Review: O Come all ye Kinky edited by Sarah Frantz

Looking for kinky Christmas season themed Femdom reading? Well, this isn't exactly it, but it's close enough to be satisfying. This is a fun collection of heart warming stories, just long enough to keep you entertained, but short enough to read in quiet moment (if such things exist at Christmas).

Of the 8 stories, 6 are M/m, 1 is F/f and then there is a M/F/m. The F/f and M/F/m are rather anomalous - I don't really understand how they fit in. If you want to read about men and women in the same book, then why not a F/m or a M/f story as well? I don't really get it. A purely M/m book probably would have made more sense to me. If you can get yourself into the headspace of the appropriate man and enjoy the stories, these are good fun and pretty hot. If F/m is the only way you can enjoy kinky Christmas fun, then these will not be for you.

Anyhow, the stories.

Twas the Night by Ava March (M/m)
A period tale of a gay couple, I really enjoyed this. Sweet, obviously, with a nice telling of the tentative push and pull of a developing relationship - that moment when both parties realize that yes - you're for me. Love that.

Tree Topper by Jane Davitt (M/m)
An argument about whether a fairy or a star is the right tree topper is the prelude to a bigger row about whether Stan will really accept Martin as his Dom. This was great too, for a similar reason. The insecure Dom and big misunderstanding isn't a trope that I particularly like, but here it works well.

Fireworks by Katie Porter (F/f)
Set on New Years eve, this is another well known trope of the repressed 'nobody loves me because I'm unworthy and scarred' dominant. I'm not so keen on either this trope (especially in females) or F/f, so this wasn't particularly for me.

Candy Cane by L.A. Witt (M/m)
In Candy Cane there is tension as the couple try to escape family to be on their own for Christmas. And there's a sexy male sub being caned with peppermint candy. Awesome.

Submissive Angel by Joey Hill (M/m)
I was looking forward to this, as I love Joey Hill's F/m full length novels. But I'm not so sure about Hill's short stories. I found this story a bit too heavy handed, cliched and smaltzy. Calling the submissive 'Ange' and have him dance in the snow - just in case you didn't get it HE'S AN ANGEL - he's the perfect submissive who will unlock Robert's frozen heart. I felt rather like I was being beaten around the head by sentiment. A total lack of subtlety. I also squicked every time Robert called Ange 'Kid'. I couldn't get into Robert's dominant headspace, despite most of the story being in his third person pov. He just seemed like a bit of an emo whiner. Also - both men were big cliches of gay men (braces? Kind to children, fancied by giggling women?). Sorry. It wasn't for me. Your milage may vary.

Open Return by Elyan Smith (M/F/m)
The story involves Zack going back for Christmas after 10 years, to his small-town teen loves, Laura and Scott, a dominant pair. His recollections are a bit disconcerting and read like typos until you realize that this is a trans story (the he/she issues, as well as Zack having a pussy). The relationship between Scott and Zack is emphasized, at the expense of Laura and Zack. Laura always seems like a bit of an afterthought, a tag on. There's very little dealing with the issues of 1) running away for 10 years, and all the emotions (including anger) that might bring up 2) small town prejudice (there's an incident, but it isn't resolved) 3) potential jealousies that might arise in a 3 way relationship 4) how Zack might be explained to Laura and Scott's kids 5) what happens next? The ending is sex scene, which presumably is a HFN, or is perhaps intended as a HEA. I'm not convinced. 

His Very Last Chance by Kim Dare (M/m)
If New Year is about anything, (aside from fireworks and getting drunk) it is about redemption, correcting mistakes, forgiving and forgetting and starting again with misconceptions corrected. Drew messed up. He boasted that his Dom wasn't into love and romance (making him even more Dom-ly, of course). Kingsley is upset that all the little ways that he's indicated to Drew that he values him beyond anything or anyone else have gone unnoticed. He's hurt and angry (mainly at himself). After licking his wounds alone over Christmas, he decides that New Year is make or break, and orders Drew to meet him. I really enjoyed this story, and found Kingsley's Dom headspace a very pleasant place to be (via the third person). He is nervous about finally revealing himself, but more sarcastic and sadistic than whiny. And the descriptions of the het up sub are nice. I wouldn't mind one of those over New Year.


If I had my time over, I'd have read to the end of Candy Cane, then skipped to His Very Last Chance, and ended with a nice sexy Christmassy feeling of things coming right, despite all too fallible human nature. B-

Review: Double Take by Rynna Cress

This is the perfect jerk off material for submissive men who fantasise about their lovely neighbour. I don't quite fulfil the criteria to really love this story, but in general, I did enjoy it.

