March 28, 2008
This Will Go Down On Your Permanent Record
We've already covered quite a bit going on this weekend in Chicago, but if you're looking for something a little more literary-minded, we highly recommend the release party for Susannah Felt's new bookThis Will Go Down On Your Permanent Record, happening this Sunday at The Hideout. If Felt's name sounds familiar, that's because she spent several years writing for such publications as the Chicago Reader (pre-takeover) and Time Out Chicago. She now resides in sunny Birmingham, Alabama, but is back in town to promote the release of the book. We haven't gotten a chance to check the book out yet, but judging from the excerpt, it's one we'll definitely be picking up soon.
Also reading at the release party will be writers J. Adam Oaks, Patrick Somerville, and Eileen Favorite. There will also be musical performances by Chicago bands The Pawners Society and Judson Claiborne.
This Will Go Down On Your Permanent Record is available now.
This Will Go Down On Your Permanent Record Release Party, Sunday, March 30, 7 p.m., $5, The Hideout, 1354 W. Wabansia
Image via The Hideout's website



Felt writes (slight editing from me):
"'Why don’t you take a picture of this?'
Later I’d ask myself a thousand times over: why’d you keep looking? Hadn’t you seen enough? Why did you obey?
I looked.
He got his [manhood] out. He was rubbing it furiously, and I could see the slit stretching open wide when his thumb slid over the head. And I don’t know if I looked at his face again, but I could feel how it had changed—the leer had left and he was pure concentration, pure sick lust, his eyes boring into me but not seeing me at all. Seeing whatever it was he wanted to see.
I had seen and done some things myself, with Josh. And I had tried to do them right. I hadn’t been a pro, even though what we both wanted to happen eventually did happen. My hand had felt too big, small, rough, soft, clumsy.
This hand looked like it had never done anything else. Like muscle-memory was in full effect.
'You sick [deleted],' I whispered."
I think I'll pass on reading the rest of that. There is something to be said for leaving something to the imagination, perhaps.