Review: Cute Boy Gets Squeezed by D.L. King

A big thank you to Alison Tyler, who's let me take part in the blog tour for her new anthology The Big Book of Bondage. Check out her blog, Trollop with a Laptop, for links to all the other reviews. I'm talking about D.L. King's story, one of 25 in this new offering from Cleis Press. So without further ado:

The real star of this story is not endearingly submissive Cute Boy or his kooky-but-caring play pal Evangeline; it’s a piece of equipment. The vac bed, to be precise – latex sheets out of which the air is sucked leaving the sub cocooned so tightly they can’t even twitch but with every contour of their body on display. I’d hazard a guess that most bedroom kinksters don’t have one and have probably never encountered one for real (go on, hop over to Google Images, I'll wait). And that’s what makes this story so irresistible. It’s the stuff of fantasy for most, rendered real in tantalising detail. The description of Cute Boy’s experience in the vac bed gains weight from the sparseness of description elsewhere; what the characters look like is largely left to the reader’s imagination.

The story has an easy, conversational style from the first-person viewpoint of Cute Boy. That’s in keeping with the casual nature of the relationship involved. There’s no romance and little emotional interaction here. But set against that is the intensity of Cute Boy’s physical need and his experience with this piece of equipment. Eve is no stereotypical Domme either; she’s more of a facilitator for his pleasure. She sounds more than a little bonkers and for Cute Boy there’s a thrill in the anticipation, the uncertainty, over what she’s going to come up with while knowing that, fundamentally, she’s not dangerous. Although there’s no seduction involved, she does constantly reassure him in her light-hearted way that everything is going to be ‘fun’.

It’s common for BDSM stories to try to untangle the psychology of submission or look for some reason for it in a person’s past experience. But that assumes a narrative viewpoint from outside of the world of kink, a place where justification and rationale might be demanded. Right at the start of the story, King openly dismisses this when Cute Boy begins to explain his kink and trails off with the words ‘yada yada yada’. But the whole story is, in a wonderfully subtle way, an exposition of a physical and psychological need that, in this case, seems to be completely natural. There are several moments when Cute Boy (who also goes by the name Pete!) has reservations – when Eve points out his ‘nice cock’ to her housemate, when there is the suggestion that said housemate is going to take photos of him, when she introduces the butt plug. But his expressions of unease are overwhelmed by his need. And when he sees the vac bed, his deep desire to feel its embrace shuts off the noise in his head and renders him hopelessly, sweetly, compliant. Add in a couple of toys and it leads to an orgasm the likes of which he’s never had before.

Cute Boy Gets Squeezed appears to be a simple, casual tale, but beneath its easy style lies an intensity of experience and a depth of knowledge about the nature of submission and restraint that is anything but.

Thoughts: On the Erotica Explosion

So, it's now acceptable, cool even, to be seen reading erotica. Copies of the most popular series of books are changing hands at the school gates, in the office, at knitting clubs. We're all suddenly so liberated. It's like some kind of sexual revolution for those of us who don't remember the Summer of Love.

More and more people are turning their hand to writing smut - from established authors packing in more sexual detail to complete newbies giving it a go and confronting their first dilemma of which words to choose to describe our naughty bits. I've ramped up my own efforts in the past year as the number of opportunities for getting published has grown. 

But there's a downside. The big boys of the publishing industry are muscling in, launching erotic imprints, resurrecting old classics. Anne Rice's Sleeping Beauty trilogy has been re-released by a subsidiary of Penguin Group, for example. And this puts the well-established, but smaller-scale, players at risk.

I hope the smut lovers behind Every Night Erotica and Oysters and Chocolate are moving on to exciting new things and I wish them every success. Every Night Erotica used to publish a story a night (Really, clue's in the title.) They published my story Cooped Up, a lovely allotment tale of a chicken coop and some nettles on September 30th 2012. On October 7th, they published their last story. 

I was pleased to have my story Pleasing the Nymph of Woodwell accepted at Oysters and Chocolate and published in December. I got a rather sweet comment for it: 'That was probably THE most erotic outdoor story I have ever read! I hated to leave them! I hope there's more to this... or I'll have to come up with my own ending. My wife may be in for a real treat!' I sincerely hope his wife got her treat. I'd just received my payment from O&C when I saw Kay Jaybee's blog post about them closing down. I'm not mentioning the word 'jinx'. Oh bugger, I just did. 

Sites like these are invaluable for encouraging and nurturing newbies to writing as well as providing a far more instant hit for established authors than the traditional publishing process. But now the field has narrowed and I can only hope that new avenues will open up in their place that aren't dominated by commercial interest, churning out the same formulaic stories with little regard for literary quality or the full range of erotic potential.

I thought of all those formulaic stories when I read this blog post entitled How to Be Submissive for Love. I was horrified beyond the ability to form a reasoned response at some of its assertions and its muddying of the difference between female subservience and sexual submissiveness. I was also reminded of the description by Myna Wallin of the stereotypical erotic romance formula in online mag The Acrobat, shared by the Sex in Words blog: 'Rich and worldly handsome man with a brutish manner seduces innocent young woman and sweeps her off her feet in spite of her protestations - and much to her delight.'

