Our Evenings is presented as the memoir of acclaimed actor Dave Win. When his benefactor the well-known philanthropist Mark Hadlow dies, Dave has occasion to contact his widow and look back on his own life. Alan Hollinghurst has again created characters I’m interested in, that I believe in, and a complete world within the book that I am happy to inhabit.
Here we have a politician and a young man attached to a family more affluent and more worldly than his own, but there I think the comparisons to The Line of Beauty should end. There are flashbacks to Dave’s youth, ‘a chaos of privilege and prejudice’; Hollinghurst captures beautifully the details of the 1960s with a light touch, the mention of a particular car here, a new and exciting tape recorder there. It’s the almost ubiquitous racism that really stings the modern reader’s eyes though: people either don’t know what to say to Dave or feel all too confident in saying unpalatable things, making Esme’s blunt warmth even more refreshing.
I recognised in myself Dave wanting to tell his mother about his stay with the Hadlows but ‘even more to keep these things to myself’; Hollinghurst puts into words a thought or a feeling I have had that has not quite crystallised. Observations can be mundane yet delicious, commonplace and universal. Hollinghurst does not avoid explicit content but uses allusion for impact when Dave has his first proper sexual encounter, rendered simply as ‘we … moved on to the astonishing next stage’. The pacing is great throughout and the end, in the near-present, hit me with a whump of shock.
Alan Hollinghurst won the Booker Prize in 2004 and is shortly to be given The Sunday Times Award for Literary Excellence so he hardly needs my endorsement, but I’m happy to say I loved Our Evenings. My deflation at finishing it is tempered by the delicious doorstopper of The Stranger’s Child waiting to be read and seeing the man himself at Cheltenham Literary Festival.

I did enjoy this epic novel which covers a huge amount of ground, from the mid-20th Century through to modern day life. Here, we have a central character called David and we follow his life throughout the last 50 years of the 1900s. It concludes with references to the pandemic in the early 2020s.

This is quite typically Hollinghurst, particularly given the protagonist is gay - and the difficulties he experiences at boarding school, specifically with Giles - a character who comes back into David's life much later on. I really like the way the writer deals with historical events and the focus we, as readers, get on different things that happen. One criticism, though, is I the chapters are confusing in that they often jump forward to another time without explaining the time period. In some ways, the plot is a little clunky, in my opinion, and assumptions are made without explicitly saying enough.

'Our Evenings' will be a success, I feel sure, and I am grateful to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC.

A beautiful, slowly paced novel with the concept of a memoir of the central character David, a half Burmese actor who was once the recipient of a scholarship. Taking his life from meeting the family who established the endowment to his early 70s, Our Evenings is on one level a story of a life through decades of societal upheaval, and at another level a study of the role of art and culture in society, the entitlement of the oxbridge educated politicians that took us to Brexit, the changing sexual mores across the period and ultimately on life, love and aging.
The structure is heavily weighted to the school years and after that there are long gaps- this could be criticised but for me it told the passage and perception of time - when we’re young every day seems to last for longer and once we’re older years fall by until “slowly, without sending it, we grow old”.
I adore Hollinghurst and wish he was more prolific; perhaps his perfect novels are only possible due to the extended gaps between them.

n my view, Our Evenings by Alan Hollinghurst is an exceptional novel. The prose has a graceful, fluid quality that feels both timeless and enduringly classic, pulling the reader in effortlessly. It’s one of those novels that captures both the intellect and the emotions, and I can confidently say it’s one of the best books I’ve read this year. Truly a brilliant work of literature.

Dave Win is only 13 when he stays with the sponsors of his boarding school scholarship. Though not everything he’s part of is pleasant, for the teenager, it’s a chance really to see how the other half live. He and Giles – the sponsors’ son – enjoy colourful though differing lives. Now an actor, Dave must face discrimination while Giles heads into politics, where power is more important than policy. As Dave recounts his life, his loves and career, it’s a beautiful, almost haunting read written in that quintessential Hollinghurst manner. It’s a pleasure to read.

