Dark / Drama / Thriller
Date Published: July 28, 2023
Publisher: Troubadour Books
“Love before Covid - A raw, philosophical dive into love’s messy reality—unflinching, dark, and unapologetically human. Unlike typical romance novels, LOVE BEFORE COVID is a dialogue-driven exploration of human flaws and ideologies, blending fiction with metaphysical inquiry. It’s not about comfort; it’s about confrontation and insight.”
Laced with dark humour, it is best described as traumatic (sur)realism. Love Before Covid takes the reader on a journey through the mind of Joe Pastorius - jazz fan, poet, and victim of horrendous sexual and emotional abuse at the hands of his mother.
The real-time dialogues between the characters that emerge from Joe’s unconscious come via arguably corrupted memories and dystopian dreams. They tell us more about Joe than he could ever know, and perhaps more about our world than you could ever imagine.
Dialogues entail an exploration of clashing perspectives and opinions, that cause reflection. Today though, our world has been infiltrated by online dialogues that tend to feel like wild unfiltered streams of human thought, raw, chaotic and often polarising and devoid of much reflection. Arguably that attitude, and lack of reflection is mirrored by the characters you will encounter. The reflection comes from the reader as the situations unfold. Your moral boundaries will without doubt be pushed to the limit.
You will meet an altruist who can’t stand up for himself, a charming but violent public intellectual, a beautiful dancer who hates fat people, a flirty and gregarious bartender who will do anything to get pregnant, a traumatised art historian who never wants to be a mother, a successful intellectual Mexican writer who is secretly disapproving of her childhood friend’s career as a pornstar, the teenage genius son of that pornstar who has sexual fantasises about his mother, a woman who is pressured into cutting off her penis and a successful therapist who has a habit of ruining people’s lives.
And yes, before you ask, some of the characters in this book eventually catch Covid 19. However, there is always hope. For Joe Pastorious, that comes in the form of the psychopath named Janet Waverley.
“The common prejudice that love is as common as “romance” may be due to the fact that we all learned about it first through poetry. But the poets fool us; they are the only ones to whom love is not only a crucial, but an indispensable experience, which entitles them to mistake it for a universal one.”
- Hannah Arendt
“Everyone must decide for himself whether it is better to have a brief but more intensely felt existence or to live a long and ordinary life.”
- Rainer Werner Fassbinder
“You’re going to pay a price for every bloody thing you do and everything you don’t do. You don’t get to choose to not pay a price. You get to choose which poison you’re going to take.”
- Jordan Peterson
Joe is attracted to Janet because she is beautiful, charming, interesting, intelligent, creative, courageous, funny and a great flirt. Janet is crazy about Joe for similar reasons. They have great conversations together.
Joe thinks Janet is an amazing lover and has had more fun with her than he has had with any other person in his entire life. Janet shares all of Joe’s important religious and political views. She has similar tastes and shares his hobbies. Joe can spend long periods of time with Janet without either of them getting on each other’s nerves.
Janet helps Joe improve some of his weaknesses. Joe and Janet like most of the same people for the same reasons. Janet always considers Joe’s advice and very much respects his opinion. She often gives Joe good advice and shares a perspective with him that helps him see things he is sometimes blind to on his own.
Joe and Janet take their commitment to one another very seriously. Both of them will only leave the relationship if they think it isn’t working. Joe and Janet only say things to each other that are true. They do this while frequently combining their honesty with tact, so as to not hurt the other’s feelings. Joe is always there for Janet when she needs him and vice versa.
Janet has recently started going to therapy to work on problems she has with impulse control. Although Janet doesn’t believe that her problems have recently put her in any serious danger, she still worries they could get out of control in the future. After several months of therapy, Doctor Gillian Adams diagnoses Janet as a psychopath. After listening to Doctor Adams explain the reasons for this diagnosis, Janet agrees that she is indeed a psychopath.
