There’s always that awkward moment when someone has read your book and they don’t know quite what to say to you. My sister-in-law, I remember, was on the phone with me, saying she’d just begun to read Straight Up and Dirty. "I warned you that it was dirty," I said, detecting restraint in her voice.
"I mean, well, I guess I just didn’t expect the book to start with a blowjob."
"What?!"
"Yeah, you’re in the closet giving your wasband a blowjob."
"I am not! Are you reading the right book?"
"Yes, you’ve got your head in the hem of his pants." I think for a moment that she’s misread something, but then I fear that I’d written it in this unintentional, ambiguous way.
"Wait a minute," I say. "You cannot give a blowjob with your head in the hem of his pants, no matter how creative you are."
"Oh," she said.
I’ve since revisited said opening paragraph of the book, and I kinda like that people (albeit very few people) thought I was performing a género chico.


