Of course, the number who are in fact LGB or T is probably higher, as there remain plenty of closets filled with members of those groups not yet able to identify themselves as such. Relying on that unimpeachable source, Wikipedia, we learn that as of April 2011, approximately 3.5% of American adults identify as lesbian, gay or bisexual, while 0.3% are transgender. William has a grandfather who cross dresses, genetic contributions from a gay relation, a cousin who is a lesbian, a best friend who is also bi, a classmate who walks on both sides of the street, another classmate who is gay, and a notable person in town who is transgender. In the same way that Cabot Cove of Murder, She Wrote fame zoomed way above the statistical norm as a rather dodgy place in which to hold onto one's corporal existence, Little Sister, Vermont seems a statistically anomalous bastion of sexual diversity. Irving shows us his journey, his loves, triumphs, disappointments, what he discovers, what he seeks out, the discovery of self and of the world that is the core of any life journey worth telling. He struggles to find his place in the world, knowing that he differs from the usual in a significant way.
Billy is bisexual and knows from an early age that he is attracted to both males and females. William Abbot, in his late sixties, recalls his life, from his prep school days in the small town of First Sister, Vermont to his present, in the 21st century. The book is about sexuality in a larger social, historical context. So, if he is jogging for the umpteenth time down the same well-worn path, what is it that makes this one any different? The story is not one of a May-December entanglement, although that element is here. Irving maintains his fixation on sexuality in this one, and wrestling and New England prep schools, and May-December romance. (p 424)And that is exactly what Irving does here. “Yes, that is more or less what I do,” I told him. You create these characters who are so sexually ‘different,’ as you might call them-or ‘fucked up,’ which is what I would call them-and then you expect us to sympathize with them, or feel sorry for them, or something. Like Gee, that girl, or whatever she is-or what she’s becoming. You make all these sexual extremes seem normal-that is what you do. In which a character who is a writer is confronted: …I’ve read all your books and I know what you do-I mean, in your writing. There is a scene near the end of John Irving’s 2012 novel, In One Person,
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