Two approaches to romancing the curvy girl: Kilby Blades' THE SECRET INGREDIENT and Sierra Simone's MISADVENTURES OF A CURVY GIRL

While attending the conference of the New England Chapter of RWA last month, I overheard a writer complaining about the rise of "curvy girl" romances. Oh, this writer had no problem with romances that feature girls whose bodies do not fit the rail thin catwalk model profile; rather, she was sick of such romances that spent pages and pages focusing on the female protagonist's issues, problems, and phobias about her body size. "There are lots of women out there who are curvy and proud of it; why can't we see more of them in romance?"

I was thinking about this comment while I read two recent novels self-labeled "curvy girl" romances: Sierra Simone's Misadventures of a Curvy Girl and Kilby Blades' The Secret Ingredient (with the marketing-savvy subtitle A Curvy Girl Small Town Culinary Romance). Both novels feature heterosexual women who do not fit into the size 4-6 clothing made for a typical runway model. One book acknowledges that and then moves on without further comment; the other puts its protagonist's struggles to embrace body positivity in the face of a past history of fat policing and shaming front and center.

These two romances may take the exact opposite approach to depicting the curvy girl, but each does so for distinctly feminist reasons.

In Kilby Blades' The Secret Ingredient, celebrity chef Marcella Dawes has fled the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles for the east coast, renting a cottage on the North Carolina shore to work on her latest cookbook between seasons of taping her television show, "Cooking with Marcella." Her neighbor Max Picarelli is even more peripatetic; as a plastic surgeon, he travels the world on the dime of a nonprofit, doing reconstructive surgery for children with cosmetic birth defects. But in his downtime, Max, who has Italian roots just like his new neighbor, loves to cook, and is a secret fan of everything Marcella, whom he thinks of as "chef extraordinaire and goddess of the kitchen" (Kindle Loc 80). As Max describes her, "Marcella was everything a woman should be: all confidence and curves, and a true classic beauty to boot. He had often admired her generous proportions and everything that perfected them—those vibrant eyes, that gentle voice, and her mane of thick, dark hair" (73).

Marcella is a "curvy girl" only if one defines "curvy" as the norm, a point Blades is clear to make early in the story. As Cella thinks when comparing Max to the typical LA man, "Half the men Cella had dated had skin that was softer than hers. They were usually prettier and skinnier, too. At a size twelve, Cella was an average American women. LA was running as short on those was it was on strapping American men" (206). Advertising and media might make women believe that their curves are abnormal, too much, but Cella knows perfectly well that her size is nothing out of the ordinary. (In fact, Cella may be below the current U.S. norm: see this 2016 study).

Cella has no issues with her weight, with her body image, or with feeling desire for, or feeling desirable to, another person. The conflicts her stem from job satisfaction, or dissatisfaction, for both Cella and Max, not from any issues Cella has with her size or weight. Despite the novel's subtitle, the slow-build romance that builds between Max and Cella has nothing to do with Cella's "curviness." The subtitle is a bait-and-switch in the most positive sense, serving up a story of a woman with absolutely no problem with her size to readers using the search term "curvy girl" to find a romance.


Unlike Blades' Cella, Sierra Simone's Ireland Mills, who is white, has struggled with how to think, and feel, about her body for most of her life. Ireland isn't as skinny as a model; nor is she an "average" size twelve. Ireland's 5' 2", and wears a size 18 (Kindle Loc 102). But at the start of Misadventures of a Curvy Girl, Ireland has determined to break free from the negative thoughts about weight that her sister and her ex-boyfriend have spent years instilling in her (A girl of your size really should have shorter hair. Don't you think that's more of a "goal" outfit? But those dance classes aren't designed for people to lose weight... [65]). Fat-shaming framed as benevolence, Ireland has finally realized, is still fat shaming. And Ireland is so over it: "I was over the diets that didn't work. I was over the grueling gym schedule that left no time for fun. I was over hiding behind my friends whenever we took pictures. I was over shopping for print tunics at Blouse Barn" (Loc 81). Ireland's going to dress the way she wants, have fun the way she wants, and eat the way she wants, other people's judgments be damned. And if that means not having a boyfriend, then so be it: "I'd rather be alone than be with someone who will only love me if I'm skinny" (94).

Simone rewards her protagonist for taking this major step towards body positivity with not just one, but two handsome men who find her curves just to their liking. At a photography shoot on a Kansas farm  (Ireland prefers to be behind, rather than in front of, the camera), Ireland meets hunky farmer Caleb, who is immediately smitten: "She better get used to being pampered and taken care of, because I want to make it my life's work. And that's after only an hour together. Christ, I have it bad" (361). But Caleb is a package deal with best friend, bar owner Ben; the two, who have been besties since kindergarten, have discovered they're happiest when they love (and make love with) the same woman, together. Ireland hasn't ever really considered polyamory, but with two such kind, gorgeous, and sexy men, and her own awakened curiosity, she's quickly on board with the kink.

Erotic bliss, however, doesn't preclude emotional difficulties. Especially when Ireland discovers that her commitment to body positivity can't always withstand self-doubts and the voices of shame from her past. It takes some arguing, a break-up or two, and some honest talk by an acquaintance who doesn't buy into the "accept your body and everything will be OK" hype for Ireland to understand that body positivity isn't just about how you feel, but about what you do:

Body positivity doesn't mean you flip a switch and walk around feeling great for the rest of your life. It's not even really about feelings at all. Body positivity is about what you do. It's about daring to live your life as you are—not fifty pounds from now, not six dress sizes from now. And there are going to be days when ever bad feeling comes back for you again. When you feel all the messy, hopeless things you thought you were past feeling. Those are the days you do it anyway" (2456)


Acknowledge a character's "curviness" and move on; highlight a character's curviness and focus on her challenges and triumphs as she works to accept and enjoy her body—both methods work to convey the feminist message that while fat oppression is real, people who understand its methods can challenge the negative biases it demands far too many of us embrace.


