The Annex Reviews, May 2000
5/27/00 Jen's Titillating Behavior (DrSpin); Hard Dick High (Name witheld); The Secret Lair (Barbara B); The Seduction of a Desert Prince (Killashandra, Rachael Sabotini, elynross) 5/31/00 Rashid and kira (Viking Boy); Blue Whale of a 'Fish Story' (The Depraved Canuck); Civilized Society, parts 1 and 2 (Joe Camp); Mom's Dirty Dancing (AnjingAnak); Jomadi: _To Explore Potential_ (Pseudonym Jomadi)
5/27/00
Four suburban couples in their thirties are used to meeting regularly
for dinner, drinks, and the occasional partaking of weed. At one such
occasion, when everyone's gotten a bit tipsy, the subject turns to each
wife's wifely attributes: hair, tits, legs, ass. Jen has the tits. When her
husband, the narrator of story, turns in for the night, she decides to
show the other guys just what her demicup contains. The narrator
feigns sleep as she flashes them from the window, but soon she goes
downstairs again, and because this behavior is unusual for her, he
follows. As he watches from outside, he gets more than an eyeful as they
tease out one of her fantasies:
She fell back suddenly, hands free and weight on her heels, her chest
area smeared with their sperm. Her head slumped forward and I thought
she'd lost her balance. It looked as though she been knocked over by the
primitive force of ejaculation. Then I realized. Both her hands were
kneading at the crotch of her jeans and she was in the throes of orgasm.
The narrator, naturally, is stunned. Though he chooses not to call his wife to case, the dynamics of his marriage have changed forever. I liked the story a lot; it seemed realistic of the way feckless couples in their thirties would entertain themselves in well-ordered suburbia. The ending was a letdown however. The happy group breaks up under the strain, as if poor Jen had opened a Pandora's box of adultery, with the narrator having no regrets about it. This I didn't quite buy. The story would have been so much stronger if it had ended right after the incident, with the narrator drawing his conclusions and moving on. But what came before was pretty damn good, and for that I recommend it.
How can you resist a story with a title like this? Hard Dick High is an imaginary place where the girls dress like sluts and cocktease all day long and the boys are kept in perpetual frustration. The author truly used his or her imagination in describing the sluts ("Buxom Tamara Smith arrived in a top hat, black heels, and a nylon see-through body suit. Unconstrained by any bra, her magnificent 38DD knockers were full, firm, and deadly. The gorgeous vixen's sole concession to modesty was a teeny tiny black thong. ") and their language ("Whew! Is it drafty in here or are my holes exposed? Perhaps someone's stiff pipe will plug the gaps") though they sound suspiciously more like Showgirl rejects than high school girls. The young men and the teachers are forbidden to respond to any of this by the school's amazon guards, so they walk around with perpetual hard- ons all day long. But sometimes the sluts just go too far, and for that they're sent to the principal, who fucks them silly and spray-coats them with cum. After that, things *really* get out of hand, with the sluts streaming out into the halls and literally raping any male they encounter. This was more of a porny scenario than a story, and it was very, very silly. The author said in the introduction, "Here's some straight up porn designed to get your dick hard. I won't even pretend that there's much of literary merit here" yet it was so ridiculous, so crass, and so over the top, I just had to give it an A -- it was possibly the sluttiest high school story I've ever read, and I literally grinned right through it, and even broke out into laughter in a few places. I wonder if the author realized how humorous it was, or if it was even intended to be humorous. It had the overdescriptive, deadly earnest tone a lot of stroke stories have, one that usually receives my drubbing. But this time, for some odd reason, everything worked.
Like the writer of this piece, I'm a big fan of libraries. They're the
perfect place to people-watch and the quiet lends itself to building
fantasies about those people, as the narrator of the story does:
In the course of her visit she fantasizes about another man...and her fantasies come to life when he seduces her behind the stacks, and then the first man joins in! This is a type of story I don't review that much, because it's the hardest type to do well: the plotless encounter that is steamy, realistic, AND written well enough to be unique and entertaining. It took a while to get going, and was slightly rough in the beginning, but the sex scenes, which were sweet, passionate, and explicit, made up for it. So for that a hearty recommendation from me, plus I do like the idea of getting it on in a library. It's a secret fantasy I didn't know I'd had.
