Stilettos and Steel by Jeri Estes
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
As a teen of the sixties, I found much I could relate to in the book, especially in the beginning where the location was in Southern California.
In other ways, I couldn’t relate. I don’t remember the laws about gays, but then I was so sheltered and naïve back then. Wish I had known a few people like Jesse. It might have helped me find my authentic self.
I rarely went to San Francisco. I do remember a vacation when my parents finally obliged my brother and me by taking us to Haight and Ashbury. My parents were very afraid. My brother and I were sorely disappointed that there was nothing but a street corner that day. No hippies with flowers in their hair.
I was impressed with Jeri Estes’s writing that was descriptive without weighing the story down. Sometimes I didn’t care what the characters were wearing but I guess it is necessary to keep the characters current or in style for that time. I enjoyed the dropped music references. Ms. Estes pulled off the advice we writers get so often of involving all the senses. Yes, there were a few hot spots 😉 but not so much to be constant erotica.
I see that many reviewers are upset by the misogyny but, um, that was the way it was . That was WHY the woman’s liberation started and many became militant. Younger women seem to think it was silly. They need to keep reading books like this to feel what it could be if women don’t stay active for their own sakes.
The characters in the story were believable to me even when the lifestyle of prostitutes and pimps is foreign to me. I feel I only know through movies and TV what it is like. So how would I know?
Jeri Estes has mentioned that this is being made into a movie. I look forward to seeing it. I wonder if there could be a book two as I want to know what happened next.
Thank you, Jeri, for letting me read your book.
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