Rough music / Patrick Gale.

By:

Gale, Patrick, 1962-

Material type: Text

TextPublication details: London : Fourth Estate, 2009.Description: 374, 18 p. ; 20 cmISBN:

9780007307678 (pbk.)

Subject(s):

DDC classification:

813 GAL

Fiction notes: Click to open in new window

Holdings
Item type	Current library	Call number	Copy number	Status	Date due	Barcode
Standard Loan	Moylish Library Fiction Collection	813 GAL (Browse shelf(Opens below))	1	Available		39002100514695

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

A gripping and unnerving story of a family's secrets and lies, from the bestselling author of 'Notes from an Exhibition' and 'A Perfectly Good Man'. Julian as a small boy is taken on the perfect Cornish holiday. When glamorous American cousins unexpectedly swell the party, however, emotions run high and events spiral out of control. Though he has been brought up in the forbidding shadow of the prison his father runs, though his parents are neither as normal nor as happy as he supposes, Julian's world view is the sunnily selfish, accepting one of boyhood. It is only when he becomes a man - seemingly at ease with love, with his sexuality, with his ghosts - that the traumatic effects of that distant summer rise up to challenge his defiant assertion that he is happy and always has been.

Originally published: London: Flamingo, 2000.

Excerpt provided by Syndetics

BLUE HOUSE "Actually I feel a bit of a fraud being here," Will told her. "I'm basically a happy man. No. There's no basically about it. I'm happy. I am a happy man." "Good," she said, crossing her legs and caressing an ankle as if to smooth out a crease she found there. "What makes you say that?" "That I'm happy?" She nodded. "Well." He uncrossed his legs, sat back in the sofa and peered out of her study window. He saw the waters of the Bross glittering at the edge of Boniface Gardens, two walkers pausing, briefly allied by the gamboling of their dogs. "I imagine you usually see people at their wit's end. People with depression or insoluble problems." "Occasionally. Some people come to me merely because they've lost their way." He detected a certain sacerdotal smugness in her tone and suspected he hated her. "Well I'm here because a friend bought me a handful of sessions for my birthday. She thinks I need them." "Do you mind?" He shrugged, laughed. "Makes a change from socks and book tokens." "But you don't feel you need to be here." "I . . . I know it sounds arrogant but no, I don't. Not especially. It's just that it would have been rude not to come, even though she'll be far too discreet to ask how I get on with you. If I didn't come, I'd be rejecting her present and I'd hate to do that. I love her." "Her being?" "Harriet. My best friend. She's like a second sister but I think of her as a friend first and family second." "You have more loyalty to friends than family?" "I didn't say that. But you know how it is; people move on from family and choose new allies. It's part of becoming an adult. I feel I'm moving on too. A little late in the day, I suppose." "Your best friend's a woman." "Is that unusual?" She said nothing, waiting for him to speak. "I suppose it is," he went on. "I'm just not a bloke's bloke. I never have been. I find women more congenial, more evolved. I mean I'm perfectly happy being a man, but I find I have more in common with women." "Such as?" He did hate her. He hated her royally. "The things we laugh at. The things we do with our free time. And, okay, I suppose you'll want to talk about this--" "I don't want to talk about anything you don't want to talk about." "Whatever. We also share sexual interests. I mean we like the same thing." "You're homosexual?" "I'm gay." He smiled, determined to charm her, but she was impervious and vouchsafed no more than a wintry smile. "I told you. I'm a happy man." "Your sexuality isn't a problem for you." "It never has been. It's a constant source of delight. Not a day goes by when I don't thank God. If anything I'm relieved. Especially now my friends are all having children." "You never wanted children." "Of course. Sometimes. Hats jokes that if she dies I can have hers. But no. The impulse came and went. There are more than enough children in the world and I'm not so obsessed with seeing myself reproduced. Besides, one of my nephews is the spitting image of me, which has taken care of that. I love my own company. I don't think I'm selfish exactly but I'm self-sufficient." "What about settling down? You're, what, thirty-five?" "Thank you for that. I turned forty earlier this year. I have settled down. I have a satisfying job, a nice flat. I just happen to have settled down alone." "And watching all those girlfriends settled with their partners doesn't make you want a significant other." "Oh. I have one of those. Sort of, I suppose. He's really why I'm here. I made a promise to him. It was a joke really, but I told Harriet and--" "Tell me about him." He paused. Glanced out at the view again. "Sorry," he said. "It's private." "Whatever you tell me--" "--is in strictest confidence. Yes. I know. But we've barely met, you're still a stranger to me and I'd rather not talk about him just now. It's not a painful situation. He's a lovely man. He makes me happy. But I didn't come here to talk about him." A slight, attentive raising of her eyebrows asked, So what did you come to talk about? "Shouldn't we start with my childhood?" he said. "Isn't that the usual thing?" "If you like." "I warn you. I wasn't abused. I wasn't neglected. I love my parents and I loved my childhood. It was very, very happy." "Tell me about it." Excerpted from Rough Music by Patrick Gale All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.

Author notes provided by Syndetics

Patrick Gale was born in 1962 on the Isle of Wight. He is a British novelist He was educated at The Pilgrims' School, the choir school for both Winchester Cathedral and Winchester College, then at Winchester College itself and at New College, University of Oxford. Following university he had a range of jobs while he sang for the London Philharmonic Choir and wrote his first novel, The Aerodynamics of Pork while working as a waiter in an all-night restaurant. His works include: Ease, Kansas in August, Little Bits of Baby and A Place Called Winter.

(Bowker Author Biography)