This week’s press/events wrap-up

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Originally uploaded by viviane212

Week two of book press insanity is behind me now, which is a bit of a relief, but some of the stuff I did/had written about me this week is definitely worth being proud of.

On Monday morning I did a five minute appearance on the Brian Lehrer show on WNYC, which you can listen to or download here. It’s about sex trafficking, and my interview follows after an interview with NOW-NYC president Sonia Ossorio. Among other things, I talked about a recent campaign in Amsterdam that gave clients of prostitutes tips on how to identify a trafficked woman, and said that clients can be useful tools in ending trafficking, because not all men are evil sex predators. This merited a text message from Zak Sabbath reading “‘Useful tool’ - ha!”

Monday evening I led a panel discussion at the Museum of Sex, which employed me at the beginning of this crazy sex adventure almost six years ago. I was joined by Marie Lyn Bernard (who has done two hilarious recaps of the event), Lux Nightmare, Madeline Glass, and Ellen Friedrichs. The discussion was lively and books sold briskly. Afterwards there was Korean food with some of my sex blogging comrades, which was lovely.

Tuesday night was the $pread Naked on the Internet reading at KGB Bar. The turnout was a little meager, but pretty much everyone bought a book. The best part was that two of the $preadsters did a funny send up of mock radio interview with me, in which I am asked impolite questions and treated like a dumb ho.

And the press… on Wednesday night I did Playboy Night Calls with Ginger Lynn and Christy Canyon. It was really wonderful, and afterwards I was thinking about my willingness to spill the personal stuff when talking with ladies who are present/former sex workers as opposed to when outsiders try to pluck out the salacious bits. Once this whole thing has blown over, I will definitely write a long-ass post about my media experiences with this whole thing. After doing the radio show - which I did via Jamye Waxman’s groundline, we did a podcast together for Playgirl. Its a little less than half an hour long, and you can listen to it here.

Clean Sheets’ Gwen Masters gave the book a really great review, which you can read here. Among other things, she says that “Naked on the Internet is filled with a mind-boggling and delightful array of topics, covering a great deal of ground while acknowledging that the Internet is such a vast, varied beast, it is impossible to cover it all.”

There is a really good write-up in the Philadelphia City Paper, with mentions of my events there next week. Ashlea Halpern says that, “Thick with interviews and pedagogic commentary, much of which is funny and deeply personal, Naked gives its readers the distinct impression that Ray’s been around the block — as an academic, as a sex-positive woman, as a consumer of porn, even as a streetwalker. All the dough in the Dow couldn’t buy a better escort. And for keyboard-tappy feminists like me, it’s easy to forget just how far we’ve come.” Glowing, though I quibble with the fact that she calls me a “streetwalker,” which I’ve never been. Interesting how all sex industry jobs kind of get smashed together.

The City Paper and the Philly Inquirer also mis-printed some info about my appearances next week, saying that I’m at Robin’s Bookstore on Wednesday when I’m not going to be there at all. The authors of “In the Shadow of the Civil War: Passmore Williamson and the Rescue of Jane Johnson” sure will be surprised when people show up expecting to hear about naked ladies and the Internet.

Most likely the next time I write will be from another state. As I joked about on my email list earlier this week, though I’ve heard that bad things happen when you leave NYC, I’m doing it anyway, with stops in Philly (twice), Baltimore and Chapel Hill. If you’re in or near these places, come say hi! I’ll be traveling with Eliyanna, my fellow $pread executive editor, which I’m really excited about. Plus Jamye is coming with us on Monday just to Philly. I’m also doing some radio interviews along the way, plus I’ll be taking tons of pics and posting some here and all on my Flickr. Here’s what I’m up to:

Monday, June 18: The Wooden Shoe, 7 pm at 508 S 5th St Philadelphia, PA
At 3 pm I’ll be on The Jersey Boys, New Jersey 101.5 FM, online at nj1015.com and then at 5, Jamye, Eliyanna and I are having dinner with the ladies from Hot Movies for Her. Then we’re having a sleepover with Meg of the now defunct Tales of a Teacher and Slut.

Tuesday, June 19: Red Emma’s Infoshop, 7 pm at 800 St. Paul St Baltimore, MD
At 1 pm I’ll be on The Signal, a NPR show in Baltimore. And then Eliyanna and I are planning on staying in the sleaziest hotel we can find. Awesome.

June 21: Internationalist Books, 7 pm at 405 W Franklin Street, Chapel Hill, NC
Wednesday is sort of a day off, so we’re stopping in DC to do our “On the Street” interview for $pread, and then we’re headed to North Carolina for a night of grilled meat and hard liquor with Libby. On Thursday morning I’ll be on Radio Free Santa Fe at 11.15 EST, 9.15 Mountain time. This is irrelevant to the tour, but its happening next week and I’ll be doing the phone interview from Adam and Eve headquarters.

June 22: Passional, 6 pm at 704 S. 5th St. Philadelphia, PA
My last stop on the tour is back to Philly, where we’ll be joined by my boyfriend, his friends, and also my lawyer. Then a night of partying and we drag our sorry asses back to NYC.

Yay roadtrip!