C&C BOOK FACTORY
[SIDE A, TRACK 6]

“Sweet Thing,” David Bowie

Ripped straight from Gina de Vries’ story, “Bambino”:

“It was like every line of every song was written especially for me. “Sweet Thing” was an anthem, Bowie’s creepy-sexy snarl in my ear, the perfect music for dating this boy who was glam rock and choir boy, French new wave and faggotry, lisp and snarl, James Dean and Lou Reed, cocksure and shy violet.”

C&C BOOK FACTORY
[SIDE A, TRACK 5]

“Ask,” The Smiths

An editors’ pick for the countdown. Always at least try to ask for all the things.

(Or do it in person, at our reading/event/party, which is now up on McNally Jackson’s internet.)

C&C BOOK FACTORY
[SIDE A, TRACK 4]

“Islands,” The xx

Danny contributes this who-were-you-so-despondent-over-in-late-2009? anthem to the countdown.

C&C BOOK FACTORY
[SIDE A, TRACK 3]

“Love Comes In Spurts,” Richard Hell and the Voidoids

This is where one of our authors (undisclosed) whips around the mic and tell you we could all be that anonymous nerd you never suspected.

C&C BOOK FACTORY
[SIDE A, TRACK 2]
“Dirty Diana,” Michael Jackson

Next in the countdown! This one could only be for Diana Vilibert’s “The Apartment:”

“Man,” he says, shaking his head. “I can’t believe it, I can’t believe it.” He speaks quietly, as if to himself, but I feel his eyes on the side of my face. “Man,” he repeats. “Fucking Michael Jackson. Did you hear he died today?” he asks, directing his monologue at me. I nod. Jack repeats almost everything twice. “I mean, his music, fuck…” he trails off. “I was listening to Billie Jean this morning. This morning! And now he’s dead. Now he’s fucking dead.”

He tells me the story of how he heard the news and I half-listen, nodding when it seems appropriate. When his voice cracks, he shakes his head and apologizes for crying, even though he isn’t. I’m afraid he might start, so I grab his forearm and ask about his tattoos. As he talks, my fingers trace the ink around his wrist. When he asks if I have any Michael Jackson songs on my iPod, I say no, but that I do at my apartment.

Kids, we’re counting down together to what I’ve been calling THE GREAT SELL-OUT, our BOOK PARTY at McNally Jackson, which will celebrate having sold out of the first edition of the book*, and will be on December 9th 2010 at 7pm.

Meaghan and I, along with Audacia Ray, Diana Vilibert, and Matthew Gallaway, will be on hand to read and to discuss what it is to write about sex when you are writing about people who are real, including you.

So to count us down to the party, I’m going to post a song from the (unreleased) C&C Book Factory mixtape, which I made from all of the songs that the writers told Meaghan they were listening to as they wrote. Then we added the songs that we listened to as we edited. And this is one of those.

C&C BOOK FACTORY
[SIDE A, TRACK 1]
“Borderline,” Flaming Lips with Stardeath and White Dwarfs

* the gorgeous Kickstarter-produced hardcover, of which a few hundred additional copies made their way to the internet and to McNally Jackson. and to you. this is not the end, but the end of this one.