Alan Hollinghurst paints a stunning picture of Britain through time since the 1960s to the present, a queer history, focusing on class, culture, power, and race as he immerses us in the captivating life of the teenage David Win, a half Burmese brown boy, who wins the Hadlow Scholarship, a mixed blessing, as he is thrust in the challenging environment of a boarding public school. As a boy he had always stood out at home in Foxleigh, with his single white mother, a talented dressmaker. A fascinating woman, she informs a little of Burma and his father, although she waits until he is older before she moves in with her wealthy lover, the memorable Esme Croft, at Crackenthorpe Lodge. We look back through the years with the older Win with his husband, Richard Roughsedge

Win is a clever boy, with aspirations of becoming an actor, finding the adolescent sponsor's son, Giles, a sadistic savage bully, so aware of his own power, who, sinisterly, turns up through time at some of Dave's most intimate moments in life. Giles becomes the unsuitable Tory Arts Minister and leading Brexiteer, a less than wanted right wing figure that his liberal parents despair of, later asking Win if they have raised a monster. Win manages to win some of the boys over with his capacity for mimicry, and on holiday with his sponsors, meets the grandmother, actress Elise Pleynet. It is his mother who keeps his certificates, including those from Bampton, the Blanchard Prize for Verse Translation, and the Chancellor's Essay Prize. We are given glimpses into Win's life at Oxford, the Boar's Hill House, Nick, the bleak isolation of touring experimental works, with the sense of adventure, and energetic focus on work, but a lifestyle that does not lend itself to stable relationships.

There are the poignant 'our evenings' which Win shares with a variety of people, that include Mr Hudson, Chris, Hector and others, although Win's knowledge of Burma remains limited, Richard knows far more. The excruciating racism is inescapable as are the limitations in acting opportunities available to non white actors like Win, and Hector had to leave the country to find success. This looks back on a intriguingly changing Britain, the queer lives, the ups and downs, the love, misery, losses, the work, the changing norms and expectations, writing a book on the experimental theatre in the 70s and 80s, and the shock of the referendum result. Getting older means much inevitably does get forgotten and harder for Win to recall with great accuracy.

This is a sublime and gripping read, not a book to miss, and I can see it being hugely successful on publication. Highly recommended. Many thanks to the publisher for an ARC.

Beautiful, tender, sharp : Class, Race and Sexuality 1960’s – 2020’s a story of the outsiders

Hollinghurst packs so much depth of observation in this wonderful novel. There is no need for polemic, diatribe and characters to be instructing readers in their attitudes with a writer like Hollinghurst. What goes on, what the subtexts are is skilfully shown in small, telling incidents, taking the reader deeply inside our central character, and others.

David Win, a boy of some mystery in his parentage, at least, on his father’s side, is an exceptionally bright child. His English mother is a dressmaker, who spent some time in Burma as a secretary in the 1950’s. David, born in England, clearly had a father who was not English. Living in the Home Counties, he and his mother are looked on askance, a brown-skinned boy, and a single mother.

David wins a scholarship, funded by a wealthy, socialist philanthropic and artistic couple, to a public school, in his early teens. He is one of only a very small number of non-white boys. Already, he exists outside expected class, regarded generally with some suspicion on grounds of both race, class, and, possibly sexuality.

A very good looking boy, he also has gifts of mimicry and performance, a love of literature and the arts.

The book’s opening introduces us to David as an elderly man, close to 70, following the announcement of the death of his childhood benefactor, aged 91. David had stayed close to the couple, and what he had done with his life, was something much closer to their own beliefs and personalities than the personality and life choices of their son, Giles. Someone (in no doubt comedic intent) who puts the reader remarkably in mind of one B. Johnson – narcissistic, privileged, somewhat bullying, and with clear intent to rule break, and further only his own interests, from an early age. There’s not a lot to like about Giles.

There is a rather lovely – and then, quite a heart-rending twist, to the novel’s title, which becomes clear towards the end of the book, which I won’t spoil.

