''Terre Haute'' is a 1989 novel by
Will Aitken
Will Aitken is an American-Canadian novelist, journalist and film critic.Richard Burnett"Montreal author Will Aitken revives Death in Venice". '' Xtra!'', January 26, 2012. Originally from Terre Haute, Indiana, he has been based in Montreal, Quebec ...
.
Gregory Woods
Gregory Woods (born 1953 in Egypt) is a British poet. He was the Chair in Gay and Lesbian Studies at Nottingham Trent University from 1998 to 2013. He is the author of five books of literary and LGBT studies criticism, and seven poetry collect ...
, ''A History of Gay Literature: The Male Tradition''. Yale University Press
Yale University Press is the university press of Yale University. It was founded in 1908 by George Parmly Day, and became an official department of Yale University in 1961, but it remains financially and operationally autonomous.
, Yale Universi ...
, 1999. .
''Terre Haute'' describes a year in the life of fourteen-year-old Jared McCaverty, a bright and attractive young boy going through puberty in
Terre Haute
Terre Haute ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Vigo County, Indiana, United States, about 5 miles east of the state's western border with Illinois. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 60,785 and its metropolitan area had a ...
,
Indiana
Indiana () is a U.S. state in the Midwestern United States. It is the 38th-largest by area and the 17th-most populous of the 50 States. Its capital and largest city is Indianapolis. Indiana was admitted to the United States as the 19th s ...
. Jared, who comes from a wealthy family, is many ways a happy boy, but he is overweight, socially awkward, and gay.
Plot summary
Jared McCaverty has a sexual encounter with a friend, Paul Herzog, but his father finds out and beats him. He buys a gay magazine, but his father finds it and cannot accept his son's sexual inclinations. He then has another homosexual episode with Randy Sparks, a school friend, but his father discovers them having sex in Jared's bedroom.
Jared meets Julian Clay, the new curator of the local museum, and a sexually abusive relationship ensues. Jared faces rejection by Julian and threatens him.
Julian Clay then commits suicide. It is likely that he did so because Jared threatened to expose him as a pedophile and a rapist, and Jared blames himself for Julian's death. In the closing pages, Jared meets Alexandre, a sympathetic twenty-year-old Frenchman, and the reader is led to believe that Jared will have found true love.
References
1989 American novels
Novels set in Indiana
Terre Haute, Indiana
Canadian LGBT novels
American LGBT novels
Novels with gay themes
1989 Canadian novels
1980s LGBT novels
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