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audaciaray's review against another edition
4.0
A few disclaimers before I write about this book: Zak Smith is a friend. He writes about me (as Auspicia Clay) in this book. In general, he writes about my/our friends in this book and some of the events he writes about were ones I was present for or have heard stories about through other channels.I took this pic of Zak and Mandy in July of 2007, when I was in Los Angeles on the book tour for Naked on the Internet: Hookups, Downloads, and Cashing In on Internet Sexploration. They'd just moved to LA. This picture really cracks me up every time I look at it.
So, I'm involved.
All this means it's hard to write about this book. But here goes:
We Did Porn is definitely a page-turner, and not just because I was nosy about how Zak would write me (I was pleased and amused by what he said about me), but because it was a genuinely enjoyable read. And the drawings served as great punctuation to the written bits.
One of the things that struck me upside the head as I read We Did Porn is that most of the books I read about the sex industry are written by women who at some point are or were activists. Women who write memoirs or other stuff about the sex industry frame their work in some way in relationship to feminism. If you’re a woman writing about the sex industry, you kind of can’t help it. And that's a very different kind of read than this book. Zak just has a different perspective on the porn industry, which is not to say that he’s necessarily feminist or anti-feminist – the subject just doesn’t really come up (and I’ve never really hashed it out with him either, it’s never seemed like the most pertinent of conversations we could be having). He's not apologetic about the fact that he signed on to make porn because he made a joke to Benny Profane about fucking girls on camera. And this simple fact - that Zak would like to fuck more girls - remains his reason for being in the business. The rationale being: if you were a dude, and you got offered the chance to fuck hot girls and get paid for it, you'd be insane not to go for it.
The pieces of the book that really shine are the moments where he draws the parallels between the art and smut businesses. There's a lot of depth there. Though his style throughout the book is somewhat disaffected (see above bit about the simplicity of his porn-doing motivation), there are great moments of intensity, when he gets fired up and not just in a cantankerous way (though that stuff is delightful too). For example, this moment (pg 391 for those playing along at home) in which he's writing about a conversation between me, Bella Vendetta and Mandy Morbid that he listened to as we were doing late night food after the 2008 AVN Awards:
Their basic attitude -as they dissect the convention and the people in it- is that everything about sex and porn is really stupid, except the sex and porn that they like.
And this, again, is strikingly similar to the way I feel about art.
In writing about the sex industry, it seems that women have to more carefully negotiate the issues around exploitation, good and bad experiences of sex, all that touchy stuff that people get crazed about – but seem much less concerned about when it comes to thinking about men and the sex business. Zak runs with this, but also cracks open tough stuff around abuse, negative experiences of sex, and mental illness in porn business folks. Zak isn’t afraid of writing ugly things about the nature of the porn business and the sadness that touches the people who are in it – but he doesn’t get too heavy handed about it either. And actually, characterizing Zak and the writing as not being afraid is kind of silly and trite – that really sells it short, like it’s some other kind of book, like it’s a brave thing and there should be head patting and reverence. And that’s – just not really it either.
Let’s boil it down to this: I love how Zak mixes writing about porn and art without any of the tired old "is it porn or is it art?" garbage. It just is. These things are in parallel and also entangled universes. It's a mess. There aren't any stupid questions in this book and no overly simplistic answers, just tough, weird, messy stuff. Coiled together, this stuff isn’t nonsensical, but it doesn’t have a neat and tidy narrative either (and my use of the word “narrative” will be funnier to you once you read the book. Which you should).
Zak has a bunch of book events coming up in cities like San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Seattle - you should see what he's up to and go to one of his signings if you can.
ghostrachel's review against another edition
5.0
4.8 stars. This book is the literary translation of Zak Smith's art. Yes, there are a lot of details that aren't directly about the main topic of the text, but while they may not inform the narrative, they inform the setting (literal or mental) and understanding the context is just as important as understanding the events taking place. I love his art, and now I hope he writes more as well.
jasminenoack's review against another edition
1.0
I am giving this book one star in a vindictive manner, but fuck it at least I am honest. I actually did consider not reading this book when everyone I knew suddenly admitted to knowing the author and well all had miserable things to say about him (Well except lesley who had a sort of complicated I dealt with him because my friend liked him but then, type story, which still felt a lot like "he's an ass hole"). Here is the thing about Zac Smith... there are apparently two Zac Smiths: there is the one all the people I know met who is a complete ass hole and draws when he should be out socializing and objectifies women, and there is the zac smith that wrote this book who is honestly not even interesting enough to be a fucktard.
In reality, lets be honest, I like creeps most of my male friends fall a lot closer to creepy side of the spectrum than the normal one (Well at least the ones I like, although they also tend to consider themselves normal and their version of creepy well lets not get into it). There are all these stories about my father who apparently was the type who would turn the chair around and face a wall when my mom had friends over (I know a bit like me). My brother well his positions in high school about the correct manner for women to look, well lets say left something to be desired in the empathy department. I love all those novels greg thinks are redundant that are simply about middle class ass wipes being middle class ass wipes. All of this would lead me to believe that I would love a book by the Zac smith that I heard so much about.
