Little Cat

Two novels, two young women at the frontiers of sex. Like a series of Penthouse letters penned by Kathy Acker, Lie With Me recounts a woman's sexual escapades, picking up random men in bars for a series of increasingly extreme encounters, hoping to understand love from the far side of sluttiness. In The Way of the Whore, Mira, an introverted Jewish girl obsessed with Jean Genet, allows herself to be seduced by the sex industry, determined to find meaning in her tormented relationships with cruel men. Tamara Faith Berger's first two novels have been languishing out of print. They were scandalous when they were first published; substantially revised and returned to print, they're just as titillating and troubling now.