Last week I read a book that literally set my brain on fire. My brain. Was firing. Neurons. Axons. Claxons. I’m talking about intellectual orgasm. And I suspect I’m not the only one. BEA goers rapidly snapped up the entire supply of The Mistress Contract
advance galley copies, which were cleverly presented in plain brown bags. (The book is due out in October, but I was able to beg a PDF from the publisher.) I’ll admit it, curiosity — prurient interest even — kicked it straight to the top of my TBR pile. I inhaled it, stumbled gobsmacked around the grocery store for an hour, then returned home and inhaled it again.
The book opens with the document which we're told the anonymous author actually sent to her wealthy lover in the 1980s. A single page generated on an old-school typewriter, it pitches a straightforward deal: He will provide adequate accommodations for her and cover her living expenses. She will provide 1) all housekeeping duties and 2) “all sexual acts as requested, with suspension of historical, emotional, psychological disclaimers.” For the duration of the agreement, She will be his “sexual property.” Party the second, we’re told, promptly telephoned to accept the proposal.
What follows is part performance art, part character study, part Socratic dialogue. We’re told that we’re reading the transcribed conversations of He and She, recorded while they were in the car, at restaurants, and yes, in bed. He and She are fully aware that the reader is in bed with them. (The recording device takes on the personality of something purchased from AdamandEve.com.) Even when the conversation is about literature, politics, power, and other far flung topics, the context of the talk and the electric connection between He and She creates a deeply sexy environment in which disbelief and political correctness are quickly suspended.
What shocks in The Mistress Contract
is the discourse, not the intercourse. The Foucault, not the f#@king. As He and She go at it with the brainy chemistry of Beatrice and Benedick, the naked opinions expressed about men, women, and feminism are challenging, frequently infuriating, thought-provoking and just plain provoking, witty, poignant, and astonishingly progressive, considering the context of the recordings. (Think “telex” as opposed to email.) I was warned and I agree that this book is going to make people want to throw things — most notably the book itself — and it sparked heated dialogue between me and my husband, between me and my daughter, between me and the guy sitting next to me for three hours at the drivers license office. This will be the brave selection that turns book club to Fight Club. Most important, it ignited heated dialogue with myself, made me ask unsettling questions and struggle with unexpected answers as a woman and an artist. If this book doesn't make you think - and rethink - darling, candidly, you need to get laid, preferably by a smart person.
The anonymous author (I have my theory) and publisher (Unbridled Books) definitely get an A for audacity. I have my thoughts about various ideological particulars and some opinions about the origins of the book, but I’ll reserve these until The Mistress Contract
comes out in October, at which time I hope you’ll all buy the heck out of it, read it cover to cover in one sitting, and fling it at someone you love.
