The Thousands

It’s shameful to admit, but before reading this book I was clueless about ol’ Patti. Of course I knew the name, the image, and that she’d made an era-defining album, but aside from that I was sadly unenlightened. In my defence (sort of), I was busy raving and stuff, but if I could go back and have a quiet word with my teenage self, I would certainly recommend that I search a little harder for musicians who prized art and poetry over glowsticks.

Thankfully, it turns out Patti was a goober as a teenager too – of the gangly, tom-boyish variety – and Just Kids begins with stories of her refusing to wear shirts and thieving trinkets from friends.

From the start she writes with an intimacy that makes you forget words like ‘legend’ and ‘icon’. When describing her first months with Robert Mapplethorpe (who the book is for and about), she doesn’t leave out that he affectionately nick-named her ‘Soakie’ for crying so often, and it’s through details like this that we come to understand their peculiar relationship.

They were two innocents living in romantic squalor, sacrificing everything for their art with an impressive single-mindedness. But they were also just kids, making weird decisions and trying to get by. Like me, with the glowsticks…right?