Photo sources:
Average size comparisons: Into the Wild
Stop negative talk: Safecity

Kilby Blades

The Secret Ingredient

Luxe Publishing, 2019

Sierra Simone

Misadventures of a Curvy Girl

Waterhouse Press, 2019

A thought-provoking excerpt from Misadventures of a Curvy Girl:


     A couple of years ago, I was watching a movie with a handful of girlfriends as we traded gossip and passed around popcorn and bottles of wine. And we got to the part of the movie where the hero makes his grand gesture, chasing after the heroine and declaring his love for her. Declaring that sh was his.
     The room gave a collective groan at this, popcorn flying at the screen, and someone pronounced how utterly backward and chauvinistic is was and how she'd never be caught dead with a man who looked at her and said mine. A man who looked at her like she was a prize in the machine simply waiting to be claimed. I stayed silent. Because I wasn't going to argue that on a structural level men should act proprietary with women, and I never would. But on a personal level, well...
     It was hard to look at my friend, who was slender and sleek and would no doubt have men wanting her everywhere she went and not think easy for you to say. Her body was the kind of body that people wanted to claim, wanted to stake some kind of sexual ownership of, and mine was not—never had been, and as years of pointless diet torture had taught me, never would be.
     So it was hard not to wish I had the luxury of scoffing at male desire. It was hard to watch those movies and know that, according to them, people like me didn't have heroes chasing after them. People like me are the best friends, the comic relief, maybe even the villain.
     And in real life? In real life, the kind of male attention I received was dangerous and demeaning. Aggressive frat boys who told me I should feel "lucky" to have them fuck me and then got belligerent and nasty when I refused them. Mean men at bars who grabbed and groped and assumed I'd be grateful for the assault since clearly nobody else would ever want to touch my body.
     Girls like me, we didn't get chased, we didn't get claimed, we didn't get the happily ever after. Not in movies. Not in real life.
     And was it such a crime to want those things? (1624)
   

FemDom with a Twist: Tanya Chris' MINE

I'll be the first to admit that I'm no expert when it comes to FemDom romance. But the books in the genre that I have read tend to depict submissive masculinity as heroic, largely in keeping with traditional masculinity: the submissive male demonstrates his strength and power by standing up courageously to the pain his dominant lady love so enjoys dishing out. It's far more rare, at least in my reading experience, for a submissive male hero to be portrayed as enjoying the emotional aspects of submission, of enjoying caring for and serving another, as opposed to glorying in the physical triumph of enduring pain. Which is why I so enjoyed Tanya Chris's latest erotic romance, Mine, a companion volume to My Guys (reviewed last year on RNFF). For its hero, handsome, unassuming, slightly goofy Derek, is someone who yearns for a girlfriend who will tell him what she wants, and who will demand that he give it to her.

Readers of My Guys will remember Derek as the unassuming bi-racial (Norwegian father, Asian mother) rock-climber who was drawn into an affair with an older woman, a woman who was already sleeping with his friend. At the start of Mine, Derek is once again unattached, but is nursing a crush on tall, muscular, white, assertive redhead Amanda, who has recently moved to the area and has become a fixture at Derek's rock-climbing gym. After noticing how turned on Derek gets after she orders him to tie her climbing shoe, Amanda invites herself over to Derek's for dinner. But Amanda's expectations for some fun BDSM times go awry when Derek greets her demand that he kneel in front of her with a innocently humorous "Neil who?"

Amanda's been clear about her own sexual preferences since her teens:

There'd been a girl, a worshipful, adoring girl, who'd followed her from class to class, jumping to fill her every need. One day Amanda had looked at this girl and thought, If she was a guy, I'd fuck her, and her sexuality had clicked into place with a single, solid thunk. (Kindle Loc 356)

And Amanda has also "lived in her own body long enough to know that the media overestimated the uniformity and blandness of the American male's taste. They weren't all looking for women who were fragile or stupid, not even most of them" (319). But even as an experienced Dom, she doesn't quite know what to do with Derek, who appears to enjoy being submissive, but who also doesn't seem to have a clue that being a submissive might be an sexual proclivity, rather than just a response to a particular woman to whom he is attracted. And Derek, nice guy that he is, isn't after a one-night stand; he's longing for someone to call him "Mine" for the long term. Amanda may be experienced when it comes to kink, but not when it comes to romance. She hasn't ever had a romantic relationship, and isn't sure she wants to start one, especially with a guy who is far more comfortable identifying as "submissive to you" rather than "submissive" full stop.

But as Amanda spends more time with Derek at the gym, she's increasingly drawn to the "sweet-faced, pretty-mannered, submissive boy" (579). Which to her mind is a major problem: "The problem was... that she liked Derek. The problem was that she did want to be what Derek wanted. And that was definitely a problem. Because she didn't think she could be what Derek wanted and who she was all at the same time" (839). Amanda assumes that Derek wants a vanilla girl—a bossy vanilla girl, yes, but a vanilla girl all the same.

Derek's so gone on Amanda, though, that he'll try anything, even a little BDSM. But can Amanda truly enjoy herself if her "puppy" isn't taking pleasure in receiving pain, only pleasure in serving her?  Especially after Lissie, Derek's former lover and current friend, insists that she's trampling on Derek's feelings, and pushing him to do something he really doesn't want:

     "He's only doing it because you want him to."
     "Yeah, duh. That's the game, Lissie. That's how we play it." She looked around for Derek.
     "It's not a game to him, Amanda. He's crazy about you, obsessed. He'd do any fucked-up thinking you asked him to, but that doesn't mean he wants to. I see how he looks at you. If you care about him, you won't take advantage of him this way." (2066)

If Derek is only agreeing to submit to her to please here, is it submission at all, Amanda wonders. "What did yes mean if he wasn't capable of telling her no?" (2396). Even if he promises "I won't ever let you do something to me I'll hate you for," can she trust him to tell her when she needs to stop?

There's so much to enjoy in this funny, heartfelt romance: Amanda's brusque self-confidence, and her frustrations with the lingering male privilege of even the most submissive of men; Derek's growing realization about, and acceptance of, his own sexual likes and dislikes ("He'd never wanted to own up to who he was, and so he'd settled for women who were bossy rather than dominating" [2611]); a scene in which Amanda teaches a younger girl how to physically stand up to her pushy older brother at the climbing gym; another when Amanda brings Derek home with her to her "normal" family for Thanksgiving; and the hilarious discussion between Amanda and Derek's mom when she realizes that the small Asian woman may be even kinkier than she is ("Although, you know, your Mom and I were talking about voluntary restraints, and it got me thinking..." [3087]).

And especially the way that Amanda finally figures out how to be sure that Derek's devotion to her is given with full consent, rather than coerced from him by her. A way deliciously reminiscent of the the black moments of many a classic romance.

Another romance for the feminist keeper shelf.


Photo credits:
Redheaded climber: 123RF
Combination lock choker: Le coq sportiv

Tanya Chris

Mine

indie-published, 2018

Loving Your Company, Not in Love with You: Kilby Blades' SNAPDRAGON

Apologies for the lack of posts of late. Rabid Olympics-watching combined with an over-long bout with perimenopausal PMDD brain fog led to an unintended reading and blogging hiatus. But RNFF is back today with a recommendation for an unusual erotic romance, which begins with a woman and a man meeting at the ultimate "meet-cute" site: a friend's wedding.

But the meeting between Darby Christensen 32, a high-powered psychiatrist and research psychopharmacologist, and thirty-one year-old Michael Blaine, an equally career-focused architect, doesn't resemble the usual rom-com meet cute. As the lone unmarried woman among her group of female friends, Darby may be used to the husband and baby talk, but it hardly makes her feel part of the crowd during the reception for the latest one in their group to marry. Especially when her friends' eyes start to glaze over when she tries to talk about what's most important to her: her job. Most of her friends have given up promising careers in favor of being wives and mothers, and spend more time talking about breastfeeding and diapers than they do about pay scales or awful bosses. Darby has no desire to be either a wife or a mother, and when the conversation turns to whether Daniel Tiger or Peppa Pig is better at teaching kids about sibling rivalry, she's so out of there.