Gabe is in love with Ashley, his neighbor. So when she phones and asks him to pick up her sister from the airport for her, after he stops his heart palpitations, he readily obeys. What she doesn't tell him is that he is picking up her evil twin. Gabe is supposed to be innocent of BDSM, but he takes to Jenna (Ashley's twin) ordering him around rather easily. Gabe's awkward flirting quickly turns into Jenna telling him what to do. The first thing that Jenna does is grab Gabe the balls, and squeeze. As it turns out, Gabe likes this. Though of course, as this is mainly from Gabe's point of view (the story is in third person, but we mainly hang out in Gabe's head), he has to posture about how much it hurts. Jenna proceeds to take all sorts of liberties with Gabe's body.

Gabe is mortified that he is betraying Ashley, as although nothing has happened yet with her, it's Ashley that Gabe really likes - loves maybe. So he is terrified that Ashley will walk into her apartment and find him with Jenna. So it's rather a co-incidence that when Jenna goes to "get changed", Ashley walks in to find Gabe naked, plugged and shooting off all over her floor.

Ashley though gets straight into the spirit of the situation that has been left by her sister

Since this is a novella, only about 30 pages, with plenty of sex and kink, there is obviously not much chance for little things like realism, safewords, or character development. And that's okay. The thing that rather didn't work for me is, as ever, a spoiler.

*** Spoilers ***

In the epilogue, Ashley walks into her kitchen, to find that Jenna has put the dildo into the dishwasher. They joke that they can have him in shifts. The twist is of course, that they really are twins. They joke about sharing and stringing him along, that they are the same. I guess it's a fun sort of ending, imagining poor Gabe being ordered around by these twins. But I'm not keen for several reasons. I'm not a big one for sharing - I like my boy all for myself. Then, I'm not keen on any sort of familial relationship mixed up with sex - it squicks me out. Deception rather ruins the HFN, as although Gabe probably wouldn't give more than a token resistance to the idea, it doesn't feel quite right. Also, I'm not sure that two doms and one sub is a fantastic combination. Too much potential for jealousy and, really - is one sub enough for two women?! It doesn't seem to me to be woman's fantasy, to share a sub with her sister (it certainly isn't mine). It's a man's fantasy, and that's just fine if you're a man.

*** End Spoilers ***

This story has Cress' trademark humor and high sexuality. It's brief and fun, and features moments like this that I like:

“Ass up in the air, darling, and spread those knees…”
Gabe obeyed, his eyes growing wide as his cheek landed against the carpet once more. He felt her hand on the small of his back, pushing it downwards and stretching his backside into a position of maximum vulnerability.
My ass, he realized… she’s going to fuck my ass.

Who can resist such a delightfully obtuse submissive? I can't.

I should add another squick warning. This story includes a sort of golden shower moment, when Jenna forces Gabe to drink her urine straight from the source. This didn't work for me. I couldn't really understand why it was there - Jenna was already pushing his boundaries pretty comprehensively, so I didn't feel it was needed. Was it a punishment? Or a reward? I wasn't really sure what purpose it had. And personally, I think that unsolicited pissing in your sister's living room is a hard limit when it comes to politeness, never mind kink.

Apart from that, it's all rather tongue in cheek and sexy at the same time. So yes, I enjoyed this on balance. It's not the emotional connection between a mistress and her submissive that I really crave, but it was entertaining. For being fun, but not really for me, it's a C+.

Review: The Cruel Dr. Frost by SM Calor

Sam Gomez is a student in trouble. After being truculent and disrespectful all term in Dr. Julia Frost's English classes, Sam fails (under slightly suspicious circumstances) to hand in his term paper and he goes to her office to seek her compassion. He wants a drop-pass rather than a drop-fail for the class. Dr. Frost isn't amenable to this, so Sam begs. He'll do anything.

Dr. Frost has that sexy repressed teacher look thing going on, that Sam secretly finds very arousing. He also secretly likes her domineering and uncompromising attitude too. So when she demands that he proves that he will do anything and has him come around the desk to kneel. So begins Sam's semi-willing slavery.

The Cruel Dr. Frost is told in first person from the point of view of Sam and successfully walks the fine like between describing the WTF that would be natural to a naive student and the burgeoning excitement of submission. Most of the story focuses on domestic servitude. Sam cleans Dr. Frost's car, clears her garden and does her washing. But he also is engaged to lick his Mistress' pussy and ass and we hear Sam's internal monologue about how hot he finds her demands. There's also cock and ball torture, foot worship, humiliation and ownership. Quite a lot of kink in a short story.

