Author(s): Joe Pernice

General Fiction

The hilarious and irreverent debut novel about a modern Everyman struggling to learn how to love, choose, and commit on his own terms, from the highly acclaimed singer and songwriter.
From the first moment he met Jocelyn, he knew he would marry her or destroy his life trying. He didnat count on being the lucky bastard that got to do both.
Itas October 1996 in Cape Cod. Our heroa a narrator so ordinary that he remains nameless ais a talented but floundering musician-turnedwaiter who has hightailed it out of a volatile day-old marriage in New York and further into his own ever-deepening mess. With no job, no apartment, no wife, and a six pack of beer, heas looking for a clean slate. For years heas been dodging lifeas extremes, stuck somewhere between responsibility and freedom, love and obsession, obligation and desire, apathy and success. Now heas seeking sanctuary at the home that his sister abandoned, along with her marriage, so that he can sort out something in his lifeawhat, heas not quite sure.
Looking for distraction from his memories of the hot-blooded Jocelyn, who is still refusing to return his calls, he agrees to look after his two-year-old nephew. Together, the unlikely pair catches the attention of Marie, a young woman in the neighborhood with a troubled past of her own. As they get to know each other, our hero ventures into unknown territory, where his affection for a damaged kindred spirit just might shock him awake and shake him to the core. By turns hilariously irreverent and unpredictably affecting, "It Feels So Good When I Stop" is a disarmingly fresh love story and coming-ofage novel that refracts with pristine clarity what itas like to grow up, and to fall and stay in love in the real world.