On the beach near the hotel where the wedding reception is being held, she runs in to a blue-eyed, dark-skinned handsome stranger, a fellow wedding guest. Michael Blaine, it turns out, is the friend of today's groom, who also happens to be one of Darby's oldest friends. The two escape the "when are you going to find a girl/guy" pressure cooker of the reception by taking a walk together, a walk which includes neither the usual banal chitchat of the newly-met, nor a contrived rom-com excuse to fall into bed together, but instead some open, honest discussion about their friend, their own sexual pasts, and their mutual seventy-hour work weeks, which has made successful dating pretty much impossible. Neither has the time nor the energy to devote to romancing a potential romantic connection, although each is deeply lonely for companionship. As as Michael explains:

"The truth is, I like you. I think you're the kind of girl I'd like to have dinner with and take to social functions. I think we'd  have more good conversation, some fun times, and sizzling hot sex.... But I don't need to start something with you to know how it'll end. Experience has taught me that women are biologically incapable of having unattached relationships. Since I'm too busy for the kind of commitment they want, I go without. I'd rather do that than lead them on." (Kindle Loc 260)

Darby's response challenges both Michael's assumptions and the sexism that underlies them:

"But your broad categorization of women is short-sighted." And borderline sexist. She bit her tongue again. "If you think there aren't plenty of single women who want to stay that way, you are mistaken. My parents' marriage was a disaster, and the idea of emulating that repulses me. Despite all you've heard about biological clocks and maternal instincts, not all women have them. I have a career I love that has me working just as many hours as you do, probably more. The last thing I need is to come home after a hard day to somebody who is biologically incapable of not needing his ego stroked" (267)

Finding someone who is willing to be a companion, a friend, and a sex partner, but who won't be disappointed that he or she isn't the center of a partner's attention—that is the challenge for high-powered career-focused professionals such as Darby and Michael. Michael describes his ideal:

"I want a woman who doesn't confuse me loving her company with me being in love with her. She has to know that whatever we have today may not be there tomorrow, not because I'm heartless or distant or incapable of intimacy—but because right now, I choose my career, and my love isn't in play—only my companionship." (298)

Michael knows that he's going to be promoted to partner some day, a promotion that will likely lead to a transfer far away from the Chicago they both call home. And he has no desire to leave a broken-hearted girlfriend behind. His job must come first, before a girlfriend, before a relationship, before family. Before everything.

A sentiment with which Darby, estranged from her senator-father and equally committed to her patients and her research, entirely agrees. And thus the two find themselves spending the night in bed, not for a one-night-stand, but as an interview of sorts, an interview for the role of mutual part-time sexual partner, dinner companion, and person to hang with in the all-too-rare free hours between work commitments.

"You're hired" is all Darby writes on the note she leaves behind before she takes off the next morning for her scheduled flight back to Chicago. The only terms the two negotiate before they begin their unusual arrangment is that 1. their jobs come first, and 2. when their relationship ends, it will end without drama:

"We promise each other that when it ends, it ends in a single word—whether that be tonight or a year from now. No awkward confrontation. No messy breakup talk. That's the shitty part anyway, right? We agree to keep it fun and simple. And, when it stops being fun, or stops being simple, it's over." 

Rather than a safeword to interrupt unwanted BDSM sex, Darby and Michael agree on a safeword to signal the end of their relationship. That safeword: Snapdragon.

The relationship that develops between Michael and Darby in the months that follow their arrangement proves far from superficial. The two share dinners, attend charity events together, and spend hours and hours in bed having amazingly intense sex. And they also do a lot of talking. About their jobs, about their career goals, about their large and small triumphs. And when they have shitty days at the office, they begin to talk about those, too, which in turn leads to far more personal conversations—about their difficult childhoods, their current privileged lifestyles, the good they want to do in the world. And Michael gradually begins to treat Darby more as a beloved partner than as a casual friend.

But when a colleague's inadvertent comment shows Darby that there's a lot more to Michael than he ever lets her see, Darby's thrown for a major loop. Because "when it came to Darby, Michael knew everything" (3018), but "she only knew parts of Michael, the parts of him he wanted her to see. That the parts of him he wanted her to see were narrower than she'd believed. That there was too much she didn't know about the man who, for all intents and purposes, she was dating" (3013). Should Darby be the first to say "Snapdragon"? Or might Michael be preparing to say it himself?

The arc of most romance novels centered around the "we're not really having a real relationship" trope usually focuses on one or both partners learning to overcome a fear of commitment. Unlike those novels, Blades' romance directly challenges the underlying assumption that not wanting a long-term partner or a child is a psychological problem you'll naturally overcoming when you meet the right person, but might instead be the valid choice of a mature adult.

But also that one's choices, one's priorities, have a funny way of shifting over time . . .


Photo credits:
Beach walk: Rick Tagaki, PopularPhotography
"You're Hired": YouthVillage
Snapdragons: Park Seed

Kilby Blades

Snapdragon

Love Conquers None Book #1

Luxe Press, 2017

The Feminism of Pain? Sarah Taylor Woods' HOLD ME DOWN

Daddy fetish and feminism? If someone told me five years ago that I'd be putting those two ideas in the same sentence, I'd have laughed them out of the room. But since returning to romance reading in the intervening years, my eyes have been opened to a far broader spectrum of human sexual practices that my white middle class upbringing ever even acknowledged. And I've learned that the feminism or lack thereof in any sexual practice depends not just on the practice itself, but on the people who partake of it, and their reasons for so doing. So, daddy fetish and feminism? Sarah Taylor Woods, you've convinced me it's possible.

Woods' debut romance novel, Hold Me Down, is told in the first person by Talia Benson, a junior at the University of South Carolina. Talia's been in therapy ever since her mother found her cutting herself in high school, an emotional reaction, everyone assumed, to the messy divorce her parents just went through, to her father's verbal abuse, and to her boyfriend of three years unceremoniously dumping her. Talia knows that she's emotionally a mess, but her reasons for the cutting are far more complicated. Ever since she can remember, Talia's been fascinated by bondage and pain—wrapping curtain cords around her wrists when she was six; playing as many contact sports as she could as a kid and a teen; masturbating to fantasies of being held down by a faceless man who bites her and hits her when she was twelve; asking her boyfriend to tie her up as a present for a teenaged birthday (which led to the above-mentioned unceremonious dumping).

