Reading Daniels’s book, I found myself alternately appreciating her crass and self-aware humor, and cringing at her shameless self-aggrandizement. It struck me, repeatedly, that she’s a bit like the female flipside of Trump: fixated on her greatness, unabashedly bragging about her achievements and a touch vain ... She is vulgar and candid in the way lovably brassy women always are, sharing the farcical and just-too-much, from descriptions of Trump’s genitals and personal grooming habits to an aside about shaving a part of her husband’s body that is unprintable in a family newspaper ... Her book is not exactly a gripping read or a remarkable piece of literature, but it’s blunt, funny and authentic...When you read her story, you believe her.
Full Disclosure is a canny Trojan horse of a book. She knows exactly why you are reading it and — a career entertainer — gives the people what they want: that is, 'two to three minutes' and 'smaller than average' ... She baits readers with the salacious details of her alleged time with Trump, but instead offers a jaunty, foul-mouthed treatment of her life, from a childhood growing up in poverty in Louisiana to the world of clubs and porn sets ... Daniels' voice is warm, expletive-laden and boastful ... Full Disclosure is more flashy than thoughtful, and Daniels rarely interrogates herself or her industry ... Full Disclosure, with its carefully spaced revelations and its emphasis on the larger context of Daniels' life and work, is the product of someone fighting to stay in control of a story.
Chapter 3 will tell you more than you’d ever want to know about Trump’s low-energy sexual performance and low-end toiletries ... Daniels makes the ideal nemesis for Trump, Full Disclosure reveals, because she really is what he mostly just pretends to be. Her red-state cred is solid ... Unlike every other porn star memoir, Full Disclosure doesn’t traffic in inane industry clichés about Daniels getting into the business because she 'loves sex' ... She’s a witty, scrappy underdog who stood up to a fat cat and his big-city lawyers, to all the snooty hypocrites who turn their noses up at her in public while eagerly consuming her movies in private ... Both Trump and Daniels like to trumpet their own achievements, but she’s actually earned hers the hard way. If he’s a fearless 'straight-shooter,' Full Disclosure amply proves that she’s a far superior one—with much better aim.
Emetic as it all is to remember, Stormy knows that she has a responsibility to history ... Trump is as good as gelded by her description: no wonder he’s so terrified of sharks, since Stormy rears up like Jaws to menace his mushroom with her jagged incisors ... Before and after this encounter, Stormy’s book reveals what a defiant, unsinkable woman she is, brought up in squalor ... she is on a cosmic mission. After she fingered Trump, fans urged her to save the world ... Stormy has already done her bit by belittling Trump’s tackle and making him look, to use his own most hurtful word, like a loser ... Autocrats may survive protest marches and impeachment proceedings, but they have no defense against ridicule.
In print Daniels emerges as no less than Trump’s equal ... Make no mistake, Full Disclosure is a story for our times. Ancient Rome has returned, complete with bread and circuses and a president impersonating Caligula ... For the moment, Daniels is one person with an unvarnished narrative.
[An] intensely intimate portrait of a clownish and insecure Trump ... Beginning with Daniels’s youth as a girl named Stephanie Clifford growing up in Louisiana, Full Disclosure tells a vivid story of childhood poverty, neglect and abuse, including sexual abuse by a middle-aged man beginning when Daniels was nine years old. The stories are intercut with light moments such as her time with a beloved pet horse and a crush on Patrick Swayze so intense she kissed a hole in her Dirty Dancing poster.