Janet is a thrill seeker with completely self-interested motivations. On the inside, Janet cares about people she likes only because of what those people can give her (whether it’s good company, loyalty, practical help, fun experiences, stimulating conversation, good sex, advice, or money). She doesn’t care at all about people she dislikes who give her nothing. Janet can cry on cue to get what she wants.
Nevertheless, she believes that she is a benevolent psychopath. She believes she is a benevolent psychopath because she never tries to harm anyone. She also tries never to treat anyone unfairly. This is because she understands that harming those she dislikes and treating them unfairly would give her less of what she wants in life. It’s not because she cares about the suffering or unfair treatment of people she dislikes.
Janet cares about Joe more than anyone because Joe gives her what she wants from a boyfriend. Most of the time, Joe is good company, fun, sexy, a good conversationalist and someone who is very supportive of her.
Janet also cuts Joe a lot of slack.
She allows him days when he is grumpy and isn’t good company because she understands that realistically, you can’t have a committed relationship unless you cut your partner some slack. However, if Joe were to permanently stop giving Janet the things that make her happy in their relationship, she would not hesitate to end it.
Janet knows that behaving selfishly and using people makes people she cares about dislike her. She knows behaving this way would especially make Joe dislike her. Because of this fact, she mostly behaves in a way where she doesn’t appear selfish or like she is using people.
Sometimes she slips up.
On a few occasions, Janet does show Joe behaviours he finds quite selfish. However, the amount of selfish behaviour she shows Joe is comparable to the amount of selfish behaviour he shows her. He isn’t a psychopath.
Nonetheless, when Joe finds out about Janet’s diagnosis, he feels frightened, overwhelmed and confused. He’s also feeling impulsive.
About the Author
During the pandemic Dr Greg Scorzo completed his first novel ‘LOVE BEFORE COVID’ as well as producing an innovative radio play based on 6 chapters from that book, also called – LOVE BEFORE COVID. available on our YouTube Channel. and via Audioboom with links to all major podcast platforms.
Greg says, “I was interested in the challenge of writing a novel that was formally experimental, while still being easy for a mass audience to read and understand. I love the idea of a piece of philosophy that is simultaneously a work of fiction, and a philosophical thought experiment which can function like a great, twisty roller coaster of a story that asks the reader many questions. Unlike traditional philosophy and many fashionable works of literature, this book purposefully asks questions without giving answers, encouraging readers to think (and emote) for themselves.”
Since gaining his PhD in Philosophy in 2011, Greg Scorzo has aimed to find creative and original ways to take philosophical thinking outside of academia. By using modern accessible philosophical dialogue inpublic talks, podcasts and his novel Love Before Covid, Greg explores clashing perspectives and opinions that cause reflection. Based in Leicester, he was a founding member of Culture on the Offensive and runs the podcast The ‘Art of Thinking’.
Dialogues entail an exploration of clashing perspectives and opinions that cause reflection. Statements and declarations can close minds.
The ‘Art of Thinking’ with Greg Scorzo podcast is available on YouTube where he does friendly philosophical interrogation of ideas with many interesting thinkers. Also available via Audioboom linking to all major podcast platforms.
His extended essays on Arts and Culture as well as Cultural Issues are available on this platform www.gregscorzo.com
He has a passion and extensive knowledge of film and music.
From 2017 – 2020 Greg Scorzo was active in running over 60 engaging voluntary community sessions, centred around ‘The Art of Thinking’ The focussed on universal philosophical themes, arts and culture and cultural issues. The ethos behind these events was to encourage the use of EMPATHY, CLARITY and COURAGE in ensuing dialogues with the audience. These were organised by COTO.
He also took up invitations to partner and run sessions at other events, including the Battle of Ideas Festival at the Barbican London, the Philosophy Now conference, Leicester Comedy Festival and DeMontfort University’s Cultural Exchanges festival. He is always interested to partner up with other like minded people.
Contact Links
Purchase Links
https://mybook.to/LoveBeforeCovid
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