COVER REVEAL: Valley Girl by Amy Asbury

Expected Publication Date: Sept. 1, 2012

Valley Girl: Childhood in the 80's is a prequel to Amy Asbury's first book, The Sunset Strip Diaries. You can see my review for The Sunset Strip Diaries here. 

SYNOPSIS:
Pop some pink bubblegum and turn up the boom box: It's time to visit the 1980's. Crazy cartoons, wacky food, crackhead-like candy and the most important decision of a pre-teen's life: new wave or heavy metal? Jelly shoes or checkerboard Vans?
Growing up in California's San Fernando Valley in the 80's was chock full of sunshine and skateboards, but author Amy Asbury takes us through the lesser known issues such as creepy pervs in cars and overly sultry sixth graders. Amongst these lively essays are the 80's pop culture: Why did Simon LeBon's sexy stare work straight through the TV? Why did Cabbage Patch Kids start to run out of good names like Jennifer and start coming out with names like Bertha and Edna? Why did we love camel-toe inducing designer jeans? Why did the bass of "Billie Jean" make us stop in our tracks like a dog hearing a silent whistle? Why did a boy's entire social life depend solely on his kickball skills?
Read about the fights with neighborhood kids, taking down bullies and trying to fit in with the cool chicks; slumber party games, crushes, scary teachers; rivals, finding one's talent (double joints, rolling tongue, or wonky eye tricks), looking at boobs in Sears catalog and forays into capitalism by way of lopsided homemade carnivals and melty sno-cone stands. 
Jump into the salty waves at Zuma beach, eat your 30-scooped zoo sundae at Farrell's Ice Cream Parlor, and get yourself down to the North Mall: It's time to dive into the world of the Valley Girl. 

Preorder your copy of Valley Girl from Barnes & Noble today

Confetti Covered Quicksand by Amy Asbury

(The Sunset Strip Diaries series, book 2)
Fresh from the Sunset Strip in Hollywood, Amy Asbury is at a crossroads. The grunge scene took over and left her hair band crowd in the dust. Where to go? What to do? It was as if a three year long party had just been broken up and no one remembered where they lived. Everyone was left with an identity crisis. Those who turned to drugs found themselves spinning out of control, especially Amy’s friend Birdie.

The Sunset Strip girls migrated into the mainstream LA club scene and took over the VIP rooms. Read about lots of run-ins with 1990’s stars like Anna Nicole Smith, Pamela Anderson, and many others. What happened inside the clubs? Read about the insane nights of young twenty-somethings on the loose in Los Angeles.

When Amy became overwhelmed by LA, she headed for Aspen, Colorado. Read about the total chaos inside the closed doors of Aspen ski lodges, where cocaine was king. The death of a close friend caused her to sink into an ugly depression. Will she turn to drugs to comfort herself?

This is a true story of a girl in Los Angeles, trying to survive on her looks and struggling with her identity. It is about using drugs and alcohol to cover up pain and humiliation. Can she find happiness in the emptiest, numbest city in the world?

A quote from page 146: “Los Angeles makes me sad. It’s like confetti covered quicksand. You don’t notice you are sinking, because there is always a party going on around you, so sensationally slick and fun.”

Amy finds herself lost, not sure where to turn now that her party scene on the Sunset Strip has officially been taken over by the grunge movement. Does she stick around and become a washed up has-been, does she move? No. She does the only thing that she can think of to keep the party going; she redefines herself and makes new friends who are tuned into the new LA club scene. She manages to make herself an “it-girl” in the club scene, and continues the constant party that her life has become over the past three years. Her life is just as chaotic now as it was during the glam rock scene, which actually surprised me. She’s still hanging out with dancers, getting blackout drunk, obsessing about her looks, and having frequent celebrity run-ins with people such as Tommy Lee, Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt LeBlanc, and Anna Nicole Smith.

She finally moves to Aspen, Colorado after having a breakdown, losing a number of her close friends, and trying to distance herself from her friend Birdie, who is now a full blown heroin junkie. As she takes in Aspen, she quotes “I half expected some yodeling son of a bitch to zoom by me on a bobsled or the Von Trapps from The Sound of Music to come frolicking over the mountaintops.” That made me giggle : ) She quickly finds the party scene in Aspen, at which time she finds out the drug of choice that everyone seems to be doing there is cocaine. One guy actually deals coke to his own parents! His own parents! Is this real life?! I was continually shocked reading this book, and I really thought after reading The Sunset Strip Diaries that nothing in this book would wow me the way the stories in that book did; I was wrong.

