What I'm Watching: "The Dog Days and Your Creative Juices"
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The Actress
Adult actress with script, Los Angeles, Calif., 2017 | Photo credit: Susannah Breslin
An adult actress reads her script before shooting her scene. For more of my photos, follow me on Instagram.
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Books I Read: Moord in Rotterdam
Moord in Rotterdam is not for the faint of heart. It compiles crime scene photos taken by the Rotterdam police between 1905 and 1967. The cover features a woman who un-alived herself. She appears to be napping. Her lookalike doll is at her side. Is it creepy, beautiful, tragic? The scene is in the eye of the beholder. Flipping through the pages of homicides, suicides, and crimes of passion, one is struck by the grand artistry of it all. I don’t know whether to credit the Rotterdam police for their photography skills or chalk it up to fantastic editing of a gruesome body of work. A great pick for fans of Joel-Peter Witkin and Wisconsin Death Trip.
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What I'm Watching: "The Discipline of D.E."
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Triptych (Playboy)
I made this triptych the other day of various Playboy-related things I own for my most recent newsletter, which details my time on Playboy TV. There’s a vintage Playboy mirror, a few magazines, and a branded basketball.
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Books I Read: A Guest in the House
E. M. Carroll’s A Guest in the House is a tricky book to review because about 90% of it is terrific. It’s a dark, weird, gloomy story about what happens when you marry a man who seems normal and it turns out he may have murdered the wife before you. One of the most exciting things about the book is how it occasionally explodes out and across the page in moments of colorful surrealism. So, mostly, I really liked this book. But the ending left me baffled. It felt rushed, patchworked together, and I had to search the internet to try and understand it. Your experience may vary. But in general, this is a great work. She didn’t nail the ending.
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Scenes From My Life on Playboy TV
“My shtick was that I was the sarcastic one who covered the most deranged, out-there subjects.” Read my latest newsletter, which explores the five years I was on Playboy TV. Subscribe to get it in your inbox weekly.
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I'm a Comic Book Character
In my recent review of Desolation Jones: The Biohazard Edition, I mentioned that a character in the comic book series is based on me. Her name is Filthy Sanchez, and she’s a porn czar in Los Angeles. What you see here is a snippet of their interaction. She appears to be accompanied by her gimp. I think it’s hilarious.
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Nice Words
Thanks to John Wooden, who gave me my first editing job, for these nice words about my memoir, Data Baby. John has a new newsletter on Substack called EPOSTASY, where he rails against the all consuming “ebyss.”
You should subscribe to it.
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What I'm (Re)Watching: "Apocalypse Now"
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Books I Read: Frank Sinatra Has a Cold
I’ve read Gay Talese’s “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold” several times, so when I saw Taschen had produced this oversized version with photos by Phil Stern, I had to have it. I really enjoyed re-reading Talese’s work this way, Stern’s photos, and the ephemera that includes Talese’s hand-drawn outline for the work. A good buy.
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Triptych (Porn Valley)
A triptych of photographs I’ve taken in Porn Valley, from yesterday’s newsletter. Subscribe to get it every week.
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Creeping Around the Valley
Adult actress in backyard, Los Angeles, Calif. | Photo credit: Susannah Breslin
In my latest newsletter, I share what my novel, the adult industry, and fictional literary maps have in common.
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What I'm Listening to: Black Rebel Motorcycle Club's "Love Burns"
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Sex $75
In the early 2000s, there was a very cool magazine called Arthur. It was edited by Jay Babcock and, per Wikipedia, “featured photography and artwork from Spike Jonze, Art Spiegelman, Susannah Breslin, Gary Panter and Godspeed You! Black Emperor.” Arthur was printed on paper and about all kinds of things: music, art, L.A. In 2003, I wrote an essay for Arthur, “Sex $75,” the title taken from a photo I took of a wall, on Santa Monica Boulevard, upon which someone had scrawled those words. My story was accompanied by some photos I had taken, including on the sets of porn movies. In any case, Babcock has scanned every issue of Arthur and made them available online as PDFs. It was pretty cool to see a piece I had written so long ago. The main photo at the top of the essay I had forgotten about entirely. I took it on the set of a porn movie filmed in a house above the Sunset Strip. When I arrived on the set, I asked if I could take photos of the male porn star, whom I knew, and the female porn star, whom I had just met, while they filmed their sex scene. When the woman hesitated, the male porn star said to her: “She’s cool.” Anyway, thanks for that moment, and for saying that. Time travel is pretty cool, even virtually.
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Ride It
Girl on a seesaw at a sex expo in the Chicago area. 2013 or so. For more of my photos, follow me on Instagram.
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What I'm Watching: Casa Fornasetti
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Books I Read in June: Favorite and Least Favorite
This year, I decided to read only books with pictures. In June, I read three books. (You can find all my short book reviews here.) My favorite was Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland: Tove Jansson Edition which I called “vibrant and beguiling.” My least favorite was Art Monsters by Lauren Elkin which I did not finish.
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The Porn Library Archive
In my latest newsletter, I talk about The Porn Library and what’s in this evolving archive. Read it and subscribe.
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Novel-in-Progress: 25,000 Words
At 25,000+ words, I’m nearly halfway through my novel-in-progress, which is set in the adult movie industry.
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