Review: Candy Girl by Diablo Cody

Title: Candy Girl: A Year in the Life of an Unlikely Stripper

Author: Diablo Cody

ISBN: 978-1-592-40273-1

Publishing Info: Gotham Books, 2006

Number of Pages: 212

Book Category: Memoir

The other day when I wrote my review of Her Fearful Symmetry in the form of an open letter to the author, I had an epiphany. The reason I have 14 book reviews waiting to be written is because I'm taking this reviewing stuff too seriously and making it seem like work When I let myself out of my self-imposed review template, the review came naturally and quickly. And, based on your feedback, you enjoyed it too. So I'm going to make a conscious effort to play around with my reviews so they don't get stale and stifling for me or for you. This time around, I'm going to review the book in list format, with various thoughts about the book interspersed.

3 Reasons You've Might Have Heard of Diablo Cody

1. She wrote the screenplay for Juno and won a screenwriting Oscar for it.
2. This summer, she wrote the screenplay for Jennifer's Body. It is doubtful she will win an Oscar for it.
3. She writes a column for Entertainment Weekly.

With that kind of resume, you may wonder why she was able to write a memoir about a year spent working as a stripper. Well, before she "hit it big," Ms. Cody was living in Minneapolis and working a "straight" job at an advertising agency. On a lark, she decided to strip at local strip club's amateur night to satisfy her curiosity about what it was like. The adrenaline rush (and the money) hooked her, and she ended up spending a year stripping at various clubs and working in a sex shop and as a phone sex worker.

5 Things I Learned About Being A Successful Stripper From This Book

1. Blondes get bigger tips so it is worthwhile investing in a wig.
   
2. Wear white for your stripping outfit.
   
3. Learn how to work the pole.
4. Pick your spotlight songs carefully. (Ms. Cody thoughtfully provides a list of good songs and bad songs to strip to in the book. I decided that in the unlikely event I take up stripping, I will pick Kid Rock's Cowboy as my signature song.)
5. Be prepared to sell more than lap dances. Many clubs expect you to sell a certain amount of drinks as well.

Ms. Cody is very candid about what it takes to be a stripper. She breaks down how the various clubs worked, explains the stripper hierarchy, describes what kind of strippers tend to earn the most, and offers (often hilarious) advice about the ins and outs of being a stripper. The book is very humorous and often very crude, and Ms. Cody doesn't take herself too seriously most of the time. It was a kick to get an inside glimpse at a world that most of us will never explore. The fact that Ms. Cody chose to pursue this lifestyle and wasn't forced into it makes a big difference as her story is one of a woman in control of what she is doing—not a woman who was forced by circumstances to pursue this line of work. Plus it helps that Ms. Cody is a darn good writer with a direct, conversational writing style. However, she didn't walk away from the experience completely unscathed.

3 Most Disturbing Things I Learned In the Book

1. There are really really disgusting freaky people in the world. (I guess I knew that but hearing about some of the people who would come into the sex shop where she worked toward the end of her stripping career was really disturbing. Really disturbing.)
2. If you strip for years, you'll probably end up with "hammertoes, coke-worn sinuses and intimacy disorders."
3. You cannot work in the sex industry without starting to lose some element of your humanity.

Her stripping career ends abruptly one day when she finds herself unable to stop crying. Allow her to explain:

It wasn't the nudity or the grinding or any sex-phobic moral issue that was pinning me to my chair in a moment of blinding epiphany. It was actually the opposite. The one-on-one aspects of the industry made sense; it was the whole girls-in-bulk thing that repulsed me. Hundreds of girls on the floor at some clubs, all reduced to begging dogs for an army of smug little emperors. The rules of attraction were reversed at a strip club. Girls that could halt traffic at Nicollet Mall were rejected by fat guys wearing Zubaz. Joe Punchcard with $20 could toy with several dancers over the course of an afternoon, finally selecting the one who'd receive the dubious privilege of entertaining him for three and a half minutes. The rejected girls, regardless of how loved they were by husbands or paramours or infants at home, would feel worthless for an instant, and all because of ol' Joe. Those instances multiplied, and soon everyone felt like creeping crud, regardless of how much ego they projected.

3 Reasons To Read the Book

1. Diablo Cody has a conversational, honest writing style that is entertaining, funny and easy to read.
2. The book offers an inside glimpse into a world that not many people have experienced and written about.
3. You'll laugh out loud quite a few times.

3 Reasons Not To Read the Book

1. If explicit writing about sex and working in the sex industry isn't your thing.
2. If you are offended by the concept of strippers and strip clubs in general.
3. If you find bawdy, crude and explicit sex talk disturbing.

I really enjoyed this book and I'm giving it 4 stars. However, due to the subject matter, it isn't a book for everyone so I can't recommend it wholeheartedly. I suspect you already know if you want to read this book anyway.

Why and Where I Got The Book: I received the book from Paperback Swap. I requested it the second I learned about the book because:

1. I enjoyed Juno and Diablo Cody's column in Entertainment Weekly.
2. I love reading books where people live "outside the normal" for a brief period of time.
3. I thought Mr. Jenners might want to read this book. (He did. He thought it was "Okay," which is his basic reaction to almost any book so don't go by him.)

Want to win my copy of Candy Girl? Click here to enter my giveaway!