All right, I admit it. I've got a love/hate relationship with slash. On the one hand I like its audacity and its pink-cheeked, crochet-potholder endorsement of the kinky, the maudlin, the melodramatic. On the other hand, I'm frustrated with its sloppy structure, its repetitive stories, its lack of true imagination. When I came upon this novel-length story I thought "Oh boy!" anticipating a juicy M/M sex slavery tale in a Middle Eastern setting, with lots of hot sex, angsty emotional confessions, and florid language, not to mention D/s and bondage. Well, I got that, but ...there were problems. This was a Highlander fandom story about Duncan (the slave) and Methos (the tribal leader who buys him). It was a whopper -- over 75,000 words, and yet unfinished. I should say here I don't watch Highlander and never have, although I'm familiar with the basic premise of it. Logically, a fan of the show could say "That's why you didn't get the story, dumbass" but in my defense I'll say I've read slash from shows I watch or watched a lot (Star Trek, Gatchaman) shows I watch only occasionally (Xena) and shows I never watch (Buffy) and -- guess what! What makes me enjoy a story is how well and convincingly it is written, not how familiar I am with its predecessor. In other words, a fanfic story stands alone as a work of writing, not an extension of a TV show. Slash writers often seem to dismiss or make excuses for this truth. In fact, they have ready excuses for a lot of authorial shortcomings, which they post both on their websites and in various newsgroups. Many times they purport to want feedback on stories but tell us in big capitals NO FLAMES ALLOWED. Some go as far to say they aren't interesting in learning to become better writers (read: communicators) at all -- they're just doing it for the fun of it, a handy way of escaping the critical glare. So say anything negative about slash fiction, and you're bound to offend someone.
That said, the story began well. Duncan, an Immortal good deed-doing
Scottish warrior, is being sold at a slave auction and Methos, an older,
more cynical Immortal (the "Desert Prince" of the title), buys him. The
Highlander TV show is set in the present day with frequent historical
flashbacks, but this story plays with canon a bit: it is an AU (alternate
universe) depiction of how these two met sometime in 16th century
Morocco or Algeria, after the rise of Islam but before the widespread
dissemination of firearms. I expected, as is common for slash, long,
detailed descriptions of the two falling in love with each other: the slave
overcoming his pride and rebelliousness and learning how to be
properly submissive and love his master, while the master learns how to
see his slave as a human and not a plaything, and open up his heart.
However, the writers fumbled things by having the slave obviously
attracted from the get-go:
Thus punctured the tension a lot, as we already *know* they're going to get together without any real problems, right? Duncan winds up being an oddly narcotized captive. He spends most of his time feeling only slightly embarrassed, as if the authors wanted to honeycoat his predicament. In fact he comes across more as a sincere, logical, cautiously detached female than a sword-swinging warrior. He gets wet a lot (it's precum, but described suspiciously like vaginal wetness) and his abdominal muscles clench when he gets aroused and his belly burns; he feels all-over tinglings rather than organ centered ones. This I don't have problem with; it's a fantasy, and it's slash, and many female readers identify with the male sex objects in the stories. But in the logic of the story, if he's a warrior, and a proud honorable Immortal warrior at that, he should be acting more proudly and aggressively, so we know that's who he is. Methos, on the other hand, is more of a "man," but even he flubs up; as a tribal leader he's supposed to be leading his people through a tense time but instead he paces about and moons excessively over his slave, and one moment he's distant and the next companionable -- very inconsistent. Some of the problems with the romance may have been due to the fact the story has three authors (among them Killashandra, highly regarded in Trek circles), and it may have been written in a round-robin fashion. If so, it's a good job, because the joins were seamless, and the proofreading, as usual for slash, is excellent. But the effect is still that of the characters being used as puppets moved