The Sluts by Dennis Cooper

I recently saw two films that were co-written and co-directed by Dennis Cooper and Zac Farley:  Like Cattle Towards Glow (2015) and  Permanent Green Light (2018), and I realized that I've never read anything by Cooper, who is primarily known as a fiction writer. So I looked around a bit, and thought I'd try The Sluts (2004). After reading the book, I was surprised by how accurate the blurb on the rear cover is as regards the set-up of the book: "Set largely on the pages of a Web site where gay male escorts are reviewed by their clients, and told through the postings, e-mails, and conversations of several dozen unreliable narrators, The Sluts chronicles the evolution of one young escort's date with a satisfied client into a metafiction of pornography, lies, half-truths, and myth." What this doesn't hint at is how violent much of the book is. S&M is mild compared to the extended discussions of snuff films and the extreme torture played out on the supposedly willing underage street prostitutes. The book is basically torture-porn, with a bit of a plot. Neither the subject matter nor the technique of this book interests me, so I think I'm done with Dennis Cooper.