Sleaze

David Bowie, Rochester, New York, 1976 Image © Rochester Police Department

Mug Shots: Celebrities Under Arrest

George Seminara

“The crime, the arrest, the taking down of names and numbers, the emptying of pockets, the one allotted phone call, the fingertips smeared in ink, and finally, the booking photo: the mug shot. Culled from and ferreted out of police departments from all over the country, here are the mug shots of dozens of America’s celebrities who have been arrested. Suzanne Somers, Tim Allen, Larry King, Jane Fonda, Christian Slater—all have blinked in the flash of the police photographer’s camera. With great difficulty, George Seminara has compiled a startling rogues’ gallery of dozens of well-known public figures.”

Publisher: St. Martin's
Paperback: 100 pages
Illustrated

Reviews

Understanding the Male Hustler

Samuel M. Steward, Ph.D.

“‘There’s all kinds of hustlers,’ he said. ‘Every salesman’s a hustler. A workaholic’s a hustler about his job… Hustling’s a universal occupation.’” A free-form “attempt to get into the mind and personality of the male hustler through a largely imagined series of dialogs between a well-known fictional hustler” and his biographer. Motivations, lifestyle, advantages and disadvantages are chronicled in a racy conversation, gleaned from interviews with hundreds of real dick ‘n’ dollar boys. GR

Publisher: Haworth
Paperback: 147 pages

The Unsinkable Bambi Lake: A Fairy Tale Containing the Dish on Cockettes, Punks and Angels

Bambi Lake and Alvin Orloff

In this tell-all autobiography, Bambi Lake, glamour queen chanteuse, stripper and film star, exposes deeply hidden secrets of she-male America. Her evolution from innocent, suburban Johnny Purcell into fabulous, sophisticated Bambi Lake covers San Francisco’s psychedelic ‘60s, gay revolution in the ‘70s, and the punk rock scene in the ‘80s. Absolutely nothing is off-topic in this sexy, revealing drama. AK

Publisher: Manic D
Paperback: 157 pages
Illustrated

Unsubmissive Women: Chinese Prostitutes in Nineteenth-Century San Francisco

Benson Tong

“Unsubmissive Women goes beyond the moral questions surrounding prostitutes in the Gold Rush West as working women and objects of anti-Chinese sentiment. In so doing, Tong exposes the complexity and texture of these women’s lives. He also portrays them as living beings rather than commodities. They demand our compassion and more—we must admire the human agency they exercised.”

Publisher: University of Oklahoma
Hardback: 320 pages
Illustrated

Up and Down With the Rolling Stones

Tony Sanchez

“This insider’s account of the lives of Brian Jones, Keith Richards and Mick Jagger in the ‘60s and ‘70s has become legendary in the years since its first publication in 1979. Sanchez worked for Keith Richards for eight years—buying drugs, running errands and orchestrating cheap thrills—and he records unforgettable accounts of the Stones’ perilous misadventures: racing cars along the Cote d’Azur; murder at Altamont; nostalgic nights with the Beatles at the Stones-owned nightclub Vesuvio; frantic flights to Switzerland for blood changes; and the steady stream of women, including Anita Pallenberg, Marianne Faithfull and Bianca Jagger. Here are the Stones as never seen before, cavorting around the world, smashing Bentleys, working black magic, getting raided, having children, snorting coke and mainlining heroin. Sanchez tells the whole truth, sparing not even himself in the process. With hard-hitting prose and candid photographs, he creates an invaluable primary source for anyone interested in the world’s most famous rock’n’roll band.”

