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265 of 290 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A Cautionary Tale It Is, January 23, 2005
Most people, I suspect, when they spy the title of Jenna Jameson's "How To Make Love Like A Porn Star" rarely see the next line of the title ":A Cautionary Tale". The glitz, the glamour, the women and men, and the sex are what they think porn is all about. The tawdry, abusive, dirty and sad side of life is the real world of porn.
Jenna Jameson aka Jenna Massoli was born in Las Vegas. Her mother was a Vegas showgirl and died a very painful death from cancer when Jenna was a small child. Her father never really recovered from his wife's death. He became a policeman and essentially left Jenna and her brother Jack to grow up by themselves. He was absent from much of their lives. They moved frequently and Jenna had a hectic life. Never really making friends and never having a loving relationship. In one small town in Montana she was gang raped and left for dead. Jenna reacted violently and injured a girl who had been abusive to her. The family left town - the same way they reacted with all problems; fleeing and never facing the problem head-on. Jenna drifted into one bad relationship after another and learned to make money with her body. At first she danced in a strip club and moved on to stripping and then on to porn stills and then porn movies.
Much of this book is about Jenna and her life in the porn business. She is quite open about the drugs and alcohol and life she led. In order to maintain a semblance of life she had affairs with men and women she worked with. She tells us of her life and that of other female and male porn stars. At times she tries to glamorize the business by talking of the money, the clothes, the make-up, the travel, and all the people she met. But most of the book is about her search for love, and of course, for love in all the wrong places with all the wrong people. She believes that celebrities will welcome her into their lives and business. She tells of her affairs with well known Hollywood stars and rock band members. But beneath all of this is the raw, gritty life of the porn star that survives on booze and drugs and never makes it to the top. This is a sad story of a life of a young woman who did not have a family to support her. She only knew that she had to fight and kick her way into life and that is what she is still doing. Jenna has some good insight into her life and the men she loved, but she is unable to leave the business. She is still making movies and at times dreaming of having children. She is proud that she has been able to rise above her stripper life and make her way in the world. She married a kindred soul, and they are in business together. It seems this is enough for Jenna Jameson.
This is a very honest portrayal of life in the porn business. Jenna Jameson does not pull any punches. She does not make excuses for her life, nor does she try to leave the business. This is her life she believes, and she will make the best of it. She is a success she believes because she has learned from her inner strength, and not waiting for fulfillment from someone else. A good read but not for the squeamish. prisrob
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141 of 163 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Porn Queen Turned Literary Genius, September 21, 2004
Jenna Jameson pours out her heart and soul in this autobiography that gives us a detailed and colorful account of her exciting life and career. I was aware of who she was from the time I saw her in a porn movie many years ago. There was something so sensual about the way she performs for the camera. If I could use the word grace about something related to porn, in my mind Jenna Jameson is the most graceful porn diva out there.
To be honest I was enticed about the title and the cover when I bought the book. The book is very thick, but don't be afraid, as over a third of its content is comprised of pictures and collages of beautiful Jenna. However, I found it hard to read in the subway as the revealing pictures got a lot of attention by other commuters. The fix to this problem was to start carrying a white sheet of paper that would cover the pictures while I would read the text.
Jenna's life is exciting, sad, dramatic, abusive, humorous, and extravagant all at the same time, and she does an excellent job at opening her heart to the public. She takes the reader on a journey that starts with a naughty little girl that plays with Barbies and also has a certain tomboy side to her, and finishes with a giant porn diva that sits at the top of thirty six billion dollars a year industry. This journey is full of ups and downs, which Jenna manages to turn into constant learning and self-exploration. She is very generous at sharing these learning experiences in the shapes of Jenna philosophies about family, love, relationships, sex, drugs, or all kinds of other dependencies. And as nobody in a healthy state of mind should take these philosophies at face value, they are nevertheless entertaining and will give you some interesting perspectives on all these well-debated issues.
The book is a wealth of knowledge about the porn industry. If you are thinking about making it in this business, this book will be your new Bible. It is fascinating to find out about the sad self-destructive lives of most porn stars. If you are like me (or every guy I have talked to) and wondered about being a porn star, reading this book will definitely make you reconsider.
