Gold by the Inch [Hardcover]

Lawrence Chua (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1998

The narrator of "Gold by the Inch", a young New Yorker of Asian descent, has returned to Thailand, the country of his birth, following a disastrous relationship and his father's death. When he becomes obsessed with a very beautiful male prostitute who works at a Bangkok night club, he finds that he is forced to look at the connections between desire and exploitation, personal and national identity Print publicity. 11-city author tour. .

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Lawrence Chua has long been praised for his astute cultural commentary and experimental prose. In his first novel, Gold by the Inch, he also proves himself as a vibrant and breathtaking writer of literary prose. The narrative follows a young gay man of Asian descent as he returns to Thailand from the United States for an extended visit and to recover from his father's death and a failed love affair. After becoming involved, well, obsessed, with a young male prostitute, the narrator has to confront issues he has long avoided: national identity, the exploitation of other people, and the endless clashes between Asian and Western cultures. Like the novels of Doris Lessing and Nadine Gordimer, Gold by the Inch attempts to wed the personal with the political, the emotional with the cultural. It is as much a novel of political ideas as it is a meditation on romantic and sexual relationships. Chua's prose is boldly literary and often shocking in its simplicity; he knows the power of words and has the ability to conjure up images that surprise and resonate.

From Publishers Weekly

A clever challenge to Marguerite Duras's The Lover, this first novel by journalist Chua updates the time-honored themes of empire and eroticism. In a stream of precise prose in which "even the mess has an intellectual clarity," the narrator, a nameless, precocious 23-year-old gay New Yorker, lands in his native Thailand after a 13-year absence and a painful breakup with his American lover. Recovering with drugs and debauchery in the discos of Bangkok, he quickly falls for a beautiful, privileged prostitute named Thon and ends up living with Thon's wealthy family until the affair comes to an inevitable, unhappy end. Chua's prose is sensuous, often feverish, studded with vivid images: we're hearing, the narrator notes, "the sound of time eating its own children." Despite the sadness of his subject and the grimness of his historical imagination, the narrator's restless curiosity survives his romantic disillusionments. "I love you because your body is expensive," he says near the end of the novel. In Chua's debut, love always comes with a calculable pricetag, whether or not it can be paid in cash.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 209 pages
• Publisher: Grove Pr; 1st edition (March 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0802116264
• ISBN-13: 978-0802116260
• Product Dimensions: 7.4 x 5.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (25 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,573,572 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A leisurely literary cruise, April 12, 2001

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Grady Harp (Los Angeles, CA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: In September, the Light Changes: The Stories of Andrew Holleran (Hardcover)

I often return to books for repeated readings when my first impressions are lasting. Short story collections by such authors as Andrew Holleran renew the vigor of initial impact, the joys of lingering. IN SEPTEMBER THE LIGHT CHANGES is a treasure of smaller stories that prove once again that Holleran is one of our best writers today. Without depending on one locale, familiar and constant faces, recurring themes to keep us aligned, Holleran strings together tales like the best of Song Cycles by Schubert and Schumann (and Ned Rorem, more poignantly!) and allows us to absorb his luxuriant prose through very complete novellas about love, age, lust, and friends. His hour is magical...and never more evident than in his final In Septmeber the Light Changes. Smart, elegant, and yet very much from the heart.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Times We'll Never Forget!!, August 8, 2000

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Joseph J. Hanssen "Joe" (Upstate New York) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: In September, the Light Changes: The Stories of Andrew Holleran (Hardcover)

I have been a great admirer of Andrew Holleran for many years, and have always enjoyed his stories he wrote for Christopher Street magazine. Every month I waited with anticipation for the next issue for his latest writing. He always writes from the heart and these 16 stories prove it. Andrew's writing is so polished and easy to read, you feel you are listening to him tell these stories in person. Some of these stories are pleasant to read, and others are very sad because they deal with loss(AIDS), loneliness, getting older, and still having desires, especially to be young again, and the yearning for youth.

I found myself finishing one story and then continuing right on into the next chapter without stopping, they are so interesting. Maybe its because these stories relate to my generation and the times I lived through in the 70's and early 80's. I feel this book will interest anybody, there is so much beauty and history in his writing. Andrew Holleran, I believe, has not been given enough recognition or credit for his brilliant writing. I truly enjoyed this book.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This Is Why I Read Books, May 26, 1999

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Jon Miller-Carrasco - See all my reviews

This review is from: In September, the Light Changes: The Stories of Andrew Holleran (Hardcover)

Andrew Holleran is an example of why I read books. _The Beauty of Men_ will always be with me, I suspect, somewhere in the back of my mind, as the measure of what writers are "supposed" to do with their art. This collection of short stories I loved almost as much. Mr. H can, technically, set up sentences that are complicated and still lucid. Artistically, he can designate a character with an amazing minimum of details; it's like he knows just the right characteristics to show you to make his characters stand out. None of his characters are perfect, and most are struggling with growing older and being lonely, but I cared about all of them. Joshua, in "Blorts," for example, was hilarious. Morgan, in "Petunias," was self-absorbed and afraid, but struggling to rise above it all and even though the story is tragic, it still ends on a mystifyingly hopeful sentence. Mr. Holleran might not churn out novels every year, but when he does put one out, I'm always deeply affected by it. I wonder, though, why no author's picture on book jackets?