The stories in this book are just as ridiculous, which just goes to show you that even though the glam rock scene on the Sunset Strip died, Amy still found a way to keep her party alive. It was kind of mindboggling just how much energy she put into completely revamping her look, attitude, and trying not to look “white trash” just so she could keep partying with the “in-crowd.” When one of her close friends died, I was a little bit heartbroken. I kind of had an inkling it was coming, but I just didn’t want to believe it.

Like I said in my review of The Sunset Strip Diaries, Amy’s writing style makes you feel like you’re right there with her experiencing all of this craziness first hand. It’s captivating, scandalous, and incredibly delicious.  

Purchase on Amazon Kindle

Purchase from Barnes and Noble

The Sunset Strip Diaries by Amy Asbury

(The Sunset Strip Diaries series, book 1)
There comes a time in every girl’s life, where she has to choose good or choose bad. Amy Asbury chose bad, hands down. Good meant wallflowers, secretaries and subservient wives. Bad meant power – and a possible escape from a life of secrets.

At twelve-years-old she was trying to make sense of a drug-addicted father and his disturbing behavior. By fifteen she was dealing with horrendous depression, blackouts and rape. At sixteen she was in a mental institution for suicidal tendencies and violent behavior. She could never be normal. The only place for a girl like her was Hollywood.

This is a true story of the social ascent (and eventual decline) of a girl in the Sunset Strip music scene of the early 1990’s. From crazy parties to glittered junkies and man-eating strippers, Amy has chronicled what life was like back in the days of excess and debauchery. It is not just a fascinating look into an amusing time in pop culture, but also details the mindset of a young woman trying to find confidence and self-worth in a life full of pain and chaos.

The party came screeching to a halt when the Grunge movement took over and heroin became more prominent. How far off track can a person go before it’s too late?

WARNING: This book contains substance abuse, profanity, and disturbing sexual situations,

This book chronicles the life of a confused teenage girl trying to find her way in life, and desperately wanting to become a part of the party scene on the Sunset Strip. She succeeds, and the stories of her three wild years being a popular staple on the Strip are shocking, somewhat depressing, and at some points even a little bit horrifying.

Amy’s childhood was anything but normal; her mother has completely turned her back on her and acts like she doesn’t exist and she is coping with the realization that her father may have sexually molested her when she was just twelve-years-old. She does however show off her humor to lighten up the book in some situations, whether it’s from her dousing herself in knockoff perfume (where she says “I’m sure I smelled like an old lady’s crotch"), to trying to teach herself about sex by listening to the Beastie Boys album, Licensed to Ill, to finally describing herself as “a giant heaving bowl of crazy with sprinkles on top.” Even through the humor, it was easy to see this was a troubled girl. By the age of fifteen, she had been date raped, videotaped, blackmailed, contracted VD, was bulimic, suicidal and failing school. By the age of sixteen, she had been put in a psych ward twice. That just sounds like the definition of path of destruction.

Her stories while on the Sunset Strip are just outrageous…that’s really the only way I can describe it. She tells of her relationships with glam rockers from various bands like Swingin’ Things, Alleycat Scratch, Glamour Punks, and Big Bang Babies, befriending various strippers (and as she finds out, one hooker), and details partying and frequently blacking out at hot spots on the Strip; The Rainbow, The Roxy, Whisky, El Compadre, and Gazzarri’s were a few of her most frequent hangouts. She rarely worked, never had any money, and relied solely on her looks and mooching off of her friends to support her Hollywood lifestyle. She’s determined to make it to the top no matter what the consequences. She eventually does become a hot commodity on the Sunset Strip, and then the Grunge movement takes over and she soon realizes the whole scene that has been her life for the past three years is in serious decline, if not already dead. Should she stick around Hollywood and live life as a has-been, or should she try to turn her mess of a life around?

I won’t lie; some parts of this memoir are actually rather disturbing. The number of times she gets raped is shocking, and her complete disregard for everyone is just sad. Overall, it was an easy read, and her writing style coupled with frequent diary excerpts makes you feel like you are right there partying on the Sunset Strip with her. You get an inside view of the crazy, glitter-covered Sunset Strip in the late 80’s and early 90’s, and I can’t wait to read the sequel to see just what became of Amy after the death of glam rock. 

Purchase on Amazon Kindle

Purchase from Barnes and Noble