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Just read the first chapter of this novel and very much enjoyed it. Those jokey changing room references to matters of Onan, most of us have been there, the chance aroused state and suggestions as to what to do next. There is a brief period when perhaps something might of happened but as adolescents become more mature these references are seen as juvenile or implying a lack of proper sexual activity with the female of the species!
To add a double entendre, I am hoping Kit can keep it up over the next 14 chapters!
Ian
[Updated on: Fri, 05 July 2013 16:06]
Visit my Blog: http://thepaintheagony.blogspot.co.uk/
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Jolyon Lewes
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Toe is in the water |
Location: SW England
Registered: September 2012
Messages: 62
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Having read the first three chapters of this increasingly absorbing series, I feel compelled to say something about it. Ian is a teenager who reminds me very much of my young self in some ways; he is academically quite bright but lacks self-confidence and isn't very sporty. Among other difficulties, add a slightly difficult relationship with Andy, his younger brother and a disastrous flirtation with a handsome but poisonous boy called Simon and we have a truly troubled teen. Anxious to expand his narrow field of interests, Ian joins the school's Outdoor Club and gets to know Frank, a very sporty schoolmate, who seems to be taking more than a passing interest in our young hero. How will things develop? Another of Kit's beautifully-written stories, this one looks to be as intriguing as his masterpiece, Tapping.
[Updated on: Sat, 27 July 2013 11:35]
Jolyon
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3 chapters in and I'm loving the story. I came into it having enjoyed Kits previous work and this isn't disappointing so far. Got to agree with Jolyon about it maybe being up there with Tapping, I just hope the standard can hold for the remaining chapters. Really impressed at how precise the writing is, everything that's there is there to push the story forwards, there are quite a few moments where I think a lot of writers would have been tempted to pad the story out with unnecessary scenes but Kit keeps the momentum going. Now if only I wasn't stuck waiting for chapter 4, I need to know what happens after the night in the tent.
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Jolyon Lewes
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Toe is in the water |
Location: SW England
Registered: September 2012
Messages: 62
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Chapter 4 has arrived (at last!). It describes Ian's growing friendship with his tent-mate Frank, who patiently tries to help Ian overcome his natural diffidence. There is much tenderness in this chapter and the setting will be familiar to any reader who has spent a night alone in a tent with another boy, to whom he thinks he's attracted and is hoping something will develop but hesitates to make the first move. Delicious. 
Jolyon
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13772
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Sorry for the gaps, chaps. some personal issues have caused the inability to process pages for a while. These will pass.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Real life issues meant I've not been able to check for new chapters so it was a nice surprise to find 2 waiting for me. Still loving the story but ouch to chapter 5, poor Frank! I hope I'm wrong but I don't see things ending well for him and Ian. Keep up the good work Kit, I'm loving the characters and can't wait to find out what happens next to them.
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Kitzyma
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Likes it here |
Registered: March 2012
Messages: 228
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Quote:samsone wrote on Mon, 19 August 2013 17:26Still loving the story but ouch to chapter 5, poor Frank! I hope I'm wrong but I don't see things ending well for him and Ian.
--
Poor Frank, maybe, but what about poor Ian?
Ian has some flaws and weaknesses, but who wouldn't after the experiences he's had? Sometimes he makes wrong decisions, but he's only human. Some readers may not like him, but if they're honest they may admit to being a little confused about their feelings when they were teenagers and making similar mistakes. All we can do is muddle through and hope that with good intentions things can be sorted out.
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Oh don't get me wrong I have sympathy for Ian and the dilemma of being honest over saying what you think someone wants to hear. I was feeling sorry for Frank over his grades, it touched on something personal to me, I don't think many relationships are strong enough to survive a separation.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13772
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Ian does seem to be the architect of his own future. I do know that Frank does not deserve what has happened to him.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Jolyon Lewes
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Toe is in the water |
Location: SW England
Registered: September 2012
Messages: 62
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I agree with Timmy. Even though we know something about what makes Ian who he is, he now seems to be playing loose with some dodgy individuals while dear, loyal Frank seems to have been ditched.
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ivor slipper
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Likes it here |
Registered: September 2013
Messages: 128
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Ian appears to be a very self centered character or perhaps just a person who doesn't see the need to say things he doesn't truly feel. But, on the other hand a good story, which this is, can always make use of a bit of a villain 
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Kitzyma
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Likes it here |
Registered: March 2012
Messages: 228
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Is it self-centred not to want a relationship with someone you love only as a friend?
