Celestial Reviews 153 - January 29, 1997

Note:  Good news!  Mark Aster is back.  He says he has a new backlog and 
should post a story a week for a month or so.  In addition, he is 
reposting some of his best stories. 

In addition, I have discovered that there are some stories by Mary Anne 
Mohanraj that I have not yet reviewed.  I'll review one or two each 
week, and she'll repost them when my reviews appear.

And finally, it looks like Mat Twassel has gone on a bit of a writing 
binge.  He also is reposting some of his old stories.

What all three of these authors have in common is that while their 
stories are often extremely erotic, they are also just plain good 
stories in their own right.  I hope you enjoy both the reviews and the 
stories.

- Celeste

      "Heather Investigates" by Unknown Author (sex for science)
            9, 9, 10
      "Out in the Woods" by William Bloom (outdoor sex) 8, 7, 8
      "Sailor Moon - Anniversary" by nomad (Japanese cartoon
            pastiche) 9, 8, 4
      "The Coaches Wife" by Taylor Norton (boy fucks woman)
            4, 5, 5
      "The Conquest" by Mystery Girl (late-night rendezvous)
            9.5, 10, 10
      "Clean White Linen" by Mark Aster (exotic romance) 10, 9, 9
      "The Devouring Night" by Mary Anne A. Mohanraj (exotic
            romance) 10, 10, 10
      "Wineskin" by Mat Twassel (surrealistic sex) 10, 10, 9
      "Snowed In" by Dulcinea (really cool sex) 10, 10, 10
      "Hazy Shade of Winter" by Hawkeye (youthful romance)
            10, 10, 10
      "One Lucky Girl" by Ed Richards (romance) 9, 8, 8

"Heather Investigates" by Unknown Author (MCG@bartra.demon.co.uk). 
Heather is very attractive, so attractive that she has always been 
getting more than her share of attention from men, ever since she was 15 
years old. She is now 29, and the years have only added to her physical 
splendor. She'd rather buy shoes, she has told herself many times, than 
get laid.  But not today.  Today she is taking part in an experiment - 
actually a study, but she calls it an experiment.  It's a study to 
determine the intensity and duration of female orgasms. The study is not 
that bad a deal, unless a girl objects to being blindfolded and gently 
bound while hungry hands, mouths, and cocks stimulate her to sexual 
rapture. Eventually our blindfolded beauty has a cock in her pussy, 
another in her anus, and the head researcher <g> in her mouth, while she 
jerks off two young lab assistants. And then Mary goes to work on her 
breasts.  Anything for science!

"Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeehhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!" says Heather, as 
she registers an 11-minute orgasm. Two more minutes and she would have 
set the record.  Better luck tomorrow!

Ratings for "Heather Investigates"
Athena (technical quality): 9
Venus (plot & character): 9
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
 
"Out in the Woods" by William Bloom (Red Dragon Repost).  On senior 
ditch day, the kids head for the park.  Billy's ex-girlfriend Alice asks 
him to follow along behind her friend Ellen to make sure nothing happens 
to her.  He watches, and eventually Ellen takes a swim and then 
sunbathes in the nude.  Then "something" happens to her, and April joins 
in the fun with Billy and Ellen.

One of the mistakes this author makes is convoluted verb tense.  For 
example, at the very beginning of the story the narrator says, " I think 
it was because she (April) has this prudish hang-up about only having 
sex in the missionary position."  At the time he's telling the story - 
after the orgy in the woods - he knows that April has no such hangup.  
He should have said, " I THOUGHT it was because she had this prudish 
hang-up about only having sex in the missionary position."  Problems 
like this are annoying, but it's still a sexy story.

Ratings for "Out in the Woods"
Athena (technical quality): 8
Venus (plot & character): 7
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 8
 
"Sailor Moon - Anniversary" by nomad (nomad@cyberverse.com).  My 
understanding is that the "Sailor Moon" stories are based on the 
Japanese cartoon Sailor Moon.  I am not familiar with the cartoon 
series, but I was told that there is enough information about the series 
within the text to make it intelligible to a reader who is unfamiliar 
with the series.  Despite the fact that the show is concerned with the 
adventures of fourteen year old girls, the present story takes place 
several years later, after the characters have matured sexually.

As I understand it, the Sailor Scouts possess mystical powers that 
enable them to exercise unusual control over their bodies.  I assume 
there are other stories in which Sailor Moon and her friends engage in 
ordinary, non-sexual activities. Therefore, Sailor Moon fans will 
perhaps find this pastiche to be interesting because it applies the 
familiar characteristics of these girls to sexual settings.  

As an outsider, however, I found the story to be vaguely interesting but 
generally boring.  Little aspects of magic that I didn't care about kept 
popping up.  For a fan these aspects might make the story really 
interesting, but they simply drove me to distraction - largely because I 
could not decide whether each episode was supposed to be funny or 
romantic or whatever.

Ratings for "Sailor Moon - Anniversary"
Athena (technical quality): 9
Venus (plot & character): 8
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 4
 
"The Coaches Wife" by Taylor Norton (jocon@tiac.net).  Bill has been the 
hero in the Big Game; but instead of celebrating with the guys by gang-
banging Tina the cheerleader, he has a rendezvous with the coach's wife.  
It seems that Bill's parents are moving out of the district, and the 
coach has asked his wife to keep the kid happy so that he'll be willing 
to move in with them and stay in the district, so that they'll have 
another good basketball season.

I become suspicious when an author misspells the title of a story, and 
in this case my misgivings were verified.  The grammar is extremely 
confusing.  In this case, the incoherence of the grammar really does 
detract from the overall quality of the story.  I reviewed another story 
("A Night Out") by this author, and that one was far, far better than 
this one.  I hope this author gets back on track.

