'Down The Rabbit Hole': Holly Madison Shares Painful Truth About Living In The Playboy Mansion In New Book

Life at the Playboy Mansion may seem like one big party, but according to former playmate Holly Madison’s chilling new book, that’s not the case. The 35-year-old former "Girls Next Door" reality star shares her story, which details years of abuse, manipulation and drug use in her memoir, “Down the Rabbit Hole: Curious Adventures and Cautionary Tales of a Former Playboy Bunny."

In the tell-all book, Madison claims she was offered drugs by Playboy founder Hugh Hefner on her first visit to the famed mansion. She declined the pills, which he called “thigh openers,” and continued on with her night. Three weeks after her first overnight, Madison moved in with Hefner and a select few other playmates, according to Us Weekly. While that might sound like one big sleepover, Madison assured readers it was not all fun and games. She wrote that she and the rest of the girls were controlled by Hefner, now 89, adding that they weren’t “treated well.”

“I learned Hef was the manipulator and that he pitted us against one another,” Madison writes. “I realized I wasn’t treated well. I’m done being afraid of people. I don’t have any loyalty to Hef. I haven’t talked to him in four years, so there’s no reason to reach out now. Besides, it’s the truth.”

By 2002 she said she was so miserable she contemplated killing herself. In her book she wrote that “the pot and the alcohol” combined with living in Hefner’s “twisted world” left her helpless. While lying in a bath one night she thought to herself, “if I just put my head under water and take a deep breath in, it would all be over.”

Fast forward nearly 13 years and Madison’s life could not look more different than the one she was leading while playing Hefner's girlfriend. She has been happily married to Pasquale Rotella since 2013. The couple have one child, a 2-year-old daughter named Rainbow.

Madison’s book, “Down The Rabbit Hole: Curious Adventures and Cautionary Tales of a Former Playboy Bunny,” will be available for purchase on June 23.