Noteworthy Erotic Novels

The novels listed on this page will appeal to men and women who enjoy erotic fiction. The list includes underground classics from the 19th century (Man With a Maid) and modern novels destine to become enduring favorites and possible future classics (The Story of O). Titles range from hardcore bondage, spanking and contemporary swinging, to passionate love stories and all the lusty varieties in-between.

Looking for exceptional retro entertainment? We recommend:

• VCX, Home of the Classics - The premier source for the Golden Age of Porn
• Michelle7-Erotica - No high tech stuff, just spectacular sex art photography
• Hands On Orgasms - What could be more retro than good old fashion masturbation!

Masterpieces of Victorian Erotica by Major LaCaritilie (Editor)
Magic Carpet Books, May 2007; ISBN-10: 0977431169

There is no shortage of great works to compete for the title “masterpiece of Victorian erotica.” Indeed, as readers familiar with Dickens or Trollope can attest, the Victorians were nothing if not prolific. Yet to be a masterpiece, a work has to distinguish itself in many ways. It can be without equal in its subgenre or the apotheosis of its tradition. It can offer a deeper insight, a more vivid image, or a more surprising turn. Or it can be unique, truly peerless in its style, plot or execution. Having distinguished themselves in these ways, the works in this volume represent the very best of the Victorian erotic imagination. There’s poetry and prose, narrative and instructional guide; there’s fetish, queer, s-m, and vanilla; and there’s bawdy, tender and daring.

For the newcomer to the Victorian erotic universe, these stories are the place to start. For the connoisseur, this collection offers undiscovered delicacies. For everyone, these stories cannot fail to arouse, stimulate and amaze with their delightful sexiness and bold originality.
Available at: Amazon | Amazon UK

I Came Up Stairs: A Victorian Courtesan's Memoirs, 1867 to 1871 by MC Halliday
Eternal Press, March 2010; ISBN-10: 1770650504

Led from filth and poverty by a gentleman in the hopes of gaining coin for his purse, Mae is shaped into a lady and tutored in the arts of pleasure. With raw sensuality, she creates a seductive dance that entices the peerage in puritanical England, and she quickly becomes favored courtesan to Prince of Wales. Her renown and riches ever rising, she continues to romp with gamely men and women of both the nobility and the lower classes. Eventually, Mae's bohemian ways cause suffering for those she loves and her own heartbreak. Must she conform to Victorian mores, or can she remain true to her sensual desires? These intimate memoirs reveal a young woman's journey from the slums of Whitechapel to celebrated dancer of the Victorian music hall, and courtesan to the highest peers of the British realm. From the years 1867 to 1871, Mae recounts her varied lovers and false loves, and her heartbreaking losses in a quest for happiness.

"For lovers of literary erotica and historical fiction, this book is a treat. " — Jean Roberta, ERWA review April 2010
Available at Amazon

The Pearl by Anonymous
HarperCollins UK (February 2010); ISBN-10: 0007300387

Follow the story of Beatrice in Volume One, Lady Pokingham, where sordid adventures in the sexual underworld are commonplace, and virginal fantasies, flagellation, and Catholic guilt manifest themselves as streams of erotic poetry. In Volume Two, La Rose d'Amour, a young man is influenced by his lusty young cousins, who invite him to join an illicit club of debauchery and brandy-saturated orgies, where pearl necklaces and see-through negligees are the only dress codes required.

About the Author: These stories are taken from The Pearl (A Magazine of Facetiae and Voluptuous Reading), which was published between 1879 and 1880, and which across its 18-issue lifetime reveled unashamedly in its reputation for salubrious gossip from the upper echelons of society.
Available at: Amazon | Barnes & Noble

The Way of a Man with a Maid by Anonymous
HarperCollins UK (December 2009); ISBN-10: 0007300395

Jack has built a special place called the Snuggery in a padded room of an old lunatic asylum. Filled with ropes, cushions, straps, and feathers, he chooses Alice to complete the decoration. Imprisoned against her will, she is teased into submission. And in moments of passion, when Jack names her his "wife," Alice finally surrenders her maidenhead, submitting to the power of his unbridled lust. This is a foray into pleasure, pain, lesbianism, and etiquette—told from the viewpoint of a quintessential Edwardian gent. Having first appeared in Parisian journals around the turn of the century, it is widely acknowledged to be a defining example of the erotic genre, and reveals the dark underbelly of human sexuality.

