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Stacking in Rivertown [Hardcover]

Barbara Bell (Author)
3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)


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Book Description

July 5, 2000
An intricately emotional and erotic debut and a haunting foray into the deepest recesses of a sexual underworld, "Stacking in Rivertown" is a novel of love, pain, and redemption.

Young, beautiful, and happily married, Beth is finally learning to relax and enjoy her success as a bestselling novelist. She has at last achieved the well-adjusted life she always wanted; it almost seems too good to be true. And it "is."

Beneath her thin veneer of normalcy lies a terrifying history of sadism, sexual torture, tragic violence -- and a single long-buried secret that could destroy her. Beth is scarred by childhood abuse: as a sixteen-year-old runaway, she was picked up by Ben, an upmarket pimp whose girls are virtually slaves and who specializes in expensive sadomasochistic "plays" for wealthy clients.

In one of those plays, Beth was stabbed and her best friend (and lover), a fellow young prostitute, was savagely murdered in front of her eyes. Now, recaptured by Ben, she struggles to remember what happened and who did it.

"Stacking in Rivertown" marks the auspicious debut of a refreshingly bold new writer. In the bestselling tradition of Thomas Harris and David Lindsey, Barbara Bell plunges readers deep inside the mind of a woman struggling to survive and rebuild her life despite a harrowing past.

As Beth flees for her life, fighting to get her revenge and somehow learning to love without pain, "Stacking in Rivertown" hurtles its readers toward a terrifying and unforgettable climax.


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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Brutal yet beautiful, this unflinching debut novel delves deep into the darkest realms of terror and abuse. At the age of 16, Beth (also known, variously, as Becca, Becker, Clarisse and Terri) is a runaway starving on the streets of Manhattan. Lured into bondage by ?ber-pimp Ben, she is submitted to months of ritual abuse. By the time Ben is finished with her, she is his willing slave, a player in the s&m skits he orchestrates for wealthy clients. Living with Ben's other victims for 10 years in a bizarre kind of family, Becca grows to love another girl, Violet. But one night, in Ben's fearsome basement den, Violet's head is sliced almost off her neck. When Becca wakes up in the hospital the next day, her stomach is stitched up and she believes she has had an appendectomy. The past has always been a painful blur, but now she remembers practically nothing. Another hospital patient, clueless, wealthy Jeremy, proposes to her, and she marries him. For five years, she lives an anesthetized, upper-middle-class life; encouraged by Jeremy, she writes a novel based on her vague memories of her rocky childhood in a two-room shack on the banks of a river in the South. The book acquires a cult following, and the attendant publicity panics Becca into calling Ben for help. Sucked once more into a horrific spiral of violence and abuse, Becca fakes suicide. Setting off on a cross-country odyssey with an Uzi and a change of clothes, she winds up in San Francisco, where she makes some real friends and falls in love, but the past keeps catching up with herAin her waking dreams and in a final, horrific encounter. Fierce and incredibly resilient, Becca is a remarkable character, and Bell's impressionistic, fragmented narration allows her story to unfold as Becca herself recalls it. This disturbing, impressive novel introduces an urgent and powerful new voice. (July)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

When Beth's dark novel becomes a cult favorite, her fans begin asking tough questions about her pastDmuch of which she cannot remember. Uneasy and dissatisfied with her life, and looking to start a new one, Beth calls Ben, the sadistic pimp who drugged her as a teenage runaway and cruelly initiated her as a "player" in a violent, high-priced prostitution ring. "It turned out to be the stupidest thing I've ever done," she admits with wry candor. Now Ben is after her again, and Beth is on the run, piecing together long-sublimated secrets to save her life. Loaded with graphic torture and explicit sex, this unflinching first novel from poet/songwriter Bell is too horrifying for mainstream audiences yet will capture adventuresome readers with its gritty, vividly rendered prose. Recommended for larger fiction collections.DChristine Perkins, Jackson Cty. Lib. Svcs., OR
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

  • Hardcover: 304 pages
  • Publisher: Simon & Schuster (July 5, 2000)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0684870355
  • ISBN-13: 978-0684870359
  • Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.3 x 1.1 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
  • Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,450,006 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Barbara Bell's acclaimed novel, Stacking in Rivertown, was purchased and edited in 1999 by Michael Korda, editor-in-chief of Simon & Schuster. It was released in 2000 and subsequently released in Australia and Israel.

