In the world of hip-hop, she was the one who kissed, sucked and told it all.
Karrine Steffans shocked the world of hip-hop in 2005 when she released Confessions of A Video Vixen.
In this book she let it all hang out and told how hip-hops biggest stars treated her like a well-worn mattress.
Four years and two books later, Steffans is set to release the book she calls her baby, The Vixen Manual: How to Find, Seduce & Keep the Man You Want.
This is the first book that I actually started writing, but no one wanted to by it, Steffans said in an interview with Creative Loafing. The first two books, Confessions and the Vixen Diaries were part of the machine. It wasnt what I really wanted to do, but publishers said to me this is what you should do.
She said with the publication of The Vixen Manual, she feels lighter and like a different person.
The book is just what it says, a guide to seduction that, in very explicit terms, tells women what they should be doing to get a man. And from someone who once answered to the nickname Superhead youd think The Vixen Manual would be all about sex it isnt, completely about sex.
This is stuff that I learned along the way and Im really glad that I didnt finish it four or five years ago because I didnt know anything four or five years ago, she said. And in four or five years from now, I will know so much more than I know now.
In case youre wondering, Steffans does have a man. She said that she married Darius McCrary Eddie Winslow from the ABC sit-com Family Matters. Steffans even dedicated the book to her husband for taming a vixen.
Its not that Im an expert, she said, and also writes in the preface of the book, Its just things that Ive learned or things that have been told to me. I got a lot of advice from older people who are not in my generation and gave me some of that old school sensibility that I was lacking and most of us are lacking because the world has changed so much.
While Steffans doesnt say reading her book will turn you into an uber sexy vixen, she believes it can help.
No book can make anything happen in your life, she said, you make things happen in your life. Weve all been there where you were younger and someone tells you something and it makes no sense to you until youre 35. Then you wish you wouldve listened. I feel like I live in a generation where women arent talking to each other, we talk about each other. I feel that at least I said. You cant say I didnt tell you. You cant say I didnt tell you to learn to be quiet and stop challenging your husband. These are things that people have told me it is group conversation. Do with it what you will. I hope that it impacts your life positively and there will be some things in it that you dont agree with and thats fine. But at least we had the conversation.
Steffans said she hopes this will get women to talk to each other more.
I have this really sordid past. A lot of people have similar pasts but are afraid to talk about it. Women, especially black women, [dont talk about their past]. With me sharing so much of how I used to be and how my life used to be in my 20s, I think that womenlike me or nottrust me, she said.
Steffans said because she was so upfront about her past that women who read the manual will take her advice because they know I dont lie.
As a matter of fact, she told too much of the truth, Steffans said. When you fast forward five years to The Vixen Manual, these are things I know to be true for me. What I would like to give to women with this is the opportunity to begin conversation.
The book will be in stores on July 13.
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