{"product_id":"i-felt-the-end-before-it-came-memoirs-of-a-queer-ex-jehovahs-witness-9780735242104","title":"I Felt the End Before It Came: Memoirs of a Queer Ex-Jehovah's Witness","description":"\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e*SHORTLISTED FOR THE GRAND PRIX DU LIVRE DE MONTREAL*\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA \u003ci\u003ePUBLISHERS WEEKLY\u003c\/i\u003e BEST BOOK OF 2023 \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\"I spent eighteen years in a group that taught me to hate myself. You cannot be queer and a Jehovah's Witness--it's one or the other.\" \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eDaniel Allen Cox grew up with firm lines around what his religion considered unacceptable: celebrating birthdays and holidays, voting in elections, pursuing higher education, and other forays into independent thought. Their opposition to blood transfusions would have consequences for his mother, just as their stance on homosexuality would for him. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eBut even years after whispers of his sexual orientation reached his congregation's presiding elder, catalyzing his disassociation, the distinction between \"in\" and \"out\" isn't always clear. Still in the midst of a lifelong disentanglement, Cox grapples with the group's cultish tactics--from gaslighting to shunning--and their resulting harms--from simmering anger to substance abuse--all while redefining its concepts through a queer lens. Can Paradise be a bathhouse, a concert hall, or a room full of books? \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWith great candour and disarming self-awareness, Cox takes readers on a journey from his early days as a solicitous door-to-door preacher in Montreal to a stint in New York City, where he's swept up in a scene of photographers and hustlers blurring the line between art and pornography. The culmination of years spent both processing and avoiding a complicated past, \u003ci\u003eI Felt the End Before It Came \u003c\/i\u003ereckons with memory and language just as it provides a blueprint to surviving a litany of Armageddons.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDANIEL ALLEN COX is the author of four novels published by Arsenal Pulp Press, and his essays and short fiction have appeared in \u003ci\u003eCatapult, Electric Literature, The Rumpus, \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eMaisonneuve\u003c\/i\u003e. His essay \"The Glow of Electrum,\" which appears in this book, was a finalist for a 2021 National Magazine Award and named a Notable essay in \u003ci\u003eThe Best American Essays 2021\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Viking","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50568361902354,"sku":"9780735242104","price":17.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_f95edfc5-f5c8-40c0-bf83-b296bba9332d.jpg?v=1731942581","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/i-felt-the-end-before-it-came-memoirs-of-a-queer-ex-jehovahs-witness-9780735242104","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}