The Beautiful Room Is Empty

A Novel

By: Edmund White

Narrated by: George Backman

When the narrator of White's poised yet scalding autobiographical novel first embarks on his sexual odyssey, it is the 1950s, and America is "a big gray country of families on drowsy holiday." That country has no room for a scholarly teenager with guilty but insatiable stirrings toward other men. Moving from a Midwestern college to the Stonewall Tavern on the night of the first gay uprising - and populated by eloquent queens, butch poseurs, and a fearfully incompetent shrink - The Beautiful Room is Empty conflates the acts of coming out and coming of age.

©1988 Edmund White (P)2014 Audible Inc.

Amazingly honest memoir/"novel". Best narrator.

Loved this book! Edmund White's narrative power is through the roof. The actual voice narration is also superb.

Great Book!

Tipical life of a gay man with wonderful sex scenes and very well written.

Edmund White is a Bearer of Gifts

Edmund White is a great, great writer (I’m reading everything he’s written now, after kind of forgetting about him for about twenty-five years). Odd that I can feel the greatness easier in an audiobook than I had done when reading his words in a book.
He is the smart, kind, generous gay uncle that I like to pretend I had to guide, explain, accept and welcome me as I grew up. He’s a witness.
The narrator is remarkably good, no small feat with this kind of eclectic writing style. He perfectly serves the writing.
I am now moving into The Farewell Symphony, and I’m already in tears.

Well written

Why a good quasi-Christian like me would read a novel like this? I am sure that most of my co-religionists would be greatly confused and may be even disappointed in me (:. Plus take into account White's somewhat hostile attitude towards Christianity. To begin with...language. White's mastery of language is totally superb. Read it just for that. Honesty- this is a very honest book. This is what I am, White tells us- deal with it. May be occasionally too much of it but still kudos to White for doing so (I would not be able to write a book like this; sometimes however I wish- and if I were what would exactly happen to me? would I be disowned?). Compassionate treatment of people of different sexual orientation (I feel like I am on shaky ground right now- forgive me if I offend anyone). When I read the novel I was within a different world of different existence (different from mine, I mean). White, like Nabokov and Tolstoy (two of his favorites), knows how to write about complex matters with a light, exhilarating and humorous tone. He also manages to convey that being gay is a painful experience in the society that does not accept homosexuality. To his credit he is not in any way didactic about it. White has been called the voice of gay America. Is it the voice only for the gays? I doubt. All of us need to hear this voice. I enjoyed very much Backman's reading (contrary to some). It has a touch of neuroticism and urgency about it. He sings through the novel. Strongly recommended on all counts.

ENJOYED IT!!

Very good book by a fine author. I didn’t realize that this is the second book in a trilogy, but I don’t think it matters what order they are read/listened to as I had no trouble following the story. I do plan on listening to the other books in the trilogy as well as a worthwhile endeavor. I think I recall a number of people “dissing” the narrator, but I thought the narrator was great(!!), and a good part of what made listening to this book so enjoyable.

I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys reading about the authentic gay male experience during the years prior to the explosion of the gay rights movement by someone who knows (the author, not me!) because he was there and actually went through it.

There are quite a few very graphic sexual scenes in this book. However, this was not the main thrust (so to speak!) of the book and, I thought, very much in context with the rest of the telling of the story.

I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys reading about this topic by an intelligent and talented writer.

Awful Narration

Would you try another book from Edmund White and/or George Backman?

Yes for Edmund White ... No for George Backman

Do you think The Beautiful Room Is Empty needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

Yes it needs a follow up, but I know what it will focus on. That will be AIDS unfortunately, for that was the gay communities plague in the US.

Any additional comments?

I had to end up playing this on 1.25 speed just to get to the end. The narrator is so slow and over the top it's extremely annoying.

Socialist are pro Socialist until it hit them in the pocketbook

This was a good book mostly because it shows how realistic Socialist are until it hit them in the pocketbook.. the strongest storyteller I have heard in many months, had it not been for the teller I would have turned off the book.

I would recommend this to young men to read.

great book

narrator was good but he did stumble on a few possible words here and there

not what i expected but great

wow totally unfiltered. reminded me of similar and now impossible situations of my past and city

The Beautiful Room is Merely Pretty

I am a big Edmund White fan. I own many of his works; and now, because I am nearing 80, I wanted to hear them read aloud. This edition is good, but being the 2nd book in the trilogy, I find it to be more of a placeholder, than a standout. Still enjoyable, of course, because it’s Edmund White.