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| Pocket Books, April 1989 |
Recently I've strayed from my typical reading cuisine to
sample old bestsellers of their time that were marketed toward women. One of
the titles that I’d come across now again is A Glimpse of Stocking by Elizabeth Gage. I distinctly
remember seeing it often enough in used bookstores but would skip right past it. A post at
The Sleaze Factor, kindled my interest in this one. Then finding the dang book turned out
to be not so easy. That’s often the way it is, you hear about a book, decide
you’re going to look for it and come up short at the local bookstore haunts.
So, I put it down on that list of “want-to-reads” that I always lose and moved
on to other things. Then about a month back I found it in a used bookshelf,
shoved on its side, spine down, so that all one could see was a brick of yellowed pages.
Yep, it’s a thick one all right, sort of like your typical Clive Barker
paperback.
A Glimpse of Stocking turned out to be a pretty good find. I
got pulled in immediately to the story, which starts out in late 60’s Hollywood. The novel
kicks off with a prologue that, like most prologues could be skipped, followed
by short chapter detailing a disturbing tryst between an unnamed man and woman
in a hotel room in 1947. Jump ahead 20 years to 1967 and we meet hopeful young starlet
Annie Havilland arriving alone at movie tycoon Harmon Kurth’s mansion. There’s
no doubt that Kurth is one of those villainous bastards who has no good
intentions in store for our heroine Annie. She quickly realizes that she’s been
lured into Kurth’s digs under false pretexts and, as she tries to leave, is
brutally beaten and raped by Kurth and his valet. Used and discarded, Annie
attempts to press charges and discovers that Kurth is one of those guys who has
friends in high places, and that her word against his isn't worth a used condom
on a dirt road. After an offer of hush-money is made and rejected, Annie discovers
that her name is poison in Hollywood circles. So, it’s back to New York for
her, to lick her wounds and plot her next course in life which will ultimately include vengeance on Harmon Kurth.
Christine is brought into the novel as a call girl of
stunning beauty matched only by her capacity of self preservation. After a
childhood of terrible cruelty and abuse, Christine makes a life for herself
hustling playboys and wealthy scions with kinky tastes. And if she has to kill a few dickheads along the way, well then, buddy, that's just what she'll do.
It doesn't take much of a genius to know that Christine and
Annie’s world will soon intersect, and in ways that neither one of them could
dream of. Along the journey we’re entertained by a parade of characters ranging
from noble to sleazy. Included in the bunch is a private investigator who,
while essentially honest, isn't above keyhole peeping to get what he needs, a
movie star whose seething sexuality and rebel-good-looks mask the fact he’s
really just another shallow douchebag, a larger-than-life writer who can buck
the rules in Hollywood to get what he wants, a talented stage actor who spirals right down into the basement industry thanks to the needle and the spoon, a socialite with
a secret past, and a powerful movie mogul with a taste for torture. There are plenty
of scenes to please that little perv hidden within everyone, and just enough
violence to counterbalance the melodrama.
Oh, my friends, it’s the stuff of the best kind of trashy
fiction you can get. Just the kind of book that is supposed to smell like musty
paper and Kent cigarettes. Maybe there should be an app for E-Readers that’ll
replicate that…