On the other hand, [Author: Legs McNeil] has a wrote a book ( [b:The other hollywood|614354|The Other Hollywood|Edward Thorpe|http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-60x80.jpg|600798] ) In which he claims that nothing interesting happened in porn since 1970. Zak Smith was born in 1976 and if he is an example of porn since 1970 I would say that we should all agree with McNeil and go back to fighting about whether Linda Lovelace wanted to get eaten out by a dog or if her manager, whose name I forget, beat her up and made her do it... Is she bruised in the video someone go watch it and we can start with some lovely conjecture on the matters of interesting porn trivia. On this note, this is zac smith:
Now I don't know about the rest of the world but I knew that look stopped being edgy or interesting when I was 15. seeing as Smith is 10 years older than me I am left to hope that picture was taken about 20 years ago, wikipedia is probably updated more often than that, although he has clothes on and based on his complete inability to not be having sex according to his memoir... Okay but now we are just devolving into ad homs. I apologize to, well nobody because after that load of shit well I have to do something to entertain myself.
Connor a lovely fellow I know is reading Joyce it is unclear how long he has been reading ulysses but we had a nice chat in which he asked me what would happen if someone were to write Ulysses now. My first though [b:swimming inside the sun|6676676|Swimming Inside the Sun|David Zweig|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41h31deeT%2BL._SL75_.jpg|6871777] and despite my love of ulysses I mean this as an insult. Although I believe that Zweig(was that his name) actually had the mental capacity to create a work of similar "genius" to ulysses and failed (what I mean is he had a unique ability to live inside his own head in an irrational and mildly endearing way which I find truly impressive and if better edited may have actually been able to create something great. But now I have to move on before I convince myself that book deserves a second chance). We did porn is what would happen if a pretentious idiot who wouldn't know a mental process from a hole in the ground tried to write ulyssess, or perhaps if someone decided that they wanted to be mark dainelwinski but copied [b:only revolutions|7275666|Only Revolutions|mark danielewski|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1267369072s/7275666.jpg|8431469] instead of [b:house of leaves|24800|House of Leaves|Mark Z. Danielewski|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51CV88E7WQL._SL75_.jpg|856555]. Instead of a study of the complex thoughts of the human mind we run across random lists of what the president was doing today. And you know what Zak It is completely awesome that the vice president shot someone in the face, now learn how to present that fact in a manner that implies you are a necessary part of the process and not an annoying middle man who has wasted a good portion of my time that could be spent reading books about things like buddhism that you don't have the time for. Well I have less time for them too now thanks so much for spreading your misery.
Right I have gotten off subject. What I am saying here about joyce is that he liked to pull in all his random bits and bobs. He liked to talk about everyone in a situation and everything that is happening well zac smith is the same except the everything is the daily news headlines. I was alive I know them. They have no thoughts attached to them no added sentences really just a list of this happened, this happened, this happened. It is what you would get is [a:Zachary German|2764135|Zachary German|http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66.jpg] decided to write a book about current affairs, which I hope to god never happens.
Historically porn is a super interesting topic. I don't mean watching it. I have never seen a porn and the way things are going it is looking like I will probably never watch one. Now before you decide that makes me not the audience for this book, I also know a creepy level of porn trivia, given this is slacking off in recent years since I started reading more fiction than sociology, but lets be honest a good portion of that might as well be porn, high quality but [b:the story of o|40483|The Story of O|Pauline Réage|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1169436577s/40483.jpg|2462307] is certainly not a bed time story. I keep coming back to this because there is one thing I find truly amazing about this book it is the most boring thing I have ever had to read. (I didn't have to but I really want to throw the book away and I will feel guilty if I do that without actually finishing it.) To truly understand the problem of this book here is what you have to do. Go out make and porn and then try to comeback and explain it to me in a way that I will find horrifically boring? don't think you can well Mr smith can teach you. I get it you did it so long it was no longer interesting. As a weird sidenote I don't actually think zak smith likes porn, or women, or possibly breathing at least he gives no indication of liking any of them. He does seem to have a weird canada fetish but we all have out things I guess.
Right so I am giving a vindictive rating based on the fact that I wasted so much time reading this book. I apologize to the people who gave it to me free but I will need at least three more free books to pay for the time I have wasted, and I think it is just wrong how high the average star rating is on a book this bad. I mean I use those to choose books and it scares me that one could be so off.
I don't know that I have gotten a point across about the terribleness of this book, but seeing how everyone I know already hates him I think that will work out fine in reality because I have no actual convincing to do. The people that are already kissing his ass deserve what they get and I don't desire converts, so I simply say yuck to the book.
The art is clearly 4 possibly 5 star in my opinion though, if only the words hadn't been so shitty.
In reality, lets be honest, I like creeps most of my male friends fall a lot closer to creepy side of the spectrum than the normal one (Well at least the ones I like, although they also tend to consider themselves normal and their version of creepy well lets not get into it). There are all these stories about my father who apparently was the type who would turn the chair around and face a wall when my mom had friends over (I know a bit like me). My brother well his positions in high school about the correct manner for women to look, well lets say left something to be desired in the empathy department. I love all those novels greg thinks are redundant that are simply about middle class ass wipes being middle class ass wipes. All of this would lead me to believe that I would love a book by the Zac smith that I heard so much about.
