The Back Passage by James Lear
Erotic Fiction Meets Crime Comedy - Gay Erotica at its Funniest
Dec 17, 2008
Imagine the setting – an English country house in the depths of Norfolk and a prospective marriage between Cambridge rowing champion, Boy Morgan and Belinda Eagle, daughter of Sir James Eagle, owner of the house. It is here that our hero, Edward “Mitch” Mitchell, Cambridge room-mate of Boy Morgan, has been invited.
The scene of Back Passage (Cleis Press 2006, ISBN 978-1-57344-243-5) is set for an Agatha Christie style tale of mystery and intrigue. Set in 1925, it meets all the criteria of a Christie setting, contains a large family of dubious and secretive motives for their movements, a scattering of servants who are equally secretive, and, of course, the detective, Edward Mitchell, a 22-year-old American hunk.
Hunky Hero with Designs on his Watson!
All should be serenely mysterious in this Christie-style plot – except for two things: Mitch has the sole intention of seducing his university chum and introducing him to the delights of gay sex before the horrific reality of heterosexual marriage gets him. Add to this a murder, discovered in the first few pages of the novel, after the first – and incredibly explicit – attempts by Mitch to initiate Boy Morgan while they are in a cupboard together during a game of Sardines!
The tone for this novel is set even before the first page. The photographs on the cover by Louis LaSalle suggest a provocative eroticism in the naked man (get used to this – it’s a recurring theme in the text!).
But don’t be fooled into thinking that the cover suggests a highly literary, velvety smooth sensual text, driven along by a perfect Hercule Poirot type detective in this fabulous house. Mitch is nothing more than an amateur with an intense fascination for Sherlock Holmes mysteries. Mitch claws his way from clue to clue to discover the truth behind the murder, which everyone seems in a great hurry to bury under the carpet of mystery and scapegoats – and some are really keen to keep Mitch out of the way, finding other ways to keep his attention occupied!
Mitch makes progress with his case, held back only by his insatiable appetite for gay sex. In fact, it is surprising really that he ever unmasks the murderer, such is his distraction by anyone with an Adam’s apple and a pair of trousers (or not, as the case may be). Sometimes, though, he uses it to aid his questioning technique to useful effect. Nothing stands in the way – eventually – for this Sherlock Holmes wannabe to find his clues wherever he can get them.
While critics may debate the sexuality of Mitch’s hero, Sherlock Holmes, and the way it sits uncomfortably with him while he solves his cases with Watson, Mitch bears no such inhibitions. And neither does his sidekick, Boy Morgan. Mitch has an excellent, and very useful partner, in many ways and they work well together when they can get themselves out of the bedroom (or the bushes, or the lake or…).
They have a very strong, genuine friendship, too, and this loyalty proves useful, even life-saving as solving this crime becomes more and more dangerous and it is impossible to tell who is in on it and who is not.
Comedy – Honesty, Setting and Pure Comic Farce
The easy, conversational, first person narration by Mitch makes this novel incredibly easy to read as the plot flows from plot to sex and back again throughout. The frankness expressed in Mitch’s storytelling makes for great comedy – not of the slapstick variety, but of the ironic, sarcastic and just plain amusement due to the honesty expressed by the narrator.
The comedy is also due to James Lear’s deftly explored situations in which the characters find themselves, from the Sardines cupboard, to the bushes, to the more conventional bedroom (which, in this house, is anything but conventional!) and even the back passage, which makes its appearance as things reach a climax – so to speak.
Undertones of Reality and Relationship
But this is not just a book where the pleasures of promiscuous, gay sex remain paramount. Virtually everyone in this English country house turn out to have homosexual tendencies and, for some, this is the source of great physical and emotional pain, not least when Mitch witnesses the sexual abuse of the scapegoat “murderer”, Meeks, Sir James’ servant. Mitch may be gay, but his revulsion at the misuse of sexual power in this way is frank and authentic and ensures the reader realises that sex on any level should be about choice.
Relationships come under the microscope, too. In this strange house are all manner of feelings - those of loyalty and love for a sibling, regardless of their oddities, long lost love of men forced apart by politics and circumstance, staunch and strong protective love of one man for another and the quiet yearnings for love by those not in a position to do anything about it. Heterosexual relationships are there, too. Some work and some don’t, and those that do, again, work because the individuals had a choice over their destinies.
The Back Passage is, evidently, no Agatha Christie story, full of politeness, manners and neat endings. If you want this, then look elsewhere. But it is a fabulously fun book for anyone who is looking for pages of totally explicit sex and a very comic taste to run all the way through the plotline. And the plot is strong, notwithstanding the sexual encounters, and would make a great story on its own, minus Mitch’s (and everyone else’s) debauchery.
For heterosexual readers, it is most definitely worth reading if you are a fan of the old-fashioned crime story, enjoy subtle comedy and are open-minded enough to take the sex for what it generally is portrayed to be – erotic fiction.
 |
