Ladies in the Parlor

by Jim Tully

This is the saga of Madame Rosenbloom’s fashionable establishment in Chicago and of the ladies in her domain. And here is the Jim Tully of “Circus Parade”—the forthright Tully whose language is as frank as life itself.
Tully does not pull his punches. The big men and the little ladies for whom Madame Rosenbloom’s house is a social center are portrayed with vigor and hon esty. The novel is crammed with incident and penetrating word pictures. It is not a story for the squeamish. But if life itself, —that robust, lusty segment of life that is here so honestly and brilliantly de­picted—does not frighten or shock you, this novel will hold your deepest interest.

Upon initial printing of this book in 1935, copies were seized from the publisher and destroyed by police based on allegations that the material was obscene and blasphemous. It is unknown how many copies survived. This is the first printing since that time.

166 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1935

About the author

Jim Tully was an American vagabond, pugilist, and writer. He enjoyed critical and commercial success as a writer in the 1920s and 1930s.

Reviews

[Rex Hurst · Rating 5 out of 5]

By modern terms the book is pretty tame. In fact, in this story of women working in a brothel ,there is not a single sex scene. It is a character study of the women in a high end whorehouse and what brought them there, but there is none of the dirt that would accompany modern prostitution tales. All the girls want to work there, none regret their decisions, none have ever been raped or molested (except one and the reference is easily overlooked).

The story follows Leora, the eldest of nine children in an Irish family, who rejects the life of her poor parents and drifts into casual prostitution and later convincing those men to pay for a fake abortion. She eventually becomes a full time prostitute until the madam of her brothel passes away from pneumonia.

[Carolyn F. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Reading in January for https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

This book took me a long time to read because it read more as an accounting of occurrences and stories that were quite boring. When I got to the 80% mark on the book it finally got good and then ended abruptly. 2-1/2 stars.

[Chris Stephens · Rating 3 out of 5]

A plain language story about whores.
very obviously written by a man.
very edgy for the time period.
very tame for ours, pg-13,
Tully paints a very positive picture of whoredom,
while fully attacking Christianity.
Very obvious why this was banned in 1935.
Taken for what it is, found it an enjoyable "era" piece.
ahh and for the snowflakes, has the typical racism.

[Bobbye Hudspeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tully is an excellent storyteller. I wish he had told more of them. When this book was published in 1935 it was seized from the publisher by police because it was deemed obscene and blasphemous (few copies survived...definitely a book to look for on dusty shelves!) Now, 77 years later it's available and now even in Kindle format.

I didn't find it "obscene or blasphemous." It's simply a story told through the eyes of a young prostitute who finds a "home" with a crusty madam and makes friends with the other "ladies in the parlor." I wasn't just blown away by the story line or the characters, but it was a very good story that was told very well.