On the other hand, [Author: Legs McNeil] has a wrote a book ( [b:The other hollywood|614354|The Other Hollywood|Edward Thorpe|http://www.goodreads.com/images/nocover-60x80.jpg|600798] ) In which he claims that nothing interesting happened in porn since 1970. Zak Smith was born in 1976 and if he is an example of porn since 1970 I would say that we should all agree with McNeil and go back to fighting about whether Linda Lovelace wanted to get eaten out by a dog or if her manager, whose name I forget, beat her up and made her do it... Is she bruised in the video someone go watch it and we can start with some lovely conjecture on the matters of interesting porn trivia. On this note, this is zac smith:
Now I don't know about the rest of the world but I knew that look stopped being edgy or interesting when I was 15. seeing as Smith is 10 years older than me I am left to hope that picture was taken about 20 years ago, wikipedia is probably updated more often than that, although he has clothes on and based on his complete inability to not be having sex according to his memoir... Okay but now we are just devolving into ad homs. I apologize to, well nobody because after that load of shit well I have to do something to entertain myself.
Connor a lovely fellow I know is reading Joyce it is unclear how long he has been reading ulysses but we had a nice chat in which he asked me what would happen if someone were to write Ulysses now. My first though [b:swimming inside the sun|6676676|Swimming Inside the Sun|David Zweig|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41h31deeT%2BL._SL75_.jpg|6871777] and despite my love of ulysses I mean this as an insult. Although I believe that Zweig(was that his name) actually had the mental capacity to create a work of similar "genius" to ulysses and failed (what I mean is he had a unique ability to live inside his own head in an irrational and mildly endearing way which I find truly impressive and if better edited may have actually been able to create something great. But now I have to move on before I convince myself that book deserves a second chance). We did porn is what would happen if a pretentious idiot who wouldn't know a mental process from a hole in the ground tried to write ulyssess, or perhaps if someone decided that they wanted to be mark dainelwinski but copied [b:only revolutions|7275666|Only Revolutions|mark danielewski|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1267369072s/7275666.jpg|8431469] instead of [b:house of leaves|24800|House of Leaves|Mark Z. Danielewski|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51CV88E7WQL._SL75_.jpg|856555]. Instead of a study of the complex thoughts of the human mind we run across random lists of what the president was doing today. And you know what Zak It is completely awesome that the vice president shot someone in the face, now learn how to present that fact in a manner that implies you are a necessary part of the process and not an annoying middle man who has wasted a good portion of my time that could be spent reading books about things like buddhism that you don't have the time for. Well I have less time for them too now thanks so much for spreading your misery.
Right I have gotten off subject. What I am saying here about joyce is that he liked to pull in all his random bits and bobs. He liked to talk about everyone in a situation and everything that is happening well zac smith is the same except the everything is the daily news headlines. I was alive I know them. They have no thoughts attached to them no added sentences really just a list of this happened, this happened, this happened. It is what you would get is [a:Zachary German|2764135|Zachary German|http://www.goodreads.com/images/nophoto/nophoto-U-50x66.jpg] decided to write a book about current affairs, which I hope to god never happens.
Historically porn is a super interesting topic. I don't mean watching it. I have never seen a porn and the way things are going it is looking like I will probably never watch one. Now before you decide that makes me not the audience for this book, I also know a creepy level of porn trivia, given this is slacking off in recent years since I started reading more fiction than sociology, but lets be honest a good portion of that might as well be porn, high quality but [b:the story of o|40483|The Story of O|Pauline Réage|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1169436577s/40483.jpg|2462307] is certainly not a bed time story. I keep coming back to this because there is one thing I find truly amazing about this book it is the most boring thing I have ever had to read. (I didn't have to but I really want to throw the book away and I will feel guilty if I do that without actually finishing it.) To truly understand the problem of this book here is what you have to do. Go out make and porn and then try to comeback and explain it to me in a way that I will find horrifically boring? don't think you can well Mr smith can teach you. I get it you did it so long it was no longer interesting. As a weird sidenote I don't actually think zak smith likes porn, or women, or possibly breathing at least he gives no indication of liking any of them. He does seem to have a weird canada fetish but we all have out things I guess.
Right so I am giving a vindictive rating based on the fact that I wasted so much time reading this book. I apologize to the people who gave it to me free but I will need at least three more free books to pay for the time I have wasted, and I think it is just wrong how high the average star rating is on a book this bad. I mean I use those to choose books and it scares me that one could be so off.
I don't know that I have gotten a point across about the terribleness of this book, but seeing how everyone I know already hates him I think that will work out fine in reality because I have no actual convincing to do. The people that are already kissing his ass deserve what they get and I don't desire converts, so I simply say yuck to the book.
The art is clearly 4 possibly 5 star in my opinion though, if only the words hadn't been so shitty.
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