About the Author: Mysteriously, for such a classic book, the initial publication date is still unknown, and the author remains anonymous.
Available at: Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Justine by Marquis de Sade
HarperCollins (January 2010); ISBN-10: 0007300441

In a Parisian tavern the Countess de Lorsange reveals her history to a young woman named Therese—a story in which a young girl and her sister fight a battle of morality. Set in a period before the French Revolution, Justine shows the battle of virtue versus vice, where earning your keep takes on fresh connotations, and a titled lady holds a lifetime of illicit secrets. De Sade's first novella, this book was written in 1787 while he was imprisoned for two weeks in the Bastille. Although published anonymously, de Sade was eventually indicted for blasphemy and obscenity (without trial) for its authorship at the behest of Napoleon Bonaparte.

About the Author: The Marquis de Sade was a French aristocrat, revolutionary, and writer of violent pornography. Incarcerated for 32 years of his life in both prisons and asylums, he is famed for his graphic depiction of cruelty within classic titles such as Crimes of Love and One Hundred Days of Sodom.
Available at: Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Fanny Hill by John Cleland
HarperCollins UK (November 2009); ISBN-10: 0007300417

Fanny Hill is a blushing country maiden until tragic circumstances force her to seek a new life in London. She is taken in by the motherly Mrs. Brown, but on her first night she receives a rather unorthodox welcome from one of the young ladies in the house—and swiftly gains a much more explicit idea of what is expected in her new role. Fanny takes to carnal pleasures with gusto, and she vividly recalls each lusty encounter and every thrusting conquest, in her saucy, voyeuristic, and thoroughly irresistible memoirs. Scandalizing thousands of Victorians with its vivid descriptions of sexual pleasure, this book landed its author in court a year after publication on charges of "corrupting the King's subjects." This only heightened its allure—and today it is still hugely appreciated as a work of true erotic and literary merit.

About the Author: John Cleland wrote Fanny Hill, also known as Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure, in two installments while serving time in prison for debt. In 1749, he was arrested for obscenity, yet denied responsibility for the novel. The book was not officially published again for 100 years. However, it continued to sell well and was published in pirate editions.
Available at: Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Venus in India by Charles Devereaux
HarperCollins UK (November 2009); ISBN-10: 0007300425

Captain Devereux is posted to India, far away from his beautiful young wife and child, and at first is devastated at the parting. But when he comes across Lizzie Wilson, the wife of one of his fellow officers, her ample bosom and open thighs prove more than enough consolation. And when her husband objects to their dalliances, no matter—for the regiment Colonel's three young daughters, Fanny, Amy, and Mabel, are more than eager to be initiated into the ways of adult love!Set in colonial Hindustan, each sinuous line in this tale provides proof that tropical heat and erotic lust are perfect bedfellows. Also known as Love Adventures in Hindustan, this story was originally published in Amsterdam in 1889.

About the Author: Captain Charles Devereux is a pseudonym, and is thought most likely to be that of Major Crommelin Henry Ricketts.
Available at: Amazon | Barnes & Noble

The Autobiography of a Flea by Stanislas de Rhodes
HarperCollins UK (October 1, 2009); ISBN-10: 000730045X

A young maiden, Bella, and her boyfriend Charlie consummate their passion under the moonlight, shrouded in petticoats. Little do they know that someone has been watching them—a priest who blackmails Bella over the sight he has witnessed, enslaving her into a world of sexual subservience. This story is narrated by the smallest voyeur of them all, who uses his size to avenge Bella's misfortune, revealing the sordid details of a priest's inner sanctum.

Initially published in 1887, this book inspired a film directed by one of the first female pornographic directors from the 1970s. Starring the inimitable John Holmes, it is recognized as a classic example of the X-rated genre.

