Toot Toot: On becoming a john

The author relates the controversial subject of the relationship between prostitutes and their clients from a different perspective; from that of the client. As he takes us through the process of his "becoming a john," he reveals his troubled past and vulnerable emotional makeup. Uncovered also are the histories of the women he dates, their strengths and vulnerabilities, their individuality.

Although told with tenderness, sensitivity, and sprinkled with humor, the telling is raw and vivid as the man ventures into the prostitutes' world of sex, drugs, violence, and homelessness. As the women conduct their business, the buyer of the sex for hire they provide repeatedly follows his nature and seeks to find love and romance there instead. The otherwise intelligent and resilient man recognizes the folly in that and comes to consider these encounters and relationships with the hookers as adventures, as fantasies separate and apart from the reality of his everyday life.

When something happens to fracture the wall between fantasy and reality, everything changes.