Martin and John

February 1, 1993
With this poetic, tightly compressed novel, Peck makes a head-turning debut on the literary scene. It is composed of a feverish sequence of vignettes, which the reader gradually learns are the reminiscences of John, a gay man, as he tries to come to terms with the death of his lover, Martin, from AIDS. Some episodes straightforwardly recount John's life: abused by his hostile father, he escapes to New York and survives by becoming a hustler; he falls in love with Martin, and moves with him to Kansas, where Martin dies. Alternating with this account are ``stories'' written by John, in each of which different, spiritual versions of the narrator (named John) and of a chameleonic character named Martin work their way through states of need, surrender and bereavement. Subtle but highly charged, the fragments carry the reader continually deeper into human mystery, and what we at first hear as a fugue on the destructive powers of sexual desire evolves rapidly into a lay psalm that proclaims both the necessity of love and its inevitable loss. Peck's operatic intensity and lyric grief come tumbling out in these pages; this is very much a young man's novel, but its flaws are also emblems of its power. Though the symbolism is often obvious, and the writing so pitched that it would seem excessive in less talented hands, the narrative plunges forward on a wildly romantic course.