Jason Hytes. A Time of Torment. 1963, Midwood.
"Illicit triangle."
"Some authors attack man's sexual foibles with a meat-ax … not Jason Hytes. He is a master of the scalpel. With deft strokes he peels away each layer of man's sexual pretensions until each character lays bare."
"The story opens with three characters, two women and a man, entrapped in a triangle of sensual torment. Then author Hytes slowly begins to reveal their true nature: how a man can delude himself into believing he can love two women at the same time; how a wife can make the most immoral proposal to hold her man; how a beautiful young girl can tie herself to a man who offers her no future. A Time of Torment is the story of how such a triangle was resolved, or more exactly – dissolved."
I would have never read this book except that it was part of an ebay autction that I had won. There was very little on the book in either blurbs or cover art to suggest that it had lesbian content. Also, I had read some other Hytes' novels, and they were pretty much what Barbara Grier calls trash. I actually only read it cause I was sitting on the couch and there it was. I strated browsing it, and I'm glad I did as it contains a rather touching lesbian subplot.
This novel tells the story of Matthew who is having an affair with Ronnie. The book starts with Matthew's wife Cynthia confronting him about the affair. He admits to it, and his wife seduces him out of desperation. It is also revealed that when Matthew and Cynthia have sex she always has to be on top (1st clue that the wife might not be what she seems to be). Matthew's mistress Ronnie plans on getting him to divorce Cynthia and marry her, and Cynthia plans on keeping him for reasons that will soon be revealed. It turns out that Cynthia is a lesbian who married Matthew as a way of avoiding what she perceives as the low life that lesbianism would mean. She has not, however, been able to stop desiring women, and she has been reduced to going to a woman who reluctantly has sex with her in exchange for money.
As the novel progresses, Ronnie finds another man whom she starts liking better than Matthew, and Cynthia meets a woman at a lesbian bar. In a rather touching scene, the two women make love – for the woman it is her first time – for Cynthia it is the first time in a long time that she has sex with a woman that isn't sleazy. She finds herself very moved by Helen's passion, and the book ends with the implication that the two of them will stay married to their husbands for 'safety,' but will have each other for love. The scene of their lovemaking is really quite delicate and evocative of that very first time you finally get to touch a woman sexually. This story made me wonder how many women actually did live with this kind of arrangement in those days (well, in some places in the world, maybe still), and though it is not something I would want for myself, it was a relief to think that there were some options available to lesbians who for whatever reason were unable to live fully as lesbians other than completely denying their sexuality. The insight with which this part of the book was written makes me wonder just who really did write this book.
The book ends with Ronnie going off with a different married man, Cynthia and Helen looking forward to a growing love, and Matthew back with Cynthia after a very humiliating (for both parties) sex scene with his secretary.
Lastly, I am wondering if more than one writer used the pen name Jason Hytes (I do know that pulp writers often shared pen names). In addition to this novel being less trashy than yer average pulp, it is also much more well written than other Jason Hytes' books. In fact, it has some sex scenes that are very realistic and complex and not even very successful – not your usual trash thang.
c2007 melodie morgan frances
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