Woods, through Talia, explains in a way I've rarely seen in a romance novel, why pain is so appealing to a masochist:

    "So what is it? Why do you do it?"
     I shrugged. "Because it feels good."
     "What does that mean, 'It feels good'?"
     "You know how funerals make people horny? It's that. It's affirmation. Like I'm reminding myself I'm here and alive and this is all I've got." (1240)

     "But it's like... you want to do this thing, right? A hard thing. You have to work for it, and it hurts. It takes time and energy and effort. And you get the shit kicked out of you for your efforts—like roller derby, right? and at the end of the day, you see these visible, physical reminders of your ability to take what's thrown at you. To take it and keep going and come out the other side. It almost doesn't matter if you win." (Kindle Loc 1258)


But Talia's fantasies and desires bother her, especially in light of her progressive values:

Never mind that I'd identified as a feminist since I learned the definition of it. I was so invested in determining y own future and making my own decisions and being as good as any man walking down the street—but as soon as I got my clothes off, boss me around, hurt me, threaten me, humiliate me.
     How on earth was I supposed to reconcile that? (2068)


Because of her ambivalence, Talia hasn't engaged in a romantic relationship since high school. And because she's not found anyone at all interested in the same sort of "not normal" desires that she has. Until, at a lunch get-together sponsored by her Archaeology professor, she meets doctoral student Sean Poole:

     Pooley was hot.
     Hot like, Thor moved to Portland and got a job in a logging company hot. Blond hair pulled back into a little knot. Beard. Plaid button-down, solid tie. Flat front chinos, broken-in work books, and—
     Jesus. Legs for days. (135)

Talia finds herself initially tongue-tied by this gorgeous specimen of male pulchritude, but her usual brashness quickly reasserts itself, a combination that catches Sean's attention. And Sean, who always goes for what he wants, immediately asks sassy, mouthy Talia out.

As the two gradually begin to date, it becomes clear that they share a lot more than a love of archeology. Sean's a fairly experienced dominant, a sexual sadist who gets off not just on control, but on marking the bodies of his lovers—biting, bruising, and whipping them. But Sean, who has been taught how to do BDSM safely, recognizes Talia's ambivalence about her own desires, and will not engage in any kinky behavior with her unless she gives her consent first:

     He let me go, and I wanted to slap him. I couldn't stop my hips rolling toward him, pushing back against the door. He reached down and swiped his shirt off the floor. "Someone told me I wasn't allowed to boss her around."
     I gaped at him.
     "And I promised I wouldn't until she asked me to." Grinning, he laid a hand over his heart. "And I am nothing if not a man of my word."
     "Sean."
     "I'd hate to violate your trust." He pulled his shirt back on. "Relationships are based on trust."
     "Oh my God. Sean."
     "Yes, Talia? What is it?"
     I opened my mouth to ask him to boss me around, but for some reason, the words wouldn't form. I couldn't deny I wanted him to. But why? Why this insane urge for him to hurt me and push me around? What would Olly [her psychotherapist] think?
     What would my other think? Where was the independent girl she'd raised?
     Forget all that. What should I think? (1405)

No one's ever suggested to Talia that sexual desires such as hers are "real and normal and attainable" before Sean. And so Talia gradually grows comfortable enough to give her consent, and  the two begin a Dom/sub romantic and sexual relationship, one in which Talia eventually finds herself calling Sean "Daddy" and Sean calling her "little girl." (Given Talia's very real issues with her own domineering father, I had to do some outside reading here to get a handle on why people in Dom/sub relationships might use such language; this article in Broadly helped a lot).

Talia's never been happier in than her unusual romantic relationship with Sean. But Talia's friends and family aren't quite so sanguine. Especially after catching sight of the marks Sean leaves on Talia's body, Talia's roommate and longtime BFF Mallory, her therapist Dr. Oliver, and eventually her mom begin to challenge her belief that her relationship with Sean is a healthy one:

     "But I worry about you," [Mallory] said gently. "I worry that you get so wrapped up in seeking male approval you forget about all the approval the rest of the world is throwing at you.... You know you don't need some human with a penis to make you appreciate how awesome you are. Penises are just really well-irrigated skin tags." (2169-77)


     "I'm not talking about consent," [Dr. Oliver] said. "I don't doubt you're both very interested in what you're doing. That you're both very excited by it. But that doesn't make it healthy. Do you see the difference?"
     I did. God help me, I did.
     "Talk to me," she said. "Tell me what you're feeling."
     "I'm feeling really judged," I said. "And I didn't think that was a thing that was supposed to happen in here."
     "I'm not judging you," she said. "I'm diagnosing you." (3809)


    "How does he talk to you?" [Talia's mother] asked.
     You're not in any position to question me.
     I swallowed. "What do you mean, how does he talk to me?"
     "Does he tell you how to be better? How to do better? Because that's how your father talked to me.
     Wear a skirt.
     I'll tell you when we're done.
     We're going to talk about self-preservation
     Don't drink too much.
     Someone oughta teach you some patience. (4250)

I loved that the narrative didn't just brush off these questions as unimportant, or make out that the people asking them are stupid or uninformed. They all question Talia out of caring, out of worry that her decisions are not wise.

But at the same time, the story, through Sean, offers a counter-narrative:

You are probably the bravest woman I know.... It takes a lot of guts to ask for what you have, and guts to go through with it."
     "Because it's weird?"
     He took a deep, steadying breath, his jaw working under his beard. He said, "No. Because everyone keeps trying to convince you it is, and you want it anyway, bad enough to ask for it. Baby, I need you to know I don't give a fuck about those people and you shouldn't, either. Okay?" (3056)


Talia's not always comfortable buying into Sean's take on her desires. And deep into the story, when up until now her perfect boyfriend makes a huge misstep during their sexual experimentation, Talia's trust in him, and in her own judgment, takes a nosedive.

Where was the line between getting off on someone else's pain and being a fucking monster? Was I rationalizing? Was that something abuse victims did? Justify it with but we're both getting off? Could one-sided violence really be consensual? (2677)

That Woods offers no easy answers to these questions, but ultimately grants her protagonist the freedom to decide for herself what will be her own normal, what best constitutes her own happiness, makes for an unusual, and decidedly feminist, romance.


Photo credits:
Cord around wrist: Claireabellamakes.com
Consent heart: University of Wisconsin-Platteville
Daddy Vanilla card: Etsy

Sara Taylor Woods

Hold Me Down

(Carolina Girls #1)

indie-published, 2017

Feminism with a Kink: Teresa Noelle Roberts' DRIVE and Tamsen Parker's DUE SOUTH

Hearing Teresa Noelle Roberts and Tamsen Parker speak at February's meeting of the New England Chapter of Romance Writers of America on how to use kink to develop a romance arc reminded me that I hadn't read either of their recent releases. And so I spent a few evenings this week most pleasantly entertained by two erotic romances that use kink not only to titillate readers, but also to advance feminist ideals.

