Customer Reviews

Hooking Up with Tila Tequila: A Guide to Love, Fame, Happiness, Success, and Being the Life of the Party

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I'm not typically a fan of celebrity autobiographies, but because of Tila's extreme noteriety in popular culture, I picked up this book in hopes of learning more about the woman behind the superstardom.

Tila tries hard to write a manifesto of worldly advice on subjects such as success, fame, sex and sexuality and being a woman, but much of her advice falls flat. Unless you're also a self-absorbed 20-something slut wanna be (yes, she actually uses the word slut proudly, even defining it as a woman with loose moral character), this book is less a book filled with sage advice for attaining your goals, she encourages the reader to "do whatever you have to do" in order to reach that goal - even if it means compromising yourself and ultimately your self-worth. Sensationalistic and at times downright offensive (her habitual use of the F-word gets tired and loses impact), she claims to have it ALL by 26 or 27-ish, including valuable wisdom.
There's a difference between personal advice and wisdom, an wisdom she has none of. After reading this book, I was left with the feeling of, "get back to me when you're 40 and have grown up a little - no, actually A LOT. Maybe then you'll have something worthwhile to say about what it really means to "make it".

She appears to take pride in her "badness" and carries it to the hilt. Every page is filled with personal and provocative photos, including a great deal of erotica which at times borders on being pornographic. At the end of one chapter, she invites the reader (or ratehr, encourages) to view pages upon pages of photos of a scantily clad, highly eroticized Tila, and "get [their] rocks off", or "box off in the case of the lovely ladies".

Every now and again she drops an interesting nugget of information but does not elaborate on it. It becomes a mental tease, but a shallow one. When I picked up this book, I hoped to learn more about the "real" Tila Tequila - who she is, where did she come from, her home life, early childhood, etc. I came away from this book sorely disappointed. The prose is pedantic and juvenile and filled with expletives in every other sentence, but again, this fits with her "bad to the bone" chica persona - which appears not to be a celebrity persona at all!

Tila certainly is a savvy buisness woman - I'll give her that, even if her scruples and advice is questionable; she wrote this book, after all, to supplement her hype, and people have bought it in droves, but the overall satisfaction with this book is evidenced by the number of copies up for resale and at such a low price.

So, if you're looking for masturbatory material then this book is definitely for you. If you're looking for a meaningful autobiography, or motivational/inspirational book on overcoming odds to get what you want, you're well advised to save your money and look elsewhere.

well i got this book last month and i read it all in one day. i got to say it was pretty motivating and i dont see why people call her a slut, i mean yeah she did not so good things but tila is still pretty badass. if your young like me this is a good book if your an old prude you will probaly think this is a bad book. overall it doesnt hurt if you buy it its only like 4 bucks if you search the used section.

Tila's book turned out a little better than I had expected. Just the slightest bit.

Let's start off with the first chapter: she discusses public reaction. While she calls on others for frequently branding her a "slut", as well as several other common criticisms, she doesn't do any better with unimaginative comebacks. There is nothing classy or admirable about the way she responds to them (as a matter of fact, most things). Right in the first chapter, she says something like, "It's not a big deal, everybody has called me a slut. It doesn't always mean bad; as a matter of fact, I believe that it means I'm a hard-working, independent woman in my own case." Just a few lines later, the reader is offered to take her explanation of, "I didn't originally want to be a model, but that was what I had to make usage of then and there. So I went ahead and did it. But I'm not ashamed of it." That's not good at all. Perhaps she should have explained why she kept on doing it and why she isn't ashamed of it.

Her advice is surprisingly honest and straight-forward. Maybe it's due to her having to put up with all of the "haters" and hard times in her life. I found myself nodding and agreeing with the majority of it. "Forget about the others! Sometimes you just have to accept that this is the way it is! Those other people don't matter. Only you do, and going after what you believe is best."

