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"Love Conquers All" by JS3729 (sexual revenge) 5.0
"Love Conquers All" by JS3729 (js3729@mindspring.com). Guest review by Dave Myers. It would fairest to characterize this as a story of sexual revenge. As might be expected, there is more revenge than sex, and to pull this off skillfully, it takes a writer who knows his craft. Alas, the plot offered is probably out of the range of this first-time author. His disclaimer reads: >This is my first story, and let me apologize, in advance to any lesbians >who may read this. I do not mean for this story to demean or ridicule >lesbianism in any way - it just is a part of the whole story and please >treat it as such. A fanatic might draw the conclusion that the author believes lesbians to be man-hating, wife-stealing freaks (ergo the revenge theme). But I suspect JS3729 just didn't think long and hard enough about how all the elements in the story would fit together before he put it in writing. The heavy mixture of bisexuality, gang rapes, transsexuals, and hypnotism is just too much all at once. These aspects create a vivid revenge story, but do not lead to a buildup in sexual tension as the plot progresses. The final burst of energy feels out of place after the initial wandering narrative. I credit JS3729 with handling the main thread well through the use of flashbacks with two or three separate points of view. The characters trade off nicely, building a little suspense. Narrators even finish each others' thoughts when appropriate (but perhaps slightly too often). Unfortunately, sloppiness results in many errors of verb tense. During these sections, the use of colons for quotations (e.g. 'Lynda:') makes me feel like I'm reading a play. In fact, so much of the storytelling is done by characters other than the first person narrator (George) that his inner voice comes up hollow and decidedly non-introspective when he is allowed to emote. Apart from the cardboard cut-out treatment of hypnotism and transsexuals, a few other items of the plot hamper its credibility. As one example, breasts are bared at one point during mixed company for no apparent reason. The results seem so far out of character that the story is weakened. As another example, the devotion that is displayed between two sets of couples after many years of separation (hence the title, Love Conquers All) is hokey. The protagonists need more motivation than they are given here. Rating: 5 |