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This book bothered me for all of the wrong reasons.

Also, I wish I could have Gay Talese‘s career.

“The only way that our society is going to achieve proper sexual stability and mental health, which are undisputed requirements for maturity, is to know the truth of what people are actually doing in the privacy of their own bedrooms. We must educate people with the truth, not indoctrinate; teach facts, not fallacies; formulate a code that accepts all sexual practices, not preaches asceticism.”

(The Voyeur‘s Journal: Gay Talese)

Creepy, sexy, and fascinating.

This book isn't as explosive as one would think.An owner of a hotel rigged some rooms and spied on his visitors in various sexual positions and in various sexual arrangements.

And yes, Talese does say there are inconsistencies in the narrative, the dates and some events. Some would say that he should have checked and recheck everything written in the journal.But Talese wanted to present the material as is with all its promises and shortcomings.

With only a third of the book left. Talese does and repeatedly say there are inconsistencies in the journal of Mr Foos. I read in the Guardian that Sam Mendes will be directing a movie based on this book. The book improves in the last third of it. It's nice that some chapters are just a single case :)

So far it reads like amateurish porn. Some are exciting, but many are flat and expectant.

Let's see what the fuss this is all about.

Just listened to this and was fascinated with the conversation about the Gay Talese saga.

This is really just a book of badly written amateur porn, dressed up as investigative journalism. Through the endless excerpts from the "voyeur's diary" I keep waiting for the author to wink at the reader, to let us in on the joke. At 40% I'm still waiting, and getting fed up.

To say I'm having a few issues with this book is an understatement. The legality? The morality? The truthful(less)ness? It is a short book, so I'll probably plough through and see where it ends up, but I do not have high hopes.

Having seen a bit of the controversy over this, I thought I'd give it a read first and then dive into the backstory.