Is it selfish to look for someone to fall in love with and have a relationship with?
No matter how nice a person is, you either fall in love with them or you don't. You can't force yourself to fall in love with them just because they fall in love with you.
Ian could easily lie and take the easy way out, but instead he tells Frank the truth and ensures he never cheats on Frank. Isn't Frank the selfish one for wanting all or nothing and not being prepared to settle for friendship?
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13772
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If one is fair, each is selfish. Society teaches us that one selfishness differs from the other.
We are sympathetic to the character we identify with the more closely, that is all.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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axelsrod
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Getting started |
Registered: September 2011
Messages: 6
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I think Ian wants it all. But then, who among us doesn't? 
This story is very familiar to me. Did I read it on another site a few years back?
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Kitzyma
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Likes it here |
Registered: March 2012
Messages: 228
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Quote:axelsrod wrote on Tue, 03 September 2013 19:45I think Ian wants it all. But then, who among us doesn't?
This story is very familiar to me. Did I read it on another site a few years back?
--
The story has the same basic plot as an earlier story posted elsewhere but has been substantially rewritten and amended, with new material added. For example, all of Ch 1 and most of Ch 2 is totally new and intended to show how Ian got to be the way he is.
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I wanted to answer the poll, but all I see are poll results, not the poll itself. :(
I don't think "deserve" is a very useful concept here. Ian has made some bad choices, because he is inexperienced and emotionally crippled. One of the bad choices was the way he hurt Frank, and Frank's reaction is adding to Ian's anguish, but I don't think of that as "punishment." I respect Ian for not taking the easy way out by settling for a relationship with someone with whom he is not in love. I don't think Ian is capable of being in love with anyone. I suspect (and hope) that, as part of his emotional healing, he will fall in love with Frank. But he is not ready for that yet, and Frank is taking care of himself by not letting Ian back into his life. There are no villains here (except Derek and his sycophants), and I am rooting for both Ian and Frank.
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Kitzyma
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Likes it here |
Registered: March 2012
Messages: 228
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Hi Peter,
Thank you very much for your comments about Ian and Frank. Of course, I agree.
Thanks also for trying to vote in the poll. I think you have to be logged into the forum to be able to vote. If you were logged in and still couldn't vote then I suppose there must be a problem with the poll setup. That wouldn't be too surprising, bearing in mind that this is the first poll I've ever set up. Anyway, I've just gone back and checked the poll settings and it is still set to be unlimited time and unlimited votes. So if you (or anyone else) still can't vote after logging in please let me know and I'll investigate further.
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Kitzyma, you were correct: Once I had logged in <duh!>, I got the actual poll, rather than the results, so you did set it up correctly. I voted #1 (yes), because it seems to fit better than "no," and the maybes seem like a cop-out, but for the reasons I indicated, I am not completely happy with that rather judgmental answer. I tend not to do very well with multiple-choice surveys.
If you would like to share, I would be interested in hearing your reasons for posting the poll. I'm guessing that the results won't change how you finish the story.
I do not read many stories in which the protagonist loves another person but not as deeply or passionately as that person loves him. You have done that here, and elsewhere. Ian also seems to be intellectualizing and agonizing over the question, "What is love?" These themes resonate deeply within me, and I thank you for your treatment of them.
[Updated on: Wed, 11 September 2013 16:04] |
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Kitzyma
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Likes it here |
Registered: March 2012
Messages: 228
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Quote:PeterSJC wrote on Wed, 11 September 2013 15:52I tend not to do very well with multiple-choice surveys.
If you would like to share, I would be interested in hearing your reasons for posting the poll. I'm guessing that the results won't change how you finish the story.
--
Thanks, Peter, for trying again.
Maybe it's not you and multiple choice but the poll and my badly designed options. :) After all, it is my first ever attempt at a poll.
The whole story (all 15 chapters) is already in the queue for publication. So nothing here in the forum can change how it finishes.
The reason for the poll was that all of those who sent e-mails to me directly about the story (thanks to those who did!) had a pretty negative view of Ian, mainly because he didn't return Frank's love. That was a bit of a surprise to me for two reasons. First, because I thought there was a lot in the first two chapters to explain Ian's character and generate sympathy for him, and second because I thought readers would sympathise with the uncomfortable position of being loved by someone you can't love in return. It's a position I've been in.
So I set up the poll to see if the e-mails I'd received directly represented the views of readers in general. It seems that they did. Maybe readers can't easily identify with the way Ian thinks too much and agonises about emotions rather than just letting himself feel them.
