Sex, Drugs, and Spiritual Enlightenment (but mostly the first two) by Karuna Das Excerpt and Guest Review!

 

Publisher:  DX Varos Publishing (March 28, 2023)

Category: General Fiction, Fictionalized Memoir
Tour Dates: April 4-21, 2023
ISBN: 978-1955065764
Available in Print and ebook, 280 pages

 

On the cusp of turning eighteen, it’s time for Drew Lovell to become a man.

But deep within, Drew has questions—ones he doesn’t know how to phrase—about what that means and how to go about it. 

During three intense stretches between 1985 and 1993, taking him into his mid-twenties, Drew undergoes a series of profound experiences—often wild, sometimes painful, and always revealing—that force him to rethink his current assumptions. Only after nearly dying from trying to conform to conventional models of masculinity does he begin to become the man he wants to be and not the one he thought the world required him to be. Still, he’s unable to live with full integrity until interaction with a pair of awakened humans inspires new awareness that helps him at long last embrace the truth of who he is.

Review Sex, Drugs, and Spiritual Enlightenment by Karuna Das

Guest Review by Laura

I don't think I've ever read a book that the author bills as both a novel and memoir before and this was an intriguing place to start! He actually calls it a “fictionalized memoir.”

'Sex, Drugs, and Spiritual Enlightenment (but mostly the first two), is about exactly what you think from reading the title, one man's journey into himself and his spirituality. You could also call it a coming-of-age novel. Though Das insists that this book is not technically a memoir, he also points out that some parts of it are truthful to his own life.

However, the main character, Andrew Lovell, is a different person entirely. Drew is a young person who spends most of his time on the whirlwind of life's most dangerous delights. Having been born in the Midwest, Drew's family moves to New England when he is a young boy and his mother soon falls in with an alternative religion.

Called the Bahá'í Faith, this group is one that Drew respects for their open-mindedness, despite not fully believing in their message. As he grows into a man, Drew experiences love, heartbreak, travel and, finally, an illness that completely and utterly changes his perspective on not just his own life, but his place in the world. He decides to write a memoir and that's where the 'fictionalized memoir,' as Das calls it, becomes, I think, more real.

Speaking as someone who doesn't consider themselves very spiritual, this was an interesting read. I came out of it with a different perspective on a few things, and I always appreciate a book that can change my mind.

Das is a solid writer, with a lot of chops. I never felt like he missed any marks and I couldn't pick apart which parts of the book were real and which were fictionalized, which I think is a good thing. It was hard to put down and is definitely worth the read! 

Trigger: Language

Edited excerpt of Sex, Drugs & Spiritual Enlightenment (but mostly the first two) by Karuna Das, taken from the book’s Second Movement, “Holy Daze,” and the chapter “In Memoriam”:

 “F*ck the world!” I yelled from the rooftop of Angie’s apartment building.

“F*ck the world!” Scott echoed me.

“F*ck life!” I shouted.

“F*ck life!” he repeated.

“F*ck death!”

“F*ck death!”

“F*ck everything!”

“F*ck everything!”

If you’ve ever ingested psychedelic—a.k.a. “magic”—mushrooms, perhaps you can relate. Either way, I should explain how I came to be, at nearly midnight on Memorial Day Eve, at that site in that state of mind.

#

“What is liberty?” said Alex, reading the words I’d written with the magnetic stylus on my podium screen. “That’s the correct response. And how much did he risk? Everything!”

Go bold or go home.

To win I still needed the prodigy beside me—a sixteen-year-old college senior—to have either missed it or mis-wagered, the latter of which seemed unlikely given this juvenile genius was Asian, and thus an obvious math whiz. I struggled in this opening match until the Double Jeopardy round, when I got back in the game by sweeping a College Sports category—a feat not actually as impressive as it might sound, coming against a nerdy teenager and a bubbly Ivy League coed.

“Now we come to the young man who held a solid lead going into the Final Jeopardy round,” continued the quiz show host. “What did he write?”

“E pluribus unum,” said my opponent with a shake of his head, answering the rhetorical question in violation of the instructions we were given to remain silent until the visual reveal.

