X

By Davey Davis

Published 27/10/2022

9781739784935/ Paperback / £10.99

An electrifying novel about the creeping reality of political terror, and the violent pleasures found in Brooklyn's queer heartlands. Part noir, part erotic thriller, X is a vivid, moody and darkly funny portrait of those living on the margins of an increasingly hostile society.

Broke and discontented, amateur sadist Lee spends their days working for a big corporation and their nights searching the warehouses and dungeons of Brooklyn looking for the mysterious, seductive, and bloodthirsty X. In a sly purging of migrants, refugees, sex workers and queers - any citizens they claim to be undesirable - the US government has started exporting people, and Lee has heard X might be among those about to disappear.

As their obsession with X grows, Lee becomes further enmeshed in the crimes and dramas of the city's queer community, following ex-lovers, playmates, clients, best friends, and accidental accomplices through damp and shining bars and parties looking for any lead that might bring them closer to X, before she vanishes for good.

Davey Davis's first book, the earthquake room, was released by TigerBee Press in 2017. They write a weekly newsletter and mutual aid fundraiser about art, culture, sexuality, and people named David at itsdavid.substack.com. They live in Brooklyn.

“Davis is an astounding writer, seemingly unconstrained by taboos and waist deep down in the maw of life, examining what the rest of us shy away from—never more than here in X, the rare book that can thrill and entertain, while simultaneously causing you to question everything about how you’re living.” —Torrey Peters, author of Detransition, Baby

"In X, Davey Davis presses down hard on all of our bruised places until we beg for more. In their taut, electric prose, Davis performs a skillful sleight of hand: keeping our eyes on the noirish tale of a pain slut's growing obsession, while just out of frame fascism slowly creeps into daily life. X will leave you wet, hard, and implicated." —Morgan M. Page

"Hardboiled style meets dyke drama in the clubs and play parties of queer Brooklyn…X is both a delight to read and a penetrating study on the intimacy of violence and the violence of intimacy." —McKenzie Wark, author of Reverse Cowgirl

"OH OH OH I FINISHED IT AND THREW MYSELF DOWN THE STAIRS" —Leigh Cowart, author of Hurts So Good