around a game board for the benefit of the writers...which can be seen as a parallel process to the act of watching the shows and projecting the homosexual relationships into them. There's something both endearing and insulting about this; it's like the writers are deliberately playing dumb as to what they're *really* writing and fantasizing about. I've seen this in a lot of slash, and usually, it's part of the fun; but 75,000 words of it was just too much. Again, one could say, "Well, who cares, it's a sexual fantasy about two straight men having a gay relationship." Right, but if its entertainment value is based on romance and gradually growing feelings of love, why not make the process as realistic and believable as you can? That said, I found most of the sex scenes to be pretty steamy and they were written well, though they became repetitive after a while. Oddly, I found the best of the bunch were the most blatantly heterosexual -- one in the beginning, where poor Duncan is mortified to be oiled up by an attractive female slave in preparation for his master's bed; and the other where, having established an uneasy relationship with Methos, he masturbates on the bed for his pleasure. Aside from the organs, he could have been a woman. Actually, the whole thing was almost a female wish fantasy: the relationship does not develop in a linear way, but instead eddies around in little pools, backcurrents, and stagnations, with Duncan as the "female" who is constantly losing control of himself and Methos playing the "man" who is just as passionate but feigns cruelty and detachment because he doesn't want to get hurt for loving too much. But despite the hot sex the story moved very slowly. This was a shame, as the authors had a very nice subplot going with the tribe under threat from another, and the minor characters were well drawn, and the sociocultural bits, while not especially detailed, seemed well-researched and plausible; but this made the romance all the more draggy and tedious. Between Chapters 5 and 18 nothing is advanced in the relationship besides a mild master-slave accommodation and a sort of transcendental soulbonding accomplished through sex. Usually when two people of whatever gender develop a relationship they share fun times together, or talk about what they have in common, or endure/enjoy common experiences; all the emphasis on pure passion, while fun for the authors, is lost on the reader, as it's a well-nigh impossible concept to get across to someone not in the relationship (or not creating it, as the author is.) The story was also not served well by depicting events from both Methos' and Duncan's POVs--it was like the entire story was neatly plotted and stitched and laid out in advance so you could see it all at once. To be fair, the story shaped up around Chapter 18 when things finally started happening, and the two Immortals began to have conversations and got to know each other, and some real excitement began to gel when Methos considers abandoning his charges and running off with his bed-slave. But those chapters that came before were very hard to get through. So, do I recommend this? Yes, if you are a slash fan and love the show or you want to read some hot M/M sex in the slashy vein. The writing was good and so was the sex. But if you're looking for good novel length D/s erotica, I'll think you'd be frustrated. This is the last slash story I'll review for a while, I promise.
5/31/00
This story, which seems to be the third in a series about the same characters, is set in the perennially popular mythical Middle East (see the 5/27/00 Reviews for particulars) where slaves are fiery yet submissive and Masters harsh, but fair. Rashid is a Greek officer in the Sultan's guard and he returns after a long trip expecting to be rewarded with kira, a slave whom he fancies. He gets her after a few minor problems, and the rest of the story is devoted to whipping and all that other good stuff.
This story was a little different than the usual run of the slave mill in
that the author tried to give the language an Arabian Nights feel:
Throughout the story Rashid was Master, He, and His to denote his status, while kira was uncapitilized, to denote hers. While fairly common in D/s slave role-playing circles, in a story it annoys me. I can see how a story told from a slave's point of view might deify the Master and grant him the almighty capital 'M', but this one story wasn't told from any particular POV, so therefore, why?
