Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Unavailable
    When Love Comes to Town
    Unavailable
    When Love Comes to Town
    Unavailable
    When Love Comes to Town
    Ebook247 pages2 hours

    When Love Comes to Town

    By Tom Lennon and James Klise

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    The year is 1990, and in his hometown of Dublin, Ireland, Neil Byrne plays rugby, keeps up with the in-crowd at his school, and is just a regular guy. A guy who’s gay. It’s a secret he keeps from the wider world as he explores the city at night and struggles to figure out how to reveal his real self—and to whom. First published in Ireland in 1993 and compared to The Catcher in the Rye by critics, Tom Lennon’s When Love Comes to Town is told with honesty, humor and originality.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAW Teen
    Release dateMar 1, 2013
    ISBN9780807589175
    Unavailable
    When Love Comes to Town
    Author

    Tom Lennon

    Tom Lennon's fiction is noted for its understanding of gay politics in modern society and for the sympathetic and honest treatment of the characters it depicts.

    Related to When Love Comes to Town

    Related ebooks

    YA Historical For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Quantum Radio

      Feb 22, 2023

      Quantum Radio
      5 min read

    • Article

      Come with Me

      Dec 1, 2022

      Come with Me
      12 min read

    • Article

      Whose Life Is It

      Dec 10, 2023

      “What the hell?” Danny jumped up and tore out of the kitchen where he’d been reading his mail and enjoying a quiet lunch with his sister, Elaine. Startled, she looked up from the newspaper. “Danny?” He ran through the foyer, out the front door, and t

      7 min read

    • Article

      They Got Their Show

      Aug 10, 2021

      It is midnight in Ponderosa and Nick Velasquez can’t sleep. The public doesn’t want him to sleep. It’s been like this ever since it hit all the big streaming platforms. The viewers stay up bingeing and he… well, he has been bingeing in his own way. W

      14 min read

    • Article

      Bucksaw

      Jun 3, 2019

      From the back seat of the car, Benjamin read the gold-lettered sign at the edge of the rolling green lawn and said, “Why do they call it a correctional facility?” He’d meant only to think the question, rather than speak it, but lately, more and more,

      23 min read

    • Article

      Stay and Fight

      Jul 9, 2019

      Stay and Fight
      16 min read

    • Article

      My Word

      Jan 1, 2022

      My Word
      4 min read

    • Article

      O Fortuna, Velut Luna

      Sep 15, 2018

      What is Miss Treece’s trouble, according to a popular notion? The man A has failed to show up. Arousing herself at the restaurant, she fixes her lipstick when her solo supper concludes and takes herself down the stairs situated behind the bar. There,

      3 min read

    • Article

      What Just Happened?

      Apr 9, 2021

      What Just Happened?
      4 min read

    • Article

      Parakeet

      May 29, 2020

      Parakeet
      11 min read

    • Article

      Suspicious Minds

      Apr 7, 2022

      Suspicious Minds
      5 min read

    • Article

      Who We Were WHO ARE WE NOW?

      Apr 8, 2020

      Who We Were WHO ARE WE NOW?
      7 min read

    • Article

      Make A Stand

      Jan 17, 2024

      Make A Stand
      6 min read

    • Article

      Speedboat

      Mar 24, 2022

      Nobody died that year. Nobody prospered. There were no births or marriages. Seventeen reverent satires were written – disrupting a cliché and, presumably, creating a genre. That was a dream, of course, but many of the most important things, I fi nd,

      14 min read

    • Article

      The Nanny

      Dec 15, 2019

      There isn’t much in the house,” Mary said. “I’m sorry.” Kayla looked around, shrugged. “I’m not even that hungry.” Mary set the table, bright Fiestaware on place mats alongside fringed cloth napkins. They ate microwave pizzas. “Gotta have something a

      21 min read

    • Article

      The Date

      Jan 7, 2021

      The Date
      5 min read

    • Article

      Birdie

      Jan 14, 2020

      Birdie
      24 min read

    • Article

      A Leap In THE DARK

      Feb 1, 2023

      A Leap In THE DARK
      6 min read

    • Article

      Take That, Sucker!

