Richard Cabut’s, ”Looking for a Kiss” is an 80s post-punk, twisted tale of drug-fuelled beat, punk, love and hate, set in Camden, Camberwell and New York.
The book is a fabulous chronicle of our protagonists Robert and Marlene struggle to find themselves and their lives whilst immersing themselves in drugs, sex, magic, chaos and post-punk music. Incorporating the themes of the time, acid, pop art, teenage perversity, the nature of melancholy as they head into breakdown, breakup, and then breakout. Expect to find amusement in bathroom functions, clairvoyance, personality crises, primal scenes, screams and schemes. Finally, following their eternal quest for cool and the endless search for redemption.
Richard Cabut is a British author, journalist, playwright, and musician. His writing has been nominated for international awards, and his plays performed nationwide. Cabut began his career in music journalism (at the NME, pen name Richard North), and coined phrase ‘positive punk’ to describe the movement that was soon to influence goth. His career lineage includes recent co-editor and author of the anthology Punk is Dead: Modernity Killed Every Night and author of Dark Entries. His early years saw him publish punk fanzine, ‘Kick’, and play bass with punk band Brigandage and more.
As author and screen writer Jeff Young says in his introduction to the new edition:
‘The book simply reeks of Post-Punk 80’s, the years after the doors were kicked in by punk when we went striding through the splinters to seize the possibilities, that brief moment of filth and fury and glorious subcultural, subversive adventure and imaginative anarchy that eventually soured into a bewildering aftermath of dreams unrealized, hopes broken. Even though the book is set in the 80s it doesn’t feel nostalgic, doesn’t feel about the past, it feels alive, right now, in the moment, a lived, alive, immersive experience.’
PC-Press who are an independent, DIY book publishing company will be releasing ‘Looking For A Kiss’ by Richard Cabut in paperback and hardback versions to be distributed to shops internationally, and available worldwide via online outlets on 15th June 2023.
Richard comments on ‘Looking for a Kiss’,” I wrote the novel during lockdown – a period which reminded me of the one following punk in the late 70s/early 80s– with vaguely that same sense of isolation, desolation, disappointment, and perfidy – yet with, over and above that, the utter need for rebirth. I wrote about a couple who had invested all their efforts and emotions into the idea of punk but at its end had lost track of their personal and cultural arcs, which are intertwined.
He continues: “Following the initial release 2020 (Sweat Drenched Press) I wanted to add new text, photos and artwork to enhance the narrative. Including additional non-fiction pieces about the novel’s punk, positive punk and post-punk background, as well as further original diary entries.
Plus expanded the introduction from bonus guests’ contributions, Jeff Young (Ghost Town, Eastenders, Holby City) and Cathi Unsworth (Seasons of the Witch)”.
Details: https://pc-press.co.uk/product/looking-for-a-kiss-by-richard-cab-oldut/