It’s Monday and that means a new book comes into The Territory. This book I’m bringing in might raise a few eyebrows but I think it belongs in the higher echelons of American Literature. The book is called Pimp and chances are that through a few degrees of separation, it has influenced you in some way. Pimp was written by Iceberg Slim and outside of a few hardcore enthusiasts and faithful documentarians, no one really got to know that book. You see, Pimp is credited in some circles as being the beginning of rap. What were Run DMC, Ice T, Public Enemy and Afrika Bambatta doing in High School when they had no hip hop of their own to check out? They all were checking out one of Slims novels. Pimp is Iceberg Slims own account of growing up in various ghettos around the country and after not assimilating into society, Iceberg turns to hustling and then pimping. This is no friendly pimp from those nice blaxploitation movies that make pimps out to be like your rich eccentric uncle. This is for better or worse the story of some of the most awful people dealing with each other and one person trying to be even more terrible than the worst people he saw because that was the only way he knew he could make it. In a lot of ways Pimp is like “Pimp 101”. If you’re curious about how one goes about pimping or breaking into the business of pimping or how to turn a rich suburban wife into a hustling whore than this book will tell you. There are some things in Pimp that are pretty hard to take but the book is called Pimp for a reason and the story will leave you thinking and reevaluating a lot of things that you hold to be true. You can find it anywhere for cheap. Also, my Mozilla Firefox with its internet spell check does not recognize: Run DMC, Blaxploitation and Afrika Bambatta. Jesus Mozilla, get with the program.