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Erotica Book Roundup: New Selections in Sex Readings
by Debra Hyde
03/06/03
The ranks of the sex worker literati continues to grow, thanks to the release of Lapdancer from PowerHouse Books. Author Juliana Beasley documents her eight-year odyssey as a professional nude lap dancer and guides us through the clubs--onstage and on laps, backstage and back rooms--detailing its economic underpinnings and the intimate-yet-anonymous currency between dancer and customer. At society's edge, she uncovers a bevy of fin-de-siecle metaphors for sexuality, gender politics, capitalism, therapy, and even love. There is, of course, a companion website for the book. (ISBN: 1-57687-139-8; Price: $35.00.)
Aficionados of BDSM fiction might remember Molly Weatherfield's Carrie's Story and Safe Word novels. Like most books published by Masquerade Books, they fell out of print with the publisher's demise in the late 1990s. Now fans have cause to rejoice: Cleis Press has reprinted both books, with Safe Word: An Erotic S/M Novel just now hitting bookstore shelves. Safe Word continues where Carrie's Story left off: Protagonist Carrie leaves the master who initiated her into a life of slave auctions, training regimes and human ponies, and gets whisked away to Greece by the demanding gentleman who demands new, more rigorous methods of sexual pleasure for her. (IBSN: 1573441686; Price: $12.95.)
When Playboy calls your first anthology "a first-class journey through sexual encounters around the world," can a sequel be far behind? Of course not and now editor Mitzi Szereto can celebrate the release of Erotic Travel Tales 2. Also a Cleis Press book, this anthology features erotica's first Royal Fellow of Literature contributor, as well as such known authors Lesley Glaister, Maxim Jakubowski, Mary Anne Mohanraj, and Alison Taylor. Actually, the list of contributors reads like a who's who in erotica writing, and the tales span the globe of exotic settings and erotic possibilities. (ISBN: 1573441554; Price: $14.95.)
Blue Moon Books goes the multi-contributor anthology route with Sacred Exchange, edited by Lisabet Sarai and S. F. Mayfair. Like all Blue Moon Books, Sacred Exchange focuses on BDSM fiction, but rather than fixating on the physical aspects and paraphernalia of dominance and submission, it explores how the bonds of trust between dominant and submissive can lead to emotional and spiritual revelations. Its stories of ritual, communion, telepathy, devotion, dreams, commitment, and personal transformation aren't the usual BDSM fare, that's for sure. (ISBN: 1562013475; Price: $14.95.)
Long time literary and erotica publisher Grove Press brings Spanish erotica to the United States with a translation of Vicente Munoz Puelles' The Arch of Desire: An Erotic Novel. Called "a delectable novel of a man's lifelong devotion to erotic exploration," the novel is loosely based on the life of artist Pierre Molinier, admired by the surrealists and the creator of a many-layered erotic universe. In many ways, this novel appears to echo the plot of countless Victorian-era novels, namely in the protagonist's sexual initiation by a family servant and his discovery of his half sister's more forbidden charms. In art school, Pierre simultaneously pursues a growing complexity of pleasures, from devouring his father's collection of erotic classics to sampling the varieties of women, including a Senegalese prostitute, a lesbian dominatrix, and a beautiful German who becomes his last, most perfect lover. Pierre even squeezes in time to explore the limits of his fetishes for dressing up and the adoration of beautiful, feminine feet. Likely to appease a variety erotic appetites.(ISBN: 0802139698; Price: $11.00.)
Grove Press also has released Steve Almond's critically acclaimed My Life in Heavy Metal in paperback. A short story collection that raises the bar for literary erotica, Almond's twelve stories are, according to the promotional copy, "populated with hookups, drunken kisses, failed passes, and souring relationships. His characters stumble unrehearsed through the choreography of modern love, wearing their sloppy passions on their rumpled sleeves, aching to connect." Me, I appreciate any book where female ejaculation is portrayed as an addictive marvel, and while the book fails to register on the one-handed read meter, don't let that stop you from buying it. It may only tease the groin, but it really captures the mind. If you can, catch Steve at one of his many readings this spring -- he's quite entertaining -- and visit his website. (ISBN: 0802140130; Price: $12.00.)
Last, I've received my copy of Greenery Press's fiction collection entitled Dreaming In Color and it's gorgeous. This small, clothbound hardcover features an inset photograph exclusively provided by Charles Gatewood and its interior pages features fiction from over a dozen Greenery Press authors. Better known as a sexuality how-to publisher, Greenery Press decided to publish a fiction collection to celebrate its tenth anniversary and the result is commendable. Especially since its opening story, Dossie Easton's "Theory of the Big Bang: Introducing the Corps de Valets," ends with a bang. Literally, a lesbian gang bang.
Collectors and fans of fine erotica take note: Dreaming In Color is limited to 500 copies and likely to sell out soon. None of its stories, poems and essays has ever appeared in book form before and the authors have promised Greenery exclusive use of their contributions for three years. This book will not be available in stores, so visit Greenery Press to order it. And like I said, lesbian gang bang. Just for starters. (Price: $58.85, including domestic postage.)
Happy reading!
This article previously appeared at the now-defunct Yes Portal website as part of its news and entertainment coverage.
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