Comic-book writer Alan Moore, author of V for Vendetta, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, and the much-lauded Watchmen, insists that his three-volume graphic novel, Lost Girls, be viewed as pornography—a provocative sound bite if ever I've heard one. Produced in collaboration with artist Melinda Gebbie, the oversize boxed set has been sixteen years in the making. During this period, it's assumed mythic proportions, eagerly anticipated by some, reviled by others, assumed unpublishable by many.

There's no denying the seductive brilliance of Moore's writing. Like most American women, I'm a