My Favourite Hooker contains the autobiographical confessions and picaresque adventures of Edgar Albertin. The events take place mostly in Kiev and Moscow and cover the years 1993 to 2005, a period marred by ubiquitous anarchy and the economic collapse resulting from the dissolution of the former Soviet Union. This fictional account may be read as a highly informed historical synopsis of the post-Soviet period in Russia and Ukraine. It will not disappoint the reader looking for a better understanding of today's Russia, and it contains a full range of iconic portraits of "new Russian" life (all clearly drawn from first-hand experience): the Russian Mafia boss, the Slavic prostitute, the horny Western business executive, the low-life Western rabble which crossed the border to strike it big in the East. However, more than just a historical account, My Favourite Hooker is first and foremost an exploration of its author's twisted psyche as he is confronted with the rough-and-tumble reality of the Wild East. For a long time he manages to keep up his protective guard against the cultural pressures from without, until his defences finally break down when one night he picks up Svetlana, a Ukrainian working-girl, and is drawn into a vortex of sexual obsession. My Favourite Hooker is a love-story, of sorts - both on a cultural and on a personal level. It is also the story of a man "going native" - the story of a man being pulled "upriver" into the Wild East's heart of darkness and (almost, almost) being consumed by it. The book's protagonist is a figure that is ironically broken at many levels, and his description and interpretation of the events unfolding around him is often idiosyncratic - and sometimes down-right delusional. He has a number of literary predecessors: Mann's Felix Krull, Proust's narrator, even MacDonald's Flashman. But his closest ancestor is clearly Nabokov's Humbert Humbert. Like Humbert, Edgar Albertin is a highly educated man deeply steeped in 19th century European Romantic imagery, who finds himself thrown into a rather "uncivilized" environment. Like Humbert, he is arrogant, deeply narcissistic, a megalomaniac, a chauvinist, a cynic, a misogynist, a reactionary, and a pervert. He loves death and decline. He is unable to relate to his surroundings on any other terms than those prescribed by his literary heroes (Baudelaire, Nietzsche, Proust, Nabokov, amongst others) and finds out, to his detriment, that these terms are singularly unsuited to understanding the rather more down-to-earth soul of "New Russia". Just as Lolita has been called Nabokov's love-affair with America, My Favourite Hooker can be read as an "old European's" love-affair with the Wild East - a love-affair which is doomed from the outset and goes badly wrong at the end. Edgar Albertin's views on life, love, and marriage are unlikely to be shared by the average reader. But the author is brutally honest and always funny. The book draws much of its comedy from the clash of Edgar's old-European decadence with a much more earth-bound Slavic culture; or, put differently, from the juxtaposition of Edgar's blind misconceptions and quasi-philosophical ravings and ramblings (as he is caught in the thrall of his own wayward creation) with a very mundane reality: ie. an emotionally healthy, young Ukrainian girl taking advantage of him. This is a book about prostitution (intellectual and physical), corruption (moral and intellectual), and the culture clash between East and West. Ultimately, it is left to the reader to decide who corrupts whom and whether "the twain shall ever meet". The book is provided with an introduction and annotations by Edgar Albertin's friend and editor Dr. Aaron Kroulle. Dr. Kroulle is currently working on an edition of another work by Edgar Albertin, entitled The Mistress with the Golden Tooth. Edgar Albertin himself has been declared missing ever since he left his then domicile in Cuba for the southern regions
About the Author: Edgar Albertin is a cultural explorer, adventurer, poet, and philosopher. His works are published by his friend and editor Dr. Aaron Kroulle.