Also, if you enjoy juicy gossips (who doesn't?) about the rich and famous, this book will prove to be very informative at that matter. You will find interesting bits about Nicholas Cage, Nikki Sixx, Tome Lee, Marilyn Manson, Derek Jeter, Joe Montana, Pamela Anderson, or the Undertaker. Who would have thought that Marilyn Manson likes to cuddle after he has sex? Who would have thought Nicholas Cage smells like the homeless people at the subway stations?
I will highly recommend this book to anybody that likes to mix up his or her reading materials. If you are a fan of biographies, this book is must! If you have taken an interest on the porn industry this book will be eye-opening (no pun intended).
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25 of 28 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Scintillating story about Jenna's roller-coaster life, August 20, 2004
A previous reviewer called this book self-serving, boring, and alleges that a school report is more interesting than Jenna's memoir. The reviewer also alleges that the author is less than intelligent. All I have to ask is this: did you even open the book, much less read it? Most likely, I'd guess the answer is 'no' and the reviewer's ragging on the book only because it's written by a pornstar.
The book is hardly boring. Its prologue begins with Jenna stumbling across her best friend--the stripper who showed her the ropes of stripping--hanging dead from a noose in her bathroom. That prologue sets the tone for the entire rest of the book, and each of her anecdotes and stories maintain quick pacing.
You follow her through her life as she recalls being sexually assaulted twice before she ever turned eighteen. You follow her tale, which is one of a very scarred, injured, and wounded individual getting carried away by the momentum of trauma which leads to an unhealthy lifestyle. She shares her stories of her dependency on men and drugs, both of which contribute to make her life worse and worse. It's a story about a woman coming through the other side. She also very straight-forwardly tells about the not-so-bright choices she's made, sometimes one after another, which, I feel, is hardly self-serving. She's no saint and she doesn't try to be.
For the record, I'm female and I enjoyed the book. I actually think women may enjoy this book more than men, because it's a very personal story about another woman's life. She centers her story around her life, not just porn, so I really do see women being able to relate more to her troubles.
This isn't my advocating the life of in pornography or lauding Jenna Jameson as someone whose life is worth admiration, but I definitely admire her spirit and fortitude. She's quitting movies now and is looking to settle down with her husband and raise a family (though she realizes the challenges her children will have to face having the queen of porn as a mother). While I certainly disagreed with her choice of lifestyle, I began to feel for her as she tells the story of how she came about her hard-won independence from drugs and abusive men. While she never puts down her choice of doing porn, she constantly warns both male and female readers about the pitfalls of such a career choice and the detriment it can cause to a person's life (for instance, she warns that normal relationships are very hard to come by in the industry because it's hard for one partner to watch another have sex with other people for a living).
What I found wasn't a pornstar glamourizing her lifestyle. What I did find was a surprisingly intelligent and articulate woman divulging her past. Her story doesn't revolve around glitz and glam, rather, it centers around abuse and heartache.
Her tone is completely unapologetic and candid, but never arrogant. She presents her story in a "here I am--take it or leave it" manner. Most of all, I felt her story was genuine. Even when she goes on about another man who mistreats her, you don't feel as if she's trying to win sympathy. Her tone indicates she understands it was her fault in the first place for putting herself in that situation in the first place. That very tone is what keeps the book from turning into a sob-fest.
This certainly isn't a book for the prudish. Being a porn star, she does talk about sex. I did not feel she was gratuitous, but she definitely was candid. And depending on your constitution for the topic, my 'candid' may be your 'gratuitous.' I didn't have a problem picking up a memoir of a pornstar. I've seen her work, I was genuinely curious about her life, and I had no problem with the subject matter--if you feel similarly, it's quite a fascinating read. She's surprisingly articulate!
This is something definitely for the 18 and older crowd, not for younger readers (as if the title didn't indicate that). She talks about sex, drug dependency, death, sexual assault, and she also describes her encounters with the same sex (she's bisexual). If you can stomach that list of topics, you'll be able to stomach the book. If any of the above listed subject matter turns your stomach, you should definitely reconsider. It is, however, a fascinating, whirlwind-paced look back on the life of the most famous face of adult films.
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