A faux autobiography focuses on Hollywood’s queen of crass—Aida Libido, the salacious star of song, stage, and screen.

Aida was born with platinum blond hair; her first words were “Hello Sailor”; and puberty hit when she was only 4 years old. The “hyper-flexible, over-developed pre-adolescent with no gag reflex” became a dancer, contortionist, and prolific sword swallower who would quickly abandon the sideshow and board a Greyhound for Hollywood. The Tinseltown waiting for her was not quite the one that most readers know—sure, the money trench was just as shallow and casting couches abounded, but this Los Angeles was the once-thought-impossible love child of John Waters and Anna Nicole Smith, a place where Aida’s bountiful assets opened doors wide. After a short detour sharing an apartment with a lascivious, underwear-stealing hustler named Meryl Streep, Aida landed the lead in Steven Spielberg’s “tour de force” Beach Blanket Bimbo and won an Oscar. What followed was everything she could have ever wanted—two Grammys, a Tony, a relaxing stint in White slavery, and true love with her third husband, a dashing Latin count. But when he turned murderous—and worse, willing to ally himself with Streep to destroy her—Aida found herself at a fantastical rock bottom in LA’s secret, orgiastic, mildly Satanic celebrity theme park of perversion known as Jizzneyland. Easton, who performs the role of Aida on stage, brings the outrageous yet conversational conventions of drag onto the printed page, not just spilling the tea, but also its vodka chaser. Real-life torrid tales of the rich and famous blur together with Aida’s own experiences, with the garrulous narrator sometimes having to work quite hard to make sure the truth isn’t stranger than the fiction. But the book suffers from the law of diminishing returns—Aida’s charm is in the constantly shocking things she says, but these observations come so hard and fast that after constant zingers about racial stereotypes and Streep’s inhuman promiscuity and more blowjob jokes than most readers can stomach, the audience will find that it’s easy to become numb. As the biting wit and political incorrectness begin to lose their impact, the tale reveals itself as mostly a long setup for recurring punchlines.

While this Hollywood account delivers plenty of raucous debauchery, the humor sometimes overwhelms the story.

A sequel continues the fictional, comic adventures of Hollywood’s most salacious star.

Things had been going so well for Aida Libido. The former teenage circus performer-turned- award-winning Hollywood actor and musician had finally found the perfect husband, Count Jose Delgado. But her dashing South American count turned out to be a thief and killer, and swindled poor Aida out of her fortune. To make matters worse, when Jose was found dead in a motel room with alarming objects inserted in his orifices, Aida was arrested for his murder. Now she’s in prison, guarding herself against unwanted attention with a shiv made from a melted toothbrush. Luckily, real-life attorney Gloria Allred shows up to help Aida beat the charge. Out on bail, her husband buried, and her defense formulated, Aida starts scheduling meetings and planning her big comeback. But the murder accusation proves harder to shake than she thought, and there’s still the matter of making sure she wins her trial. Still, if anyone can claw her way back from ignominy—as well as navigate adventures with jihadist militants, the Nobel Prize Committee, and a very gay fourth husband—it’s Aida. In this novel, Easton’s prose, as narrated by Aida, is theatrical and wry. The episodic plot mostly serves as a vehicle for Aida to discuss her many over-the-top encounters with real-life celebrities. Here, she recalls a conversation from a memorable outing with actor Aziz Ansari: “Oh, Aziz! You thought this was a date!...(could you get your hand out from under my skirt, please?)...Thank you, dear….No, I just agreed to come…(Please, dear, it’s hard to concentrate with your tongue in my ear)…I’m just here because I lost a bet with Amy Poehler.” The humor tends toward the shocking and transgressive—unlikely sex acts, racial stereotypes, scatological everything—though it’s not often laugh-out-loud funny. Over time, the constant joking actually becomes somewhat abrasive, particularly given the low stakes of the plot.

An amusing, discursive, gleefully crude tale that skewers celebrity culture.