Dirty Books - part the first

I am taking my last class at USM and the course is Service to Library Clients: Romance and Erotica. My professor is a researcher in erotica and really threw us into the deep end with her selections! I am putting the first four here and I am just going to copy and paste my class responses and my Goodreads ratings. 

Brace yourself...

Week #1 - PEN PAL by J.T. Geissinger

I read PEN PAL as a requirement for a special issues in libraries course about romance and erotica. Now I love some romance, but I have said of erotica (well, I said it of porn, but it tracks for erotica too) Reading/watching erotica/porn and thinking it is a realistic depiction of sex is like watching a Marvel movie and thinking that it accurately represents law enforcement. I just can't suspend my disbelief when people are having orgasm after orgasm at just the right time and with SO MUCH TALKING!! I know, it's a book, we need dialogue, but good grief.

And (mini-spoiler) the main character's husband has just died at the beginning of the book and she is hopping in the roofing guy's bed about 20 minutes after she leaves the funeral! And there is some master/slave stuff that I know people are into, but honestly straight-up irritates me. I am happy when people find something that makes them happy, no judgement, but I also don't want to read about veganism or crossfit. It's me, not them.

So about halfway through, I went to Goodreads to see how others perceived it and it has over 200,000 ratings and the average is 4.11! Granted, people who like this kind of thing are probably reading it, which explains the score, but 200,000 people?? That's a lot of ratings! And so I started to read a review and immediately saw a spoiler shield and clicked on it because I couldn't stand the book and didn't care if I read a spoiler. It was a HUGE spoiler and completely changed my opinion of the book. Of course I would have loved to seen the reveal come out a little at a time, but knowing the twist made me really appreciate the story more. And I am notoriously bad at "seeing it coming" for someone who reads as much as I do, so I would have had to hate-read this thing for another 100 pages or so. So thank you, stranger on the internet, for the info.

I can't really write much about the plot other than Kayla and her roofer get it on, she thinks her house is haunted and she likes getting spanked. And it has almost nothing to do with penpals. I probably wouldn't recommend it, but if someone told me they were reading it, I would definitely want to discuss it with them after. There is some excellent structure in the writing and some parallels to classic literature that were recognizable to me even though I try to avoid classic literature. I blew through it pretty quickly once I stopped judging Kayla for moving on so quickly, I was hooked.

So I guess I can read erotica. I am just looking for more of a ramp up. And maybe a male character who realizes that there is no foreplay more effective than vacuuming without being asked.

I gave it three stars on Goodreads. 

[Going forward, they will be in the format of the assignment.]

Week #2 - Week 2 Reverse Harem Assigned Choice

NANNY FOR THE BOSSHOLES by Rebel Bloom

Summary: Aggie (Who named their kid Agnes that late in the 20th century?? Already having to suspend my disbelief.) is great at her job as a business problem solver, but her toxic boss/boyfriend cuts her loose when she refuses to have his baby. She approaches his rivals, the Graves brothers - each of them hotter than the others - with an offer to work for them and destroy the jerk who fired her. They don’t believe her but she bonds with their orphaned niece so they hire her to be a temporary nanny. And then they have lots of sex with her AT THE SAME TIME!! The brothers never touch each other, but they are not shy about getting it on, industrial style, in front of each other and at the same time. They all fall in love, there is a misunderstanding and then a final act where I lost a little respect for them all, but the happilied-ever-after in a fairly satisfying way. 

Trope: Reverse harem

Triggers: Gangbanging, I guess? Abusive relationships, orphans

Favorite character: I loved Aggie’s old hippie dad who just accepts his daughter is in a relationship with all three brothers without batting an eye. 

Favorite thing: I loved the relationship between Aggie and Gracie. The fact that they both lost their mothers young is a bond that they have and I feel like the care Aggie took with her was very genuine. I loved the actual story part of this book and really enjoyed the unconventional love aspect of the brothers who share everything, if not the sex.

Least favorite thing: The sex, particularly the first scene where they all get it on in the library right out of the gate her first night at the house! What the heck - she seemed completely unfazed, but I was fazed. Very definitely fazed.

