IN ONE PERSON

Bestselling novelist John Irving posits that exploring the spectrum of human desire is one way of revealing the identity of his bisexual main character, Billy Dean. Narrator John Benjamin Hickey juggles numerous characters and plot twists as Billy, who becomes a novelist, deals with love affairs, the AIDS epidemic, and the search for his absent father. Billy experiences the sting of prejudice and societal rejection as he ages through the 1960s to 2010. Hickey weaves this funny and heartbreaking story at a calm and deliberate pace. While Billy’s experiences are explicitly recounted, his many loves exemplify different chapters of America’s perception of love and sex. While the journey is long, Irving and Hickey make the destination well worth the trip. R.O. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2012, Portland, Maine [Published: MAY 2012]