Roberts' Drive, the first book in her Cougars, Cars and Kink series, spins a romantic suspense story about a forty five-year-old recent widow who finds herself in the midst of car chases, break-ins, and terrorist plots after she discovers her husband's high-tech business focused not just on the industrial and consumer markets, but on defense work for the government. The suspense plot wasn't what grabbed my interest, though; instead, it was the book's parallel story about a middle aged woman who had once enjoyed walking on the kinky side but who had suppressed those desires for the sake of her marriage. And who rediscovers her pleasure in being sexually submissive with a hot guy fifteen years her junior. So many romances, even erotic ones, take it for granted that the natural heterosexual pair is an older man with a younger woman. The gap between the ages of said heterosexual pair has narrowed over the years, but the rarity of older women paired with younger men in romance indicates that the general principle is still alive and well in the genre.

Suzanne Mayhew had initially been attracted to her husband, Frank, because he seemed in control, an adult while she was still floundering, figuring out her life. But Frank's controlling nature did not extend to the bedroom ("If the world ever needed proof that control freak and Dom are two different traits..." [Kindle Loc 53]). Suzanne was on the verge of getting a divorce when Frank wrapped one of the classic cars he seemed to care about far more than his wife around a tree.

Eight months after Frank's death, Suzanne is finally ready to move on with her life. Part of that moving on includes confiding to her old college friend, Janice, a Domme in Boston's kink community, that Suzanne misses "the spanky side of sex" (19). And Janice, good friend that she is, arranges for one of her Dom friends to go and check out the 1965 Mustang, Frank's favorite classic car, that Suzanne is putting up for sale. That neither Suzanne nor Neil, Janice's thirty-year-old friend, has any idea that they've been set up only adds to the excitement of their flirty meeting.

Suzanne has no hangups about a short term fling with younger guy Neil, and for his part, Neil has a decided preference for older women: "Older women were more confident, as a rule, more in touch with their own sexual needs and less likely to use the submissive role as an excuse to avoid responsibility" (97). But when things start to get really intense really fast, Suzanne ends up backing off. Only when Neil experiences his own personal crisis, after Suzanne's have all been resolved, can Suzanne shrug off her worries about their age difference and realize what she wants for herself, and from Neil.

I'm looking forward to reading future installments of this unusual series, which promise more romance and thrills for other members of Janice's Kinky Cougars support group. Younger men, bring 'em on!

Parker's Due South, the fifth book in her Compass series, features two protagonists who aren't nearly as sure about their sexual desires as Suzanne and Neil are. Lucy Miller, assistant to hard-driving boss India Burke (see books 1 & 2 in the series) and Evans, India's second in command, are about as awkward and deferential as two people can be. As Lucy describes them, "A flutter of 'sorrys' follows because both of us could probably get Canadian or British citizenship based solely on the amount of apologizing we do" (56). Evans has been nursing a crush on Lucy for years, but has never acted on it, not only because fraternization between employees is strictly forbidden by the company handbook, but also because "I can barely speak a sentence to women outside of a work context because I don't want to impose, and I feel the urge to apologize just for existing" (115). As for Lucy, she likes Evans, but has never really thought of him in any romantic, never mind sexual, way. As unlikely a pair of lovers as one is likely to find in romance today.

And it takes something completely unexpected to bring them together: accidentally observing their tough-as-nails boss engaging in BDSM sex with her husband at the office. And taking the submissive, rather than the dominant, role. While watching India's husband hit her with a belt kills Lucy's tiny crush on him, watching the two engage in hot sex turns her on—as does the sight of Evans' own arousal. And as soon as India and her husband leave, Evans' mouth comes crashing down on hers, not in any mild, tentative way, as his affect might suggest, but "demanding, passionate...hungry. Like he wants to devour me" (367). And Lucy isn't at all reluctant to be devoured.

But Evans, being Evans, immediately apologizes for his unacceptable behavior and flees. But the evening has even more embarrassing moments in store for them both until they begin to see a way out of their predicament:

    "What if you... weren't you?"
     He starts, but then it seems as though the sun comes up and shines on his face. "You mean like pretend?"
     "Yeah. Pretend. Like we could still be Lucy and Evans, but braver."
     "Bolder."
     My breath speeds up, and I bite my lip. "Yeah. Sexier." (479)

Even under the guise of pretend, though, Lucy, who grew up in a conservative family, has difficulty bridging the gap between what she wants in her head and actually speaking her desires aloud:

But I can't quite get the words from my brain to my mouth. They keep getting hung up on everything I've been told my whole life. That sex is only appropriate inside the bonds of marriage and I need to set a good example because girls have more self-control than boys." (509).

Lucy knows, now, as an adult, that her family and her church's teachings are misogynistic. But still, it's difficult to keep those teachings, those voices, out of her head. It takes real work, feminist work, to allow herself to believe her desires are not bad, that "it's okay to want sex, to like it, to enjoy my body and be proud that men find me attractive. It's okay to be a sexual creature" (523). But with Evans, someone equally as diffident, ready to combine bold and sexy with shy and awkward, Lucy finds the courage to be an active participant in her own sex life.

But conquering your inner slut-shamer isn't a one-time affair; the old familiar feelings of shame and embarrassment don't disappear overnight. With an awkward, but equally eager partner, though, Lucy can get in a lot of practice reciting her sex-positive mantras and laying down new patterns in her brain. Patterns that say "yes" to pleasure—even if said pleasure includes a touch of kinky exhibitionism—and "no" to misogynistic shame.


Photo credits:
Red Mustang: Mustangattitude.com
Office spies: Metro

Teresa Noelle Roberts

Drive

Cougars, Cars and Kink

Samhain, 2016

Tamsen Parker

Due South

Compass series

indie-published

Bad Boys Finish First? Cara McKenna's DOWNTOWN DEVIL

After a long and often difficult summer, I'm so happy to have the time and emotional oomph now to get back to writing about and reviewing romance. And it only seems fitting to restart the blog with thoughts on the latest from one of RNFF's favorite authors, Cara McKenna. In her edgy, intense romances, McKenna often interrogates the things we take for granted, not just about the romance genre, but about romantic relationships in general, something that I find deeply satisfying on both an intellectual and an emotional level. McKenna continues this trend in her latest erotic novel, Downtown Devil, the second book in her "Sins in the City" ménage series.

Edging closer and closer to her thirtieth birthday has Clare feeling restless, especially after taking a hiatus from sex after breaking with her overly staid boyfriend of three years. Working in a customer service call center certainly doesn't help, especially since Clare would far rather put her degree in Fine Arts to more creative use. But a girl needs to pay the bills, so Clare pursues her photography after hours, no matter how antsy she's feeling.