Ratings for "The Coaches Wife"
Athena (technical quality): 4
Venus (plot & character): 5
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 5
 
"The Conquest" by Mystery Girl (mystery@sentex.net).  One of the joys of 
reviewing these stories is finding a new author who writes exceptionally 
well.  This story is marred by some minor grammatical errors, but 
overall it is an extremely well-written story.

Alexis is one of those 16-year-olds whom nobody notices. Her personality 
and lifestyle seem so unremarkable that not even her family members 
wonder what is going on behind those greenish-hazel eyes of hers.  In 
Part 1 we discover that she is very much in touch with her own 
sexuality, and in Part 2 we discover that she often takes part in sexual 
adventures that nobody else knows about.  The description of her 
rendezvous with her cyberlover is a real turn-on.

This is one of those fantasies that might be really stupid in real life 
(especially for a 16-year-old), but exploitation and abuse can be absent 
in the imaginary world of this newsgroup.  I certainly hope this author 
has more stories to offer!

Ratings for "The Conquest"
Athena (technical quality): 9.5
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
 
"Clean White Linen" by Mark Aster (MyFrThAl@aol.com).  This story, set 
at a home or hotel on an African coast, describes part of a romance 
between a beautiful young woman and a much older man.  The story is both 
erotic and exotic, but I needed a few more clues to give me a clear 
picture of what was happening.  It's good to see this author posting 
again, and I look forward to seeing more of his stories.

Ratings for "Clean White Linen"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 9
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 9
 
"The Devouring Night" by Mary Anne A. Mohanraj (mohanraj@mills.edu). 
Princess Sharmila is to be married to Gamilah, twelfth prince of that  
name, lord of the richest province in all of the country of Ranek, which 
seems to be located in the area of the Indian subcontinent.  She's not 
excited about the prospect, but she will do what is in the best interest 
of her country.  In fact, she feels a stronger attraction to the poet 
who sings her praises at the banquet on her wedding night than to the 
prince to whom she is betrothed.

This story certainly is about sex, but it is not exactly wet-dream or 
masturbation material. Telling you any more of this story would ruin it 
for you, and so I will summarize no further.  I'll simply say that this 
story is both simple and shocking.

Ratings for "The Devouring Night"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
 
"Wineskin" by Mat Twassel (mmtwassel@aol.com).  The narrator and her 
husband are invited for an evening at the house of his new boss and his 
much younger wife.  The wife invites the narrator to go shopping with 
her, and either the wife has a kinky approach to sex or the narrator has 
a bizarre imagination - or perhaps both.  Reality blends so closely with 
fantasy in this story that it's difficult to tell what is really 
happening; but the author intended it that way.  This is a confusing but 
interesting story.

Ratings for "Wineskin"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 9
 
"Snowed In" by Dulcinea (ImDulcinea@aol.com).  "The sun that brief 
December day/ Rose cheerless over hills of gray...." Had John Greenleaf 
Whittier simply co-authored his poem with Dulcinea, it would certainly 
be a lot easier to get teenagers to read "Snow-Bound."  I don't see the 
problem: fuck rhymes with duck, cunt with hunt, and precum with become.  
Whittier goes on for 759 lines; the folks that populate his poem spend 
over a week cooped up in a house, and the raunchiest thing they do is 
read a novel that they have to "hide from younger eyes."

Like many of Dulcinea's stories, this one celebrates the simple joys of 
two people sharing their love and their bodies.  In real life, you have 
perhaps noticed that teachers often marry other teachers.  That's 
because they can share their snow days together.  Would I kid you about 
a thing like that?

Q.  What's the definition of a "coolie"?
A.  A quickie in the snow.

Ratings for "Snowed In"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
 
"Hazy Shade of Winter" by Hawkeye.  This story must have been around for 
a while; it's a repost from the THC archive and has a 1993 copyright, 
but I have never seen any stories by this author before.  This story 
read like a short version of a Dirty Dawg story.  I mean that as a very 
real compliment.

Sam was attracted to Lisa when she flipped into his life; that is, he 
thought she was beautiful because of the cute way she flipped her hair 
out of her eyes.  They became close friends as they worked together, 
mopping rancid beer and sharing other intimacies.  However, since she 
was already committed to another boyfriend, he loved her from afar.  
Well, you can guess where this is going, and you'll probably be right; 
but you should read this excellent story anyway.

Ratings for "Hazy Shade of Winter"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
 
"One Lucky Girl" by Ed Richards (gnbc@alpha.wcoil.com).  Pat has led an 
uneventful life, reading alt.sex.stories and posting erotic drawings on 
a binaries newsgroup.  Chuck has led a similarly uneventful but more 
affluent life.  They meet on an Internet chat group, and he invites her 
to accompany him in his motorhome to the Montana area.  To Pat's 
surprise, their hormones click; and they copulate enthusiastically as 
they travel across the country.

This is a romantic story with good sexual scenes.  If the author wants 
to improve it, he should stop being quite so concerned about telling a 
"true" story and improve the focus on interesting details.  Often, the 
author seems to be summarizing details rather than telling an 
interesting story.  Authors often swear that a story is true, and they 
think that's important; but most readers enjoy realistic stories more 
than true stories.  Specifically, I would suggest that this author check 
out some of the great stories by SueNH or Ann Douglas and see what he 
can learn from their styles.  On the other hand, this is already a 
pretty good story.

Ratings for "One Lucky Girl"
Athena (technical quality): 9
Venus (plot & character): 8
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 8
 
