Book 46: Stripped

Stripped: Inside the Lives of Exotic Dancers by Bernadette Barton was clearly a book that had it’s roots in an academic paper.  It was well researched and packed full with information.

I have a love-hate relationship with books like this. I love how it’s well-research and it tends to have different ideas/insights that I wouldn’t normally have had. Yet it’s awful in the way of enjoyable reading. Academia has it’s own style and it’s very dry where more narrative styles are more enjoyable to read.  

I got Stripped since it was one of those books recommended by Amazon based on the books that I purchased from Belle Du Jour and Miss S.  The book was a look at the strippers (not the working girls or escorts like the other two books). Another difference is that this book is researching the American experience rather then experiences in the United Kingdom.

I will have to say it’s interesting that the girls in this book were more anti-sex in their home lives. For the girls that really don’t put out, they are the ones who get turned off by sex. Sure their bodies are displayed and they have to deal some of the worst in clients since they are being purely objectified. But out of all the sex industry fields, I would have thought that they would be the most sexual after work.

Overall I am glad that I read this book as a way to add to my budding idea for a character in a novel I’m writing. But I’m not sure if I will want to read Stripped too often.