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"The real scandal in my working as a stripper is that I can't dance," writes Lily Burana in her decidedly unracy Strip City: A Stripper's Farewell Journey Across America (Talk Miramax Books, $23.95). While this admission alone may shock fans and foes of the bump and grind, the real surprise is the quality of personal debate that rages within these pages.
Burana spent six years peddling her wares in strip clubs in New York City and San Francisco before segueing into the life of a journalist. When she becomes engaged to a man who supports both her past and present, she feels compelled to resume her outsider profession for one yearlong cross-country adieu. "While I've had ample exposure to what everyone else feels about stripping, what eludes me still, after so much time, is how I really feel about it." Her true triumph is that this quest doesn't smack of gimmickry; there's no sense of exploitation of a sexy subject for the sake of a book deal. Her motivations to strip in the past have ranged from the financial to the political to the psychological. "Now I'm just here to bear witness, no illusions, no agenda, no filter of idealism." What a provocative book, in ways a reader might not expect.