The Autobiography of a Flea was first published anonymously—but was later revealed to be by the London lawyer, Stanislas de Rhodes.
Available at: Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Sadopaideia by Anonymous
HarperCollins UK (October 1, 2008); ISBN-10: 0007300379

Cecil Prendergast has a problem. He has been selected by Muriel Harcourt and her maid as the third dimension in their relationship. The "problem" is that Muriel likes to beat Cecil's backside with a bamboo cane. Before long, a new master emerges—and Cecil finally asserts his dominance. Through disciplinary scenes, he wages a war of retribution via stinging pleasure and mutual consent—and punishes Muriel, her maid, and Muriel's two nieces in turn.

Here is a shocking, explicit, classic tale of sadomasochism at the heart of English high society. Set in London and the Dorset coast, in an era of English history where corporal punishment was freely dispensed, the characters represent the core principles of disobedience, chastisement, and compliance.

Sadopaideia was originally published in 1907, in Paris, within two volumes. The author remains anonymous.
Available at: Amazon | Barnes & Noble

My Secret Life by Walter
HarperCollins UK (September 1, 2009); ISBN-10: 0007300476

Only six copies were initially printed in 1888. Attempts to republish the book resulted in the novel being repeatedly banned. This is a dark work of Victorian erotica, and an explicit memoir of unspoken desires in the English class system—encapsulating the joy of hidden sins in an age of moral fervor.

Welcome to the secret world of Walter, a diary of one man's obsession with the opposite sex. A champagne-drinking Victorian traveler, Walter is lascivious, obnoxious, and possessed of an insatiable sexual appetite. Through a bawdy catalog of indecent scenarios with maids, widows, and wenches, he solicits an indulgent exploration of the flesh. His obsessions, fantasies, and voyeuristic tendencies are explored and revealed within this diary—one of the most famous examples of Victorian erotic literature from the decadent era.

Claiming to have slept with 1,200 women from 27 countries (including every one in Europe), Walter is often referred to as the "English Casanova"—although the author's true identity still remains a mystery.
Available at: Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Venus in Furs by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
Virgin Nexus (December 9, 2008); ISBN-10: 0007300468

First published in 1870, the author defined—and unwittingly gave his own name to—that sexual proclivity we know as masochism in this understated, charged erotic classic.

Severin is a young Galician nobleman with a secret; he can only love a woman with a ruthless heart, who will rain her whip upon him in a shower of bloody kisses. When he meets Wanda, the wealthy and beautiful widow living in the apartment upstairs, he wonders if she might be the one to help him realize his darkest desires. But Wanda is better than she ever dreamed possible at domination—and soon Severin realizes he is powerless to escape what he has begun. Here, fantasy and reality writhe together in a ceaseless, fraught embrace.

Leopold Von Sacher-Masoch was an Austrian writer of fiction and short stories whose masterpiece inspired a famous song of the same name by The Velvet Underground, and continues to be referred to as a defining work within the realm of erotic literature.
Available at: Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Sleeping Beauty Novels by A. N. Roquelaure (aka Anne Rice)
New American Library; Boxed edition ISBN: 0452156610

A beautifully designed boxed set of erotica by the bestselling author. Rice's enormously successful "Beauty" books are based very loosely on the Sleeping Beauty tale, and explore just about every sexually explicit fantasy imaginable. "Articulate, baroque, and fashionably pornographic". —Playboy.

The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty:  Anne Rice writing as A. N. Roquelaure. In the traditional folk tale "Sleeping Beauty," the spell cast upon the lovely young princess and everyone in her castle can only be broken by the kiss of a Prince. Anne Rice's retelling of the Beauty story probes the unspoken implications of this lush, suggestive tale by exploring its undeniable connection to sexual desire.

Beauty's Punishment:  This sequel to The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty, the first of Anne Rice's elegantly written volumes of erotica, continues her explicit, teasing exploration of the psychology of human desire. Beauty, having indulged in a secret and forbidden infatuation with the rebellious slave Prince Tristan, is sent away from the Satyricon-like world of the castle. Once again Rice's fabulous tale of pleasure and pain dares to explore the most primal and well-hidden desires of the human heart.

Beauty's Release:  In the final volume of Anne Rice's deliciously tantalizing erotic trilogy, Beauty's adventures on the dark side of sexuality make her the bound captive of an Eastern Sultan and a prisoner in the exotic confines of the harem. In Beauty's Release, Anne Rice makes the forbidden side of passion a doorway into the hidden regions of the psyche and the heart.
Available at: Amazon | Barnes & Noble

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