Description

Walking Through Clear Water in a Pool Painted Black is the only story collection from the legendary writer, actress, ex-biker and columnist Cookie Mueller, published in the UK for the first time.

Mueller chronicles her high-risk, high-reward life in glorious technicolour, from becoming a part of John Waters’ legendary acting troupe to becoming a mother, from describing the hedonism of 1980s New York to critiquing the government’s dire response to the AIDS epidemic. Cookie’s voice is fresh, wise, freewheeling and unafraid of darkness. Like a lysergic Nora Ephron, she is the candid flipside to the idealistic hippie dream. Whether good, bad or ugly, her stories are fiercely entertaining and reliably honest.

Featuring a new introduction by Olivia Laing, this edition collects Mueller’s stories, columns and writings, and presents a testament to a life lived courageously and well.

Publisher Review

A how-to manual for a life ricocheting joyously off the rails . . . a live corrective to conformity, conservatism and cruelty -- OLIVIA LAING Cookie Mueller wrote like a lunatic Uncle Remus - spinning little stories from Hell that will make any reader laugh out loud. She was a writer, a mother, an outlaw, an actress, a fashion designer, a go-go dancer, a witch doctor, an art-hag and, above all, a goddess. Boy, do I miss that girl -- JOHN WATERS People fall in love with Cookie when they read her . . . She was a matchless beautician of the word -- RICHARD HELL