I've got depressingly little to go on. I used to have a collection of short stories that I got via recommendation of someone I wasn't aware read fiction - he was the kind of guy who read Tacitus and Sun Tzu as preparation for his career in business, except then one day, he was like, read this book, and I still feel weirdly close to him for it (even if he did turn out to be the kind of guy you possibly should be afraid of). I remember them as startlingly brilliant and dark, sort of an exploration of the cruelty of human nature kind of thing.
I do not remember the name, at all. I dont remember the title. All I remember is a story about a trans prostitute and her friends, and the man she was in love with, who was hopelessly cruel to her (I think he threw knives at her feet for entertainment?), and that they had an addiction to bennies - the author's word, I think it referenced benzodiazepines in this story, tho I've heard the term applied to classes of drugs with the exact opposite effect, an ambiguity I'm glad to see resolved since the time when this book was published. Oh yeah! I think that was in the 50s or 60s? Far back enough that trans prostitutes were not frequent protagonists in literary fiction.
This is all I got, and I can't figure it out, so I thought I'd take a shot in the dark. Does this admittedly vague description strike a bell with anyone?
I do not remember the name, at all. I dont remember the title. All I remember is a story about a trans prostitute and her friends, and the man she was in love with, who was hopelessly cruel to her (I think he threw knives at her feet for entertainment?), and that they had an addiction to bennies - the author's word, I think it referenced benzodiazepines in this story, tho I've heard the term applied to classes of drugs with the exact opposite effect, an ambiguity I'm glad to see resolved since the time when this book was published. Oh yeah! I think that was in the 50s or 60s? Far back enough that trans prostitutes were not frequent protagonists in literary fiction.
This is all I got, and I can't figure it out, so I thought I'd take a shot in the dark. Does this admittedly vague description strike a bell with anyone?