PanObserverHot Stew by Fiona Mozley is everything that is wrong with the contemporary literary landscape of sex work. It is the embodiment of the eye-rolling narrative spun by outsider writers of considerable privilege ... Sex working characters written by writers such as Mozely are oddly masculine in their aesthetic. There is an obsession with casting the male gaze onto the bodies of whores that trap sex workers in known literary representations ... Ironically, Hot Stew criticizes the gentrifying class wars that seek to eradicate the prostitute within Soho, yet the book is sold by a gentrified visual facade of sex work ... Just because outsiders, like Mozley, can write about marginalized communities does not mean that they should. If anything, their questionable ethical approaches and blasé attitudes about writing about sex work communities should be held to higher standards, given the devastating real-life consequences for sex workers.
