“Jo Weldon is the gold-standard for New Burlesque. I am proud to call her my friend, and unashamed to admit she’s my idol.” — Lily Burana, author of Strip City: A Stripper's Farewell Journey Across AmericaFrom one of the stars of the New Burlesque scene, Jo Weldon, comes a definitive, easy-to-use, and indispensable guide to the art form, with a foreword by superstar comedian and burlesque enthusiast Margaret Cho. Fans of Dita Von Teese—as well as performers of every stripe—will lov...

Sex Work Matters brings together sex workers, scholars and activists to present pioneering essays on the economics and sociology of sex work. From insights by sex workers on how they handle money, intimate relationships and daily harassment by the police, to the experience of male and transgender sex work, this fascinating and original book offers new theoretical frameworks for understanding the sex industry.The result is a vital new contribution to sex-worker rights that explores ...

REDISCOVER THE FORGOTTEN ART OF ASKING IN THIS NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING BOOK'Amanda Palmer joyfully shows a generation how to change their lives' Caitlin Moran'To read Amanda Palmer's remarkable memoir about asking and giving is to tumble headlong into her world' Elizabeth Gilbert'The Art of Asking is a book about cultivating trust and getting as close as possible to lov...

THE RUNAWAY GLOBAL BESTSELLER'Gripping, enthralling - a top-notch thriller and a compulsive read.' SJ Watson, bestselling author of BEFORE I GO TO SLEEPRachel catches the same commuter train every morning. She knows it will wait at the same signal each time, overlooking a row of back gardens. She's even started to feel like she knows the people who live in one of the houses. 'Jess and Jason', she calls them. Their life - as...

'If you read the papers, you'd think that the only girls to get hooked are from dysfunctional families. But what happened to me could happen to anyone. Your child, your sister, your friend - even yourself if you are young and naive enough, like I was'Emma was just 13 when her happy childhood came crashing down. A nice girl from a good home, she had no idea the young lads she and her friends met every Saturday in the shopping mall weren't all they seemed.The boys we...

Katie was an innocent 13-year-old schoolgirl when she was targeted, raped and abused by a gang of sadistic men. But that was just the beginning…Bullied from an early age Katie had low self-esteem which made her a prime target for the paedophile that followed her home from school. In the following months she was systematically groomed and raped by a group of predatory Asian men who separated her from her friends and passed her between them. But it was the ring leader Zeb who lured her with ...

A heart-stopping story of lies, brutality and fear. British girl Megan Stephens tells the true story of how an idyllic Mediterranean holiday turned into an unimaginable nightmare when she was tricked into becoming a victim of human trafficking and held captive for six years by deception, threats and violence.While on holiday with her mother at a popular Mediterranean coastal resort, Megan fell in love. Just 14 years old, naïve and vulnerable, she had no reason to suspect that the m...

"Wanna stand in the face of a charging elephant, get hit by a motorcycle, eat giant water bugs, blowtorch your mouth on some of the hottest chili peppers on earth, then go watch a sex change operation? Of course you don't, but, happily, Jerry Hopkins has done all that and more—lots more—in this darkly humorous, deeply affectionate, clear-eyed but never patronizing portrait of Thailand, his adopted home. Highly recommended." —Tim Cahill, author of Lost in My Own Backyard, Hold t...

The sex industry is an endless source of prurient drama for the mainstream media. Recent years have seen a panic over "online red-light districts," which supposedly seduce vulnerable young women into a life of degradation, and New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof's live tweeting of a Cambodian brothel raid. The current trend for writing about and describing actual experiences of sex work fuels a culture obsessed with the behaviour of sex workers. Rarely do these fearful dispa...

"Lust will not keep…Something must be done about it."—inscription at the entrance to YoshiwaraFor over a hundred years the Western world has heard whispers of the pleasure city, Yoshiwara, set behind its walls in the city of Edo itself, which is today called Tokyo. Here was an eastern red light district, the place for the hedonists, the woman-seekers, the sensual plasure-hunters of old Japan. There, behind moated walls, an erotic Japanese world unmatched b...

At a time when there were almost no career openings for women a group of intrepid and gifted females scaled the heights of what was literally a man's world - they became bawds. Mother Clap - women bawds were often known as Mother - ran male brothels, or Molly Houses. Elizabeth Holland had an immense moated mansion built on Bankside and for thirty years entertained the aristocracy, including royalty. When troops attempted to stop her trade and eject her from the house, she ...

Jenny Nordbak takes us to a place that few have seen, but millions have fantasized about, revealing how she transformed herself from a USC grad lacking in confidence into an elite professional dominatrix who finds her own voice, power and compassion for others.On an unorthodox quest to understand her hidden fantasies, Jenny led a double life for two years. By day she was a construction manager, but at night she became Mistress Scarlett. Working at LA's longest-running dungeon, she c...