Adam is a modern-day adolescent love story set in rural France. Adam is a sixteen year old boy from England who moves to France when his father's engineering company dispatches him to work on a bridge construction project. While there, Adam adapts rather quickly to the French language and culture and develops friendships with a handful of his school mates. He also meets an older boy, age 22, while exploring the countryside one afternoon.Adam's acquaintance, Sylvain, is ruddy and extremely manly. At once Adam is attracted to him. Months earlier, while still residing in England, Adam had first discovered his homosexual attractions when he engaged in repeated sexual exploration sessions with his best friend Michael. When he begins to realize that Sylvain is attracted to him as well, he picks up where he left off in his pursuit of sexual self discovery. They embark upon an ongoing sexual relationship and ultimately fall in love.When Michael visits Adam a few months later, a mutual friend Sean tags along. For ages Adam has harbored a secret crush on Sean, and he is conflicted over how to reconcile these feelings with his relationship with (and commitment to)Sylvain. Adam ends up having sex with both Michael and Sean during their visit.Eventually, Adam has to face the reality that his father's temporary post in France is going to expire and the family will be moving back to England. He is distraught, not sure how to break the news to Sylvain. When he finally informs his lover that he will be soon leaving, Sylvain takes drastic measures, taking matters into his own hands as he attempts to force a solution to their dilemma which is anything but practical.This story was a mixed read for me. There are numerous things about the book that I honestly loved. The writing was superb. The romance and physical intimacy were beautiful presented. I was able to relate to Adam, and I grew to genuinely care for him, as flawed as he may have been. In my view, the author presented a touching story that depicted a teenager sampling three very powerful variations of love for the first time. His relationship with Michael represented an enduring, most often platonic love, a love that will likely continue throughout his life. They are best friends and share a connection most others are incapable of understanding. Sean represents infatuation. He's the unrequited lover (at least for a season), the one Adam pines for and fantasizes about. Sylvain is the person with whom Adam ultimately falls in love.I understood these distinctions, and although it was unsettling at times to see Adam approach sex so casually, I also accepted the context. My personal viewpoint is that there are many sixteen year olds who are sexual active, even promiscuous, but it didn't sit right with me as I tried to mentally frame his sexual behavior within the context of his overall identity. Adam seemed to be an intelligent, well-mannered, and possibly even fastidious young man. Then this other side of him made me think of him as being slutty and replete of any firm morals.I ended up questioning myself, wondering if perhaps my issues with this depiction were culturally based. Perhaps my attitude toward sex is far too Puritan as opposed to European. Setting this issue aside, I also took issue with the characterization in the story. Yes, the story is primarily told from Adam's POV, but I yearned to understand Sylvain more. I struggled a bit with their romance. Was it supposed to be a classic opposites attract type relationship? That certainly was the case, Adam being intellectual and a bit cultured while Sylvain was a simple farmer. Adam was younger with a slender, boyish body, and Sylvain was a grown man. Adam was a deep thinker who had big dreams while Sylvain could not see beyond his limited scope of experiences on the farm.Sexually Sylvain dominated, yet Adam was completely in control of the relationship. Adam had intellectual superiority, and the fact that he was proud of this fact made him at times seem snobbish. There was a part of me that hated him for this. Is such a relationship possible for two people who are so opposite one another? It seemed a stretch for me. If only I'd been able to see more of who Sylvain was, maybe I'd be able to "get it". Then again, maybe there was no more of Sylvain to show. That was the point. He was a simple person, with limitations, and love transcends such things.It also irked me that the author often used such verbosity in his prose. He provided a minutia of detail that was unnecessary and often included blocks of text (dialogue) that were in French. Perhaps a bilingual reader would be able to appreciate this. To me, though, it was confusing. I grew weary of trying to decipher the French quotations by using context and wished the author had simply translated them. Although the writing itself was beautiful, I think there is something to be said for the adage, "Less is more."Overall I enjoyed the challenge of this read. I was stirred emotionally and I learned some new vocabulary in the process. I also really did grow to care about the main character. I think readers who enjoy stories that are non-formulaic and atypical may appreciate this read. And readers who appreciate the beauty of the written word over the plausibility of the plot would rate this book highly. In other words, the writing can be appreciated even if the story itself is not.
