Celestial Reviews 21 - Sept 20, 1995

Note:  I recently received a note from a potential author who was not a 
native speaker of English.  He asked me if I would be willing to clean 
up his English grammar.  I don't have time to do this myself; but it 
occurred to me that there may be others out there who could do this.  
If you are willing and interested, let me know.  (All I am offering to 
do is this: when an author contacts me, I'll send you - the helper - 
the author's e-mail address.  The helper and author can then decide how 
to work together.)  I suppose similar assistance could be extended to 
native English speakers who would like to have someone look over their 
work before they post it.  Let me know if you are interested in helping 
other writers in this way.

Second Note:  If authors wish to do so, they have my permission to post 
my reviews at the same time they repost their stories.  This could be a 
useful service to readers.  They can do this by pasting my review of 
their story (not other stories in the same review) into a separate 
message, and adding this brief tag:  "This review is taken from 
Celestial Reviews by Celeste (Celeste801@aol.com).  The review was 
written independently of consultation with the author and does not 
imply collaboration."  At the end of my review, you can add your own 
comments - which might include rebuttals of my criticism or statements 
about how the story has changed in response to the review.  The 
review's title should follow this format [REVIEW: Name of Story].

Third Note: If there's anybody out there who has the capacity to 
archive the Celestial Reviews and make them accessible to the public, I 
would probably be willing to cooperate.

-Celeste

      "Imagine... A First Kiss" by CathcGuilt. (romance with a
            dominant twist) 4 
      "Settling Down" by Dave Schulte (romance & spanking) 5
      "My Sister Jean - Ch 8" by BillyG (flirting & innuendo) 8
      "Spring" by deirdre (hypnotism) 10
      "Older" by deirdre (spanking) 10
      "Trainee Manager" by Unknown Author (torture) 4
      "Soaked in Seattle" by Green Onions (emerging sexuality &
            urination) 10
      "Hottestchat" by Frank Lambert (cybersex fantasy) 8
      "Walk in the Woods" by BinaryEdge (outdoor sex) 7
      "To Serve and Protect" by Sue (sex in the fast lane) 10

"Imagine... A First Kiss" by CathcGuilt (cathcguilt@aol.com).  I lost 
interest halfway through this story.  It was labeled "romance with a 
dominant twist."  As near as I can figure, it's about a guy who thinks 
he is God's gift to womankind building up the tension until he deigns 
to kiss a girl foolish enough to wait.  I think people who are really 
heavily into the dominance scene might like this story a lot more than 
I did.  (Rating: 4)

"Settling Down" by Dave Schulte (schulted@aol.com).  In this story a 
man befriends the younger sister of his closest friend.  Eventually he 
becomes sexually attracted to her and discovers that he is in love with 
her while he is spanking her for stealing money from him.  The 
narrative reads more like a summary than a story.  I would have liked 
more tension, anticipation, or character development - and a good 
proofreading to get rid of annoying errors.  (Rating: 5)

"My Sister Jean - Ch 8" by BillyG (Yosh@loop.Com).  I reviewed two 
early chapters that this author sent me; and then I saw this one in the 
postings.  The protagonists have grown up.  I was afraid they'd be 
having sex with each other by now.  That's where all these 
brother/sister stories seem to go.  But so far what we have here is 
good healthy flirting and sexual innuendo.  In my own life I have ruled 
out sex with my brother.  Period.  This allows me to share thoughts 
with him that I would not feel free to share with a potential sexual 
partner.  My brother and I don't interact the way Billy and Jean do in 
this story; but I enjoy imagining that we do.  I just hope this author 
avoids the fascination with the incest taboo and lets this go on as a 
nice, healthy story about emerging sexuality.  (Rating: 8)

Spring by deirdre (an65862@anon.penet.fi).  This is a story about a 
college girl who learns about hypnotism, and suddenly the people around 
her find themselves doing things that they cannot control.  You know, 
yesterday after I read this story, I spent three hours reading a.s.s. 
stories, when I should have been doing something else.  You don't 
think.... No, hypnotism can't be done across the Internet - or can it?  
Why does deirdre always get such high ratings from me?  Why do I get 
this warm feeling in my.... (Rating: 10)

"Older" by deirdre (an65862@anon.penet.fi). Weird! (Rating: 10)

"Trainee Manager" by Unknown Author.  (I should know this author's 
name, but I lost it through a glitch in my AOL service.)  This story 
describes the sudden changes in the life of a man who thinks he's about 
to be promoted but instead is subjected to a constant barrage of pain 
and humiliation from the boss's daughter.  The story is written in a 
fairly clear manner.  I'm really not sure how to rate this story.  The 
women in the story all seem to feel that it is perfectly natural to 
want to inflict great physical pain on the man for no reason other than 
the fact that he is a man.  The man derives no noticeable pleasure from 
the beatings - he just endures it because he wants to keep his job.  
When I wrote a review of a  D&s story recently, a few readers pointed 
out to me some of the values of pain in a relationship; but I don't see 
how any of them apply here.  When Simon Legree inflicted torture like 
this on slaves simply because they were black, the novel in which this 
occurred (Uncle Tom's Cabin) got people so upset that it practically 
started the American Civil War.  

