Yield
A spiritually tormented hustler searches for salvation in Houck's moving debut. After gay New York City hustler Simon and his friend Louis get savagely beaten, Louis turns into a hermit and Simon fills with an inexpressible rage that he tries to tamp down with a chain of empty sexual encounters. Things begin to change when Aiden, a customer of Simon's, wants an actual relationship, and soon Simon's doing what he never thought possible: falling in love. Helped by Aiden and his friends, Simon examines his complex views of sex, intimacy, and violence and tries to find a way to heal. Houck's sparse prose is a nice match for a grittily portrayed New York that perpetually teeters on the edge of violence, and the city's and gay culture's larger problems are a perfect counterweight for the internal struggles of a young man trying to redefine himself. Solid, unsentimental storytelling distinguish Houck's first time out.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.