In this sex industry exposé, self-described “Hand Job Queen” Liangyuan sheds much needed light on Taiwan’s most taboo profession, revealing the inner workings of an industry normally obscured by closed doors, dim lighting, and a haze of cigarette smoke.

Despite existing within a purportedly open and liberal East Asian society, Taiwan’s sex workers remain burdened by rigid stereotypes and negative associations, often viewed as women of low morals who sell their virtue for easy money. In this exposé informed by ten years of experience in the trade, author Liangyuan sheds much needed light on Taiwan’s most taboo profession, revealing the workings of an industry normally obscured by closed doors, dim lighting, and a haze of cigarette smoke.

Liangyuan starts from her work in a massage parlor, then goes on to explore the internal operations and surprising market segmentations of the sex industry. Beauty salons, KTV parlors, massage parlors, and hostess bars each provide unique services, and set their own boundaries for contact between clients and workers. Roles within the industry are also strictly defined, with managers, agents, administrators, and, of course, the front-line workers each playing their part. Liangyuan illuminates every detail of the trade down to scheduling, payment, contracts, and hiring.

The second half of the book introduces the human beings who populate the industry. There are the sex-workers themselves: the young woman who enters the trade in order to pay for her cancer treatments, only to rack up more medical bills after being roughed up by a client; the co-worker everyone thought had exited the trade, but is rumored to have returned, and to have abandoned her long-held bottom-line in the bargain. Then there are the clients, unsparingly interpreted through the lenses of their professions, nationalities, and sexual predilections.

Page-turning, wry, and incisive, Hand Job Queen dissects the sex industry as only an insider could. Liangyuan’s book will bring readers from the edge of tears to helpless laughter and back again, all the while peppering her highly readable confessional with genuine compassion and warmth.