I can only hope that the new erotica revolution will lead more readers to try out the many, many stories out there that smash that formula to pieces.

The picture is of Plymouth Rocks at feathersite.com, much like the three bantams I had before a mink savaged them. If you'd prefer to see a naked man in a chicken coop, google it and you will find one.

Review: Red Grow the Roses by Janine Ashbless

Vampires. Everyone knows the rules. We all own at least one Buffy box set. (No? Just me then. And it’s four actually.) The coffins, pointy teeth, superhuman speed and strength, vulnerability to garlic, crosses, holy water. That whole ‘inviting them in’ thing. We know it all until some new author comes along and chucks half the rules away, picking and choosing what suits their vamp world. I hated the invulnerability of the undead in the Twilight series. I can’t have been the only one homing in on the moment Jane of the Volturi makes Edward suffer, the one and only time he appears to be less than smugly invincible. (What, that was just me being sadistic then?)

Janine Ashbless has taken the vampire myth and made it her own. Yes, they sleep in coffins. Sometimes. But she really gets you to smell the freshly dug earth, hear the worms burrowing beneath you. No, they don’t show up in mirrors. Except when they do. But Ashbless portrays one that inhabits mirrors, and other reflective surfaces, a being so old she is ephemeral and barely exists in the material world any more. Yes, sunlight kills them. Unless they’re young in vampire terms. They have an insatiable blood lust. The blood we all know about, the lust less so even if it’s there in thinly veiled manifestation in every portrayal of punctured flesh.

Well, for these vamps, the lust is as unquenchable as the thirst for blood. And for their lucky human blood donors, their bites engender similar feelings of uber horniness. Don’t act surprised – you read my review of Ashbless’s Named and Shamed didn’t you? You knew there’d be sex. Lots of sex. All kinds of sex. Not to mention violence, particularly in the kinky cage fighting scene. I’d recently re-watched Fight Club when I read Red Grow the Roses and it all chimed quite nicely in my psyche’s own personal erotic thriller. (Repeat after me, the first rule of Fight Club...)

I love the way Ashbless chucks in obscure bits of folklore and mythology; things you think you knew somewhere at the back of your mind in a Jungian collective unconscious kind of way but could never have put into words. Ashbless puts those things into words, beautifully shaped words that are delightfully evocative. But what I’d really like to know is how on earth she knows about the giant pike I used to be scared of when kayaking as a teenager?

She’s a damn fine writer with the sort of style that flows along easily, making you perhaps forget how much skill it takes to produce. Red Grow the Roses is often discomfiting. The vamps treat humans as playthings to be used and discarded. They bicker amongst themselves and the book culminates in all-out nastiness between London’s six undead. But it’s also a book that draws you in and consumes you with the need to keep reading. You’ve been warned.

I bought Red Grow the Roses at Amazon.co.uk, where, at the time of posting this, it was still at the ridiculous price of 20p. Yes, 20p. 

Thoughts: On Reviewing

I've been reading a lot of erotica lately. Lucky me! Some of it I review on here. Some of it I don't. I thought I should explain why.

I feel that it's important to have an idea of what's going on in the erotica genre so I know where my own work fits in. What I know for certain is that I'm never going to write the kind of material that becomes a phenomenon. You know the sort - like *that book* and its sequels which was such big news last year and will be again when it gets made into a film. There are others like it, all alpha males, billionaires, high society, slick city living and big business. I can't write that stuff and I don't want to. It's just not me. I prefer flawed people, slightly farcical situations, unexpected power relations, make-do-and-mend mentality, simple living and the great outdoors. 

I don't review books that I can't be mostly positive about. I will give my opinion of the odd shortcoming in a story I've enjoyed, but I'm not going to write a review slating someone's work just because it's not to my taste or is full of unfortunate errors. I may be a journalist in my other life, but here I'm blogging as a fiction author and I don't see the need to unnecessarily piss anyone in the industry off. And I don't think readers of my blog want that kind of thing either. So my reviews are really personal recommendations. I add edited versions to Amazon because I think it's important to support fellow authors, although I would never accept payment in return for a positive review.

I read the other stuff because I think it's important to be aware of it. And I may be muttering to myself about what a load of twaddle it is and rolling my eyes in exasperation at the cliches and stereotypes but I'm not going to share my scathing remarks, much as I'm tempted to bitch, on occasion.

On the subject of unfortunate errors, I'll be launching my own proofreading and editing business in earnest soon, having tinkered about with it for a while. That's why there's a new link on the menu up there, but the website still needs a tweak and a polish that is proving to be infuriatingly exasperating to a non-techie.

Of course, when I'm reading I always look like the woman pictured in the painting above by Howard Chandler Christy as long as you swap real paper and ink for an ereader.

Review: The Museum of Deviant Desires by Fulani

Fluently written, intelligent and super kinky.

