed mother, father & sister), schooling community, friends, bullies, girlfriend, hunky Mexican hired hands, a tormented gay Red-Indian neighbour ... all in all, this reads like a gay version of To Kill A Mockingbird and possibly quite it's equivalent in literary standards.

Tom Spanbauer is a delight to read ... and Rigby John is a truly wonderful sweet and hug-worthy protagonist to cheer on - he's what I imagined Mouse Tolliver would've been like as a youth before arriving in San Francisco to join the little community at 28 Barbary Lane. I read this 450-something pager in one sitting - just could not stop reading. I'm so enamoured with this author l've gone and straightaway ordered his Man Who Fell in Love with the Moon. An extremely highly recommended book IMHO.

[J.]

Thanks for the heads-up, guys! I just read my first Spanbauer novel, In The City Of Shy Hunters, and I'm excited that he has other work that may be just as good as that one.

[PaperMoon]

J. wrote: "Thanks for the heads-up, guys! I just read my first Spanbauer novel, In The City Of Shy Hunters, and I'm excited that he has other work that may be just as good as that one."

Oh good to hear, J. I hope you'll enjoy this as much as I did. I've got City of Shy Hunters sitting on the shelf awaiting to be read, and there's only so many hours in a week for reading (sigh).

[Aussie54]

I read this back in 2009. I borrowed it from the library and reviewed it in my Live Journal at the time.

I wrote that it took me a while to get into the story. The author uses a very unusual style. He doesn't use speak quotation marks. It didn't worry me, but sometimes I thought the writing was a little self-indulgent.

This is another quote from my review:

Possible spoiler: As with "Three Fortunes in One Cookie", the ending I was hoping for did actually eventuate. Once I'd got going, it was hard to stop reading, especially towards the end. I kept thinking, "Oh, what if such and such happens!" I was so pleased when it did. Often with stories as stark as some of this was, the ending leaves me feeling downhearted. Not this time, though. I've re-read the last 60 or so pages many times over, starting with my favourite scene at The Back Door Club.

With my visual reading style, I had plenty of mind pictures reading "Now is the Hour". It's an explicitly graphic story, so some of those pictures were off-putting, but others melted my heart. I came to care very much about Rigby John, with his pork-pie hat and shaved head.

I think I should borrow it again, just to refresh my memory.