Over the years I've built up quite a collection of books on piercing and body art in general, looking for authoritative sources, and trying to determine what's out there.

Here's a pic of my "library." I've tried to focus on books related to body piercing, so there's a large number of books that focus strictly on tattoos that I don't have.

I'm going to give you Cloud's picks for the best of the bunch, in later posts, for

--general books on body piercing
--modern piercing history
--history/tribal adornment
--gorgeous body art