Dream Boy

Un premier amour est toujours une aventure merveilleuse et compliquée et, lorsqu'on vit dans le sud d'une Amérique rurale et religieuse et qu'on aime un autre garçon, les choses deviennent extrêmement difficiles. Nathan est un garçon intelligent, ballotté par les constants déménagements d'une mille sur laquelle règne le despotisme d'un père alcoolique et religieux. Il cache le terrible secret de la terreur que lui inspire son père. Nathan et Roy s'aiment mais ne savent pas encore tout dissimuler et ils se trouvent aux prises avec la bêtise et la violence impitoyables des autres garçons. Seule la fuite pourra les sauver. L'écriture poétique parfaitement maîtrisée de Jim Grimsley nous introduit dans l'univers et les sentiments de l'enfant tout en maintenant une distance qui évite tout pathos. First love is never easy. But when the new boy in a small town is being secretly abused by his father, first love might be the only thing that can save him. With his mother busy in the kitchen and his drunken father reading scripture in the living room, Nathan can watch his schoolmate Roy from his upstairs bedroom window and dream about a life free from his father's night-time prowling. Nathan feels safer with Roy in the house next door and safer still with Roy beside him. Studying algebra shoulder to shoulder on Nathan's bed, one thing leads to another. But where will love lead Nathan? In a corner of the rural South blistering with hatred and petty meanness, Nathan and Roy must hide their love from their friends, church, and families. But that comes easily to Nathan, who is used to keeping secrets. He is only afraid of the one secret he has always kept, even from Roy -- the terrible truth about his father that makes his life impossible. Fleeing the house one night with only a blanket to shelter him, Nathan escapes with Roy on a camping trip to the haunted ruins of a plantation. As the boys track a path through the otherworldly wilderness, a sense of unnerving peace begins to surface in Nathan, along with the awful certainty that he will never return home. In a novel as stunning and heartbreaking as his acclaimed debut work, Grimsley recounts the story of a painful first love--between two adolescent boys who bravely sustain each other in a world of domestic disintegration. On Sunday in the new church, Preacher John Roberts tells about the disciple Jesus loved whose name was also John, how at the Last Supper John lay his head tenderly on Jesus's breast. Jim Grimsley ; Traduit De L'anglais (États-unis) Par Françoise Davreu. Analyse : Roman d'amour. Roman psychologique (formation)