"Deja Vu" by Ann Douglas (annd@pop.tiac.net). Ann Douglas placed four stories among my Top 100 of 1995. I have been keeping a running list for 1996; and if I had to post that list right now, she'd make it four more times. She'd make it even more often, except that irritating proofreading errors get in the way. In short, she writes very good stories. Let me tell you her secrets to success.

First, she writes stories that contain vivid, realistic portrayals of hot sex. Nearly all the stories on this newsgroup contain sex, and a lot of them contain hot sex. What Ann Douglas does is to write vivid, realistic portrayals of hot sex.

Second, her characters are normal people. Some of them are also typical; but all of them are normal. Although some bible thumpers would disagree, most of the protagonists are basically moral people. Nearly everything that happens in her stories (except maybe in the sci fi and comic book stories) is something that my husband or I have done or could do or at least know somebody else who has done it. These people are not depraved predators, sex-starved sluts, contortionists with 12-inch penises, or generally dysfunctional sex maniacs. I have a soft spot in my heart (as well as somewhere else) for all the people covered in the previous sentence; but readers like myself do like to read about normal people. I get the impression that some people would disagree with me on this point; Ann's characters - they would say - are not normal, because they are lesbians or at least bisexual. I am not a lesbian. I think I could enjoy lesbian or bisexual activity; but I won't, because I have made a life-choice not to. In spite of this, however, Ann's characters make perfect sense to me. A very large number of readers feel this way. We enjoy Ann's stories because her characters act the way we think we would act (or would like to act) in similar situations. Third, Ann embeds her hot, realistic sex and normal characters in plots that are intelligent and well developed. A lot of authors try to do this, and several succeed. What Ann and many of the other successful authors do is integrate the sex with the plot in an effective manner. Some authors who try to develop a plot fail because they spend too much time on details that have no connection with the sex. One of Ann's greatest strengths is that while she is developing details, she is also developing sexual anticipation by describing events and information that give us the feeling that something exciting is going to happen and then later make the sexual activities more interesting when they finally occur.

Ann also uses other techniques effectively. For example, she's a pro at the story-within-a-story technique; and her plots are often set in exotic places or focus on important social issues. But I'm convinced that the three techniques described in the preceding paragraphs are what make this author's stories so consistently good.

There! Now that you know all this, you yourself can compose stories that are every bit as good as those written by this author.

The present story is about Connie D'Angelo and her relationship with her granddaughter and her memories of her own sexual awakening during adolescence in the 1950's. Just read the story! It does an excellent job of implementing the techniques I described earlier in this review.