My Policeman A Novel

Die wunderschön und traurige Geschichte über die Liebe von drei Menschen in den 1950ern. Herzzerreißend und auf eine so schöne individuelle und persönliche Art geschrieben. Ich konnte es nicht aus der Hand legen. Die Ungerechtigkeit gegenüber der LGBTQ Community und der damit verbundene Schmerz berührt zutiefst. Absolut empfehlenswert!!!

Das Buch war zum weinen schön. Da aus zwei Sichten geschrieben wurde, konnte man sich besonders gut in die Geschichte hineinversetzten. Das Thema LGBTQ wurde in dem Buch toll hervorgehoben und es wurde gezeigt, dass es manchmal schwer ist zu wissen, wer man selbst eigentlich ist. Marion, etwas naiv und doch total verliebt; Tom, „anders" als seine Frau ihn gerne hätte, und Patrick, ein Mann, der Tom die Freiheit zeigt, bilden ein Trio, wie man es nur aus den besten Büchern kennt. Ich wünschte mir, ich könnte das Buch erneut zum ersten Mal lesen! Es ist das Buch zu dem ich greife, wenn ich mich wieder in den Seiten einer Buches verlieren will.

Der Einblick in die fiktive Beziehung eines homosexuellen Paares und die Realität der 1950er in England, erinnert dass solche Geschichten leider nicht nur fiktiv sind sondern viel mehr als das. Ein Meisterwerk und definitiv weiter zu empfehlen!

I actually bought it only because Harry styles is gonna be in the movie of this book, so I wanted to know what Happens there exactly. Didn’t finish yet but all I can say is that the writing style is amazing and I recommend it to everyone!

The first words that come to my mind when thinking about this masterpiece of a book (and soon to be movie) are raw, hurtful and beautiful in equal amounts. But even though it‘s beautiful, the story is far from a romantic secret and (not so) well hidden relationship between two men. It draws a clear picture of the queer community in the 1950‘s and how the individuals suffered in brutal, suffocating silence. It’s about the way people look back on these times in a later section of their lives and how they handle this part of themselves. My Policeman is about unconditional love - both platonic and romantic. Choosing Marion. Loving Patrick. It’s messy. It’s chaotic. It’s raw. It’s all that while being framed by strickt rules society applied to itself. Tom and Marion are good together. They’re loving. But not equally. They don‘t love each other equally and while they don’t talk about it, they‘re aware. She knows that he‘s not all hers, that some parts of him are hidden away from her, kept for someone else to unfold. He knows that she knows that and still keeps up with him. They share laughter, frequent meals and a life while a part of it never was truly theirs. That part of their lives didn’t belong to anyone for a very long part. It was just there, hushed up in the very far corner of reality. Patrick and Marion. They‘re great friends and while they may not share the bond the other pairings have, their equal adoration is real. Both of them having to share someone they love gives them space to relate to each other in a deeper way than you could without it. They give a sort of danger of collapse to the dynamic between the three of them. They‘re the breaking point, the snap of tension and key to the story. It’s a different point of view to see them as the key instead of Tom and Patrick, but it would underestimate the difference the relationship of Marion and Patrick have in the plot, not to do it. Tom and Patrick, together, offer something to create the breaking point, but they’re not it themselves. Tom and Patrick. They’re their own little riot in their controlled, little bubble. They‘re each others safe place and biggest risk. Patrick strikes Tom‘s interest quickly. He‘s the artsy guy who‘s travelled a lot while Patrick has always stayed in his bubble, not daring to think about what may lay on the outside. It‘s obvious to see how scared they are to give into this feeling of attraction. Going to Venice and kissing in front of the gods takes a toll of them. They both WANT to get away from being forced to hide but Tom does not give into that temptation. While loving Tom with all he has, he keeps his safety blanket of Marion available - which is in no way fair to any of the involved. None of it is. The older versions of the characters hold so much regret and hope. The mistakes they individually made along the way are not painted to look smaller and less significant, but they’re made out to be real and made out of bad decisions all of us ever make. Each and every human being is set up for failure. People learn by trial and error and it’s the effect of making mistakes and learning from them that shapes us as people. All of them regret not living up to their true selves out of fear. But with that doesn’t equally come the acceptance of this hidden part of Tom. Marion may has come to terms with it and tried to make up for her mistakes by taking Patrick into her home, but Tom doesn‘t get to that point. It‘s utterly heartbreaking to see how Tom denies himself to get close to Patrick when he is finally allowed to be, because he‘s regretting all the time he‘s denied himself. He is mourning the time he wasted by loving someone else when it all ended up with no chance to make up for it. Patrick is there, in his home, with no chance to get back a little of the time they wasted. But it’s not only this part of himself that he mourns, but also how he denied something and took it from Patrick. He put himself out of Patricks reach and decides for them both that they will not be a thing in the future. He’s living with the guilt of that. Although a lot of focus is on the wasted time between Tom and Patrick and the potential of their love, I believe there is also a tragic turn on Marions side of the story. She held onto someone who she knew did not love her in a way he should have loved her for years. She has done terrible things, some you may never truly find forgiveness for, but she also was set up to do that. Watching the way her husband and a friend love each other was bound to make her lash out. She did not have to write that letter and then actually send it out, but she had to react to it in some way. She acted in the conditions people were supposed to act: call people out on their wrongs. She did the thing she deemed right even when she knew what may happen. And happened in the end. While you could say that the Story of My Policeman could possibly have happened in the 1950’s where no equal rights existed, it still is enormously impactful to the modern world. Because modern laws and rights don’t exactly mean equal rights and opportunities. There are still almost 70 countries that discriminate queer people by law. Many more do the same without the governmental aid. People still are discriminated against. People live with fear of being themselves. My Policeman is, as you may have gathered from all of the words above, a very emotional story on friendship, love and wasted opportunities. It is about loving someone in the dark, making wrong decisions and having to face the consequences of that later in life. It’s regretting, mourning and loving, learning to be forgiving towards others and yourself.