      Apr 22, 2021

      Take That, Sucker!
      4 min read

    • Article

      Good Bones

      Mar 19, 2020

      Good Bones
      18 min read

    • Article

      The Shape Of A Person

      Oct 20, 2022

      The Shape Of A Person
      25 min read

    • Article

      Rediscover THIS DAY

      Apr 1, 2021

      Rediscover THIS DAY
      4 min read

    • Article

      What Adults Do…

      Dec 28, 2023

      What Adults Do…
      6 min read

    • Article

      Carrot Legs

      Sep 12, 2019

      Carrot Legs
      20 min read

    Reviews for When Love Comes to Town

    3.5/5

    19 ratings4 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 3/5
      Ok, so this may not be a classic of literature! But this (somewhat short) coming out story set in the very catholic Ireland Republic (south Dublin) will keep those pages turning non-stop. In my opinion, the main downfall of this book are the very shallow and caricatural characters: the sugar daddy, the hunky boyfriend, the homophobic father, the fag hag, the disturbed best friend, the sympathetic sister, the loving but confused mother. They are there just to chorus effect and very seldom become real deep psychological characters. Fortunately, Neil, the main character, is very belivable, and his aches and doubts and funny remarks keep you involved and interested. The writing is swift, fast and light. The narrative really pushes forward, keeping everything at a very fast pace. And, even if this story has some moving tragic moments, most of the times the delicious irish humour is all there.
    • 4/5
      The version I read is the recent re-release from 2013 with an updated (and better looking) cover. Even though it takes place in Dublin in 1992, it still has emotions and messages that are relevant today. It deals with a 16 year old dealing with trying to come out to his friends and parents, always feeling like an outsider as he hides his true feelings.
    • 1/5
      Look. I understand the context. Being gay in 1990 in Ireland was kind of a Big Deal. It just Wasn't Done. It deals a lot with homophobia and gay bashing and internalized homophobia. It felt very autobiographical. And maybe it was just the electronic version, but it was hard to tell sometimes when it was Neil thinking/dreaming and what was actually happening (especially the end, in the tree house). In 1993, writing about being gay and gay bashing, especially in such a Catholic country as Ireland, was novel. Now? It's very dated and, in fact, cliché. Maybe soon it will come around again to being remarkable. Gay bashing still happens. But it's becoming rarer in the English-speaking world. Same-sex marriage is legally-recognized in more and more places. Heck, my Irish-American grandparents (born in the Teens) had more of a problem with my dad getting a divorce than him being gay (he came out in 1996), from what I remember. American, yes, and several years after this book, but still. I'm worried that if I recommended this to any of my teens it would horrify and traumatize them.
    • 5/5
      Neil Byrne is a popular Irish school guy coming up to is eighteenth birthday, a star rugby player, school prize winner, and always in demand. But he bears a heavy secret which, despite the fact that virtually all his straight friends are paired off and his remains single, no one suspects; he is gay. He has known this since the age of ten, but has so far been able to conceal the fact through his masculine attributes and successes, including a brief flirtation with a girl. He has secretly fallen for a younger lad at school, the beautiful blue-eyed blond guy with the cute behind, Ian.Finally no longer to able to contain himself he confess his sexuality, but only to his closest friends, and then is encouraged to venture into the gay bars of Dublin. He meets a new group of friends including a benevolent Sugar Daddy, and Shane, a handsome older guy of twenty five with whom he starts a relationship. But is Shane all he seems to be, and is he to be trusted? Yet all appears to be going reasonably well until Neil can no longer live with deceiving his parents, and eventually comes out to them with catastrophic results.Who will Neil be able to turn now, and can he rely on anyone? Throughout all his troubles he is plagued with doubts, and often sees suicide as an answer, is that now his only recourse?However Ian is never far from his thoughts, but he does not even know if Ian is gay.I found this an involving and enjoyable story, with a satisfying and very moving conclusion. The writing is interesting, especially when at times we see events from Neil’s perspective, as if we are following events as his mind rapidly flits from one thought to another. Recommended.