This is a toughy.

I've been a huge Delany fan since - well, almost fifty years now. I have followed his career through science fiction, swords'n'sorcery, literary criticism, queer theory, social criticism, philosophy, theory, autobiography, comics, and, yes, porn. I will read just about anything he chooses to write.

Most of his porn novels have bothered me at some level; they generally involve people doing things I find horrendous. I _nearly_ gave up on Delany's porn after _Hogg_, the story of a professional rapist(!), told from the point of view of a boy he picks up and, yes, molests. That was pretty bad. His next porn book, _The Mad Man_ ,was, to me, simply anerotic, but interesting on other levels.

His later book, _Through the Valley of the Nest of Spiders_ was so damn good, and such a beautiful relationship story, that I enjoyed it _despite_ some practices that, for me, were just disgustipating (as Popeye would say). I described it, at the time, as "somebody else's porn".

So now there's this. I don't know what to make of it. But it certainly isn't _my_ porn! In fact - if it weren't by Delany, I wouldn't have finished it. (Probably wouldn't have even picked it up.)

On one level, the writing is as amazingly beautiful as ever. Delany is, as the saying goes, incapable of writing a bad sentence. And he builds his fiction _from_ sentences.

On another, there is the loving story of a boy and his father, and the homeless man they take in; and the father's ex-wife, and her lover, who does some _terrible_ things to them and winds up in jail.

But the things the boy, and the father, and the homeless man do, together and with others...! Among other things, coprophagia, incest, urolagia, and something I con't even know if there's a name for (eating each other's snot).

I want to be clear: I am _not_ judging the characters. I am not judging Delany for writing these characters. If that's what he wants to write about, more power to him.

But I don't think I can follow him any farther down this particular path. No more Delanean porn for me; this is a step too far. I will still read anything _else_ he chooses to write and publish. (I've pre-ordered the book of essays due out later this year, and am waiting quite excitedly for it; Delany as an essayist is simply superb.)5 s Edward Champion1,071 71

This novel reminded me of Erskine Caldwell's TOBACCO ROAD in the way that it conveyed extreme assumptions (in this case, Chip's scat-heavy pornutopic fantasy, perhaps best epitomized in the piss-soaked, shit-eating environs that are quotidian to Shoat) to raise specific points about what we assume about margnizalized people. In his essay "An Extravagance of Laughter," Ralph Ellison described the uncontrollable laughter he had when attending a theatrical adaptation of TOBACCO ROAD. And I suspect that the wild pornutopia in this book (and much of Chip's later work) serves as a similarly discomfiting catharsis. In the case of Shoat and the circle of seedy and marginalized people around him (even his family), it's quite the double-edged sword -- given that he is dictating his life story to a writer who is ly rearranging and embellishing. That Chip would use such a bold narrative device to raise interesting questions about queer identity -- and that he would be forced to self-publish this volume given the risk-averse corporate nature of the publishing industry -- says everything about how the unsettling empathy-driven stories we need to hear -- even when filtered through our own impressions -- won't easily arrive at our eyes and ears.1 Josie BoyceAuthor 2 books13

Content warning

Should be the headline. The raunchiest sex and compelling characters elevate this scat nightmare into some kind of literature. It definitely tested my boundaries.1 Jaime207 13

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