Lost in the Slipstream

How does a writer learn to write? For Tim Lewis, 27, the answer arrives in the form of Joy, an impossibly desirable, dreadlocked, passion-loving beauty. Fired from an L.A. inner-city teaching nightmare, Tim is catapulted to San Francisco to pursue a last ditch, secret dream to be a writer. But before he leaves, his father, dying of cancer and unhappy with Tim's decision, makes him promise: he must write something beautiful for his dad. But the man has roughly six months to live and...
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How does a writer learn to write? For Tim Lewis, 27, the answer arrives in the form of Joy, an impossibly desirable, dreadlocked, passion-loving beauty. Fired from an L.A. inner-city teaching nightmare, Tim is catapulted to San Francisco to pursue a last ditch, secret dream to be a writer. But before he leaves, his father, dying of cancer and unhappy with Tim's decision, makes him promise: he must write something beautiful for his dad. But the man has roughly six months to live and nothing like a little pressure. In San Francisco, Tim meets Joy and discovers her odd quirk: if he conjures steamy tales with Joy as the erotic heroine, she gets hot and he gets to make love to her. The better the story the hotter she gets, and what more enticing motivation could a writer hope for? But he battles with Joy's impossible demands, her hipster friends, and struggles to stay afloat by coaching a near-hopeless collegiate cross-country team. Yet intimacy with Joy is mythic, and as Tim's deadline fast approaches, the story races to a surprising conclusion before the magical backdrop of San Francisco, and through the voice of a goofy, lovesick, and thoroughly overheated narrator who leaps effortlessly into lively, spontaneous storytelling.