Shawna Kenney grew up in the Washington, DC punk scene, with zines as her first love. She booked punk shows while working every job imaginable to pay her way through college, also writing articles about music, art, and skateboarding for national publications. She moved to Los Angeles in 1996, where she wrote I Was a Teenage Dominatrix, a memoir about her experiences in the dungeons of the nation’s capital. Kenney hosted literary events in the LA scene for years, and her storytelling has since manifested in many forms, including film, journalism, podcasts, anthologies, museum exhibits and more. Kenney’s work has appeared in The New York Times, Playboy, Creative Nonfiction, Brevity, Vice, and Narratively, among others. Her other books include Live at the Safari Club: A History of Hardcore Punk in the Nation’s Capital, Book Lovers and Imposters.

I Was a Teenage Dominatrix available now