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Loose Girl: A Memoir of Promiscuity | 
 enlarge | Author: Kerry Cohen
Publisher: Hyperion
Category: Book
List Price: $21.95
Buy New: $12.71
You Save: $9.24 (42%)
New (36) Used (14) from $10.95
Avg. Customer Rating:  27 reviews
Sales Rank: 59322
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 224
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 9.4 x 6.1 x 0.9
ISBN: 1401303498
Dewey Decimal Number: 306.7083520973
EAN: 9781401303495
ASIN: 1401303498
Publication Date: June 3, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: BRAND NEW
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Product Description
For everyone who was that girl.
For everyone who knew that girl.
For everyone who wondered who that girl was. Kerry Cohen is eleven years old when she recognizes the power of her body in the leer of a grown man. Her parents are recently divorced and it doesn't take long before their lassitude and Kerry's desire to stand out--to be memorable in some way--combine to lead her down a path she knows she shouldn't take. Kerry wanted attention. She wanted love. But not really understanding what love was, not really knowing how to get it, she reached for sex instead. Loose Girl is Kerry Cohen's captivating memoir about her descent into promiscuity and how she gradually found her way toward real intimacy. The story of addiction--not just to sex, but to male attention--Loose Girl is also the story of a young girl who came to believe that boys and men could give her life meaning. It didn't matter who he was. It was their movement that mattered, their being together. And for a while, that was enough. From the early rush of exploration to the day she learned to quiet the desperation and allow herself to love and be loved, Kerry's story is never less than riveting. In rich and immediate detail, Loose Girl re-creates what it feels like to be in that desperate moment, when a girl tries to control a boy by handing over her body, when the touch of that boy seems to offer proof of something, but ultimately delivers little more than emptiness. Kerry Cohen's journey from that hopeless place to her current confident and fulfilled existence is a cautionary tale and a revelation for girls young and old. The unforgettable memoir of one young woman who desperately wanted to matter, Loose Girl will speak to countless others with its compassion, understanding, and love.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 22 more reviews...
 Ordinary.. despite the effort to make it otherwise! November 21, 2008
I am not a native English speaker, but the language was not at all exciting. I found it a little bit simplified for the ignorants out there.
The author put a great effort in making a complete story out of her biography. and I find it interesting how she re-collected all this data. It is capturing and you can't put it down until you have finished it.
One drawback is that she - despite the point she was making - she grew quite judgmental and she gives the feeling that she knows it all, when she really doesn't. Those who acted like her - although had no reasons or reasons different than her - will find it quite insulting and annoying.
After all, you can relate to bits and pieces of it. which makes it worth your time :)
Happy reading
 Feeling whole vs. filling holes November 16, 2008
Although Kerry's memoir recounts her sexual experiences with almost forty men, her core struggle in life is not about sex. It is about finding ways to feel whole vs. temporarily filling holes (pun unintended, but perhaps appropriate). Throughout her life, Kerry's needs have never been met, and she has repeatedly turned to sex in a desperate attempt to find closeness and feel alive, wanted, and worthy. However, these attempts have offered temporary fixes at best, and the voids inevitably continued to consume her. Although Kerry's "drug of choice" happens to be sex, her plight is common to that of other addictions, which promise, tease, and taunt, yet ultimately disappoint. An honest, touching, and candid portrayal, Kerry's story puts words to the ongoing struggle of discovering, accepting, and loving one's whole self--holes and all.
 Just to add a few words... November 13, 2008
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
Mr. Bard P. Hovenga wrote a great review below. I was going to comment, and I did note that it was an excellent review of the book. I don't think anyone needs to know much more in order to appreciate why its worth reading, but I'll go ahead and add my two cents
Similarly, I am a 22 year old male. I picked this book up from a small branch of the local library. It was in the new books section still. I was able to return it yesterday (the day after checking out). In other words I didn't put it down. After reading the jacket I thought it might be a good read. It was, and its one I'll be recommending to quite a few young women and to friends in general. I think, in fact, that it is young males who would do well to give this a read.
