Dear Mr Andrews
January 2023
A young British woman’s epic journey through the precarious landscape of sugar dating.
"A remarkable debut." — Michael Turner, The Pornographer's Poem
"Latham’s writing is as sexy as it is stylish." — Barry Pierce, writer & critic
“Honest, insightful, vital, dirty and sublime." — Kristan X, Lascivity
"In an absolute act of submission this playful, hilarious, candid book dares to lay things bare for our entertainment. Highly recommended.” — Susanna Kleeman, Twice
Jenny Valentish, The Guardian: 'The fantasy of sugar dating'
"Dear Mr Andrews charts that journey in experimental form. Latham’s Tracey Emin-like drawings are scattered throughout, but Latham herself is a blank canvas, parachuting us into different engagements across Europe without the tethers of backstory."
Chapter 1 (excerpt) – Mr Andrews
We met on a sugar site. I hit on you (I think?). It’s a long time ago now. I liked your profile and thought we’d do good chat. You asked if I’d be free for weekday hotel meets with a lunch thrown in. I had asked you for some business advice and help with getting a pipe dream off the ground. Whichever way you dress it up, it was a form of transaction. I admit, it was a leap of faith to keep it that loose. I’m normally strictly ppm but I thought I’d experiment with the format just this once. There was something about you that I instantly trusted.
I always find myself trusting people who hate the same things as me. Negative cohesion, right? I think we both disliked ourselves for pretending to give a shit about our media jobs; we’re both victims of our own vanity in that sense. You asked the right questions and I held you in regard.
“Will you send me that legal contact of yours before you go?” I said, rolling my stockings back on, sense-checking where we stood on our bargain.
You glazed over and patted your pockets for your keys/wallet/phones, your mind elsewhere. You’d just fucked me, bareback, in every hole, for free, at a time that suited you. Now you were standing in front of me looking vaguely hassled by my presence.
“Oh yeah, that. If I forget about it, then chase me for it next week.”
I’d lost my side of the bargain and left that hotel room expecting never to see you again.
About the Author
Lotte Latham is a wanton experientialist who likes to see her fantasies made real. A suburban girl with a bee in her bonnet, Lotte is a fine art grad with a background in window dressing and sex work. Hopelessly inspired by the likes of Kathy Acker, Sophie Calle and Chris Kraus, her route to writing came as a way of working out the knots that come from a host of complex experimentation.
What people are saying about Dear Mr Andrews
"Written in swift, clear-eyed prose, Latham’s wry, insightful narrator is an erotic ethnographer who has managed to convince this late-born Boomer that if you can’t be honest, at least be true. An important distinction, one that harkens back to de Sade and returns to us generationally through writers like Colette, Anaïs Nin, Angela Carter and Tamara Faith Berger. I would respectfully add Lotte Latham to that list. Dear Mr Andrews is a remarkable debut.” — Michael Turner, author of The Pornographer's Poem
"Dear Mr Andrews has everything I want from a memoir. Sugar babies, daddies, johns… A natural successor to Lynne Tillman and Kathy Acker. Latham’s writing is as sexy as it is stylish.” — Barry Pierce, writer & critic
"A titillating, absurdist and dangerous screed on sex work, which, in her own words, is what that keeps Latham sane. I will add: stone cold lucid. Latham divulges the truth of female recklessness with her real treat of a mind. Dear Mr. Andrews is sweet and bitter and perfectly baked, cutting the lines between sugar babying, escorting and civilian work in a turbulent loop of righteousness.” — Tamara Faith Berger, author of Maidenhead, The Believer Book Award 2012
"In an absolute act of submission this playful, hilarious, candid book dares to lay things bare for our entertainment. Highly recommended.” — Susanna Kleeman, author of Twice
"A brutally honest candy trip dedicated to Lotte’s muse, the Daddy that got away. Each chapter unwraps relatable confessions about the nuanced motivations behind dating, love, work, and sex and where they stick together under capitalism and misogyny. Lotte's voice is sweet, perverse and deeply self-aware as she navigates the economics of defiance and goes at her own cavities with sharp picks.” — Sadie Lune, co-author of As You Wish, My Lady
"She’ll show you ‘how much loneliness there is in the world,’ among so many life lessons. This book is Lotte’s clarion call for compassion... Guts Publishing hits another one out of the cricket field. This book is a victory for all women.” — Karla Linn Merrifield, author of My Body the Guitar, 2021 National Book Award Nominee
"Filthy and fascinating – a frank, complex, thoughtful memoir, told in a (mostly) one-sided epistolary format. Dear Mr Andrews offers a unique window into the world of sugar dating. It's a visceral and viscerally enjoyable read – honest, insightful, vital, dirty and sublime.” — Kristan X, author of Lascivity