3.25 StarsThis was really difficult for me to rate. I liked it, it was well written, but way too wordy. It was distractingly wordy. I found myself scanning and skipping a lot of material to get to the story.Adam was really confusing. He's a 16 year old boy. He excels at everything he does. He's articulate, talented, intelligent and lives an extremely privileged life. He meets an obviously, mentally unstable man (who is constantly referred to as a boy) and develops a sexual and emotional relationship with him. What sane man exposes himself to a child? Even a 16 year old would know this is inappropriate. The guy is disheveled and not too bright. He was 21 at the time, but he was a grown man. I would run like hell. At least run like hell after he fucks you into the ground hard enough to break your teeth. How does anyone confuse that with rape? The guy fucking raped him!!!Then, I thought...when I was 15, I was conned by an older man that he loved me more than anyone, I also believed that he was my world and he was the one and only. A person that young might be needy enough to believe it. Adam said how much he loved Sylvain then had sex with 2 friends, repeatedly, over a short holiday. I was incensed. How did this innocent kid turn into such a slut? Then I remembered...he is 16 years old, newly sexually active, confused and his hormones are running wild. There's no chance of pregnancy and (possibly) no disease...I say...GO FOR IT!Then completely out of the blue, Sylvain kidnaps Adam when he is supposed to go home. Adam is a victim (seemingly willing) with a full-blown case of Stockholm Syndrome. I realize that Sylvain was totally obsessed and I was really uncomfortable with him from the beginning, but to me, it did come out of left-field. There was too much black-out time after Adam was recovered...in my opinion. This is one of those stories that I think would have benefitted from a dual-POV...even minimally so. I would have liked to have seen Sylvain's mental illness mentioned. I would have liked a little glimpse of his thought process and obsession with Adam and his mental decline when he stopped his meds. I know this was a book about the 16 year old Adam, but it would have been helpful for a reader to understand a little perspective into what was going on with Sylvain.I guess my problem with issues in books such as mental illness, self-injury, sexual/physical/emotional abuse, suicide, etc, is they are very serious issues and should not be skated over. It's a real problem in our society. People are suffering every day from these issues and most people are privileged enough not to have to go through them. Maybe I take them too seriously.Anthony McDonald is a fabulous writer, it was just my feelings on the subject matter that I had a difficult time with.
Do You like book Adam (2003)?
This is a fast read and kept me interested, but ulimately the plot was somewhat off-putting. The central romance is a little odd -- a 16-year-old boy and a 23-year-old with the apparent mental age of 14 -- so I found it hard to feel invested in it. Adam's bed-hopping didn't help, even if this fickleness is authentic teenage-boy behaviour.It seems like everyone Adam meets is gay, which is slightly unbelievable, as well as the fact that three different boys declare their love for him. Um why? He's not that interesting. And since when do boys throw the "l" word (love, not lesbian) around like that?
—Dana
What an odd and fascinating book. Adam's relationship with Sylvain was crazy and inappropriate and I wasn't sure exactly who was the teenager and who was the adult at times. I did enjoy Gary's talks with Adam where he tried to make the teen see that he was behaving recklessly. There's a lot of wanking going on here (which, I guess makes sense when you're dealing with a sixteen-year-old boy and his male friends), I found the constant descriptions of this a little tiresome. I am looking forward to reading the next book in the series where Adam is in his early twenties.
—Kim
Sixteen year old Adam is in France from England for a year with his parents; his father’s work has assigned him there. Adam is a well behaved lad, with a great talent as a budding cellist, he also realises he is not interested in girls, he prefers boys. While in France he continues his education and gets on well enough with his French peers, but it is the twenty two year old farm labourer Sylvain who gets his attention. Handsome dark haired and tanned, Sylvan captures his heart; they fall in love and carry on s clandestine affair. But how will it all end?We follow Adam’s exploits with Sylvan, their many adventures into the French countryside and their expressions and explicit demonstrations of love; and also Adam’s interactions with his schoolmates in France and England.This is a delightful story, Adam is a very likeable boy, and he has some very loyal friends, Sylvain is equally likeable and quite innocent for his age. The writer appears to have a good knowledge of the locality and its flora, which comes over in the narrative. While it could be criticised for being a little too good to be true at times, it is nonetheless a very pleasurable read.t*
—Benjamin
