• Sin Bum

  • Collection of Classic Erotica - Book 31
  • By: Lawrence Block
  • Narrated by: Virtual Voice
  • Length: 5 hrs and 42 mins

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Sin Bum

By: Lawrence Block
Narrated by: Virtual Voice
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Publisher's summary

LAWRENCE BLOCK observes:

“SIN BUM was published sometime in 1963 as Midnight Reader #472. (Midnight Reader was a sister imprint of Nightstand Books.)

“It may have been the final book I wrote as Andrew Shaw, the last title of mine brought out by publisher William Hamling. Or not—it’s impossible to tell. There were other titles by other hands than mine that would be published under my Andrew Shaw pen name, and there would be a stream of retitled books reissued in the 1970s with their prose slightly tweaked to reflect relaxed taboos, but it was sometime in 1963 that I stopped writing as Andrew Shaw.

“Before I get into that, a few words about SIN BUM.

“The title, I have to say, is one of the worst ever. Someone in Hamling’s employ had to come up with titles every month, and while they didn’t hew strictly to formula, there was a pattern; the typical title consisted of two words, and one of the words was apt to be SIN or SLUT or LUST or PASSION or FLESH. I would hang a title of my own on each manuscript, and some of these appeared on the published books, but whatever I tried to call this one, I know it wasn’t SIN BUM.

“But, for all that I dislike the title, I must confess to an unanticipated fondness for the book. I popped it onto my Kindle the other day and read it, not in anticipation of pleasure but so that I could write this book description, and I rather enjoyed the experience. I should say that I have no memory whatsoever of writing this book; while almost every page sports a sentence or extratextual reference that lets me identify it instantly as my work, I can’t actually remember any of it.

“I think I must have written it very rapidly, and in such a fashion that the whole episode never made its way into long-term memory. But by the time I’d made it halfway through the text on my Kindle, I found myself wondering if I hadn’t found a way to plagiarize myself seven or eight years later.

“Because as I read SIN BUM I kept getting echoes of the first two Chip Harrison novels, No Score and Chip Harrison Scores Again. Not the tone, not the voice, but elements of the plot. I won’t belabor the point, but if you’ve read the Chip Harrison books you’ll probably get my drift. What I do know is that my imitation of self here could only be unconscious; if I’d realized I’d covered this ground before in this fashion, conscience would have kept me from repeating the trip.

“Go figure.

“Oh, never mind. Back in 1963 all you could say about SIN BUM was that it was a book, and that’s all it is now. A Bildungsroman, a Coming of Age novel—and, by the time it’s finished, a male-viewpoint romance novel. My Goddess of Design & Production, the indispensable woman who has to read each book in order to return it to print and make it eVailable, volunteered that “SIN BUM is my favorite of all the Andrew Shaw books.”

“Hmm. A low bar, some might say. And it does appear to have been Andrew Shaw’s last bow. It sometimes seems clear to me that I stayed too long at the fair, but I’m pleased by the thought that the cycle ended well. And if you’re interested in the process, Gentle Reader, and what those early days were like, I’ll refer you to my memoir, A Writer Prepares.”
  • Unabridged Audiobook
  • Categories: Erotica

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