The Coming Storm
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| The Coming Storm | |
 Cover of The Coming Storm |
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| Author | Paul Russell |
|---|---|
| Country |  USA |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Novel |
| Publisher | St. Martin's Press |
| Publication date | August 1999 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback, Paperback) |
| Pages | 371 (1st edition) |
| ISBN | ISBN 978-0312205140 |
The Coming Storm is a 1999 novel by Paul Russell.
The Coming Storm is set on the campus of a boys' prep school in upstate New York. Tracy Parker, a handsome 25-year-old, is hired as an English teacher by the headmaster Louis Tremper. Tracy has a love affair with a troubled 15-year-old student. The novel touches on the transience of youth, the challenges of illegal or unconventional love, and the tragedy of sexual obsession.
[edit] Plot
Louis is attracted to Tracy and his friendship inspires him to resume work on his thesis on Thomas Mann. Louis has repressed feelings for some of the boys at the school, but never gets close to realising his forbidden desires. Instead, he writes erotic fantasies in his secret notebook about Tadzio, the beautiful, unattainable boy in Mann's Death in Venice.
Louis' predecessor as head was known to have a series of infatuations with schoolboys and actually had an affair with Arthur Branson that was uncovered by Louis. Arthur reappears into Louis' life as a homosexual friend of Tracy's when the Trempers are invited to dinner by Tracy. Louis is horrified to discover that Tracy, the young man he is falling in love with, is openly gay.
Tracy is a popular teacher and is not afraid to challenge his students. He uses the complex novel A Separate Peace, a story about unrequited love between two schoolboys, as a text in his English class. Tracy is drawn to one 15-year-old student, Noah Lathrop III, who pursues contact with Tracy at every opportunity. Noah's tough entrepreneurial father has an apartment in New York City and Noah has a chance meeting on the train into the city with Chris Tyler, a fellow student. Tyler is an unpopular student, known to be gay, and he lets Noah in on the fact that he has a 40-year-old boyfriend who is a doctor. Noah invites Chris back to his father's apartment overlooking Central Park and they have sex.
Tracy himself had a homosexual experience when he was aged 15 with Erik, when they were rehearsing Benjamin Britten's Noye's Fludde. Erik tried to stop Tracy's advances, because Tracy was a minor, but eventually gave in. Tracy likewise resists Noah's advances for some months. During this period of mixed emotions, Tracy hears that an old friend of his who had tested positive for AIDS has committed suicide. When re-visiting the College of William and Mary and the place where they had illicit sexual encounters, Tracy reveals his hidden pedophile longings when he spies a 13-year-old boy, Clay, visiting the park with his family. He tracks the boy, a "beautiful fluke of nature", all day and eventually follows him into the toilets where he sneaks a look down at the unsuspecting boy at the urinal. Tracy convinces himself that he would never molest such a young boy, thinking that there is "nothing wrong with looking".
In the winter, Noah runs away and asks Tracy to pick up from the station. Tracy does so and "reluctantly" brings the boy home. Noah slips naked into Tracy's bed in the middle of the night, but nothing happens. Eventually, however, Tracy weakens and he starts a dangerous, illegal sexual relationship with the boy.
