The Basics:
Telling Tales by Charlotte Stein
Sourcebooks Casablanca
Erotica
Published March 4, 2014
Amazon.ca Kobo.com
I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Why I picked up this book:
I read Control by Stein late last year and really enjoyed it.
The Basics:
The Sinners Club by Kate Pearce
Kensington Books
Book 1 in The Sinners' Club
Erotica
Published December 31, 2013
Amazon.ca Kobo.com
I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Blurb:
It's known as the Sinners Club. . .a private gentlemen's club whose members have mysterious pasts and secret fantasies too hot to reveal. . .
Total Pleasure
Unsure of his reception, Jack Lennox adopts the guise of his own secretary upon returning to his ancestral home to claim his father's earldom. When he arrives, he's stunned to discover the previous earl's lovely young widow, a woman of beguiling curves and sensual smiles, warming the bed. . .
Absolute Surrender
Mary Lennox is determined to remain in Pinchbeck Hall and a mere secretary isn't going to tell her otherwise. But Jack Smith is a man of many talents and soon she's succumbing to his erotic games of pleasure. Only Mary may have underestimated the intensity of her wanton longings and the depths of Jack's dark desires. . .
Why I picked up this book:
I was looking for a good erotic novel.
My thoughts:
First, the blurb is misleading. There are three main characters in this novel and while Jack and Mary are the traditional romantic pairing, Mary's brother Simon also figures significantly. I quite enjoyed it, but obviously not every reader will.
All three of these characters are very sexual beings, and all three participate in various sex scenes together, in different combinations. A good portion of this novel features M/M sex, and an open mind for other kinks will be useful. I found all of the erotic scenes to be very well-written - hot, sexy and inventive. There's a lot of variety, aided in part by the multiple partners and potential combinations, but also because Mary, Simon and Jack are all quite experienced. It lived up to its genre expectations and then some!
Because of all the secrets the three characters hold, it's hard to talk about the plot without giving anything away. It's definitely a lot of back and forth - I know what lie you've told now and I'm angry about it, and then you'll apologize for it, and so on as each layer of the lying onion is peeled back. I did appreciate that there's all this mystery and such going on, it made the book much more than the sum of its erotic parts.
In general, the book was solidly written. However, I found scene transitions a little jarring at times. Otherwise, the characters were all clearly defined and the plot was neatly laid out though it followed a certain repetitive rhythm. I enjoyed this book.
Bottom line:
The sex is good, and while it does have quite a decent story underpinning all the sex, parts of the plot are a bit repetitive. Be conscious that the book isn't just about Mary and Jack's romance, but also about Simon and Jack, and the three of them together. Pick it up for the heat or if you're already a fan of Pearce.
4 stars
For fans of m/m and menage erotica, regency erotica, Kate Pearce's previous books.
The Basics:
Awakening the Warriors by S. E. Gilchrist
Escape Publishing (Harlequin Enterprises Australia)
Erotica, Science Fiction
Published May 1, 2013
I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Blurb:
Fran must have been crazy to leave her ordinary (and safe) life and volunteer as a colonist to terra‐form a new earth. Now she is trapped in a prison cell on an alien planet a zillion miles from home and bound for a hideous death in notorious research chambers.
She has one chance of escape. Awaken the long dormant sexual urges of the Darkon Warriors shackled in the next cell.
A desperate job, but someone has to do it.
Why I picked it up:
I picked this up on the strength of the blurb alone. I liked the idea of this prisoner needing to awaken the desires of multiple men also held as prisoners.
What worked for me:
Awakening the Warriors has a lot of potential.
There's a rich universe to learn about - Gilchrist has published previous works set in it, and it looks like she has another coming out in February 2014. There's enough detail about it in this novella to make me curious, but not so much that I feel like I could really strongly describe what makes it tick.
I liked Fran, and I liked that she knew that a fair amount of the pull she felt for the two warriors was related to biology rather than simple lust or some sudden onset of love. I wanted to know more about her, and how she and the Darkon warriors related to each other. The warriors themselves felt less detailed but were still intriguing enough that I want more of them.
The escape was well-written - Gilchrist is clearly comfortable writing action scenes. I could easily picture what was happening and was rooting for *everyone* to make it out alive.
What didn't work for me:
There's too much happening in this novella for me to really sink my teeth into anything - and boy did I want to do that to those Darkon guys. They sound quite lovely, but I didn't feel like the erotica got enough screen time. For one, it takes no effort on Fran's part to awaken the Warriors: being present is apparently enough to turn the guys on, despite their wounds. Then there's a whole escape and travel time afterwards that's virtually void of anything steamy. Which on the one hand is fair enough - these characters have other things on their mind. But on the other hand, when they do come back together, it's pretty jarring.
