Female sex workers in SF

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Characters whose work explicitly involves sexual behavior or sexual performance. Includes people who provide sexual services for money or professionally, e.g., whores, prostitutes, streetwalkers, escorts, courtesans, callgirls; sex performers; and people who do sexual performance for money or professionally, e.g., strippers, porn actors, lapdancers, nude or pinup girl models, etc.

May also include people centrally and directly involved in sex work, e.g., madames and pimps.

See also List of non-female sex workers in SF and Index to female characters by occupation and Prostitution

List of characters by name

• Phedre no Delaunay - Jacqueline Carey. Kushiel's Dart (2001) & sequels - Series focuses on Delaunay, a female courtesan, but society includes sex workers of both genders.
• Smokey, from Jane Lindskold's novel Smoke and Mirrors. (Protagonist is a touch-telepathic prostitute.)
• Sydney Bristow in "Alias" - Although Sydney was not a hooker of any sort, she played one on TV several of her missions. See:
  • episode 2x11 (#35) "Phase One" Sydney undercover as an escort
  • episode 2x21 (#43) "Second Double" Sydney undercover as a dominatrix
• Cassiopeia in the TV series "Battlestar Galactica (1978)" was a "socialator", basically a courtesan or call-girl; although apparently a respectable or semi-respectable profession in the Colonies generally, on her more religious home Colony, the profession was an object of scorn and derision.
• Niki Sanders (played by Ali Larter) in "Heroes is an online performance sex worker; she runs a website with lingerie poses and chat. She was also coerced to prostitute herself in one episode (cite); although she refused to do it, her alter-ego took over and did.
• Inara Serra, a companion in Joss Whedon. "Firefly" - A "Companion" is a registered multi-talented professional who at least sometimes includes sex in her services. Although Companions are respected in the inner worlds, they may be treated as common whores in the outer worlds (see Serenity movie), and Inara is regularly described as a whore by her romantic interest, series protagonist Mal.

List of works by title

• Brian W. Aldiss, "Lambeth Blossom" in Strange Bedfellows: Sex and Science Fiction, edited by Thomas N. Scortia (1972). © 1967.
• Central protagonist; other side characters. Margaret Atwood. The Handmaid's Tale. Forced prostitution by the handmaids; and houses of ill-repute secretly provided for the bigwigs.
• Lois McMaster Bujold, Vorkosigan series books. LPSTs on Beta Colony (Licensed Practical Sexual Therapists) of both all three sexes.
• Melissa Kwasny, Modern Daughters and the Outlaw West (Spinsters Book, San Francisco, 1990). A small Wyoming town is infested with quirky lesbians, ghosts, and politics. One of the ghosts -- a leading town-mother -- was the town madame / hooker.
• Mercedes Lackey. The Gryphon books and other Valdemar series books include the "kestra'chern" profession; a sex-worker that is respected in society and is a combination therapist, sex therapist, and masseur. They come in both sexes. One of the Gryphon books focuses on Amberdrake, a male kestra'chern.
• Donna McMahon, Dance of Knives (2002) (major character was previously a sex worker; sex workers are common in the society)
• Mike O'Driscoll. "The Future of Birds". Story is about a transsexual Latina MTF.
• Charles Oberndorf, Sheltered Lives (1992). After the spread of "hives," a deadly STD, the government sets up shop with licensed sexual service workers of both sexes.
• J. Neil Schulman, The Rainbow Cadenza. All women are required to spend several years in "the Service" - prostitution.
• Sarah Waters' Tipping the Velvet - Protagonist. (It's not fantasy/sf, but readers of fantasy might well like it; the London of the early 20th century is pratically fantastic. This is a lesbian picaresque novel & well worth reading. The butch woman is passing as a man when she is selling blow jobs on the street.
• Candy - Gene Wolfe. Free Live Free

• China Mieville's Iron Council (tale-within-a-tale: The Perpetual Train)
• Night Watch (Pratchett novel) by Terry Pratchett
• Frank Miller, of course. See Frank Miller test.

TV series

• Alias (TV series) - The protagonist, Sydney Bristow, played a hooker in several of her missions: "Phase One" (2x11, #35); "Second Double" (2x21 (#43).
• Battlestar Galactica (1978 TV series) - Cassiopeia was a "socialator".
• Dark Angel (TV series) - The protagonist played a hooker in some episodes, and encountered hookers in other episodes.
• Firefly (TV series) - Most episodes feature Inara, a "Companion". The "Heart of Gold" episode features the American West trope of the whorehouse: Former Companion (name) is now a madame of a brothel; the episode centers around one of her girls who is pregnant, and portrays many others in many roles.
• Heroes (TV series) - Niki Sanders ran a sex website, as an online performance sex worker; she was also coerced to prostitute herself in one episode.
• Supernatural (TV series) - episodes "Free To Be You and Me" (5x03) and "Frontierland" (6x18)
• The X-Files - Murder of prostitutes in at least one episode.

Further reading

• Frank Miller test

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