NO EXIT. A Review of Permanent Obscurity: A Novel by Richard Perez

Book Review By Robert Mead

Permanent Obscurity plays out like an existential BDSM sex farce written by Jean Paul Sartre. At the center of this black comedy is Dolores and Serena, two bickering, self-deluded wannabe artists. Dolores, our quasi-teenage narrator, rages about society and how she's oppressed while puffing away nonstop from her weed pipe; Serena, a self-absorbed beauty, can't be bothered to work for a living so she puts out Craigslist ads for slaves who provide her with the adoration and attention she craves as a failed singer and performer. One such "slave," who becomes an important character in the book, is a man referred to as "Baby," a self-sacrificing little saint who can't stop from bending over backwards for Serena, even though it's clear she's moved on to others, including a new male servant who might better serve her purposes. Appropriated slave #2 is a failed writer by the name of "Dick," who may or may not stand in for the author himself, Richard Perez.

Dizzy yet? There's more. Raymond, Dolores's brow-beaten 40ish boyfriend, can't seem to stop apologizing for an infidelity while Dolores makes sure she rubs his nose it, since she's carrying his child. Like Baby, Raymond seems like another lost and haunted soul. The give-and-take (apologizing and Dolores' refusal to accept an apology), comprises the romantic comedy subplot and is a running joke in the book.

Dolores and Serena take to living on the run, after it becomes clear that drug dealers (more and more piling up, appear as the story goes on) are closing in. Along the way, Serena has progressed from fetish model to would-be dominatrix-headliner in a film that Dolores and she attempt to make. The BDSM movie -- or the attempt to produce it -- becomes more or less the central plot of second act of the book. And page after page, Dolores and Serena find new ways of fouling things up, until the climatic event itself (the actual sex movie shoot) turns into another disastrous reversal. And suddenly Dolores and Serena find themselves as murderers. This is the existential part of the tale, like a trap door opening up in the story, plunging the girls into the third act of the novel, "No Man's Land," in which they're made to finally deal with the consequences of their dissolute lives.

This is a long and heady story told from the meandering point of view of a pothead, Dolores. And appropriately enough, it meanders but never becomes dull. In the beginning of the novel, Dolores and Serena almost seem like tabloid caricatures, which may or not be a side effect of Dolores telling the story. But as the story progresses, the characterizations deepen. The dialog also becomes heavy with urban slang as Dolores' re-telling sinks into flashback and more or less stays in flashback, until the end of the novel when we're jolted back to the beginning and we fully understand the meaning of the opening quote of the book and how it relates to "Permanent Obscurity."

This is a wild and entertaining novel, rough in spots, but ambitious in it's own gritty, low-rent kind of way. But not for everyone with its non-mainstream BDSM sexual content, staggering drug use, and heavy foul language. Dolores, our narrator, and her best friend Serena would best be categorized as anti-heroes, certainly not role models.

Available from Amazon.

Full title of this novel: PERMANENT OBSCURITY: Or a Cautionary Tale of Two Girls and Their Misadventures with Drugs, Pornography and Death by Dolores Santana (as told to Richard Perez)

[Book Review by Robert Mead]