Beautifully written, beautifully constructed, this will also particularly appeal to those with an interest in theatre

think this book is rather splendid. I enjoyed this novel which tells the story of Dave win a half Burmese 13-year-old who lives with his mother in in an English market town . He gets a scholarship to the local private school where he boards during term time. We watch as he struggles with the differences between home and school life and the difference between many of the boys who come from rich families and his own more modest upbringing
This book has a timeless feel to it. It’s set in the early 60s and could’ve been written then as well. The description of the young boy’s homosexual feelings are described beautifully. It’s tentative and confused. Haven’t we all felt like that at his age?
Part two when he becomes an actor almost seems another book .
The friendship between his mother and another woman who becomes her business partner in a business making and mending clothes becomes clearer in the second part as a child they are seen as friends but with adult eyes eventually sees that they are lovers.
The offer has a beautiful flowing writing style which feels timeless and classic British in someway There were lots of sections that I particularly enjoyed one in particular stood out for me. This sentence “So a fairly self-sufficient person with a keen love of theatre might be the ideal partner for an actor” describes me precisely!

I love the epilogue the change of narrator is unexpected but tied the book up nicely
I recommend this novel for lovers of primarily relationship based novels with intense detailed character development. If you like in memoriam by Alice Winn then I think you will love this novel
I originally copy of the novel on NetGalley UK. The book is publishing in the UK on the 3rd of October 2024 by Pam McMillan Picadore.
This will appear on NetGalley UK, Goodreads, and my book blog bionicsarahsbooks.wordpress.com. After publication it will also appear on Amazon UK.

A poignant, funny at times all encomapssing read of the life of Dave Win. Beautifully written this will become a classic. From early days to old age, a whole life

Our Evenings is the kind of literary fiction that is built on multiple layers and nuances.
Hollinghurst’s subtle writing, authentic characters, and the dynamics between them as well as the sociocultural backdrop give us a powerful read.
It took me a little while to get into this book - in the first 30-40 pages, I was more interested in the context than the characters. When I got to know them more, especially Dave’s change over the years, I became more invested in the characters.
I came for the classic, majestic novel blurb, and stayed for the novelties.
Characterisation 5
Prose 5
Themes 5
Mood 5
Plot 4

Our Evenings is Alan Hollinghurst’s latest, beautifully written and intelligently crafted novel which both manages to be a reflective state of the nation book and an intensely intimate portrayal of one man’s upbringing from his early teens to his seventies. David Win is half-Burmese, has never met his father and is growing up with a single mother who causes a local scandal when she moves in with her female business partner. At 13, he attends the nearby private school, Bampton, on a scholarship provided by wealthy philanthropists, Mark and Cara Hadlow, whose son, Giles, is the same age as David. We follow David as he attends and excels at Bampton school, then later Oxford, but due to his race and homosexuality never truly feels like he fits in the circles in which he moves. After Oxford he joins an experimental theatre troop and later becomes a notable actor, but never quite makes it through to national treasure status. The novel joins David at key points in his life and subtly demonstrates how he is molded by the people he meets, his romantic relationships and the relationship he has with his mother. Over the course of the novel, Giles wafts in an out of David’s life in glimpses, the antithesis of everything that David stands for. Whereas David represents manners, progress, multiculturalism, experimentalism and social mobility, Giles is part of the establishment; with a streak of cruelty from a young age, he uses his class entrenchment to become a right-wing politician, ardent Eurosceptic and Brexiter. But this is not Giles' story, it is firmly David's.

Alan Hollinghurst’s prose is sublime, every word in his sentence is artfully chosen. This is a book about race and class, prejudice and privilege but also about the complications of love and human connection. But it’s also just a story of David - his loves, his relationships, his aspirations – a bildungsroman and then some.

