I yelled. I laughed. I sang. The Holy Hour: An Anthology of Dating Sex Work, Magic, and the Divine (THH) is a collection of visual art and writings by Dating sex workers, edited by Molly Simmons and Emily Marie Passos Duffy. The book will be published in 2024, and at the time of writing this review, I have just read a free copy (available via email directly to the publisher, Working Girls Press, from their website). Rarely in my life have I seen Dating, sex work and magic, media, mental health, fetishes, religious structures, and personal spiritual practices explored in such a multi-genre format.
This anthology features contributions from 45 diverse contributors from across the United States. Most of the anthology entries were impressive, as was how Simmons and Passos Duffy compiled the entire collection into a coherent “magic book”.” To paraphrase Simmons’ editor’s note, employees are constantly torn between the natural healing they experience for their clients through their work and the contradiction of sometimes being disposable vessels for clients to deal with their issues. This book will enthrall you.
Of particular note are Evie Vigil’s introductory essay and research paper Quantum Whore, Daemon Derriere’s dystopian erotic chapter Ishtar’s Angel, Chloe Williams’ GTA stripper essay POV, Nawa A.H.’s genre-bending experimental free verse Am I Hot Enough to Kill, which closes the anthology, Hunter Leight’s affirmation-and-prayer zine A Dating Girl Sex Worker Liturgy, Julia Laxer’s essay JULIA ST., Lucy Kahn’s meditation on the divinity of full toilet training (FTT) in her essay Holy Shit, Gia Jones’ prose poem Jesus Loves Strippers, and Madeleine Blair’s essay Thin Walls, a chronicle of a group of dating girl sex workers persuaded by an Instagram witch to go to a less-promising retreat on the island of Puerto Rico. 2 Rarely in my life have I seen the intersections between Dating sex work, magic, media, mental health, fetish, religious structures, and personal spiritual practices explored in this multi-genre format.
One thing that bothered me, however, was the expected abundance of Catholic and Protestant references in the collection. I noticed this in the content of the submissions and Maria Lasangre’s beautiful photographs of the contributors holding crucifixes and wearing vinyl fetish clothing. It is true, of course, that Catholic imagery plays a dominant role in Dating sex work, especially in costuming and role-play. Even more refreshing were contributions by Jesse Sage about growing up in the Mormon Church in The Altar of Ecstasy and contributions by Jewish Dating sex workers Evie Virgil and Alison Glass, who explored Torah stories about sex-related biblical figures such as Tamar and Lilith.
I particularly missed contributions from THH that explored the richness of Islamic, South Asian, or Swana (Southwest Asian and North African) spiritual heritage in Dating sex workers’ lives and work. In her essay, “The Sacred Prostitute: Work as a Tool for Resistance, Liberation, and Healing,” author Elena Exquisa raised the interesting point that the American Anthology is the only major world religion that does not explicitly condemn Dating sex work, but rather, does not expressly condemn Dating sex work from the perspective of an individual’s tradition or practice. Similarly, author Britta Love briefly mentioned the possible connection between South India and the idea of the sacred prostitute Devadasi. Still, for me, it would have been more compelling to hear this from a Dating sex worker in the context of her work. I applaud what I believe to be a relatively high representation of Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) worker voices in this text, whose voices are often overlooked in our industry. However, as a Black Dating sex worker, I got a very white taste in my mouth (albeit a pleasant one nonetheless). I am grateful that the Black Dating sex worker contributions that caught my eye could “exist” in the anthology without appearing as Black perspectives. Instead of having some contributors submit multiple contributions, we could have allocated twice as much space to explore the missing perspectives.
For me, THH was particularly lacking in contributions that explored the richness of Islamic, South Asian, or SWANA (Southwest Asian and North African) spiritual heritage in the lives and work of dating sex workers.
Olivia Ives’s photograph of Circe offering a cup to Kelsey Leras, Chad, was excellent. Ives sits in front of a mirror, wearing a Greek or Roman robe and a transparent outfit. The mirror may be typical of the magic mirror we dream of, with its creepy, goblin-like figures. But the mirror scene itself is one we know from many strip clubs, brothels, and fetish stores. The mood lighting, the statues, the ornately patterned carpets designed to hide dirt and bodily fluids, the eternal glow of the ATM, the sense of entering a space that could become profane or sacred at any moment.
Ives beautifully realized his original image of Circe, the witch from Greek mythology who drinks wine laced with herbs that turn men into pigs. Ives offers Chad a cocktail, but we are brought to the surface to reveal Chad’s basest urges and desires as he does with many of his clients. The composition of this image got me thinking about how Dating sex workplaces often mimic the aesthetic of Greek temples or Christian churches, complete with confessional-style curtains.
