Nights in Aruba

By Andrew Holleran

Holleran's follow-up to Dancer from the Dance and classic novel of love shared and love concealed is the stuff of tragedy, of comedy—in fact, of life itself.

At the center of this groundbreaking novel is Paul, an uneasy commuter between two parallel lives: one as the dutiful son of aging, upper-middle-class parents, the other as a gay man plunged deliriously into the world of bars, baths, and one-night stands. Admittedly, bored by the hijinks of sex and drugs in the Manhattan disco scene, Paul's development centers around his coming to terms with his homosexuality, his Catholic upbringing, and his relationship with his parents.