Monette was highly accomplished as a writer both of fiction and of nonfiction. I would recommend reading one or more of his memoirs before reading his fiction, because the novels benefit from some understanding of his cultural background and point of view; however, the later novels are very good independently as well.

The three memoir-like books are (in order of writing):
"Borrowed Time"
"Becoming a Man"
"Last Watch of the Night" (actually a collection of essays, most of them autobiographical).

I originally read them in that order, which is fine; I could also make a strong case for reading them in chronological order:

"Becoming a Man" (birth through meeting longtime partner Roger Horwitz)
"Borrowed Time" (later relationship with Roger; his illness)
"Last Watch of the Night" (political thoughts, travel diaries, his dog, etc.)

If you want to jump right to fiction, start with my favorite, "Halfway Home," then I'd say "Afterlife" and "Taking Care of Mrs. Carroll."

"Borrowed Time" is maybe Monette's greatest work, and "Becoming a Man" his most honored--but this novel is my favorite. A fairly simple story about a young performance artist, sick with AIDS, finding bits of life and making peace with his past at a vacation house on the ocean, it devolves into melodrama at the end, but that's hardly the point. The point is the writing, which gets inside the head of a somewhat confused and undirected person and finds gems there, some of which, I guarantee, are in your head too, except you won't realize it until you read them here. This is real fiction.

"Some mornings you wake up whole. You open your eyes, and the ceiling is swirling with light reflected off the ocean. The bright air pours through the balcony doors like tonic. It's not that you forget even for a moment that you're sick. But if you're not in pain, the sheet ballast of being alive simply astonishes. I fling off the comforter, filling the air with feathers like confetti. I rise and caper across the threadbare carpet in my Jockey shorts. I slip through the french doors, the first sight of the limitless blue never failing to catch my heart. I straddle the stucco balustrade like a pony and drink it all in. The smell of sea pine and eucalyptus wafts around me. I don't want anything else but this."

Monette returns to the shallow, or seemingly shallow, life of southern Cal that he addressed in "The Long Shot," among others, but this time through the lens of AIDS. Not my favorite of his novels, but ranks right up there.

From a reader's perspective, the companion piece to Monette's memoir "Borrowed Time"--this volume won't make much sense unless you've read the memoir. In it, Monette mentions writing poems to keep his sanity, or at least to do something, while his lover dies. These are the poems. Don't think they're depressing, however; mixed in with the mourning are many beautiful and perfectly evoked memories of celebration, travel, and daily life together.

Probably Monette's masterpiece, and possibly the greatest book about living and dying with AIDS. "Borrowed Time" is the intimate, tender, terrifying, heartbreaking memoir of the sickness and death of Monette's partner of twelve years, Roger Horwitz. Monette is not afraid to display both the courage and the weaknesses of himself and of Roger, and to show his own anger, frustration, grief, and tremendous love. If anyone thinks AIDS is an resolved issue, or doubts that two men can be as loving and as loyal to each other as any married couple, this book is the cure.

If you read this and can bear another touching perspective on a comparable experience, try Mark Doty's "Heaven's Coast."

The least of Monette's three early novels, a rehash of by-then-familiar cynicism about Hollywood and its shallowness, but well written and with enjoyable characters. I suggest reading it only after you have read his later, more substantial work.

Paul Monette's second novel; I would suggest reading it only when you are familiar with his later substantial work and his first novel, "Taking Care of Mrs. Carroll." An engagingly written work, more interesting for its character portraits than its plot.

This is Paul Monette's first published novel, and in my opinion the most charming of his three early works. I would not recommend reading it, however, until you are familiar with his more substantial work (the memoirs and/or the later novels "Halfway Home" and "Afterlife").