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Fellow Travelers (Vintage)
by Thomas Mallon
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$14.95 |
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$4.78 (31%) |
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Paperback
Publisher: Vintage
It's 1950s Washington, D.C.: a world of bare-knuckled ideology and secret dossiers, dominated by personalities like Richard Nixon, Lyndon Johnson, and Joe McCarthy. Enter Timothy Laughlin, a recent college graduate and devout Catholic eager to join the crusade against Communism. An encounter with a handsome State Department official, Hawkins Fuller, leads to Tim's first job and, after Fuller's advances, his first love affair. As McCarthy mounts a desperate bid for power and internal investigations focus on “sexual subversives” in the government, Tim and Fuller find it ever more dangerous to navigate their double lives.
Moving between the diplomatic world of Foggy Bottom and NATO's front line in Europe, Fellow Travelers is a searing historical novel infused with political drama, unexpected humor, and genuine heartbreak.
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| Wonderful |
| Customer Rating: 5 out of 5 |
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Excellent novel. The period detail and attention to 1950s historical events is superb. Finely drawn and realistic characters. Highly recommended.
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| Loved it! |
| Customer Rating: 5 out of 5 |
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Being a middle-aged, gay DC resident, I enjoyed the nostalgic perspective of reading about an era in which most homosexuals were closeted in Washington. Also, unlike some reviewers, I loved the minutiae of passing details to fully draw me into the time period. A very well written book.
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| Fellow Travelers |
| Customer Rating: 5 out of 5 |
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Thomas Mallon's history is superbly well researched, even down to phrases. His fictional characters apparently emerged from wide experience, even down to phrases. The combination is a perfect fit. There are ordinary people who are exquisitely beautiful in character, and there are drop-dead gorgeous people who are vultures with absolutely nothing to redeem them. That goes for both Mallon's historical and fictional characters. Their lives are blended in ways that never distort the history and ways that never miss the mark in populating the fiction. There's ambition that's despicable. There's romance that is exalting and heart-rending. Be ready to be cautious, if not downright afraid. Be ready to hurt as badly as you've ever hurt in your life. Be ready to fall back in time and relearn sad lessons. Be ready to apply the needed therapy to relive your way out of painful disappointment. Be ready to wonder how and why you could have loved and trusted so genuinely, so powerfully, and how or why you were deceived so terribly. Above all, you can be sure that this excursion into the past can be one of the most memorable, loving, painful, and helpful you have ever taken.
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| Haunting |
| Customer Rating: 5 out of 5 |
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Before I read this book, all I knew was that it took place in Washington D.C. during the 1950's, and that it involved men having affairs with each other. Needless to say, I drastically underestimated it. The book is really a tragic love story presented as historical fiction, but even more than that it explores what it's like for men who live a secret, double life, which leads to nothing but heartache. Tim Laughlin is the young, hero-worshipping innocent who is seduced--both sexually and emotionally--by the handsome and older Hawkins Fuller. Their clandestine relationship can be summed up in two lines; Tim: "I have to get over you." Hawkins: "Yes, you do." One man is hopelessly in love, while the other is unable to feel anything more than mere affection. The result is an imbalance which is very unsettling. Mallon is also a genius at creating characters so real you identify with what they're thinking and feeling. A third character, Mary Johnson, is friends with both men, and her own story is vividly painted and gives the book some balance. There are a lot of other characters, too many in fact for the average reader to keep up with (I would even suggest writing down who they are as each person is introduced). I can't help but wonder if this book might have limited appeal, because in some ways it's half soap opera, half political novel--and the political stuff can be kind of uninteresting at times. Still, it is superbly written, and the love story is absolutely heartbreaking.
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| Most fascinating read |
| Customer Rating: 5 out of 5 |
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Fellow Travelers targets both the Communist-and-gay-friendly people that support the rights of groups without joining them. Sometimes, the supporters will not even admit their advocacy. This novel portrays an American Cold War government of many such leanings and secrets.
In 1991 Estonia, at the American Embassy in Tallinn, Hawkins Fuller is at the close of his government career, ending as Embassy Deputy Chief. He receives an unexpected letter that recalls his earlier life with all of its excitement and lack of backbone.
He had helped a youth struggling with homosexual thoughts to secure a position in Washington, D.C. with Republicans involved in the McCarthy witch hunts. He did this to seduce the youth as a steady sexual conquest to keep handy. However, he nearly closed the gap to falling in love with Tim Laughlin, only stopping short of commitment.
Tim's family revered McCarthy, but Tim was in constant danger of exposure as a homosexual, although he was uncertain about it. However, he had fallen in love with Fuller, who sought only a stable of men and a wealthy wife.
Fellow Travelers contains sections that are surprisingly entertaining-alongside portions that are riveting. Author Mallon connects the Cold War era's fear of both Communism and homosexuality together as a witch hunt that has continued well past the fall of the Berlin Wall.
When Fuller testifies before the Committee on Un-American Activities, he is required to walk across a room to determine if he has a "homosexual walk" and to read from Of Human Bondage to see if he "sounds homosexual." These tests and the lie detector all fail, and he and beats the rap to revel in a visible federal career. He also enjoys a wealthy wife and a long, though diminishing, series of men that breaks Tim's heart. Tim had joined the army to escape, but Fuller continues to reappear and hurt Tim repeatedly, more harshly each time. Finally, Tim breaks away, becomes celibate, and has the last word through a mutual female friend.
This is an adult story to be enjoyed while comparing it to Cold War facts. Although fiction, it could all be true.
Armchair Interviews says: This was originally published in April, 2007 by Pantheon, in hardback, now in paperback.
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