Charming Young Man, Eliot Schrefer
Charming Young Man, Eliot Schrefer
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Charming Young Man

Author: Eliot Schrefer

Narrator: Mark Sanderlin

Unabridged: 7 hr 31 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Clarion Books

Published: 10/10/2023

Synopsis

From New York Times bestselling author Eliot Schrefer comes an exuberant YA historical coming-of-age novel about a rising star French pianist, navigating his way into high society as he explores his sexuality. Perfect for fans of Last Night at the Telegraph Club and The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue.They say Léon Delafosse will be France’s next great pianist. But despite his being the youngest student ever accepted into the prestigious Paris Conservatory, there’s no way an impoverished musician can make his way in 1890s Paris without an outside patron.Young gossip columnist Marcel Proust takes Léon under his wing, and the boys game their way through an extravagant new world. When the larger-than-life Count Robert de Montesquiou-Fézensac offers his patronage, Léon’s dreams are made real. But the closer he gets to becoming France’s next great thing, the further he strays from his old country life he shared with his family and his best friend, Félix . . . a boy he might love.With each choice Léon makes, he must navigate a fine line between two worlds—or risk losing them both. 

About Eliot Schrefer

Eliot Schrefer is the New York Times bestselling author of many books for kids and teens, including The Darkness Outside Us and its sequel, The Brightness Between Us, as well as Charming Young Man, Endangered, and Queer Ducks (and Other Animals): The Natural World of Animal Sexuality. His books have twice been named finalists for the National Book Award in Young People’s Literature and have garnered a Printz Honor, a Stonewall Honor, and the Green Earth Book Award. He is on the faculty of the creative writing MFA program at Hamline University and lives with his husband in New York City. Visit him online at eliotschrefer.com. 

Reviews

Goodreads review by Marieke on May 10, 2023

Actual rating 4.5 stars. From The Darkness Outside Us, an ingeniously written gays in space, to a queer historical story loosely based on a real person’s life. Eliot Schefer did it again! Eliot Schefer based this book on John Singer Sargent's painting of Léon Delafosse (1895). The painting is in the M......more

Goodreads review by ancientreader on April 27, 2023

What an odd little book this is! Our hero, Léon Delafosse, is a piano prodigy and beginning composer, studying at a conservatory in Paris around the turn of the 20th century. His family is dead broke, he needs a patron to fund his further education and advance his career, and there the story really......more

Goodreads review by Quill&Queer on November 06, 2023

The only way I could describe this is "annoying Gays in France". It was difficult to work out what the plot was intended to be beyond a vignette of the real Léon Delafosse's life, and I struggled to connect or like any of the characters. Léon gets caught up in high society, and his dreams of being a......more

Goodreads review by Nev on September 25, 2023

This was such an interesting queer historical YA book about Léon Delafosse, a young pianist who was predicted to become the next big thing in 1890s Paris. Léon needs the help of a patron in order to be able to afford to live and also create opportunities in society for him to play. It was compelling......more

Goodreads review by Starr on October 27, 2023

I received an ARC from Edelweiss 3.5 I’m a fan of Schrefer, and I definitely find this book interesting as a look at a little known historical figure. The author’s note about discovering the story and wanting to put him in the limelight made me way more willing to go along on the ride than I might hav......more

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