The chapter on what guys like made me cringe. Same with the relationships. It seems like she only wished to target those who decided to have premartial sex or go around using looks to hook up. If anything, those sections were just further proof that she is exactly what the public often brands her. "There aren't many options, except to go around and have premartial sex and work your heart out." It's not every human on this planet who believes that, even in this day and age. What about the others?

I liked the chapters about how she discussed celebrities of today and how she got into writing poetry and songs. They were agreeable and easy to read. I never knew Tila had been writing for such a long time, though it makes since as she's had years to perfect those words she puts forth into her poems and music. "I don't care what you say, I'm just out here to do this stuff for myself."

I noticed several reviewers expressed dislike because of the book not covering her early life. I already knew in advance it would focus on full-color photos, self-help, and relationship advice, so that was not one of the problems I had. However, it does cover her career, career beginnings, music, and various aspects of her personal life in light detail.

All in all, the book has a lot of good messages. I found it enlightening and inspirational. I didn't finish it exclaiming, "Oh, wow! This was the best book I've ever read!" However, it did offer additional inspiration, encouragement, and insight at the woman we've come to know as Tila Tequila.

The book talks about eveything in her life and her thoughts about ppl putting u down sometimes in life and getting throw them.

This book was very good!! I recommend it. It has lots of pictures, interesting stories and good advices.I can't wait for a new book from Miss Tila!

I bought this book to learn more about Tila's vietnamese culture and her relationship with her family.

However, she makes sure to note later in the book that she totally separates her family from her career. Even before her insane popularity -- back when you could read her bio for free in her blog -- she barely talked about her parents.

So... I guess I have to meet her to learn more about that. But this book is really encouraging. It is a good book for those who want to pursue difficult careers or are met with a lot of challenges to achieve their dreams.

The only thing I disagree with is that she says you must make sacrifices to get what you want. Her sacrifice was being a whore. Being a stripper and having sugar daddies. That's not a sacrifice, that is compromising yourself. But if you're willing to do that, then I guess that's fine. But what options do men or unattractive girls have. Its easy for her to say "make sacrifice" because her sacrifice makes great money for an attractive asian girl. What about others. I don't get what she really means here.

And I like having a collection of her photos. It inspired me to dress better and be a better flirt, lol.

I came across this book in a Borders and picked up, probably laughing at it and that I could be seen in a book store reading this book.

A half hour later I put it down. Tila actually kind of impressed the hell out of me. Her courage in raising herself to where she's gotten, disrespectable as some people may think her place is, is truly exceptional. She comes from a hard background, actually has some good advice and interesting experiences, and put together a pretty fun and raunchy and not-too-bad-in-the-advice column book.

Book made me like Tila about 10x more than before I picked up the book. Congrats Tila!

I read everything in about two days, and I found the book actually pretty good (I felt the expletives were/are part of her style, and not a gimmick / I got the second last copy at a sale / the copies ran out fast).

The print quality of the photos is great! The design of the interior pages is very aesthetically pleasing, and the content is not bimbotic, if one looks at the message and person behind it (despite some of the dramatic and quite-public antics of Tila Tequila).

By the way, the whole video/audio clips syncing onto MySpace (which the musicians on MySpace rely on quite heavily, to enable their fans/visitors to listen to clips of their music with relative ease), was actually started by Ms. Tequila. While I personally can't stand using MySpace (very, very annoying!), ^that is a sure sign of sheer cleverness, and not bimboticness.

An impulse hardcover purchase which turned out to be a pleasant, satisfying read (with Ms. Tequila's "non-BS" straight from the hip style).

Only reason why I bought this book was because Tila Tequila came to Toronto to the Chapters book store, and I had been a big fan of her reality TV show. I haven't met a celebrity before so I decided to go to her book signing. So I have a personally autographed copy of this book. She was very nice in person and looked just like she does on TV. The book is okay, she gives advice in a fun way. The coloured photos are a great addition too. She discloses lots of fun facts about her past that you may not have known about her before.

I'm not even a fan of hers all like that but I really enjoyed this book. I finished it in like 2 days! I paid next to nothing for it but it was worth what i did pay :)