The Museum of Deviant Desires was a real pleasure to read. Fulani knows his stuff, whether that’s 1950s pulp magazines or the right choice of whip. And he doesn’t keep you waiting for the kinky stuff only for you to find it’s some fluffy handcuffs and a blindfold. It’s full-on throughout with a well-stocked dungeon-full of BDSM hardware as well as some more sensual, psychological D/s scenarios. There’s a fantastically twisted imagination behind it too, with the scenes and references delightfully fresh and free of stereotypes but offering plenty of fodder for the perverse of mind.

I looked up some of the stranger references, out of curiosity, but even when they weren’t familiar to me, Fulani has a knack with description and imagery that brings them alive. There’s a densely packed richness to the stories.  And he uses big words. Complicated words like chthonic. The stories were often about the act of writing itself, so they are self-referencing, explicit about their existence as works of erotica as well as a set of imaginary places and events in the author or reader’s mind. These particular stories run on two tracks at once, which adds an extra layer for reflection and a way into discussion of the psychology of desire, while somehow managing not to detract from the reader’s absorption into the worlds they create.

I’m often ill at ease with stories of people indulging in bondage with strangers, especially when they happen to be women whom the author, in his or her wisdom, decides to imbue with feelings of low self-esteem, or anxiety, or nauseating naivety. Some of Fulani’s tales do involve women submitting to all kinds of risky shenanigans with strangers. But somehow, in this particular suspension of my disbelief, it feels acceptable. I think it’s the absence of fear on the submissive characters’ behalf and the utter reasonable nice-guy-ness of the dominants. No one’s having to be persuaded, in that terribly overdone way, to do anything they’re not comfortable with, thank goodness. (Although comfortable may be a poor choice of word here!) This is not so much kinky reading for the titillation of the mostly vanilla; it’s more like a fabulously perverse version of romance in a world in which kink is the normative framework of experience.

Dare I say it, in this age of speed reading, instant gratification and the eBook?... I liked the fact that some of the pieces were really short flash fiction. I kept thinking ‘just one more story’ and before I knew it I’d finished the lot and it was way past my bedtime.

Oh, and there’s a sense of humour too. Particularly in ‘$2.99’, the tale of an author’s revenge on a pirate downloader – the only story which involves someone who could actually be termed a ‘victim’, but hey, anyone who downloads pirate copies of books deserves it.

Addicted to Rope

The ‘bondage with strangers’ issue is back, big time, in this novella by Fulani. And in this case there is an element of it being new to the heroine and her having to be persuaded. But she persuades herself with very little effort on the part of our friendly neighbourhood Dom, Leo. And Leo seems like such a nice, genuine guy. I suppose the successful serial killers are probably the ones who manage to convincingly pull off the nice-guy act too. Oh well, I guess I must have double standards in my reading depending on the quality of the writing and the fickle nature of my whim. I finished Addicted to Rope in one sitting and immediately downloaded more of Fulani’s books. Legally. 

I bought The Museum of Deviant Desires and Addicted to Rope at Amazon.co.uk.

Research: Mud and yeast

The list of anthologies I want to submit stories to is growing again, mostly thanks to Alison Tyler's Trollop with a Laptop blog and the Erotic Readers and Writers Association calls for submissions page.

In the course of research, and I won't be revealing which call this is for, I've been viewing pictures of fit, muscular guys running, crawling, swinging and floundering through fields of mud, pools of ice, walls of flame and dangly bits of electrified wire. It's a hard life being a writer, I tell you. The pictures are from Tough Mudder, obstacle courses designed by British Special Forces for the kind of people who've got bored of Ironman triathlons.

They hand out beer instead of water at the end, which is an extremely tenuous link to the next topic of research, sourdough bread. It's all about men who can bake. All that kneading must lead to strong hands and well-honed forearms. And those big ovens make it oh-so-hot.

Inspiration: Woods and wells

My short story, Pleasing the Nymph of Woodwell, is now live at Oysters and Chocolate.

Tom and Maria have packed off the kids to their grandparents so they can have a dirty weekend away, without any little ones wandering in and wanting to know why mummy's all tied up. But will their sexy exploits please the ancient spirit of Woodwell Cottage's magical spring?

One reader comments: 'That was probably THE most erotic outdoor story I have ever read! I hated to leave them! I hope there's more to this... or I'll have to come up with my own ending. My wife may be in for a real treat!'

I certainly hope she is.

I thought I'd share a couple of things that inspired it. One being this cottage owned by the Landmark Trust in Shropshire. It's actually called St Winifred's Well. The Landmark Trust takes historic buildings of character that are in danger of falling into disrepair and restores and preserves them as holiday cottages.

I've stayed at their properties before, notably a very remote converted chapel in North Wales, but not this one... yet.

In the course of my research, I also came across this wonderful little site, Wooden Dildos. Lovingly carved by craftsmen from Scottish hardwoods and sealed with an ultra-smooth waterproof finish - so no, you won't get a splinter! Sounds so much nicer than some kind of plastic affair made in a factory.

The top image is Water Angel by Stephen Perry, prints available at ObsessionArt.com.