In 2006, she teamed up with co-director Anna Lorentzon and they began making their feature documentary, Graphic Sexual Horror, about the shocking bondage porn website Insex.com. Selling to sold-out audiences at Slamdance in 2009, it went on to screen at HotDocs Toronto, FantasiaFest Montreal, and many respected film festivals worldwide. Cinetic Rights Management, the brain-child of independent dealmaker John Schloss, purchased the documentary for worldwide digital distribution. Amazon.com released Graphic Sexual Horror in March 2010 for digital download and streaming. However, because of its use of controversial content, Amazon removed the movie from its listings within seven days, Even though it was in the top 5 independent movie downloads. Synapse Films purchased DVD rights and released the Special Edition DVD in August 2010 where it became one of the top 10 independently distributed films at Amazon. It is available from Amazon.com and other DVD distributors.

http://www.amazon.com/Graphic-Sexual-Horror-Special-Ackworth/dp/B003PNKM5W/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1276596164&sr=1-1-spell

Her most recent published novel, Line of Battle, is now available on Kindle at Amazon.com. You can read the first three chapters on her website, www.barbarabell.com where you can also purchase her CD "The Bull is Blind" and find lots more information, press, other works, and read her new blog - cribinacrackhood.

Line of Battle link: http://www.amazon.com/Line-of-Battle-ebook/dp/B003E35YQU/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1288222614&sr=1-3

mp3's of Barbara's songs can also be found at CDBaby, amazon.com, iTunes, and other distributors of music.

barbarabell.com

 

Customer Reviews

17 Reviews
5 star:
 (7)
4 star:
 (6)
3 star:
 (2)
2 star:    (0)
1 star:
 (2)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.9 out of 5 stars (17 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Extremely disturbing and I couldn't put it down, July 11, 2000
By A Customer
This review is from: Stacking in Rivertown (Hardcover)
Sometimes a book grabs you by the hair and drags you through its pages. This is one of those. Stacking in Rivertown is the story of Beth, a young, married woman just finding success as an author. Her world unravels as her five-year 'amnesia' fades and she recalls being held prisoner in a brutal S&M prostitution ring (she and the other captives were forced to perform in violent and tortuous plays for wealthy clients). After the group again captures Beth, her psyche and traumatic childhood are vividly explored with such clarity I felt I knew her soul. Just the description of what goes through Beth's mind while being bound and locked inside a box gave me nightmares for a week. This is not a light and happy read, but if you want an intense book that evokes deep and not-very-pleasant emotions, this is the book for you. With lessons in survival, the depths of pain and love, and just how far one needs to go to be free of ones demons, this book captured me from the first page and I highly recommend it. A truly stunning debut by Barbara Bell.
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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars What Happened to "Safe, Sane & Consensual"?, July 7, 2001
This review is from: Stacking in Rivertown (Hardcover)
I'd heard about Stacking in Rivertown through a review posted to an online list. The reviewer described it as a really good SM novel, a literary piece of work with hot SM. That piqued my curiosity. Well, I'm not at all sure that SM novel is the description that I'd use. The book I read had a lead character who was the victim of kidnapping, abuse and non-consensual slavery, who fights her way out again and again only to be recaptured, physically or mentally, by a brutal man who somehow claimed to love her.

Don't get me wrong. I actually found myself liking this book. It is well written and has some beautiful and moving passages and a central relationship between two women that is compelling and saved it for me. I got to a point where I needed to finish it because I cared about how it would turn out. That's my highest recommendation.

I was disappointed, however, in the BDSM aspect, especially given the review that got me interested. The SM scenes turned me off because they were non-consensual, the use of a whip something to endure. I guess I understand why BDSM seems to be always portrayed as evil in popular media, but I don't like it.

Ms. Bell is talented and creates an atmosphere and characters that are memorable. I just wish she'd found a way to tell her story without steeping it in the S/M world and then twisting what some people find to be a pleasurable activity.

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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Disturbing psychological thriller, January 1, 2002
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This review is from: Stacking in Rivertown (Hardcover)
I really believe the only reason this book doesn't have an overall average of 5 stars from readers is that some object to Bell's portrayal of the BDSM world. The twisted, sordid edge of that world described in the book is only a backdrop for the journey of the main character from traumatic loss of memory to acceptance and some healing. It's beautifully realized and assured in a way few first novels are. I cried at the end, which is something I almost never do. A compelling, fascinating story--and not a piece of erotic fiction, despite the cover art.
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Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
Ten Chits. That was what Mama called me ever since the day I came home bloody in the mouth from having kicked Gedders' ass. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New York, Clarisse Broder, Detective Bates, Elizabeth Boone, Miriam Dubois, Miss Summers, Brooklyn Bridge, Penn Station, Rebecca Cross, San Francisco, Central Park, Chevy Caprice, Jane Doe, Rav Four, Southern Comfort, East River
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