Memories of Bob Guccione, Vanessa Williams, Traci Lords — and Me

Through a looking glass with the underdogs

When you work for publishers, you work for characters, larger than life. They may be risk-taking businessmen, but they are extravagant eccentrics. Bohemians. People who’ve turned life into a banquet, as Auntie Mame would say.

I think of some of my mentors: the late Sonny Mehta at Knopf. Don Katz at Audible. Si Newhouse at Condé Naste. I had one British…