*spoilers* 
 Absolutely compelling. I found the suddenly compassionate & thoughtful advice given by the slimy Jacques to be the most resonant part of the book, followed by Hella's speech in her awesome show of loyalty to herself near the end of the book. 
 The description of David & Giovanni's first meeting and instant chemistry was very powerful; Mr. Baldwin must certainly have himself experienced a 'love-at-first-sight' type of relationship. The book as a whole is very painful, it twists the stomach, in spending most of its time focusing on David's fear, his conflicting emotions, his tormented inner life, his pretending to believe that he can re-craft his own nature and thereby save his identity. The book stands as a resounding cautionary tale against living in fear and self-repression by having the reader feel how sickeningly awful the repercussions of such an existence are; I experienced in reading the novel a perpetual feeling of eating and digesting pieces of glass. There is also a strong undercurrent of grief that these are the knots some human beings must twist themselves into merely to live because our society persecutes and excludes them. 
 I could not handle the callous way David treated Giovanni at the end of their relationship, it seemed almost sociopathic to me, and it really bothered me that the book did not seem to address that much at all save for David admitting to himself how Giovanni's mother would feel if she know what he "had done to her son." I realize David is a self-absorbed coward but it seemed to me his actions, or lack thereof in several instances, really went beyond that. Even a self-absorbed coward can empathize and be moved to help ones he loves or do his best not to actively harm them. 
 I also very much disliked the final commentary at the end. Maybe it's because I was tired but the words seemed rather both excessive and empty, and I found the idea that David faces the morning - the same morning in which Giovanni has been killed - with "the burden of hope," just a fantastically enormous pile of shite. Shite both in terms of the story's narrative and also with respect to just basic writing ability that, ideally, prevents phrases being written which make one want to gag. Of course the novel on the whole is an example of excellent, incisive, nuanced writing by an author everyone recognizes as truly gifted; it's just this ending deviated so much from the rest of the novel in this respect I have to wonder if Mr. Baldwin got bored or tired or both and had a friend or employee sum things up for him at the finish.