I think I would have been happier if the erotica had been a little dirtier, grimier to fit the setting, and if there was only the barest implication of an emotional bond - perhaps one entirely based on having saved each other's skins, or one set off by the aforementioned biology. This easily could have been/could be the novella prologue to a more science fiction-based story featuring the same three characters with a menage flair.
Bottom line:
This erotic novella is muddled by having to do too much with too few words. There's a lot of universe lore to fit in so that we have a frame of reference, there's an escape plot, there's what seems like set-up for another novella or novel in this universe, and there's the erotica itself.
I think it would have benefited from another 25 pages or dropping one of those elements. Didn't love it, but there's so much here that I *want* to love, I'll look for Gilchrist's other work.
3 stars
For fans of science fiction erotica, S.E. Gilchrist
The Basics:
Menage on 34th Street by Elise Logan and Emily Ryan-Davis
Carina Press
Erotica, Romance
Published November 21, 2013
Purchase from Carina Press
I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Blurb:
Katrina and Liam Holland have the perfect marriage, a home in the trendiest part of Baltimore, and a scorching sex life. As another Christmas approaches, there's only one thing still on Kat's wish list: Hunter Croft. But she made peace long ago with his decision to choose the marines over their relationship. Until seeing him again arouses feelings she thought were in the past…
Hunter has spent a decade outrunning his attraction to both Kat and Liam. But now that he's stateside, his self-control crumbles when he comes face-to-face with the two people who star in all his favorite fantasies. Their reunion is both erotic and emotional—and has Hunter wondering if three's really a crowd, after all.
Liam can't imagine his life without Kat. But he can imagine a future where the three of them live and love under one roof. Liam and Kat have shared their bed with other men, but Hunter is the only one who could ever have a place in their hearts. And this holiday season, Liam intends to make their dream a reality.
Why I picked the book up:
This time the blurb got me. I like a good menage story and I liked that this one emphasized the attraction between all partners. I was also curious about Hunter choosing the marines instead of the couple, and wanted to see how that played out in the story.
What worked for me:
You'd think this novella hinges on the menage component, with lots of sexy times featuring three people between the sheets, but no, you'd be wrong. Instead, we've got three people who are each involved with each other individually and as a whole, and we get that throughout the novella in both sexy times and serious times. That is the part that really works for me. There's a sense that everyone's interconnected in a way that sometimes doesn't happen in such a complete way in menage erotica.
I liked that everyone was fully in command of their own sexuality. Yes, there was some trying of new things, but no one was being cajoled or seduced into anything they really weren't sure about - there was real and expressed desire to participate in everything.
There's an intricacy in terms of the emotional baggage and the difficulties of making a menage relationship work that was also appealing, and helped bridge the gap between erotica and romance.
What didn't work for me:
This novella is part of a holiday anthology, but it definitely didn't have a heavy Christmas theme for me. There's references to it, but the overall tone was more about coming home/finding each other after years apart. This isn't really a problem when you read the novella on its own - and I'd like to read the rest of the collection to see how it fits within that grouping rather than just abstractly as part of a holiday anthology.
The other thing that irked me was that nothing seems resolved at the end of this story. Yes, there's a tentative plan in place for the three to share a life together, but it's so tentative, and I felt like the groundwork was laid for so much to go horribly wrong with Hunter's job and for Kat who seemed to be settling for a lot less than she really wanted. This was a real problem for me - I wanted things tied up more neatly because as it was, there were enough painful edges that I was left unsatisfied (despite some really satisfying sex scenes!)
Now the positive is that there's supposed to be a novel follow-up that will address, I imagine, those very issues. So this is good!
Bottom Line:
The sex was well-written - the encounters were varied, creative and hot. The relationships and the concerns everyone had about them felt real and honest. There was an acknowledgement that a menage lifestyle would be made particularly difficult because of Hunter's military connections.
That said, this is the first book in a while that I ended up sneaking a peek at the end of the story before I'd gotten very far into the book. I read a fair amount non-linearly before I went back to the beginning to read from the start through to the end in one shot. There's something missing, and I think it's that sense of resolution, that it's possible for everything to be okay.
Pick this novella up for the steamy menage, get hooked by the complex relationships, and wait, I guess, for the follow-up novel to see how it'll all come together!
3.5 stars
For fans of menage erotica, military heroes and recovering lost love