I honestly do not find it even remotely sexy to think about having a 
guy lick my dirty boot clean.  The author did not present the story in 
such a way as to make this sound sexy to me.  Nor do I understand how 
it is sexy to kick a guy in the groin - a good idea, perhaps, under the 
right circumstances - but hardly sexy.  The beatings were even more 
horrendous; but I guess they could be considered sexy to the extent 
that the guy was naked.  If I were going to take the story seriously at 
all, I suppose I would have to focus on the mental aberration of the 
woman doing the torturing; but there is no character development of her 
at all.  The story seems to suggest that her actions are pretty much 
normal - which contradicts my personal experience.

I *can* understand how a person who has been greatly mistreated by men 
could find this story to be interesting and enjoyable - just as I 
suppose black slaves in America in 1850 would have enjoyed seeing or 
hearing about a slave master or overseer coming to harm.  However, 
there is no suggestion of that kind of motivation here.

As far as I can understand, this is simply a narrative about torture 
without significant motivation.  I don't want to offend people, but I 
think you would have to have fairly serious emotional problems to enjoy 
a story like this.  (Rating: 4)

"Soaked in Seattle" by Green Onions (an209246@anon.penet.fi).  Like 
many of you, I have skipped over "watersport" stories, because I 
figured that was one fetish that doesn't interest me.  On the other 
hand, I feel compelled to read stories when new authors specifically 
ask for a review; and that's why I sat down a half hour ago to start 
reading this story.  I was surprised.  It was really a good story.  

If we're honest, I think that almost all of us can identify a time in 
our lives when we found it be enjoyable - even sexy - to take a leak.  
Many of us can also identify times in our youth when sexual things 
happened to our bodies that we didn't understand.  This author combines 
these two ideas in a reminiscence about his own youth - about a time 
when he confused a nocturnal ejaculation with urination, and thereafter 
began to plan for and take greater enjoyment in the act of relieving 
himself.  The story is not at all weird; it's perfectly natural and 
enjoyable.  (Rating: 10)

"Hottestchat" by Frank Lambert (an383759@anon.penet.fi). This is a very 
short story about a man who stays up late at night, engaging in a hot 
sexual IRC chat with an unknown woman.  He turns the computer off and 
goes up to bed, where he finds the same woman in bed with his wife 
preparing to act-out the three-way fantasy with them.  In the morning 
he wakes up and realizes it was a dream - or was it.  I think we're in 
the Twilight Zone here.  Nice fantasy.  (Rating: 8)

"Walk in the Woods" by BinaryEdge (binaryedge@aol.com).  This is a 
short description of a man and his wife having sex in the woods.  A lot 
of stories claim to be "true" stories, but this one really does have 
the ring of truth to it.  It's exotic enough to be interesting, but 
tame enough that most of us can at least imagine ourselves actually 
doing it if we had a chance.  The relatively low rating is not because 
there's anything wrong with what's here - It's just not an entire 
story.  One more thing: the author mentions using withdrawal as a means 
of birth control.  I feel compelled to repeat my previous warning that 
fucking away and then pulling the penis out right before climax is not 
really an effective means of birth control.  Ask a doctor - this 
practice reduces the likelihood of pregnancy, but not as much as most 
people think.  That precum is just full of hot little sperms.  (Rating: 
7)

"To Serve and Protect" by Sue (SueNH@AOL.com). If you read my review of 
Sue's "Life's a Beach" in CR 20, you may recall that I theorized that 
Sue wrote bad stories before her 8th.  Well, either she has renumbered 
the stories or I was wrong.  This one (her 6th) is one of her best.  
Sue is driving down a highway in Maine, mentally reliving some of her 
recent sexual exploits.  The wind and fresh air have an erotic effect 
on her and her fingers begin to wander.  Eventually a police pulls her 
over because of her erratic (or erotic) driving.  The cop is a perfect 
gentleman, but after he verifies that she's not dangerous and gives her 
a stern lecture, he does public relations work with Sue - if you know 
what I mean!  They don't call those Maine cops Mounties for nothing.  
As Sue herself says, "With a cock this big, what need does he have for 
a night stick! "

This is Sue at her best: an excellent build-up plus detailed and 
graphic descriptions of the actual sexual encounter.  If you want an 
example of excellent punctuation, you should read this story.  
Likewise, if you're studying the impact of Mayan civilization on the 
modern world economy you should read this story.  You won't necessarily 
learn a lot about either punctuation or Mayans, but you'll certainly 
enjoy a good story.  (Rating: 10)