Clare's latest artistic project is a collection of portraits based on the question "So, What Are You?", a question Clare herself is often asked due to her biracial heritage (father Scotch-Irish, mom African-American). The project takes her typical people-watching to new levels, especially when she catches sight of the new hip barista manning the espresso machine at her favorite coffee shop:

He was at least half-Asian, Clare imagined, judging by his eyes and cheekbones, though his skin was fairly dark and his hair was a bundle of fat brown dreadlocks corralled into a spiky bun high at the back of his head. Black and Asian, she guessed, or maybe Pacific Islander? (7)

After sharing a bit of banter about the offensiveness (or lack thereof) of the question behind Clare's project, hot younger Mica agrees to pose. Clare tells herself not to get excited:

There was something about this guy. Maybe it was just an LA thing, but she sensed a certain lazy quality in him, a hypercasualness. Somebody this hot probably strolled from bed to bed and job to job, the next opportunity rising up before him just in time for his foot to touch down on it. She bet by Thursday he'd have totally forgotten about this chance meeting and have plans, and no clue what she was talking about or who she was when she called to meet up.
     But no way in hell was she not going to try. (14)

Clare does more than try; later that week, she agrees to take her photos of Mica at a party to which he invites her. And, after a successful shoot, Clare's wishes come true as she winds up in Mica's bed. Clare can see from one glance at Mica's room that while "Clare was a nester. Mica was migratory" but since she is after "some fond X-rated memories, but nothing more" (38), Clare isn't worried. And the sex that ensues proves even better than Clare had dreamed: "This is how I want sex to be. A thrilling exchange of power, one lover ordering, yet the other in control" (45). "Life-altering sex" (126) with the sensual bad boy—that's what romance novels are all about, no?

Why, then, is the male point of view that McKenna balances against Clare's not Mica's, but that of Mica's childhood friend and current roommate, Vaughn? Mica, who loves to entice but who tends to slam the door shut whenever anyone starts to expect anything of him, has disappeared by morning, leaving Clare to do the morning-after breakfast and greet with Vaughn. The night before, Clare had immediately pegged Vaughn as the opposite of Mica as soon as she was introduced: "You could sense steadiness and reliability on a person the same way you could sense sheistiness," and Vaughn, an EMT, is as steady as a rock (29).

Though Vaughn is attracted to Clare, he knows that he's not likely to turn her attentions from the far more compelling Mica:

Vaughn had always gravitated toward those bohemian types. Artists and musicians—creative girls, to bring a little spontaneity into his life, since he was Mr. Predictable, Mr. Routine. Though for as long as Mica was staying with him, Vaughn doubted he'd be having much luck in that department. He wasn't blind. He knew his best friend was basically catnip to women. Good-looking, fearless, flirtatious. Vaughn didn't think he was too shabby himself, but his dad had taught him to be a gentleman, and nice guys did finish last, at least when the competition was as charismatic as Mica. (65)

And Vaughn is nothing if not the quintessentially conventional nice guy.

Except, of course, for that one time when he and Mica got drunk on a camping trip, and Mica— No. Vaughn, brought up with the strict code of his father's gentlemanly African-American masculinity, squelches that memory down as quickly as he can. He's straight, after all. And he made Mica promise that nothing like that would happen again before he would agree to let Mica share his apartment for the summer.

But what if intense, sexually compelling Mica can orchestrate a "life-altering" sexual encounter not just between himself and Vaughn, or between himself and Clare, but between the three of them?

Ménage romances often end with all three participants in a group HEA, all equally committed to the others and to their triangulated relationship. But what happens when one partners likes one point of the triangle better than the other? And when one partner doesn't want to get pulled into any type of committed relationship at all? Does it matter how hot the sex is, when you need someone to help you navigate the small indignities and disappointments of everyday life?

Clare grows increasingly aware of, and upset by, Mica's thoughtlessness, even while she finds herself still wildly attracted to the guy. When she talks to Vaughn about her disappointment, Vaughn can certainly sympathize. Mica's thoughtlessness, his best friend well knows, is a big part of the guy's appeal:

Is the graph different, though, for a long-term partner?

"You watch him climb, and it's like his body knows the rock, knows exactly where every hold is, like he's been there a hundred times, even though you know it's the opposite. Everything he does—the way he moves and the way he talks, it's totally thoughtless. It's like. . . It's kind of amazing... But it can also be incredibly irritating.... If you're trying to coordinate flights with Mica, or any other sort of plans, or getting a rent check out of him...  Yeah, I love the guy, but I want to wring his neck on a daily basis" (131).

What Vaughn wants from a friend, though, is far different than what he wants from a girlfriend: "When I get married, I want my wife to be my partner. The one who picks up the slack and covers for me when I mess up, or when things don't go the way I plan them to. I can deal with a flaky best friend, but a flaky partner? Nobody's perfect, but I plan to find myself a grown-ass woman" (132).

What, though, does Clare want? And how will she go about getting it?

The answer proves both surprising, and surprisingly satisfying, acknowledging as it does the need for both stability and spark in any successful committed romantic relationship—whether it features two, or three, partners.

Photo credits:
"Who Are You?": Skidmore Unofficial
EMT logo: Sukirgent
Flaky chart: Buzzfeed

Cara McKenna

Downtown Devil

Intermix, 2016

Finding the Line between Apology and Punishment: Seressia Glass's SUGAR

There's a popular strand in romance fiction that focuses on the apology. Apologies for poor choices, for hurtful actions, for painful words said in the heat of anger or grief; apologies followed by acts of atonement so that the romance sinner to prove his (or occasionally her) worthiness for love. The words "I love you" may be the most repeated ones in all of romance, but the words "I'm sorry" may come a close second.

Some apologies are clearly long overdue (see yesterday's, from Romance Writers of America, for issuing a survey in 2005 to its members polling them on the question "should romance be redefined as between one man and one woman"). But others can serve a less worthy purpose, given the attitude of the apology's recipient. For when the one done wrong by continually demands that a wrongdoer apologize, only to then reject each and every apology said wrongdoer proffers, penance can start to look an awful lot like punishment. To find a romance novel willing to say that enough apologizing is enough is pretty rare; to find one in which the apologizer is a mother, and the wronged one her child, practically unheard of.

Which is why I so enjoyed Sugar, the second novel in Seressia Glass's erotic contemporary series Sugar and Spice. The series focuses on four female friends, all working to get their lives back together after recovering from various addictions, which gives the books' storylines a lot more emotional heft than the average erotic romance. Sugar's female protagonist, Siobhan Malloy, co-owner of a bakery in small town Crimson Bay, California, has not taken a Percocet or OxyContin in over four years. But she knows she can't absolutely promise that she'll never take too many again. She made that promise once before, and broke it by getting hooked all over again. Her husband and parents may have liked her better when she was on drugs than when she wasn't, but getting hooked on painkillers a second time led to an accident that put her daughter's life in danger. She knows that's why her second fall from grace cost her her marriage, her relationship with her parents, and even her own daughter, who refuses to speak with her even after Siobhan's recovery.

So it's more than understandable that Siobhan is reluctant to become involved in anything like a committed romantic relationship. But go-getting local business owner Charlie O'Halloran isn't used to taking no for an answer. Immediately struck by the curvy blonde behind the counter the first time he stepped into her bakery, Charlie has bided his time, watching and waiting for the right moment to make his move. When Siobhan finds the business proposal he finally dangles to tempt her intriguing (combining his delivery service with her bakery's treats), he can't resist pushing her to test the sexual waters, too. And despite her doubts, soon Siobhan and the younger Charlie (thirty to her thirty-five, or so he tells her) are heating things up between the sheets (and in the office, and at the burlesque club where "Sugar" Malloy struts her stuff in an attempt to channel her sexuality in a healthy, life-affirming way).

