Porn: Guy N. Smith and Dean R. Koontz

The horror writer Guy N. Smith I was writing about earlier started out writing porn. It's no surprise (and I would very much like to be remembered having started out writing porn*), but here's the list of his sleaze novels nevertheless (courtesy Steve Holland). (Actually I think these are no novels, but short booklets of some 60 pages instead, with lots of photos.)

Sexy Confessions of a Bank Clerk (by Peter Lynch). London, Tabor, 1976.

Sexy Confessions of a Window Cleaner: What Really Happened (by AdrianWood). London, Tabor, 1976.

Sexy Confessions of a Pop Performer (by Alan Myatt). London, Tabor,1976.

Sexy Confessions of Swinging Wives: Part 1, The Partner Swappers (anonymously). London, Tabor, 1976.

Sexy Confessions of a Games Mistress (by Joan Hudson). London, Tabor,1976.

Sexy Confessions of a Secretary (by Patricia Mathews). London, Tabor,1976.

Sexy Confessions of a Relief Nurse (by Wendy Davis). London, Tabor,1976.

(By the way, was Patricia Matthews a big name in 1976? I was wondering if the publisher of these books was trying to cash on with the success of the famous paperback novelist (and a wife and collaborator of Clayton Matthews with whom I've done an interview for Pulp some time back).)

I also stumbled on a comment Dean Koontz made in the early eighties about his career in the early seventies. He also wrote porn. Now, we only need to know that Stephen King wrote porn (hey, c'mon, I'm 100% sure he did). I'm sure everyone has written porn, if not for money, then only for the fun of it. Just picture: Bertrand Russell, Anthony Powell, Leo Tolstoy...

Well, here's Dean Koontz:

"Next, I became involved in writing porn. Gerda [his wife] andI collaborated--since my love has such a true sense of the obscene-- to produce 30 porn titles ranging from such peaks of erudition as THIRTEEN AND READY and ORAL ORACLE to SWAPPER'S CONVENTION and LAY ME DOWN, BUT NOT TO DIE. Six months of this provided us with an overwhelmingly healthy bank account. Each book required three days to write and brought in an average of $650 reward. ... But after 30 titles, we had neither the inclination or the stomach to continue, and we dropped out of the porn market. ... It gave us the opportunity to write nonfiction PIG SOCIETY which fit into the porn publisher's legit line, and we are proud of that book. But was it worth writing the other thirty while we were making contacts? I don't know."

I've been told that Koontz's porn books are very pricy. If they can be found. These are not the mild sleaze books of the sixties, but the hard porn of the later years. Only to be used with your pants down.

* I once wrote a story for the Finnish Hustler, but it was too experimental (at least I like to think so). It was told in the form of dialogue between two guys - the other one had been experimenting with a new girl in town... Have to be more mainstream next time.