Written by a former “advertising practitioner and university educator” who not only dismisses the notion that media manipulators are busy airbrushing tits, asses and cocks into advertising images, but claims that subliminal advertising doesn’t work anyhow. So, if you get horny looking at ice cubes and Ritz crackers, that’s your problem. MG
Publisher: CrossRoads
Paperback: 181 pages
Illustrated
Aside from being a deranged homicidal dyke, the late Valerie Solanas was also a visionary social theorist. Before she became infamous as the would-be assassin of Andy Warhol, Valerie, already well established as a conspicuous daub of lower Manhattan’s local color, founded the one-woman terrorist organization S.C.U.M. (Society for Cutting Up Men) and wrote the S.C.U.M. Manifesto, a wonderfully toxic anti-capitalist, lesbian separatist rant that puts the blame squarely where it belongs: on those fucked-up male chauvinist pigs! S.C.U.M. sends out a clarion call to “civic-minded, responsible, thrill-seeking females only to overthrow the government, eliminate the money system, institute complete automation and destroy the male sex.” Other targets: hippies, “great art,” fatherhood, politeness, “pussy.” She cobbles out her thesis in such a charmingly autocratic style that even her more dubious notions (sex is out in her utopia) read like common sense. And just because a few billion people would have to be butchered to implement her plan doesn’t necessarily mean that she’s wrong. Who needs Catherine McKinnon and Andrea Dworkin? Pick up S.C.U.M. Manifesto and learn the real definition of “feminazi.” MG
Publisher: AK
Paperback: 24 pages
This gorgeously bound reprint of Sacher-Masoch’s 1870 novel, Venus in Furs, which includes a thesis on masochism by Gilles Deleuze, is one of the most emotionally intense and beautifully written explorations of what Plato called “the desire and pursuit of the whole, which is called love.” One at times feels literally hypnotized while reading the book, as the protagonist erects layer upon layer of pathos for his plight: that of an obsessive, fetishistic dandy addicted to pain, servitude and the sight of fur around a woman’s bare shoulders, relentlessly imploring a reticent, disdainful Mistress to give him the treatment that he craves. Deleuze makes the point that masochism is not the opposite of sadism, locates its importance at the core of human psychology, and explains in depth Masoch’s “peculiar way of desexualizing love while at the same time sexualizing the entire history of humanity.” A complex and satisfying text that even vanilla-sexers will cherish. MG
Publisher: Zone
Paperback: 293 pages
Learn how to increase your endowment (or lack thereof) using pumps and weights, or just get off on the pictures of humungous cocks. Full of hilarious pseudo-scientific comparison charts and pointless historical ephemera, plus a list of the biggest schlongs in Hollywood! MG
Publisher: Hourglass
Paperback: 193 pages
Illustrated
Witness here the life of Jayne (formerly Wayne) County in all its messy glory, from picking up queen fuckers by the road side to breaking heads on the stage at CBGB’s. She did it first, if not best, and her antics put rock’s other drag hags way in the shade. MG
Publisher: Serpent's Tail
Paperback: 184 pages
Illustrated
And not just any woman: French diplomat Monsieur d’Eon was an 18th-century, gender-blending, male Mata Hari living in the center of international intrigue. He continued his career as a super spy after declaring himself a genetic female at the age of 49 and kept them all guessing until after his death. He/she was also an acolyte of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. MG
Publisher: HarperCollins
Paperback: 400 pages
Paternal transvestism can be fun for the whole family, thanks to Dr. Rudd, a “helping professional who reaches out to all crossdressers and their families. Through her example as the wife of a crossdresser, counselor and lecturer, she demonstrates that total acceptance is both possible and rewarding.” MG
Publisher: PM
Paperback: 160 pages
This two-part anthology combines articles on the history and ethics of nudism and nudist publishing, with scores of photos that capture the gleefully naked antics of legions of sun-worshiping men, women and children. Whether riding dune buggies, gyrating with hula hoops, sitting under hair dryers, bowling, competing in beauty pageants, or just hunkering down for a few mai-tais, life in the raw is an endless pleasure spree. And the fact that many of the nude revelers look like Martin Milner and Patty Duke makes it all the more fun. Includes the how-to essay “Dance Naked With Music” by Laura Archer Huxley, absurdly juxtaposed with a foreword by husband Aldous (“Human beings are multiple amphibians…”) with pictures of Mrs. Huxley writhing and undulating in someone’s batch pad living room, captioned with her own written exhortation to “Go into a room by yourself. Put on your favorite music. Throw off your clothes. And dance!” One can only assume that this kind of thing is included to bridge the gap between the spiritual and the prurient, but if one ignores the “sing the body electric” rhetoric while checking out the buns and wieners, and still appreciate this stuff as sublime, omnisexual porno-kitsch. MG
Publisher: Elysium Growth
Paperback: 95 pages
Illustrated
Interviews with Dhoruba Bin Wahad, Mumia Abu-Jamal and Assata Shakur (mother of Tupac), prime targets in the U.S. government’s continuing war against the Black Panthers and Move, plus mind-boggling documents from the FBI’s Panther files. MG
Publisher: Autonomedia
Paperback: 272 pages