Best Women’s Erotic 2009

Edited by Violet Blue

Book Review by Lisabet Sarai

These days I read a lot of erotic stories. To be honest, I’ve become pretty difficult to impress. I rarely happen upon stories that are downright bad, but a painfully large number strike me as ho-hum.

Despite the financial crisis and the supposed decline of the publishing business, it seems that we are awash in erotic anthologies. Last month’s Calls for Submissions at ERWA listed four different “Best of” collections. I have calls for five other anthologies sitting in my “consider submission” file. I suppose that I should be pleased that authors of erotica have so many opportunities for publication. Still, recently I’ve started to feel that the quantity is diluting the quality.

Thus, it was with some trepidation that I approached Violet Blue’s latest annual collection of female-authored erotica. I’m happy to report that this year’s volume is at least as good as last year’s – which was very good indeed.

What impresses me in a story? Originality in concept or expression. Depth of character. Intensity of emotion. Fluency and grace in language – which can translate into graphic rawness in the erotic realm.

Many of the stories in Best Women's Erotica 2009 demonstrate these characteristics.

My two favorites are as different as can be imagined. Jacqueline Applebee’s  elegant and moving “Hush” gives us a woman for whom silence is the essence of eroticism.

As a teenager I learned sign language, but even that was too involved. No, I preferred the fluid voice of a human body in motion. I listen to facial expressions, and I read kisses like journals. A long drawn-out groan means more to me than a library of books.

The protagonist encounters a man who intuitively understands, who welcomes the gag that will keep their coupling silent. Nothing is as arousing as complementary fantasies.

“Fast Car, Not for Sale”, by Trixie Fontaine, is rollicking tale of an older woman and the eager teenager who wants to buy her old sports car. It celebrates the old affinity between speed and sex.

Climbing through the gears I felt shit dropping off behind me, leaving mundane crap all over the pavement like rubberized road apples shooting off in my wake. In fourth I got that buzzing feeling as  we went faster and faster, and faster, that I was about to meet the verge of something or crest and break completely free. It was like a flying dream. No, it was better than a flying dream. I almost forgot about the kid next to me or maybe my inhibitions were part of the junk that second and third stroked away and I still felt him there, but  wasn’t afraid of being old next to him... I could move greased metal, I could turn things on; I could make things happen.

“Fly”, by Valerie Alexander, offers a creative and slightly perverse twist on the story of Peter Pan, told from the perspective of the fierce, horny Indian princess, Tiger Lily. Its heat makes the reader wonder whether some of these sexual echoes were hiding in the children’s classic all along.

Janne Lewis’ “The Bitch in his Head” wins my prize for the most intriguing characters: a demanding executive trapped by his obsessive-compulsive fancies, and the woman who loves, indulges and liberates him.

 “Snug Designs”, D.L. King’s high-spirited, kinky fantasy, taught me far more than I’d expected about the mechanics of rubber.  This may be the most fetish-positive story I’ve ever read. Even with the hot sex, it made me feel all warm and fuzzy.

In “Courting Him”, Deborah Castellano takes the trappings of historical romance and tears them to shreds with her physically delicate, but irresistibly lustful young lady enamored of her older guardian. Meanwhile, Donna George Storey explores the romance of vintage smut in her naughty tale “The Secret History of Lust”.

Xan West’s “Lucky” may be the most extreme story in the book, in which a submissive femme glories in being used by her butch mistress and her many perverse friends. 

He slipped into my mouth at the same time his boy entered my ass. He held my head still, and they fucked me together. I came, screaming and gagging around his cock as it rammed into my throat. My nipples were pinched, hands stroked my skin. I was covered in sex, dripping with it, on display for all. I joyously thrust back against the cock reaming my ass. I felt so lucky. The orgasm washed over me as it built and built and I began to fly, weightless, soaring on pleasure.

This isn’t the climax of the story – the scene goes on for several equally intense pages. However, this snippet does demonstrate one facet all these stories share. Nearly every  tale ends in satisfaction. Everyone gets off. Everyone has a fabulous time, whether the story features a casual encounter with a stranger, a kinky gang bang, or a tryst with a long-time lover.

I like that. I can appreciate dark erotica, with its conflicts and its ambiguities, but stories like those in this book offer the erotica equivalent of  happily ever after,

Lisabet Sarai
March 2009

Best Women’s Erotic 2009
(Cleis Press, December 2008; ISBN 1573443387)
Available at Amazon.com  / Amazon UK

About the Author: Raw Silk, Incognito, and Ruby's Rules; co-editor, with S.F. Mayfair, of the anthology Sacred Exchange (Blue Moon); and editor of Cream, the Best of the Erotica Readers & Writers Association.
Visit her website, Lisabet Sarai's Fantasy Factory for more information and samples of her writing.
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