Now I've read some of the other reviews here and elsewhere, and some been-there-read-that know-it-alls will say I'm drawing a message from this book that did not exist, and that this is just a story about a girl's own addiction and self destruction, and that somehow this novel is a base ploy for attention. I can say with certainty that those folks are a most insensitive and confused lot. As was said on the jacket, anyone that's ever based their sense of self-worth on what someone else thought, particularly when it comes to sex and relationships and the pretense of love--anyone that's socially and sexually active and will potentially go through as many relationships as Kerry did in their lifetime--should read this book. They should read it before they turn twenty. The younger the better.
Each chapter reveals new truths about the dynamics of relationships that we don't often take the time to analyze in our own lives. These days many of us go through life, taking people on and off like we do our clothes. The dynamics of relationships have changed, certainly, but with so many questions about where our society is headed morally, perhaps not entirely for the better. We are increasingly hedonistic it seems, and the possibilities of our gratification, moreover the constant, albeit indirect, reinforcement of the notion that obtaining our gratification and the resulting drama that we create in the midst of this is somehow de rigueur, is ever prevalent. Well, what do you expect in a world where anything and everything is marketable, including ideas that play on the basic needs that all humans have (in this case emotional and physical)? My point is that there is really something in this book for everyone, and again promiscuous youth in particular. What Kerry experienced in her childhood could be multiplied by the hundreds for the youth of today.
Kerry Cohen's heartfelt writing about what for her was an addiction gives us all the insight we need to draw our own conclusions about the relationships that we forge with others. As she said, some others may have a much longer list of people they've had sex with (in my world this is particularly the case with males). There is a lesson here about when and why what is a habit for some may become an addiction for others. If you are not a young woman, there are still many lessons here as to where responsibility begins and ends in a relationship, and the consequences of what we do to obtain casual sexual fulfillment.
Lastley, I could give this book 5 stars. I can't seem to change my selection in any case. Its possible that there are more insightful and well written novels into the topics I discussed, and my satisfaction with this novel is a result of my own ignorance. However, this book is a memoir first, and there is an added and unintentional magnificence to the story.
Hits Close to Home November 10, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This memoir is an honest chronicle of a young woman's self-destruction. Coming from a divorced family, Kerry searches for love and belonging in all the wrong places. At times it is an excruciating read for those who have been in the same place-using sex in an effort to find love and acceptance. This memoir is relevant for women who come from broken homes, as well as those who do not have loving male role models.
One criticism that I have of the book is that it chronicles in detail her sexual promiscuity, but doesn't necessarily detail how she overcame her self-destruction. At the end of the book, she writes about a time when she is married and she feels that "itch" to cheat. The end left me hanging and leaves me with the following questions: How long did it take to heal? Did she ever become monogamous? How did becoming a mother change things? Does marriage really heal that need for love that she claims fueled her promiscuous behavior, or is the issue fundamentally about self-love and self-respect?
Overall the book was good, and it brought up many memories long forgotten. If you are a woman who used sex for the wrong reasons as a young girl, be prepared to revisit your past. The book can be a very cathartic experience.
An engaging memoir October 13, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
Loose Girl: a memoir of promiscuity was engaging from beginning to end. I can tell I enjoy something when I can read for at least 30 minutes straight without paying attention to anything else (I usually get distracted very easily). This book hooks you and doesn't let go of you until the end. Around the age of 11-12 Kerry discovers the world of boys and how she can capture their attention and hopefully love as well. She basically becomes addicted to boys and eventually sex as well. She reflects it back onto her upbringing, her mom basically leaving her and her sister behind to start her own life and her father that basically let her do whatever she wanted. I actually identified more so with Kerry's sister, Tyler so it was interesting to read about how Kerry didn't understand her sister and her behavior.
Seeing what Kerry has gone through and what she has achieved in her life definitely makes her a role model. People can't be "cured" of their addictions with the snap of their finger. She realizes that she can take it day by day and can still be OK. She has written fiction and also is a practicing psychotherapist.
I do wish the ending/resolution didn't happen so quickly but this is a memoir so she wrote it how it happened. Maybe I would have liked the book to extend a bit further into her life than where it stopped. All and all a very engaging and important memoir.
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