Dr. Frost is unrepentantly dominant, mean, cruel and rather sadistic. Slightly shocked though Sam is by this, he responds to it. Or his cock responds to it rather. He finds that he wants to serve Dr. Frost. There's a more sensitive side to Dr. Frost too - she rather likes her slave. That's not to say that she's kind to him, soft, or submits at all to him. That's one of the really nice thing about this story. Dr. Frost isn't soft in the conventional feminine sense, but she is sexy and she is pleased with her slave when he does well.

So, overall, I rather enjoyed this. My reservation is mainly that the point of view didn't really work for me as a female. I think that male readers will enjoy this much more than I did. I also don't kink hugely on domestic servitude, so it wasn't really my thing. If domestic servitude, enforced sexual servitude, naughty pupil - kinky teacher dynamic and male discovery of submission work for you, then this might be for you. From me, it's a B-. It was good - rather forgettable, but neither did have any major problems.

Evangeline Anderson

I'm going to do something a bit different here and look at an author, rather than a particular book. Evangeline Anderson lends herself to this, as her style in terms of characters and scenarios is quite consistent and distinctive.

I first read one of Anderson's short stories, Masks. I rather hoped from the set up (Chloe's twin sister forces her to moonlight as a Professional Domme) that it would be femdom. In fact Chloe almost immediately loses control to the hero, Mark. However, it was well written and really pretty hot, so I tried other of her books.

They're all erotica with a supernatural, fantasy or sci-fi slant, and definitely romance (all of Anderson's books that I've read are HEA). Some of her heroines are smarter and stronger (Lauren in Found; Kat in Sought) than others (Olivia in Claimed; Shaina in The Pleasure Palace). But what I like about Anderson's books is the male characters. They're not submissive by any stretch of the imagination but they are definitely in the service of their heroine. They put her needs, her pleasure, her safety, way above their own. If you like stories of strong men worshipping their chosen woman, then this author might be for you. Especially if you like reading cunilingus scenes. All of Anderson's books have a lot of cunilingus scenes.

There are a couple of provisos. There's a rather contradictory attitude towards bdsm in Anderson's books. On the one hand, some of the scenes are borderline kinky and although the female characters are universally niave and shocked at the idea of such things, they do come around, as it were. On the other hand, some activities, which in consensual bdsm would be considered just fine, are vilified. For instance, in all of the Brides of the Kindred series, the scourge are considered deviant and evil, in part because they are violently dominant and like to inflict pain on their females. This is considered the antithesis of the reverent treatment of females by the Kindred (they're aliens btw). But then, the Kindred have their own dominance and spanking kink going on too. The result is that the reader is rather confused as to what the 'message' really is.

Another slight issue is that Anderson tends to set up her heroines in situations where they have every opportunity to really take the lead sexually, then has the hero topping from the bottom. For instance, in Deal with the Devil, the hero has the heroine handcuff him to the bed. Hot right? Well, yes, but it doesn't quite deliver. She asks him what to do and he instructs her, while being handcuffed. Similarly, in The Pleasure Palace, the heroine has to pretend to be the dominant Mistress and the hero is her slave. Again, this dynamic could be really interesting but the heroine is portrayed as clearly uncomfortable with taking the lead and the hero directs nearly all her actions.

These two problems come together in The last man on Earth. The set up is awesome: the hero is being held captive in a future world where there are no men. The heroine has been allocated to milk him for his sperm. The normal way to do this is to stick an electric probe up the male subject's ass. The heroine is tentative and the result is that he talks her out of what is portrayed as a barbaric practice. The problem for me is that I think that the probe sounds quite fun. So the heroine cedes power to the hero and lets him call the shots and ultimately, he saves her. Despite him being the one who was restrained most of the time. It's a real pity, because the concept rocks and has an real femdom tinge to it. But the heroine is so weak and spineless I find it a difficult book.

Don't expect complicated and deep plots from Anderson's books, or strong female characters. But if strong men, who enjoy doing anything to protect, service and please their women (including licking her out, pretty much 23/24 hours of the day) are your thing, you might like this author. It's disappointing that Anderson doesn't write femdom but these are fun, hot stories all the same.

If you're looking for recommendations, my favorite of Anderson's books are (in no particular order): Found; Sought; Hunted; Masks. These, imo, suffer the least from the problems mentioned above.

*** Update***

Anderson has a new Kindred series book out, Revealed. I'm sorry to say that I am less enthusiastic about this book. Perhaps I have just reached saturation point for the full-on crazy sauce that amused me in her other books (the Goddess chatting to mortals in bold all the time, cartoon baddies, telepathic links left right and centre and some pretty odd physical mating organs - including fists and wings...).