When should someone with an important life secret, a secret that may affect the way others view her, share that secret with a sex partner? Siobhan's business partner, Nadia, told her sex-only guy of her past addiction before they even slept together (see Sugar and Spice book #1), but only because her former job on a cooking show made her descent into addiction headline news. For herself, Siobhan decides to be more circumspect, especially because she is determined to keep things casual between herself and Charlie. But when he wants to push their relationship deeper, and reveals a secret of his own, Siobhan knows it is time to come clean.

Charlie's secret is a far happier one than Siobhan's, and it soon has Siobhan yearning once again for the closeness of a family of her own. But her ex, her parents, and her daughter all pretend that she doesn't exist.

Is it fair to turn Charlie's family into a surrogate for her own? Or does she owe it to her daughter and her parents to keep trying to mend the fences her drug addiction brought crashing down? Even when her family keeps yanking the ground out from underneath each fencepost she tries to re-erect, then blames her for when they fall?

Romance novels are chock-full of characters who have been traumatized by the behavior of their parents, especially their mothers. To read one in which a child's ability to emotionally wound a mother is the underlying message makes for a refreshingly feminist read.


FYI, Sugar is one of the nominees for the 2016 RWA RITA award, in the erotic romance category.


Photo credits:
Burlesque dancer: Rebel Circus
Apology not accepted: Wiki How

Seressia Glass

Sugar

(A Sugar and Spice Novel)

Heat/Penguin Random House, 2015

Short Takes for a Short Week

It's a short work week here in the U. S. (Monday was our combined Presidents' Day holiday), so here's one short post from me. I've been reading up a storm, and have a bunch of recommendations for new books from RNFF favorites, all later books in ongoing series:

Collateral damage. That's what well-heeled New York philanthropist Arden MacCarren is after her investment banker father and brother are arrested for masterminding a massive Ponzi scheme. Though she knew nothing about the fraud, Arden's left dealing with the fallout, despite being known as the weak one in the family. Looking for a safe space to hide from all the negative publicity, not to mention find a technique that will help her fight back against her increasingly debilitating panic attacks, Arden enrolls in a private drawing class. Having hot sex with the class's tattooed male model, a former marine, is just a way to help them both escape for a few moments from their own emotional wounds. Or is it? A story of two wounded warriors, both helping one another remember the fighter inside.

Best lines:
      "You saved me," he said. "They saved my life so many times, but you saved me, too."
     "I'm in good company, then," she said. When he looked back at her, one eyebrow raised, she added, "You taught me how."

Full-length books in Buchman's Night Stalkers series follow a predictable, yet still entertaining pattern: two heterosexual coworkers in the Army's SOAR (Special Operations Aviation Regiment Airborne) helicopter aviation support group strike sparks of one another during an initial action-packed mission, grow closer, spend a leave together, then return for one major mission that allows them to overcome any last doubts either may have had about making a long-term commitment. Our protagonists here are of the opposites-attract variety: Captain Justin Roberts, a sweet-talking Texan who can pilot a helicopter as easily as he can gentle a horse, and fellow Captain Kara Moretti, a mouthy Italian from Brooklyn who pilots the hottest RPAs (remotely piloted aircraft) in this woman's army. Yet despite their differences, Kara and Justin keep finishing each other's sentences, insulting and wisecracking their way through stressful situations while silently in mutual awe of each others' skills. Lots of cool tech, high-stakes action scenes, homages to (rather than stereotypes of) ethnic roots, and of course, heartfelt respect for competent military women.

Best lines:
"Families normally didn't happen in the same unit of the military. Hell, sex wasn't supposed to happen in the military at all—as if that made one lick of sense. Come on, people, corral a clue. Why would a career guy want anything less than a soldier babe?"

This follow-up to Maher's Rolling in the Deep, in which two coworkers won millions in the lottery, features the brother and friend of the lucky winners. Mexican-Italian Tony Lopez was supposed to be the successful sibling of the family, taking care of his younger brother and mother after his father passed, earning a business degree and running a successful store in his Queens neighborhood, marrying his childhood friend and parenting two beautiful daughters. But one divorce, one failing business, and one brother striking it rich later, and Tony is a man on the verge. Especially when the best friend of his brother's new love walks in the room. Cuban-European Beth Cody, single, pregnant, and happy to be both chalks up her raging lust for Tony to pregnancy hormones. But after the one-week friends-with-benefits deal she negotiates with him heads into deeper territory than she bargained for, can Beth reconcile her need for independence with her growing feelings for Tony? And that's not just a sell-copy tagline question, but a real issue, both for Beth and for readers wondering just how to keep their own sense of self while committing to a romantic relationship with another.

Best lines:
     "No doubt you think you've got this all handled, Elisabeth."
     That stops me. She never calls me by my full name.
     "You think, Oh, hey, I don't need a man. And guess what? You're actually right about that."
     I raise an eyebrow. It's not exactly what I was expecting her to say. I always assumed she disapproved of my lifestyle, that she wished I would settle down already.
     "You're a confident, competent woman," she says. "Don't think I haven't seen that. and admired it. You take excellent care of yourself and you make your own path. I love that about you, Beth."
     "Thanks, Mom, but—"
     "And I'll say it again. You don't need a man."
     "That's what I—"
     "But you are allowed to want one," she interrupts. "That's not against the rules, you know."

With so many historical romance authors dipping a toe in contemporary waters of late, it's a delight to find an author experimenting in the other direction. In Tempted, contemporary author Molly O'Keefe gives us a Western romance set in post Civil-War period, with protagonists attempting to figure out how to make a life for themselves in the wake of wartime trauma and upheaval. After seeing her once-abused sister now happily married (in book #1 of O'Keefe's Into the Wild series), Annie Denoe chooses to take her future into her own hands, moving to Denver and taking a nursing job with Dr. Madison. Luckily for her (though not so happily for him), the handsome doctor is nursing an addiction that often leaves him unable to do his job, a gap which Anne's medical training at the side of her doctor father leaves her all too ready to fill. When Madison offers marriage to protect her reputation, Anne finds his kiss far more interesting than his proposal. It's her best friend, army veteran Steven Baywood, though, not Dr. Madison, with whom Anne wants to explore her newfound interest in the carnal side of life. But Steven's war experiences, especially his time in the notorious Andersonville prison, have left him unable to be touched—emotionally and physically.