The Depraved Canuck seems to be a new writer on the scene intent on
taking up the M1ke Hunt gauntlet of fast-talking, humorous, in-and-out
heterosex, but with pedo and pregger leanings. Twelve year-old Angela
Collins has been knocked up by a blue whale while trying to liberate it
from the local aquarium in a "Free Willy" type scenario, and the
narrator of the story gives us the dirt on it as a roving reporter for
"Action News Team" which lets him simultaneously write the story and
leeringly comment on it (here he's throwing the girl's halting
statements back to her):
Ooooo-kay. It's an interesting way to tell a story, but frankly it was wasted on a plot like this. Granted, he says it wasn't his idea, but the story was still idiotic and insulting rather than humorous, and retro in an R. Crumb way...I could almost imagine seeing it in one of my brother's old National Lampoons. Of course, it *is* humor and not intended to be taken seriously, but successful humor depends on how real and plausible you can make an otherwise outlandish event, and this story hardly tried at all...the mechanics of whale mating, for example, will ring false to anyone who's had even a passing acquaintance with the Discovery channel (the kid gets sucked into the female whale's vagina and everything.) And outside of a gene-splicer, there's no way a human female could get pregnant by a whale anyway. So I didn't find the story very funny, and in fact, when I finished reading it, I was very sorry I had, and felt kinda PO'd. But then I'm a female, and being forced to birth a 200-pound whale calf is something I'd rather not think about at *all.*
This story handles underage sex more respectfully. First in a series, it
sets up the existence of "Civilized Society," a sort of secret ruling
subculture with roots in the distant past. (Think Masonry.) Members of
the society are uplifted without being snootish about it, and have long
been major powerholders in business and politics. The twist comes with
how they maintain their moral purity, so to speak. Underage sex is
frowned upon, but only between males and females. Both young girls
and young boys are paired with same-sex adult mentors from about 8
onwards whose job is it to guide them into being adults, and that
includes sexually. This concept is introduced with the introduction
ceremony of Peter, a young teenager, to his mentor David:
"Yes." I responded,
"Do you promise to continue training him in the ways of the Civilized
Society? To instruct him in the true history of the world? To love and
protect him into adulthood?"
"I do." I responded.
"Peter Morgan, is it your wish to be adopted by David Knight as his
Student and for him to become your Guide?"
"It is." Peter informed the gathering in his clear voice.
"Do you promise to diligently study and follow the ways of the Civilized
Society? To love and honor David until adulthood?"
"I do." he responded in a voice as clear as a bell.
"Citizens and young members, it is my honor to now enter the name of
Peter Morgan into the book as a full citizen under the protection of
David Knight. His name will be sent to all the Guardians of the Truth in
the world, to be entered into their books as a citizen of the Civilized
Society."
The plot is obviously a boy-love one, but the theme was handled evenly and without exploitation, and may have been a kind of wish-fulfillment on the part of the writer. The setup was almost science fiction in its thoroughness, and I'm betting as the series continues, political thriller elements will pop up as well. For that I recommend it.
This story was one of those first-person "This really happened" ones. A
young man comes home from work to find alkie Mom in her Chinese
silk pajamas waiting up for him. They're both a bit on the white-trash
side (in the story, it's played for fun) and when son asks Mom's advice
on being on exotic male dancer, she shows him how it's done:
"How's this, Mr. Critic?" she said.
"Wow!" was all I could think to say, but it must have been the right
response because Mom smiled from ear to ear, then turned around and
bent over, tossing her long hair back and forth to the beat. The cotton
fabric strained against her pussy and I could see that her lips were
large and swelling just like my cock. She obviously enjoyed putting on
a show. The setup was outrageous, but as the story progressed it became more and more believable, until both son and Ma were doin' the dirty on the living room floor, and yes, it was pretty hot. Kudos to the author for the plentiful and realistic detail; with a plot and traditional story structure, this could have been A+ material.
A teenage boy entraps a near-middle age female through a kinky internet chat room. When she goes to meet him in person, he kidnaps her and tapes her to a chair in his basement, intending to enact some Master-slave BDSM fantasies, without her consent. That's how the story starts, and after some menacing talk and preliminaries, the teen and his friend start in with the clothespins and forced "yes Sir's" from Ms. Wet, as they have renamed their victim. This story tried really hard to be dark cautionary tale--a woman goes too far with her fantasies, and gets caught for it--but it wound up being mean-spirited and overdone. The teens act more like suave juvenile clones from "American Psycho" than real high school boys who would snicker and use slang, which would have upped the story's anxiety factor considerably: how could real teens do something like this? But instead things proceed as in any other nonconsensual BDSM tale: the dom always knows the right thing to say, the victim always comes against her will. As a story it was acceptable, but missed the mark on adding a new and truly scary twist.
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