“Oh, too bad,” replied Alex once the Latin phrase appeared. “The clue, as you may recall, specified it was a single word. Your wager? Nothing! You might well still advance as a wildcard. In the meantime, congratulations to today’s automatic semifinalist, Drew Lovell.”

I pumped my fist for the camera. Winner!

I wish I could say I won the entire event. I should have made the finals. I led my semifinal from the start and, aided by a true Daily Double, built a nearly insurmountable advantage heading into Final Jeopardy. Nearly insurmountable. Still, all I had to do was get the question right.

By the time Weird Alex arrived at my podium, I knew I’d lost on Jeopardy!, as both other players had answered correctly, and I hadn’t. After the deduction of what I bet—precisely enough to cover my closest competitor’s maximum possible score—I was left in third place.

When I’m persuaded to relate this story in person, everyone wants to know the question I choked on. And I did choke. It concerned early American literature, a favorable subject for an English major—or, in this case and to my downfall, three of them. In fairness, I’d never set eyes on that particular work. But I knew it existed and, had I not panicked under the pressure of the moment, I likely would’ve pieced together hints in the clue and come up with the title.

If you want the actual category, clue, and correct response, you’ll have to find that information for yourself. Or ask my half-brother Billy. He’ll be pleased to tell you how, playing along at home, he knew the answer instantly.

The phone call notifying me I was chosen as a contestant came the day after my failed coupling—the first one—with Angie. In the two weeks between then and my weekend trip to Los Angeles to participate in the competition, I did almost nothing but memorize questions and answers from the Trivial Pursuit game I’d long enjoyed playing. I once won a match-up with that same half-brother on my initial turn, before he even had a chance to roll the die.

In hindsight, all that studying didn’t help much. But it was a convenient excuse to avoid interacting with Angie, lest we undertake another attempt at sexual union I feared would end in more disappointment for her—and humiliation for me. The pressure of that moment would’ve eclipsed even what I felt under the spotlight, in the camera eye, before a live studio audience, on that Hollywood stage. I needed time to prepare for the more intimate performance as well.

I didn’t anticipate my temporary physical withdrawal would induce her to turn elsewhere for satisfaction so soon. Talk about premature emasculation! And, more crucial to the eventual outcome of the situation, I never imagined she’d turn where she did.

Before departing for sunny Southern California, I accepted Angie’s offer to pick me up at Sea-Tac after my flight back. I figured I’d return home either triumphant and confident or defeated and in need of tender loving care, two scenarios I’d be thrilled to have her join.

“Hey, Drew-Drew!” she called as I stepped from the jetway into my arrival gate.

I stared at the young man beside her. Where did I know him from?

“Hey,” he said as I approached.

That’s when I recognized her companion as Christian, organizer of raves and supplier of MDMA, LSD, and other drugs. Without his customary and deliberately strange party attire—which I’d seen range from the Mad Hatter to Cap’n Crunch to the Cat in the Hat—he appeared almost boy-next-doorish. But he would prove to be nothing like an archetypal boy next door.

While I was aware of Christian’s involvement in illicit business, as he and I walked through the concourse on either side of Angie, I still had no idea how deep that involvement ran, or how dangerous he—and his associates—actually were. Nor did I have any idea how intimate her dealings with him had become, much less where they were headed. But I could plainly see they were high at that moment, early on a Monday afternoon, and that caused me concern.

 Copyright © 2023, Kyle Andrew Bostian

 

About Karuna Das

Karuna Das is the pen and spirit name of Kyle Bostian. Born in Wisconsin, he grew up in Massachusetts and now resides in Pennsylvania, but he lives wherever he happens to be at that moment and feels at home everywhere in the universe. He holds a BA in English and an MFA in Playwriting. In addition to his dramatic writing, he’s published the sci-fi novel Kat’s Cradle as well as short fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry. He and life partner Ti share their house with five wonderfully wacky cats. 

Website: https://www.karunadaswriter.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/KarunaDasWriter
Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/karunadaswriter Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/karunadaswriter/

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