Thursday, August 30, 2018

Gay Authors/Books that Inspire Me: The Empty Family by Colm Tóibín


Colm Tóibín, a gay author and the Leonard Milberg Lecturer in Irish Studies at Princeton University, is one of my favorite storytellers. His prose is superlative and his imagination captivates me. One of his best works, in my opinion, is his collection of short stories called The Empty Family

These exquisitely written stories, set in present-day Ireland, 1970s Spain and nineteenth-century England, are about people linked by love, loneliness and desire. Tóibín is a master at portraying mute emotions and intense intimacies that remain unacknowledged and unspoken. His characters are often difficult and combative, compelled to disguise their vulnerability and longings until he unmasks them.

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