If I have one criticism, it’s that I found the first half of the book slightly more engaging than the second, but that’s probably just a personal preference for boarding school stories and languorous Oxfordians. I found the depiction of David’s time as a child at school, navigating the world and his burgeoning sexuality utterly gripping and aching. Hollinghurst is such a good writer, every small detail is so well researched and realized to build up the sense of time and place that I just sank into the world and was swept up in the characters journeys. That’s not to say I didn’t think the second half of the novel wasn’t also powerful, but there are larger jumps in the timeline so it felt more like truncated snapshots without the same narrative flow.

Hollinghurst is a masterful storyteller. This book feels like a literary classic and I will be eagerly pressing it into the hands of everyone I know.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a copy of the book in return for an honest review.

Oh my goodness, what a stunning book this is. I was totally engaged with the characters, especially Dave, Avril and Esme. This story spans a man's life, from school through to old age. He is half Burmese, illegitimate and gay so suffers bullying and prejudice his whole life. I was really sad to finish this and in fact feel it could almost have been extended to more than one book - I wanted to read more about Dave's youth and also more about his later, happier life with Richard. Outstanding writing from this brilliant author.
Thank you #Netgalley for this ARC

Exceptional writing like a long slow journey with someone that you know and trust but don't know everything about!

Brilliant stylish writing that both captivated and held me spellbound.

ALAN HOLLINGHURST – OUR EVENINGS *****

What a remarkable book. Without doubt one of my favourite books of the year.

Alan Hollinghurst is one of our greats. A new novel by him is something to be celebrated by anyone who loves to read brilliant prose – it is a masterclass in how to write.

This concerns a ‘brown’ half English young actor Dave Win, at school with an obnoxious bully Giles who becomes a politician and his charming father Mark Hadlow who dies at the beginning of the story. The novel is told first person by Dave, an account of his life and loves, someone who knows music and Shakespeare and who chronicles the changing patterns of English life.

I really don’t want to say more than this of what happens. Spanning decades from youth to old age this is a remarkable feat, told with wit and compassion and anger and brilliant prose.

Can’t recommend it enough.

I received an advanced reading copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to NetGalley, Pan Macmillan, Picador, and the author Alan Hollinghurst.
There's no denying that this novel is beautifully written, but after a promising start I found that it dragged for me, and it was a bit of a slog to make it through to the end.
Unfortunately I struggled to connect with both the characters and the story arc, and looked forward to the ending (which felt random and disjointed), and so was happy to move onto something else.
Not for me, 3 stars.

‘Our Evenings’ focuses on the life of actor David Win beginning just after he has been given a ‘Harlow’ scholarship to attend a minor public school in Wiltshire. In 1960s England, Dave is not remarkable only for his intellectual precocity and acting talents. He is mixed race - half Burmese, half English - and being brought up by a single parent. He is also gay.
Through Dave, Alan Hollinghurst creates a marvellously nuanced state of the nation novel, exploring just how much attitudes change towards women, class, and homosexuality over several decades, culminating in Brexit and Covid. His central character is appealing in so many ways: self-effacing, resilient; funny and quick, Dave is more than aware of his perceived differences. However, apart from one tumultuous episode as a student, he pretty much just gets on with his life quietly. He’s a dutiful son, a hard-working actor, a considerate friend and a loving partner. Does this make ‘Our Evenings’ a dull read? Emphatically not. Hollinghurst’s gift is to make the everyday compulsive reading.
One of the most effective techniques the author uses to suggest that we are part of Dave’s life is the way that, in the straightforward chronology, time shifts are mostly unannounced. Characters appear and disappear without much ceremony; lovers come and go; school friends grow old; people die. Even the title choice suggests that there is a companionable, although certainly not cosy, aspect to the whole experience. This all allows the reader to feel fully immersed in David Win’s life and times.
Subtly written, this is a thoughtful, deeply engaging, often moving and sometimes funny read from a consummate storyteller. Recommended without reservation!
My thanks to NetGalley and Pan Macmillan for a copy of this book in exchange for a fair review.

To wallow in a novel by Hollinghurst is never a comfortable read and there lies much of the joy. He picks characters who could drip cliche and builds them into relatable people as he sets them in their own context, current and past.