Maybe after the last chapter has been posted I'll put up another poll to see if readers have changed their opinion of Ian by the end of the story.
Kit
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Jolyon Lewes
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Toe is in the water |
Location: SW England
Registered: September 2012
Messages: 62
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For those of us who think Ian is at least partly the author of his own misfortunes, in Chapter 12 his new friend Matt teases him thus: "Oh, Ian, don't be so uptight," he said, barely controlling his laughter. "I'm only joking, and you must admit you do make an easy target of yourself." Matt seems to understand Ian better than anyone, so far.
Jolyon
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Well I have to say I'm quite shocked at the poll results. While I feel sympathy for Frank and his situation I wouldn't wish ill on Ian. I wouldn't say Ian handled the situation brilliantly but he's young and inexperienced, surely everyone's hurt someone without really meaning to.
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At the risk of beating a dead horse, I will say that the word "deserve" can mean that a person receives a reward or punishment that we think is morally appropriate, or it can mean that an action is followed by a natural outcome. If a teenager suffers permanent brain damage while speeding in a car without a safety belt, we might say that he got what he deserved for being stupid, but I would not wish that outcome on him.
Several years ago while I was in a small Nevada town during a long bicycle trip in which I had done more than my share of tire repair, I saw an apparently inebriated driver drop a bottle out of his car window. (Un?)fortunately some pieces of the broken glass were big enough to trash his rear tire when it ran over the glass, less than a second later. My delight was intensified by the fact that the miscreant deserved his fate in both senses of deserving.
So, what about Ian? I would say that, both in the moral sense and as a predictable consequence, he deserved not to have Frank welcome him back. The debacle with Derek, on the other hand, was a natural consequence of Ian's bad judgment and disregard of warning signals, but to call it punishment for hurting Frank is both callous and unconstructive, IMO.
That said, I think that being hurt by Derek was good for Ian. It was an important learning experience, a part of Ian's healing and something that helped prepare him for the subsequent happy relationship that he seems to be finding in Chapter 12.
[Updated on: Wed, 25 September 2013 04:01] |
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[Spoiler alert...]
I just read Chapter 13 and loved it. For the past couple of chapters, it has been apparent where this story is going. Naively, I thought that Matt and Ian would easily fall into a happy-ever-after: how could Ian not fall in love with Matt? So, I feel a bit impatient, frustrated at the detour. But it is a necessary detour. The story is very much about Ian's inability to make a commitment, and we have no evidence that he has had a change of heart. But I am confident that Kit will lead him, and us, there. (If only change were so assured in real life.) I can hardly wait.
[Updated on: Sun, 29 September 2013 14:01] |
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Kitzyma
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Likes it here |
Registered: March 2012
Messages: 228
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Thanks very much, Peter, for the comments.
Indeed, in real life a change of heart is difficult, but even in fiction it can't be made too easy or it would strain the willing suspension of disbelief.
Sometimes someone like Ian needs a kick up the bum to bring him to his senses. Frank wasn't forceful enough to give Ian that kick up the bum.
Matt is a no-nonsense kind of guy and too strong-willed to put up with an unsatisfactory situation. He doesn't hesitate to give Ian a very hard and uncompromising kick up the bum. But will it be hard enough and painful enough to make Ian see sense?
There are only two more chapters to go, so you'll soon find out!
Kit
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Kit this story is really great, there are times i would love to have had the chance to smack Ian as now he is about to lose his the best thing that has happened to him. Great stuff Kit please Keep up your fantastic work.
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Well what a way to end the chapter, can't wait for the next one. Some brilliant lines in there as well.
"Well, if love was easy to control, you wouldn't be so keen to avoid it." Says it all about Ian really although I will say I feel sympathy for him at the moment, I know he's been in denial about Matt's feelings and the fact that they have been partners in all but name but Matt did spring things on him so I find myself on Ian's side in a way.
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Jolyon Lewes
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Toe is in the water |
Location: SW England
Registered: September 2012
Messages: 62
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Well, that's Chapter 14 read and digested. Ian is at last beginning to show some consideration for Matt but he can still be infuriating - complicated one minute and selfish the next. An awkward conversation with his mother concludes this chapter and I'm left wondering what on earth is going to happen in the final chapter.
Kit's writing is superb. When Ian's mother says something about 'life's rich tapestry' I realised that that was the only cliché I'd spotted in the entire chapter. It is terribly difficult to write a narrative void of cliché, especially one that includes dialogue.
