motss@bbncca.ARPA (Forwarded anonymous posting) (10/24/84)
Several years ago (3-5) I read a novel of which I totally forgot both the title and the name of the author. Can you help? Here are a couple of things I do remember: it was ~ 300-page long, published in paperback form. Its most strinking feature is that it is interspersed with poems a-la-Dr. Seuss (and I wonder if ...), about a fantastic little character called Rumpelsticken (?), whose ups and downs parallel the hero's sexual ups and downs. The hero, a young gay man, befriends (in the second half) the son of one of his women friends; that kid, absolutely neglected by his mother, is, at the beginning, very closed and untalkative, and opens up gradually while listening to these poems which the hero makes up as they walk. At some point he also befriends a blind child, son of a lover of his (who is a physician, I think). Another character appearing in this book is an Irishman whom the hero met in a bar and whose fantasy is to be killed (literally) by the hero, who, at the last moment, refuses to do so. The cover said that the author (whose name here is obviously a pseudonym) was `a well-known author of children books'. Rings a bell? If so, please help...
rick@ut-ngp.ARPA (Rick Watson) (10/31/84)
This is from memory as I couldn't find the book, but I think you are referring to "The Story of Harold", by Terry Andrews. (Terry Andrews may be wrong; that may be the name of the character in the book.)