This is a look back at a life of academic brilliance enhanced by a scholarship to a private school. His benefactors suppport him throughout his life both with their munificence and their ability to listen and understand. Our protaganist, David Win is illegitimate, half Burmese and inevitably the but of teasing and power plays. His single white mother runs her own business and is pushed to the edge of society in different ways from her son.

It echoes McEwan's "Lessons" and Boyd's "Any Human Heart" in the breadth of life, the episodic narration which skips great chunks. By lacing together formative experiences into the stuff of everyday life none of the players in the story are sketchy. This is counter-culture and eccentricity writ large.

Whilst I loved reading this book and found it propulsive, my overwhelming feelings were that it was too long and lost some of the mystique with extensive descriptive scenes. That said, I found myself fully immersed in both David and the state of the nation as it moved from the 1960s to present day.

With thanks to #NetGalley and #PanMacmillan for allowing me to read and review.

Alan Hollinghurst has an exceptional talent and Our Evenings is a showcase for the power of his writing. It’s the story of Dave Win’s life, acutely observed from childhood over the next fifty years as we follow him from boarding school to his theatre career and late life reflections. Simply, it’s a tour de force which examines, often with subtlety, racism, sexuality, class divide and bigotry.

The main players are Dave and his mother, a seamstress in a small market town. There’s a claustrophobic and suspicious feel as Dave is mixed race so never quite fits in. He’s sponsored by a wealthy couple whose son, Giles, features throughout Dave’s life; Giles is a right wing politician and an unlikely friend. Dave is subject to bullying and other discriminations because of his colour. As a teenager he begins to understand and explore his sexuality which leads to further difficulties. This is a story which so accurately reflects parts of modern Britain. It’s about living in a society where superficially, prejudice is denied but in reality, that undercurrent is ever present and a minority are subjected to small cruelties almost daily.

I’ve enjoyed every page. Beautifully written, reflective and thought provoking. Another outstanding novel from one of the greatest writes of our generation.

Dave Win is a 13 year old boy who has won a scholarship to a local boarding school. The story opens when he goes to stay with the sponsors of his award and their son Giles, a bullying, envious boy who has made Dave’s life miserable at school. Their paths intertwine over the next 50 years, due in part to the kindness and support of Giles’s parents. Dave’s as a gifted actor who constantly struggles with racism, (he’s the product of a brief affair his mother had with a Burmese man when she worked in Rangoon), and Giles as an increasingly influential right wing politician. The following year he goes on holiday to North Devon with his mum Avril and her formidable friend Esme. At the hotel his intense feelings for other
young men comes to the fore and he discovers his mother also has her secrets!
But this book is so much more, It's an observation, often humorous, through Dave’s eyes of present day England particularly attitudes to race, sexuality & class. The tales of his theatre company and plays were fascinating as were his three love affairs especially the last at age 60 where he finds a precarious happiness.
The ending, although unexpected, was written in a beautiful contemplative way.
I’ve enjoyed many of Alan Hollinghurst’s works especially The Line of Beauty and The Stranger’s Child. This novel is quite different, still very good though.

Many thanks to NetGalley & Pan Macmillan for an ARC

This evocative study of the life of a dual heritage gay man from the 1960s onwards in Britain is just beautiful. Such depth of character and restrained subtlety.. This isn't a book of huge drama or action but is a subtle reflection on otherness and on ageing.

David is a scholarship schoolboy from a small community who is being raised by his white single mother, having never known his father from Burma. Now an actor, he reflects on the death of a pivotal figure in his life and on his own life.

The subject of racism and homophobia is tackled well with a catalogue of aggressions and microaggressions. The characters are so beautifully drawn, particularly David's mother, an extraordinary woman living a seemingly uneventful life.

I liked the use of the Brexiteer antagonist who contrast so well with David.

This is totally on form for the ever brilliant Alan Hollinghurst. I was utterly absorbed in this.