Publisher: Da Capo
Paperback: 320 pages
Illustrated

Vice Art: An Anthology of London’s Prostitute Cards

Patrick Jewell

“NEW Bitch IN TOWN. Report Now. HOUSE OF HUMILIATION. 7-4-9-7,” says a crude, illustrated card left by a call girl at a London phone kiosk, where johns go to ring up the cash-and-fantasy girl of their dreams. All sorts of sexual specialties are given the graphic treatment. Like crossdressing? “TROLLOPS AND HARLOTS, GLAMOUR AND GLITZ, TVs WELCOME, OPPOSITE THE RITZ. 4-9-2-0.” Watersports? “Madame Niagral 2-1-4-5.” Women in uniforms? “BOBBIE. An Arresting Experience!” More than 100 clever and sexy cards. GR

Publisher: Broadwater House
Paperback: 64 pages
Illustrated

Whore Carnival

Shannon Bell

A collection of interviews, pleasure texts and “cunceptual” essays on the feminist genealogy of prostitution—from the ancient Greek courtesan to the sex-industry workers of postmodern Babylon. AK

Publisher: Autonomedia
Paperback: 286 pages

Wonder Bread and Ecstasy: The Life and Death of Joey Stefano

Charles Isherwood

The tragic rise and fall of major gay porn star Joey Stefano. Equipped with a gorgeous face and body, Stefano starred in more than 35 hardcore videos, danced in clubs across America and Europe, hustled his way through thousands of dollars paid to him by clients around the globe and died from a drug overdose at the age of 26. With insight and empathy, Isherwood traces Stefano’s immersion into the chaotic and dark world of the porn industry—the fast money, the professional rivalries, the plentiful drugs, the nonstop sex. The picture of Stefano that emerges is one of a sexually adventurous beauty who lived in the moment and was determined to live out his fantasies at all costs. With photos, revealing snippets of Stefano interviews and a videography listing some of his more notable and widely available videos. Particularly distressing is the event recounted in the prologue: friend and director Chi Chi LaRue unsuccessfully attempting to make sense of Stefano’s death to a pack of bloodthirsty boneheads on The Marilyn Kagan Show. An all-too-familiar retelling of the potentially lethal effects of fame, Wonder Bread and Ecstasy is a well-written and disturbingly compelling read. MDG

Publisher: Alyson
Paperback: 209 pages
Illustrated

You Send Me: The Life and Times of Sam Cooke

Daniel Wolff

A compelling portrait of the charismatic singer who helped create and define the musical genre today known as soul—from his early years in Chicago and his apprenticeship with gospel music to his bursting onto the pop scene as one of its first cross-over artists with the number-one hit “You Send Me” (the first in a string of rock ‘n’ roll classics including “Chain Gang,” “Wonderful World,” “Having a Party,” and “Twistin’ the Night Away”) to the mysterious circumstances surrounding his death in 1964 in a seedy motel in south Los Angeles at the age of 33. More than a mere biography, You Send Me also reads as a social history, addressing the racism that flourished within both the recording industry and society at large, crescendoing in the birth of the Civil Rights Movement. Of particular note is the fact that Cooke wrote “A Change Is Gonna Come” largely in response to Dylan’s “Blowin in the Wind” (“Geez, a white boy writing a song like that?”). Perhaps the most extraordinary aspect of Cooke’s genius (that is, aside from his voice: sparkling, plaintive, resilient, beguiling) was his ability, as writer and singer, to perfom gospel, soul, ballad, rock ‘n’ roll (often combining these elements in the context of one song) and never sound in the least inauthentic or out of place. With photos, a discography and selected bibliography, You Send Me is an excellent recounting of the brilliant life and tragic times of a bona fide musical legend. MDG

Publisher: Quill
Paperback: 428 pages
Illustrated

You’ll Never Make Love in This Town Again: The Flip Side to the Pretty Woman Story

X, Y, and Z

“This all-true tell-all follows the lives of three women living in the ‘cesspool’ called Hollywood. From Jack Nicholson to Heidi Fleiss to Sylvester Stallone, this scintillating book exposes a seedy side of the movie-making industry, equally as insidious as the business truths exposed in You’ll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again—and twice as intriguing.”

Publisher: Dove
Hardback: 251 pages