The Men of Brewster Place - Hardcover

Naylor, Gloria

3.8

677 ratings by Goodreads

9781568957128: The Men of Brewster Place

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1568957122 ISBN 13: 9781568957128

Publisher: Wheeler Pub Inc, 1999

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Explores the lives and fates of seven men, from Basil Michael, who marries a women he does not love for the sake of her children, to Eugene Turner, torn between his homosexuality and his beloved wife

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Review:

Gloria Naylor revisits the dilapidated brick walls, sagging ceilings, and decrepit plumbing of Brewster Place, a feeble fortress that jealously guards the hell, heartache, and hope of its tenants. Ben, the kind, alcoholic janitor from The Women of Brewster Place returns as a mythical minstrel of sorts, wandering in and out of the lives of Brewster's male denizens, introducing their stories, each a quest for the meaning of manhood.

For autistic Brother Jerome, masculine identity comes in the form of a rickety upright piano whose missing keys and wobbly wires burst to life when he plays. Jerome plays so well (better than Count Basie, mind you) that his hedonistic mother decides not to institutionalize him so she can charge for his performances. Eugene, however, has a more difficult act to shore: he's married, he's a father, and he's gay. Ceil, his wife, doesn't know that's why he keeps leaving, so she takes family matters into her own hands and sends Eugene into a bottomless pit of guilt and self-loathing. Basil looks for his redemption in a contemptuous trash bag named Keisha and her two beautiful, neglected sons, Jason and Eddie. Will Basil find atonement for his sins against his mother if he gives those boys what he never received as a child? The men of Brewster Place continue to stream into the story in raw, biting vignettes until the stage is full and the future of their community is threatened. Can these men come together and reclaim what's theirs? The answer lies at the root of self-worth and sexual identity. Or, in the words of Ben, "Brewster Place is a small street but it seems there's an endless supply of I coulda, I shoulda, but didn't. Can you call it any man's blues? I don't know, but you can definitely call it the black man's blues." --Rebekah Warren

From AudioFile:

The Women of Brewster Place launched Gloria Naylor and was filmed for television. Now the author returns to the housing project on Brewster with a similar series of first-person narratives of its male inhabitants. Joe Morton--an excellent, if colorless, actor--impersonates these men, while the author herself bridges each section as the spirit of the place. Both do a nice job--especially Morton, who reins in the book's melodrama and sentimentality. Y.R. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine

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