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.
