John Fox was an America

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

n novelist and short-story

Short story

A short story is a work of fiction that is usually written in prose, often in narrative format. This format tends to be more pointed than longer works of fiction, such as novellas and novels. Short story definitions based on length differ somewhat, even among professional writers, in part because...

 writer

Writer

A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....

. His most famous, successful and influential novel

Novel

A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

, The Boys on the Rock

The Boys on the Rock

The Boys on the Rock is a short debut novel by John Fox which details the coming out and falling in love of a gay sixteen-year-old swimmer, nomine Billy Connors, who narrates the story in the first person...

, detailed the coming out

Coming out

Coming out is a figure of speech for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people's disclosure of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity....

 and falling in love

Love

Love is an emotion of strong affection and personal attachment. In philosophical context, love is a virtue representing all of human kindness, compassion, and affection. Love is central to many religions, as in the Christian phrase, "God is love" or Agape in the Canonical gospels...

 of a homosexual teenage swimmer by the name of Billy Connors.

Fox was born in the Pelham Bay

Pelham Bay, Bronx

Pelham Bay is a neighborhood in the borough of the Bronx, in New York City. It is named for Pelham Bay Park, New York City's largest park which lies on the neighborhood's northeastern border.-History:...

 area of the Bronx

The Bronx

The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...

 (where Connors's life is set) and graduated from both Cardinal Hayes High School

Cardinal Hayes High School

Cardinal Hayes High School is a Catholic high school for boys in the Bronx, New York City. The school serves the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York. It is a member of the CHSAA.- History :...

 and Lehman College

Lehman College

Lehman College is one of the constituent colleges of the City University of New York, USA. Founded in 1931 as the Bronx campus of Hunter College, the school became an independent college within the City University in 1968. The college is named after Herbert Lehman, a former New York governor,...

.

According to his obituary

Obituary

An obituary is a news article that reports the recent death of a person, typically along with an account of the person's life and information about the upcoming funeral. In large cities and larger newspapers, obituaries are written only for people considered significant...

 in The New York Times

The New York Times

The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

, he died of AIDS in his Manhattan

Manhattan

Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...

 home in 1990. He was survived by his parent

Parent

A parent is a caretaker of the offspring in their own species. In humans, a parent is of a child . Children can have one or more parents, but they must have two biological parents. Biological parents consist of the male who sired the child and the female who gave birth to the child...

s, John Sr. and Joan, also of the Bronx; a brother, James, of Danbury

Danbury, Connecticut

Danbury is a city in northern Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. It had population at the 2010 census of 80,893. Danbury is the fourth largest city in Fairfield County and is the seventh largest city in Connecticut....

, Connecticut

Connecticut

Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...

; and a sister, Dorothy Schmidt of Malvern

Malvern, Pennsylvania

Malvern is a borough in Chester County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 2,998 at the 2010 census. The main road through the borough is King Street, although the borough is also bordered by Paoli Pike on the south, and is near US 30 on the north. The primary cross street is Warren...

, Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...

.