Best lines:
     "Do you love him?" Steven asked in a whisper.
     "I don't think that's as necessary an ingredient as my mother would have me believe. Do all those men love the girls at Delilah's?" [the local whorehouse]
     "Why are you doing this?"
     "Why not? Why shouldn't I?"
     "Anne, this is . . . shocking."
     "Well, maybe I am shocking."
     I am. I am very shocking, and no one ever noticed because I was so busy being invisible. And I love you. I love you so much and it hurts to be caught like this. Stuck like this with you. If I don't change things, they will never change.
     I will be like this forever with you.
     "Marriage is a very permanent step to satisfy curiosity," he said.
     "Are you suggesting another arrangement?"
     "Do you understand what you are asking?"
     "Yes . . . . I am asking you, if my marrying Dr. Madison in order to satisfy my curiosity about sex bothers you so much—are you volunteering to be my lover?"

Not Your Everyday Erotic Romance: M. O'Keefe's EVERYTHING I LEFT UNSAID

Last week, on the Everafter Romance blog, Guest blogger Sara Horney noted her discontent with the current state of the erotic romance market. "Has Erotica Become the Beige Granny Pants of Romance?" Horney asked, suggesting that in their rush to bank in on the 50 Shades of Grey trend, publishers and authors are simply churning out cardboard cutouts of the same story, time and time again:

No longer was erotica the sexy, bright, red thong of my reading wardrobe, it became the beige granny panties. Just a boring same old-same old in which an Alpha billionaire/MC president/rockstar/DEA Agent/MMA fighter/sex club owner/shifter of some kind meets a naive ingenue/single mom/investigative journalist/uptight sex therapist/curvy entrepreneur and teaches her about the darker side/emotional healing power/feminist truth of pleasure. Over and over and over again. For me, erotica became the Groundhog Day of reading.

I both agree and disagree with Horney. I agree that what the mainstream publishers (and many indie writers, as well) keep putting out there are simply worn out retreads of an already painfully tedious storyline. But I disagree that this beaten-to-death storyline is not the only one you can find in the current realm of erotic romance (for example, give Ruthie Knox and Mary Ann Rivers' enchanted realism/erotic new adult novella The Dark Space a try if you're looking for something really different).

And even if an author does use the 50 Shades model as a starting point, it doesn't have to end up as pointless as a rerun of Groundhog Day. It just might turn into something as thought-provoking as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

Take Molly O'Keefe, whose contemporary romances I've often praised on this blog. Her latest offering, though, looks and feels far different than her previously published novels. Its cover is dark, rather than colorful; its cover models are shot in broody black and white. O'Keefe has even gone so far as to do that strange erotica writer thing, abbreviating her first name, so that the cheerful, sweet, down-home "Molly" becomes the more enigmatic "M."

Unsurprisingly, Everything I Left Unsaid reads far differently than O'Keefe's previous books, at least as far as content goes. Hot phone sex with a stranger; a woman discovering the pleasure of her own sexuality; a wealthy alpha male who tells the heroine what to do; deep, dark secrets haunting each character's past—in this book, you can find all tropes of the repetitively boring erotic romance that Horney decries, in abundance.

What's different about O'Keefe's book, though, is that it doesn't dance blindly on the thin line between domineering hero and abusive hero, as so many erotic romances do. Horney describes her frustration thus: "Too many times have I given up on a novel because authors have written a male character that has crossed the line from Alpha male to plain old asshole male." Such books never acknowledge, never mind even recognize, that they've crossed this line, that their storylines, as Horney describes them, "read as more abusive than sexy."

In contrast, Everything I Left Unsaid puts the issue of abuse front and center. The novel opens with protagonist Annie arriving not at a swanky office building of her future boss/romantic interest, but at a North Carolina trailer park, where "escape smelled like a thick layer of Febreze over stale cigarette smoke." We gradually learn that Annie has taken the courageous step of fleeing from her physically abusive husband, dying her hair, driving hundreds of miles, and laying a trail of diversions to keep herself safe.

When a cell phone starts ringing from behind the cushions of the trailer she's rented, though, the appeasing ways her husband inculcated in her over five years of marriage, as well as her own friendly nature, lead Annie to answer it. And when she hears the caller's "angry sigh. The this is your fault sigh," she struggles with how to answer. But her actions on her own behalf give her the anger, and the drive, to fight the urge to appease:

And I had this visceral reaction, screwed into the marrow of my bones over the last five years, to do everything in my power and some things incredibly outside my power to appease the anger behind that sigh. To make it all okay.

     But those days were officially over.

     Sorry, Dylan. No one sighs like that at me. Not anymore. Not ever. (Kindle Loc 141).

Though Annie isn't wise about the ways of the big bad world (she lived isolated on a rural Oklahoma farm for all her life), she knows enough to give the caller a false name. Her choice—that of her "bold... confident. Embarrassingly sexy" cousin Layla, rather than her "utterly staid and uptight" self—suggests the person she's hoping to become. A self that she begins to explore with the caller, a man named Dylan.

Because unlike her husband, Dylan asks if she's okay, asks "Are you safe?", and refuses her offer to return his phone to him. As a result, Annie is more than tempted to trust Dylan with her secrets. But asking someone else to help her, to solve her problems for her, is not why she left her husband, a man whose offer to do the same she had accepted without thinking, to her lasting regret.

The previous renter of the trailer had used the phone to report in to Dylan about the doings of her neighbor, a surly older man named Ben. Annie offers to do the same, even without knowing why Dylan needs to know about the old man. And suddenly, abruptly, their conversation turns charged:

     "Are you offering to look in on him for me?"

     "Sure."....

     "That easy?"

     "That easy.

     "When's the last time you said no to someone?" he asked.

     "Why does it matter?"

     "I have a sense, Layla, that you give away your yeses without thinking."

     Oh, he was right. So damn right.

     "And you want my no's?"

     "I want something you don't give away."

     My knees buckled and I leaned back against the wood-paneled wall, feeling light-headed. How... how did we get here? What has happened to me? (215).

Annie tells Dylan not to call her again, fearful of the strong feelings his words, and his voice, evoke. But when Dylan sends her a phone recharger, and tells her he'll keep paying for the plan, she can't help but call him back with her thanks. And again, simple conversation turns immediately erotic.

A series of hot bouts of phone sex between inexperienced Annie and directing Dylan ensue. But this isn't just a story about a dominant guy teaching an innocent ingenue how to embrace her sexuality. It's also about how to figure out when, and where, to draw the lines. Is neighbor Ben simply a grouchy old man? Or a stone-cold killer? Is niceness a positive trait, or one that only leaves you open to exploitation and harm? Can a man be simultaneously controlling and kind? How little control does a victim have over her own life, and how much of her own behavior is self-deception, an act of complicity with her own abuse? And where is the line between brave and just plain crazy?

Since the book leaves us on a cliffhanger, none of these questions gets definitively answered. But by simply being willing to ask them, M. O'Keefe proves herself far more interested in women's empowerment than many a fellow rider on the 50 Shades erotic romance train.

 M. O'Keefe

Everything I Left Unsaid

Bantam, 2015