“An eye-opening, astonishing, honest and funny collection from those who really have lived on the edge in a parallel universe… Unpretentious and riveting, their tales are also graphic, politically incorrect and mostly unquotable in this newspaper.”

Toni Bentley, NY Times

“Having graduated from U.C.L.A (University on the Corner of Lenox Ave) Zoe Hansen’s words and vivid descriptions take me back to the street I knew and grew up on. “My American Dream” is a compelling story of striving for just that, her dream, via the oldest profession. This is a totally original tale of one womens life that will make you laugh, relate and raise an eyebrow. Words of wisdom in a time when New York was a real jungle, you were hunting or you were the hunted…”.

Eric Weinstein, Associate producer of Entourage

A Review of Zoe’s work by David Henry Sterry:

Zoe Hansen is a sex kitten who’s lived way more than 9 lives. And luckily for you, dear reader, she has the writing chops to take you down the rabbit hole with her into the sweet, sticky, fleshy underbelly of the American dream. Incesting brothers, submissive Hassidim, and sex-crazed gangsters are just some of the players you’ll meet in the flesh at the hands of the fabulous and fierce Ms. Z.

“Zoe Hansen takes us on a ribald guided tour of the sexual netherworld, a harrowing and potentially sordid journey redeemed by good humor, transcendence, and the instinct of a survivor.”

Author: “You Call It Madness“

“My American Dream, Going Down in Gotham” highlights an era of New York prostitution, where the dark nooks and crannies of Man at his Worst are illuminated beyond the reach of mere psychologists. Zoe Hansen emerged from this netherworld of subterfuge, a gifted writer bearing witness.”

Josh Alan Friedman, author of Tales of Times Square

Zoe Hansen’s ‘My American Dream, Going Down in Gotham’ reveals a sensibility that is loving, brutal, touchingly and glamorously human, and savagely female. We are in a very modern survival mode, and there is never a titanium-steel slicing instrument far from Hansen’s hand, nor a happy/helpful hug. She sees the “Top” and “Bottom” sides of the sex industry, and sails into, through and above the many manifestations thereof. The legitimacy of The Industry, by the way, in never annoyingly questioned; anyone who doubts its amazing reach, in these days, must be living in the caves where Iranians are building atomic bombs.
Her narrative is dense and swift, the quicksand of sex on pages that will be turned with appetite aroused, and the reader’s eyebrows rising higher than you ever thought possible. Sex and the city of New York, together at last!

Danny Fields, author of “Linda McCartney: A Portrait.”

Buy Linda McCartney: A Portrait by Danny Fields from Amazon.com

An eye-opening, occasionally astonishing, brutally honest and frequently funny collection of prose and poetry by all kinds of sex workers.

…actual bios for the contributors make for provocative reading and can leave one feeling like an unadventurous slacker. Zoe Hansen “achieved stability through methadone maintenance and felt it was time to open her own brothel, Sterling Ladies, which was on Park Avenue and 21st Street.”

It was the first of five brothels she opened during the next three years.” (I’m starting to get a brothel-opening feeling myself.)

Zoe Hansen writes like a three-day party in hell. She didn’t just walk on the wild side, she got her mail there. My American Dream evokes both the poetry of Kerouac and the low-life transcendence of Herbert Huncke. Hansen delivers nothing less than a literary speedball of danger and sex and sometimes funny, sometimes brutal beauty that is absolutely her own. It’s hard to say which is the bigger miracle: that the author has written such a fearless, nuanced, dementedly enthralling account of her hard-core life – or that she’s still alive to tell it… If I owned a cheap motel, I’d lose the bibles and put My American Dream in every nightstand. The whole joint would be up all night reading.

Jerry Stahl