The Harness Room

Colonel Macready enlists the help of his manly, masculine chauffeur Fred to help toughen up Fergus, his “bookish” son, who doesn't live up to his own expectations of masculinity and “What it means to be a man”.

Whilst the Colonel is away on his honeymoon, what happens is not quite what Fergus' father originally had in mind, with a lot of what is not said being part of the novella, making it quite erotic at times. The plot ultimately plays out how the internal and external pressures on one's identity can have dire consequences.

Written at a time when attitudes were very different towards the LGBTQIA+ community, the novel reads easily, despite being bogged down by paragraphs that may be more difficult for the modern reader to digest.

It asks and poses many questions that could be good for a book club discussion.

I gave the harness room by l p Hartley. A 3.5It was his only explicitly gay novel. You still had to read between the lines though. You get glimpses of each character ‘s personality but because it's short you barely know them. I'll read more from hartley because his writing is pleasing to read. It was not a weird book but I still don't know what I read . And what was that ending. I was surprised. It totally came out of nowhere. How will the lives of people look like after the ending