Book Outline The title refers to the huge
letter Q on the office tower of Hydro-Québec, The kittens had awakened me. As Jacques
slept, I raised myself to peer outside his bedroom window. Big, fluffy flakes
of snow were still gently falling. The twin rows of kitchen window sills and
decrepit wooden balconies flanking the view were covered with the dim,
night-time white of the snow that had fallen. Through the scrim of the falling
snow I could make out the fuzzy outline of the big letter Q with its
lightning-bolt tail on the Hydro-Québec building. That’s when I knew for sure I
was in the east side of Montreal. The French-speaking east side, where my
mother told me never to go, with its winding outdoor staircases, rich-tasting
coffee, the smell of natural gas—maybe even a harpsichord or viola da gamba—and
black-haired men who know how to make love with their bodies and souls. It was still
snowing the next morning as I left his flat and trudged though the snow.
Halfway along I stopped to look around. Everything was so quiet, the air
smelled so clean, the snow on the curving staircases and rusting mansard roofs
so white and fresh, my footsteps the only tracks. The lovemaking that had
reached so deep within my soul the night before glowed right to my skin and I’m
sure from my eyes. Transported emotionally as well as physically, I knew I was
coming back. The first three stories are from the narrator's
somewhat bizarre and hopefully humourous coming of age. Sixteen years later he
joins the gays who settle the new Village Gai, and so does the inevitable Aids. These stories are about the men
he and his buddy Michael meet: hot French boys from Montreal and small Quebec
towns; anglos from Montreal and English-Canadian towns and cities; boys who
live with Aids and Hiv every day. These stories move
through the seasons from joyful, lustful spring and summer and into the cold
yet romantic seasons, when all Montrealers act out their balletic lives against
the backdrop of eternal snows. I think these stories will appeal
to everyone, straight or gay, English Canadian or Québécois, and to any one
curious about Montreal. Like the window through which James spots the big Q,
and like the window where red geraniums hide a story, this collection offers a
window for story hounds to look through into the secrets of mystéreux
Montréal.
the province-owned electricity company on the eastern edge of downtown Montreal.
In addition to being the first letter of the word “queer,”
in Quebec slang it’s also q for queue, meaning cock.
In the title story, “Vers L’est du Gros Q,”
nineteen-year-old William wakes up
after the first night with his new, separatist boyfriend, Jacques:
to Kent and Fran for getting me started,
and to all the readers for their constructive criticism.