Discussion questions:

1. Which brother did you like best?
2. How messed up are Grace and Max going to be if they ever walk in on their uncles and aunt?
3. How can she legally marry three men?
4. Did you feel like the baby at the end was a stupid way to wrap things up and why was termination never even mentioned as an alternative? 
5. How many problems regularly come up in business that have to be figured out and how do you quantify that?

I gave it three stars on Goodreads. 

Week #3 - Dark, BDSM, Mafia Assigned Choice

HIS PRETTY LITTLE BURDEN by Nicci Harris

Summary: Fawn is young and pregnant and ends up in the home of Clay Butcher, the head of the mob in Anytown, Australia. Clay is planning to use her as bait to get her father, a fellow mobster who turned on him, to come out of hiding. Instead he falls in love with her in a rather lovely way and has a bunch of sex with her in an exhausting, bossy way. There is lots of sex and murder, she was assaulted by her foster brothers and when Clay finds out he executes them in a, I must admit, pretty satisfying way. Fawn is often really stupid, but also brilliant. Clay is dreamy, but kind of a monster. He has a bunch of brothers, luckily, he doesn’t want to share Fawn with them. The writing was full of emotion and strangely satisfying and I think that the obvious emotional connection between Fawn and Clay made it actually less cringey than the other steamy scenes that I have read for this class. 

Trope: Dark, light BDSM, Mafia, age difference

Triggers: Where to begin?? The assault scene was brutal, but to the author’s credit, it wasn’t sexualized AT ALL, it was monstrous. (Needless to say, I only skimmed that part.)

So assault, bossyness, betrayal, aggressive blowjobs, power struggles (that may only be a trigger for me…)

Favorite characters: I loved Clay’s brothers! They each brought something to the table that was different and showed why he was basically a decent guy for a capo.

Favorite thing: I loved that they were devoted to each other and clearly, and somewhat annoyingly, they felt like they were with their soulmate. 

Least favorite thing: The whole using her as bait and the description of her assault by her foster brothers. 

Discussion questions:

1. How do you think Fawn’s daddy issues will be resolved?
2. How can Clay stay married to his wife and still provide the protection Fawn needs?
3. What did you think of the age difference?
4. What do you think of how emotional the writing was?
5. What do you think happens next?

I gave it two stars on Goodreads.  

Week 4  - Monsters and Aliens

HOOKAH SMOKING CATERPILLAR by Beatrix Hollow

Summary: Well this is my bad for picking the book based on the title alone. I thought it was going to be a Jefferson Airplane/Summer of Love setting and it ended up being an Alice in Wonderland knock-off. There are not enough words in the English language for how irritating I find the actual Alice in Wonderland, so I actually liked this a bit better. But that is not saying much.

The premise is that Alice is maybe actually the White Rabbit (argh - rabbit metaphor again…). She is deeply in lust with the caterpillar (who is also kind of a man) but the Cheshire cat is obsessed with her and wants her to be his own private sex worker. There might be some poisoned tea murder. There are mushrooms. 

Trope: Retelling of a disturbing classic, monsters

Triggers: tails, drug use, monsters, forced prostitution, signing contracts before you read them

Favorite characters: The characters were described beautifully, but had basically no personality beyond the biggest picture stuff created by Carrol, but the physical description of the caterpillar was really stunning. And I am not one for physical descriptions, so kudos to Beatrix Hollow. 

Favorite thing: Honestly, the sex was pretty interesting. It still seemed worky and just a little too effective, but it was interesting to see how they do it in Wonderland. Perhaps the actual shift from a real world based erotica to a fantasy based was the space I needed to not be irritated by the steamy parts. 

Least favorite thing: The woman has basically been the victim of both society and her potential sex partner in just about every book I have read for this class. Are there no strong woman protagonists in erotica?

Discussion questions:

1. What the hell did we just read?
2. Cheshire cat or caterpillar - who do you choose?
3. If you could smoke those pheromones, would you? What do you think would happen?
4. What monsters do you think are hot? (I’m looking at you, Shape of Water guy!) 
5. What other classics of literature do you think could use a smutty makeover?

This was my first one star review on Goodreads!

I don't know if I just got used to the course, or if I chose better, but I REALLY liked the last three books I read for this class. So I will post those little gems togeter.