Hi everybody, I've written one of the first works of fiction ever published about a gay Jehovah's Witness...do forgive me for bending posting guideline #6, as I should probably share this with you.
If you’re a ‘jay-dub’, reading Tattoo This Madness In could get you disfellowshipped. You would, however, be in fine company.
To Florida teen Damian Spitz, the only thing more fun than getting shunned by the Jehovah’s Witnesses is dragging his friends with him to Armageddon. Tattooing each of them with a Smurf—the cartoon character the jay-dubs are notoriously afraid of—he descends into a life of pure punk pleasure. The dream mutates when Damian unwittingly forms a cult of his own, and a suicide leads him to explore desires he’s barely ready to handle.
Tattoo This Madness In is a study in sexual transgression, a community manifesto, and a middle finger lifted high.
“If William Burroughs and Clive Barker had a love child and fed it only BooBerry cereal, it's literary output might be as highly charged and frenetic as the sexy bloodbath that is Tattoo This Madness In. I'm waiting any day to hear that Haley Joel Osment has optioned it as his breakout role in an adult lead, now that he's 18 and old enough to do whatever the fuck he wants. TTMI could give him just what he needs -- Smurf tattoos, Jehovah's Witness teen abductions, and gay sex scenes in a burning sports car. Hot, hot, hot."
--Reed Massengill, photographer and author of Portrait of a Racist
"In an edge-of-control world on the manic fringe of apostasy, Daniel Allen Cox
poleaxes us into believing escape is possible. The ink from "Tattoo This
Madness In" stains in the best way imaginable. Cox writes in the same
manner that the needle-man at the core of his drama sins: outrageously,
calculatingly, urgently. He kicked my ass all over the place."
-- Brian Ames, author of "Eighty-Sixed"
I encourage you to pick up a copy and recommend it to who you think might benefit from it...
What do you think of the cover?
Daniel