A fast-paced, pulpy novel set in the 1980s that feels straight off the spinning rack at the back of a liquor store, Allie Rowbottom’s new book is as funny as it is violent, heartbreaking, and character-driven. It examines the very real history of the film-to-VHS era during the rise of the modern porn industry, capturing the fine line women walk between exploitation and agency within it.
Rowbottom tells two interconnected stories here: first, the tale of Jude, a young transplant to Los Angeles in the early 1980s; second, the story of her best friend, colleague, collaborator, and at times near-soulmate, Winnie, thirty years later. Both women dream of becoming writers, and their intense relationship constantly blurs lines and boundaries. When Jude suddenly disappears from Winnie’s life, their estrangement—along with its underlying guilt and trauma—becomes the central backbone of the text.
Jude arrives in LA without a plan, kicking off a downward spiral that shifts her from youthful, wide-eyed optimism to a life of crime and drugs that creates a hunger that is almost impossible to feed. Following a criminal mishap, she finds herself alongside Winnie, learning the ropes of the sex industry and eventually navigating increasingly high-profile, lucrative, and risky avenues within it.
As they descend deeper into a culture defined by competition, addiction, jealousy, and above all, centralized control and manipulation by powerful men, Winnie sets out to write their story—a love story of female friendship, reinvention, and the mythology of 80s Los Angeles paired with its rotten underbelly of harsh realities.
It is one of those books I absolutely love reading. It is nostalgic, pulpy, and violent in its plot, yet raw, real, and heavy in its characterization and emotional weight. Rowbottom manages to combine a shocking narrative with three-dimensional characters who humanize what could otherwise feel like fantastical circumstances. We are shown the real human beings behind the plastic facade of adult entertainment. The first half tells a thrilling story with a devastating, tragic reveal, while the second half reads like an effective, almost true-crime-style autopsy of the past.
It is a genuinely cool book that seamlessly blends several of my favorite genres into an indelible piece of fiction. It isn’t just a fast-paced pulp novel. It isn’t just a tragic story about trauma. It isn’t just an exploration of deep female friendship and the painful rifts that occur. It isn’t just a rags-to-riches bildungsroman, a drug memoir, a mystery, or a literary character study. It is, remarkably, all of these things at once—packaged in a nostalgic 80s narrative that dramatizes a Traci Lords-style story of two women risking everything.
My one bizarre complaint about the book actually has to do with the back inside jacket. It features a strange, full-bleed spread of the author posing for an Instagram-style photo. To make matters worse, the smaller dust jacket features a second pose in the exact same outfit from the very same photoshoot. It feels bizarre and, frankly, a bit insulting to the accomplished PhD writer who penned this story. It screams “desperate selfie-taker” on a book where the rest of the dust jacket, cover design, and interior text are so captivating and sharp.
Ultimately, this is a phenomenal read for Gen X readers of a certain age—a fast-paced, genre-bending adventure that was an absolute blast to experience.
Garrett Zecker 