[Updated on: Sat, 05 October 2013 21:04]
Jolyon
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Kitzyma
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Likes it here |
Registered: March 2012
Messages: 228
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Ian is beginning to change his whole outlook on life. That isn't easy and won't be quick. After the traumas with David, Teo & Simon, he's scared of being hurt. So one of his main problems is his own fear. One of the things that enabled him to deal with that fear is his realisation that he'd rather risk being hurt himself than hurt Matt. Maybe that's one aspect of real love.
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Clichés can be fun, but only from a position of strength, not weakness, that is you don't know you're using them.
I have a friend, and I haven't worked out how to deal with him yet, who is always asking me if I know what he means - I usually do - and for whom everything happens at the end of the day. I don't know what he does during the rest of the day.
As schoolmasters my colleagues and I had to guard against clichés, which was testing. My own maths master when I was a boy would say 'Isn't that so?' A boy who sat at the front of the class within reach of the board would count them by chalking five barred gates in the corner. On the occasion when the count reached 50 a great cheer went up and poor Jacko hadn't the slightest idea why.
Fortunately one of the pre-readers of my stories spots a cliché at a hundred paces which helps me eliminate them, but I'd rather they weren't there by accident in the first place. Planting them on purpose is, of course, a different matter.
Hugs
Nigel
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13772
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My Auntie Joan used to talk a lot about life's rich pageant and tapestry. How strange that she managed to raise a bigot and a homophobe as a son.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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I work with someone who calls them 'weasel words' and takes great delight in pointing out everyone's vocal habits, conveniently ignoring their own. I guess we all have words and sayings that we overuse.
I've just read Chapter 14 and have no idea where the story is going to end up. I see Chapter 15 is out now though so I guess I'll soon find out. I almost don't want it to end, I've really enjoyed getting to know the characters and with the end approaching it feels almost as if it's going to be over too soon.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13772
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Quote:samsone wrote on Sat, 12 October 2013 18:37I work with someone who calls them 'weasel words' and takes great delight in pointing out everyone's vocal habits, conveniently ignoring their own. I guess we all have words and sayings that we overuse.
I've just read Chapter 14 and have no idea where the story is going to end up. I see Chapter 15 is out now though so I guess I'll soon find out. I almost don't want it to end, I've really enjoyed getting to know the characters and with the end approaching it feels almost as if it's going to be over too soon.
--
Ah you may be right, but you might have forgotten that Kit's endings emulate real life, too. Not that I'm giving anything away you understand
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Lisa
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Getting started |
Location: Connecticut, USA
Registered: October 2013
Messages: 1
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Is that it? That's not the end of the story, is it? I heard there's only fifteen chapters, but this didn't seem like the end.
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ivor slipper
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Likes it here |
Registered: September 2013
Messages: 128
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Maybe I was too hasty to pass judgment on Ian. Perhaps now he has found someone who he truly loves he has also realised that it is possible to also just be 'friends' with others. Great to see him extend the hand of friendship to Frank.
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Jolyon Lewes
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Toe is in the water |
Location: SW England
Registered: September 2012
Messages: 62
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The ending of this story may have seemed low-key but, as Timmy inferred, this thoroughly absorbing story of Kit's emulates real life.
So, no fairy-tale ending but a satisfactory conclusion of this stage of Ian's life, with his re-establishing his friendship with Frank and, at the very end, a small but significant gesture that seems to make Matt happy. Ian is no longer ashamed to show affection in public.
The Question is the title of the story and has Ian now found the answer to it? I like to think so. Will there be other, even tougher questions in the future? Of course there will be (especially for a character as complex as Ian) but it will be up to the reader to decide which questions and to come to his or her conclusions.
This story has deservedly provoked a great deal of comment. The author has never attempted to make Ian a hero, just a slightly confused boy emerging uncertainly from his adolescence. I am one of several readers who've considered Ian to be self-centred. I'm trying to remember if I was a self-centred youth. Probably. Maybe it's a part of adolescence that we prefer to forget as we grow older.
Jolyon
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I have to admit that there were times during my reading of the last chapter where I found myself thinking, how can it end here, I just couldn't see how the story could come together to a satisfactory conclusion in the space of one chapter. Then the final scene came along and it was just perfect, the exact balance of closure with potential for the future. I feel like I've gone on a journey with the characters, watched them change as the story progressed and left them ready to face the future.
Thank you for the story Kit.
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Re: The Question by Kit 
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