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List Price: $15.95 | | Publisher: Harper Paperbacks
Salesrank: 197488
Released: June 29, 2004 |
| Our Price: $1.85 |
| Used Price: $1.00 |
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| Media: Paperback |
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Editorial Review:
The moving, gripping, and tell–all autobiography of Traci Elizabeth Lords, a former child porn queen, electronica maven, and cult movie and TV star.
At 14, Nora Kuzma ran away from home and ended up on the dirty streets of Hollywood. She fell in with a fast crowd, and her dreams of modelling soon landed her a spectacular centrefold in Penthouse Magazine, where at 15 she became internationally known as TRACI LORDS. From there she appeared in numerous adult films and magazines, denying her past and battling a deep addiction to cocaine and men. Three years later she got out. This is her memoir–a tale of loss, redemption, and ultimate survival as Traci Elizabeth Lords takes you into her secretive past, faces her demons, and shares her extraordinary journey of personal growth.
Description of Traci Lords: Underneath It All:
Nora Kuzma was a troubled teenager from Steubenville, Ohio; Traci Lords was the underage skin mag/porn queen who became the centerpiece of the adult video industry's greatest scandal. In reality, they were one and the same, the subject of this slick, if thin autobiography. But what's striking here is not the familiar storyline--confused, sexually abused teen falls in with drugs and the wrong Southern California crowd, forges fake IDs to become Penthouse Pet of the Month at 16 and the '80s hottest adult star, then arrested as focus of the Reagan administration's crackdown on porn, only to become reborn as cleaned-up, psychoanalyzed/rehabed purveyor of legitimate film, TV, and music career. Rather, what's striking is Lords's capacity for denial, compartmentalization, and myopia when it serves her ends.
Her scandalous tenure in the skin trade--undeniably the sole basis for her infamy and subsequent legitimate career--is glossed over here in a few score pages, with more attention paid to the heavy-metal musicians that dotted her life than the motivations and machinations of the Feds who literally changed her life; Slash's snake gets more ink here than Attorney General Ed Meese. Quick to ladle generous sympathy on her own plight, she heaps little but scorn upon those from the seedy past of her porn-star alter-ego, yet seems to have had few qualms about formally adopting that moniker as her legal name. --Jerry McCulley
Traci Lords: Underneath It All Reviews:
I LOVE TRACI MORE AFTER READING THAT BOOK 
2008-11-01 - If you are a fan of Traci Lords please get that book now
It rocks!!!!
You are going to love it
You are going to admire her
Written easy and simply to be read from anyone
AAAAA++++++
. . .and, after almost 300 pages, I still know little about her 
2008-07-18 - I think--if I met Traci Lords--I would like and admire her.. Unfortunately, I don't get to meet her in her autobiography. Her story should be compelling (but told by herself, isn't); she deserves credit for her talent, her guts, her success (but not for this book). It was almost halfway through the book before I heard her memorable, honest, human voice: "What would my tombstone say? Here lies a cocksucker?" And then that voice went away.
I wasn't obsessed with knowing every detail of every adult film she starred in as an underage teen. (Although I was hoping for an occassional rise.) I became more obsessed--and more disappointed when it was left unexplored--to learn how she could overcome addiction, how she could steel herself to a unhappy past which NO ONE would allow her to forget, how her important therapy worked, how success could seed in her life, how important relationships would continue to fail. . .I wanted to know something about the insides of this valiant, recovered woman. Instead, I learned she had a white cat and an expensive Japanese dinner table. . .
Try again, Ms. Lord; your story remains untold.
Traci Lords is HOT!!
2008-05-11 - I fall into the John Waters movie category of a Traci Lords fan. I had heard about her pornographic past but never paid attention to her until I heard she was in a John Waters film. I have followed Mr Waters' career from the early days. Although pregnant with many a cliche, her story is quite a fascinating one. I don't think that some of the other reviewers have actually read the book when they accuse her of not admitting that she liked & chose to do the porno films. She admitted that she was acting out by being a 'sexual terrorist' which exorcised her personal demons. She does not portray herself as a victim. It is very clear that she voluntarily pursued her various projects. Reading the book is very soothing and relaxing, like listening to a good friend. I found the part about her music fascinating (since I am a musician as well and listen to her CD 1000 Fires.) I bought both the hardback version and the paperback version when I found out it had a new chapter & new photos. This is a book I am proud to have in my collection & would really love to meet her someday. She seems like a really magical person.
Honest and Cautionary 
2008-04-04 - I give this book 3 stars because Jenna Jameson's book is MUCH better.
While Traci advises readers NOT to enter the porn industry, Jenna advises that it is ok for some people, but to do some serious thinking and soul searching before taking the plunge (no pun intended).
If you want to know why women do porn, read this book. Almost all of them have low self esteem and were sexually assaulted at a young age. Very rarely have I heard of female porn stars entering the business because they have children to feed or need money for medical bills, etc.
If you can only purchase one book, purchase Jenna's and borrow Traci's from the library. Having said that, the book is not bad, it is just ordinary and compared to Jenna's, it doesn't read as well.
Good read
2008-02-18 - I bought the hardcover in the bargain bin about 3 years ago. I bought it merely having known the name in porn circles. I figured it would be about the 'life of a porn star', as I just assumed that she was still in porn.
Obviously the book told a completely different story.
Ironically, as others have mentioned, it almost certainly was her abusive past in porn that enabled her future career.
I do disagree with those saying that her story either didn't tell it all or is just a selfish money making publication.
I think she has long since earned the right NOT to have people shaking fingers at her. Perhaps she simply wasn't comfortable exposing every detail of her earlier life.
How many of you would be brave enough to talk about an enduring, sexually abusive past? It's easy to say, "give us more", but she is the one who has to deal with fallout it from it.
I think she gave more than enough of the story to give us the idea that she wanted to; to show that she came from a very abusive, and manipulated past, and then she focused on her gradual escape from it.
A very good book unless you are so demanding of a reader that you can't let her tell the story the way she is comfortable with.
