Our Evenings

Starred review from August 19, 2024
Booker winner Hollinghurst (The Line of Beauty) traces the divisions of post-Brexit London in this elegant tale of two men’s divergent paths across decades. Dave Win, an aging gay actor, fondly remembers Mark Hadlow, the philanthropist who sponsored his education, after Mark’s death at 94. Hadlow funded Dave’s boarding school scholarship in the 1960s, where Dave was classmates with Mark’s bully son, Giles, now a leading Brexiteer whose own mother calls him an “authoritarian.” In what proves to be a brilliant stroke of misdirection, Hollinghurst suggests in the opening pages that the novel will be Giles’s. Instead, Dave takes center stage, devoting the bulk of his narration to a life well lived, despite homophobic intimidation at school and the racial prejudice he faced during his career, which often saw him typecast in servant roles (he’s half Burmese). He recounts the loving relationship he has with his single mother, Avril, a dressmaker; his success in the theater; and joyful romantic relationships. Neither he nor the reader ever learns the details of Avril’s brief liaison with Dave’s biological father in Burma after WWII, but its mystery charges the pages with melancholic intensity, as do the prejudices Dave faces throughout his life, which define his fate in the wrenching conclusion, when Giles’s vision of the world plays a decisive part. Hollinghurst proves once more to be a master of emotive prose. It’s a tour de force. Agent: Christy Fletcher, UTA.

March 7, 2025

In 1961, 13-year-old David Win has the cards stacked against him. He's the son of a Burmese father he never met and a single white British mother who is just trying to make ends meet. He is also a gay scholarship student at an elite all-boys school, where he is sometimes tormented for his differences. In his 20s, David gets involved in alternative theater. Although he finds like-minded actors, mainstream producers regularly cast him as a background, nonspecific Asian. Hollinghurst's (The Sparsholt Affair) lyrically laborious coming-of-age story follows David from high school through his golden years as he deals with microaggressions, homophobia, and racism. Narrator Prasanna Puwanarajah uses various British accents that reflect the characters' socioeconomic statuses. David is subdued, whereas several of his high school classmates are more posh. Puwanarajah's first-person narration flows like a memoir. Part I of the novel is like a daily journal; Part II is like a series of vignettes where time passes quickly. VERDICT Puwanarajah's inflections change little as David and other characters get older, and this makes it difficult to determine how many years pass between chapters. However, his effective delivery enhances the story, which becomes somewhat tedious after David reaches 30. Give to Hollinghurst's most devoted fans.--Anjelica Rufus-Barnes

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