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carog's review against another edition
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
h_motionless's review against another edition
2.0
The Night Listener by Armistead Maupin is an LGBTQ+ mystery novel, published in 2000. It follows a gay man named Gabriel Noone, a late-night radio host. His publisher sends him a memoir written by a 13 year-old boy, who claims he was a victim of domestic sexual abuse and is HIV-positive. But Gabriel suspects that this memoir is a fabrication.
This book generally felt quite underwhelming for me. The characters weren’t too interesting, the plot was very lacklustre, and not much happened. There was an abundance of gratuitous sexual imagery, and the novel started with descriptions about how this boy was raped at age 4, which is objectively very off-putting.
Even though I didn’t really enjoy this book, I would absolutely love to read more of Maupin’s books, because I adored the writing style. It felt very personal, and I massively appreciated the writing throughout the novel, despite a general lack of flair.
This book generally felt quite underwhelming for me. The characters weren’t too interesting, the plot was very lacklustre, and not much happened. There was an abundance of gratuitous sexual imagery, and the novel started with descriptions about how this boy was raped at age 4, which is objectively very off-putting.
Even though I didn’t really enjoy this book, I would absolutely love to read more of Maupin’s books, because I adored the writing style. It felt very personal, and I massively appreciated the writing throughout the novel, despite a general lack of flair.
disiscaro's review against another edition
5.0
Still feeling emotions (did I cry at some point? Preposterous!) and analyzing this book over its themes, its construction and the interpretation of its ending. Amazing read.
psalmcat's review against another edition
5.0
A real surprise! I thought that because he's so acclaimed, this could be tortuous, but it's very good. The plot is somewhat contrived, but the sketch is that this very badly abused & dying teen has written a book about his life that gets to an idol of his who happens to be (like Maupin) a writer & star of an NPR series. They talk by phone, bond, and then the Maupin character's friends begin to question whether this kid actually exists. The ending leaves it ambiguous and back at the beginning of the book. Really good--and takes place partly in Wisconsin!
mvprince's review against another edition
5.0
Compulsively readable, twisty, and based on an incident that actually happened to Maupin. I don't want to say too much, because you should really read this book unspoiled.
duffgt06's review against another edition
2.0
The book seemed disjointed going between the "thriller" aspect and the boring, moody brooding of Gabriel and his backstory. All of the backstory was completely skippable. It was definitely not actually a thriller and it felt the book within a book aspect fell flat. Much of the plot points were too ridiculous to be taken seriously and reading this just left me irritated.
monasterymonochrome's review against another edition
3.0
I've been interested in reading Maupin's Tales of the City for several years, but this became my first Maupin book when I learned about it on, of all places, an episode of 20/20 about the real-life case of Anthony Godby Johnson, which the book fictionalizes. I actually feel like I would have liked the book more had I not known about its inspiration going in, as it sticks extremely close to reality until the final third, where it takes more generous liberties. For this reason, there was very little sense of drama or suspense for me. I think the writing style is also partly to blame for this. I could tell that Maupin is used to writing less heavy fare, as there's a certain lightness to the prose that contradicts the gravity of the situation. Even though the story is, by necessity, largely dependent on phone conversations, I also thought that Maupin relied too heavily on dialogue in place of other forms of characterization. Finally, the extreme meta-ness of the novel was a bit much for me to take: it was often frustratingly difficult to figure out where Maupin ended and Gabriel Noone as a self-contained entity began, and I know that this partially serves the story's purpose of showing the blurriness of truth vs. fiction, but it could have done with a lot more nuance and subtlety in that regard. The afterword, particularly, was so heavy-handed that all I could do was roll my eyes. Overall, this wasn't a bad novel - it was interesting if not exciting, moved along at a brisk pace and was immensely readable (like many noted, I also liked that it featured gay characters whose gayness was not essential to the plot while remaining an important part of their characters) - but I think it could have been a whole lot better.