Rachel Kramer Bussel’s annual collection of romanterotica has once again graced our Kindles, e-readers and bookshelves, and this collection is just as delightful as the last. I liked it rather better than the previous volume, as this one feels more consistent.
As always, the submissions involved vary, from a woman’s encounter with the town bad boy to a couple of empty nesters trying lifestyle-variety D/s. There’s a woman who hires a male prostitute to help her figure out her need to dominate, and a story about tattooing as a form of submission.
Romancelandia, of course, is well represented here. One of the best stories in the volume is Olivia Waite’s Cabinet of Curiosities, featuring two older bisexual heroines who finally explore their long-simmering fascination with one another. Zoey Castile pops in with a fun story about a woman and a man who hook up after a car accident.
The collection has one big weakness – a heavy lean toward D/s-themed stories. There are a thousand different kinks out there to explore, and the collection’s easy reliance upon one single interest tends to make the book repetitive. If you don’t have a huge interest in bondage only half the stories will appeal.
But then again, repetitive does not mean unoriginal. After all, this is also a book in which a woman breaks decades of veganism with a sausage and a wank (no – it’s not what you’re thinking!!) over the cute butcher she just met (Jane Bauer’s Meat Cute, written with enough sensuality and humor to anger up the blood of anyone who lives off of tempeh bacon.) and includes a story about balloon kink (Inflated Egos by Evie Bennet). There’s public sex and sex clubs, long-distance fucking and long-term yearning.
It’s the top talent that make this volume of the series stand out from the others, and makes it my favorite thus far, in spite of the repetitive subject matter.
Buy it at: Amazon or shop at your local independent bookstore
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Grade: A-
Book Type: Erotica
Sensuality: Burning
Publication Date: 12/2020
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