CLOSE TO THE BONE

iece places five men—Hal Hardaway, Walker Dupree, Jojo, Dr. Emmett Mercy, and Charlie Beers—at Dr. Mercy’s Black Pride seminar. Each is having trouble with his partner, and finding out who to love becomes the major thrust of their search for identity, sexuality appearing to be the defining feature of identity. Hardaway is a “buppie” executive with an African- American corporation who struggles in his relationship with Corky Winterset, his white girlfriend. Walker is a graphic artist who lives in the ongoing twilight of drifting ambition, occasional light drug use, and irresponsibility that dismays his black girlfriend Sadie. Dr. Mercy is also an ambitious, self-absorbed egoist who aspires to climb through white society by dispensing “official” black views on current events. As in a lot of fiction featuring multiple couples, none of the original pairings here is right, and the plot shuffles the pairs into their proper arrangements. Lamar’s use of cultural signposts (the O.J. trial; Marion Barry’s travails, etc.)—helps him trace the various, often conflicting, views of his characters. But this is a weak substitute for the actual creation of character, and by confining the struggle for identity to the question of finding sexual rightness, the author is forced to leave many other societal aspects of racial identity (e.g., economic disparities) out of consideration. Lamar’s conclusion seems to be that everyone is an individual, itself something of a clichÇ. What remains, then, is the search for satisfying sexual relationships, and, in exploring this, the author takes few risks—and offers few insights. (Author tour)