It’s hard to believe that it’s been five years since Marcy Sheiner published the first Best of Best Women’s Erotica.  “Best of the Best” is one hell of an accolade to foist upon anyone’s shoulders and I honestly don’t envy Violet Blue having to judge which stories from the Best Women’s Erotica series should be placed in the compilation title Best of Best Women’s Erotica.  Yet Ms Blue has managed this task with style and aplomb and I can’t see any stories in this collection that don’t deserve such elevated praise.

The collection is prefaced by a highly personal introduction from the editor, which is as arousing and well-paced as any of the stories included.  It then moves onto Rachel Kramer Bussel’s “Animals”: a tour-de-force encounter that celebrates the physicality of sex in a powerhouse rush of literate erotica.  This is followed by Kristina Wright’s “Call Me,” an obscene phone call that successfully uses dialogue to impart conflicting ideals of taboo-breaking and arousal.  And then there’s Teresa Noelle Roberts’ “Voice of an Angel” which imbues a deliciously unreal sexuality and passion to baroque opera.

I could go on, listing author after author, and producing an incredibly dull review that is the antithesis to an incredibly exciting collection.  Instead, I want to focus on two stories that highlight the diversity of this anthology whilst illustrating its phenomenal power to consistently arouse.  The titles are “Heat” by Elizabeth Coldwell, and  “Chill” by Kathleen Bradean.

“Heat” is a story of sultry, smoldering passions.  Coldwell writes with graphic intensity that hurtles the reader toward the satisfying conclusion of this sweat-fuelled fantasy.  The simmering tension between the central characters is exemplified by the following extract:

When I think of Ian, I think of heat.  The heat of the sticky days of summer and sweaty sheets.  The heat of the flame that draws in the moth.  The heat of passion, and shame.  I think of that sultry August night, and the things he did tome, and I still hate him—and I still want him.

Coldwell’s story is written to inflame.  The story produces a warmth of welcome arousal as well as the uncomfortable glow of embarrassment.  It’s an erotic encounter that many will find reminiscent of tasting forbidden fruits: a discovery that the flavor is so delicious it should be forbidden.

This contrasts with Bradean’s treatment of arousal in “Chill.”  Here the story dwells on a single and uncommon fetish.  The fetish, as suggested by the title, includes an extensive use of ice cubes and an emotional distancing that enhances the story’s powerful premise.

It wasn’t healthy, this thing, this need.  I’d go for months without it, and then I’d be on the phone with a client, or at dinner with friends, and I’d yearn for the cold.  Thinking about it would make my breasts ache.  I’d cross and uncross my legs, and fidget in my chair.  Sometimes, I’d take an ice cube from my drink, put it into my mouth, and excuse myself to the ladies room, where I’d rub the cube against my clit until I came.  Then I’d smooth down my clothes and take my seat, and no one would ever guess.  But it was never a really good orgasm.  It was a shadow, a knockoff, a little something to see me through.

Bradean’s use of language is as cold and clinical as the fetish that drives her protagonist.  The story employs such intense description it blends the heat of arousal with the chill of the fetish, accumulating in unprecedented peaks and troughs of physicality.

And I mention these two stories because they show the perfect balance Violet Blue has achieved in this anthology—selecting stories that can warm the reader, or chill them to the core—without losing sight of the focus that these stories are written to arouse.

There are other stories in this collection, and a collection of respected names from the genre including Kristina Lloyd, Donna George Storey and Kay Jaybee, all of whom deserve their place in a collection entitled Best of Best.  If you don’t regularly subscribe to the annual collection of Best Women’s Erotica, you’d be foolish to miss out on the Best of Best Women’s Erotica 2.

This is the second compilation of stories from five years of the annual Best Women's Erotica series. Considering the flood of story submissions that are sent to the editor each year, and the number of published stories that found their way into all the volumes from 2006 through 2010, choosing stories for Best of Best Women's Erotica 2 must have been a challenge.

In general, these stories are polished and effective in delivering sexual frisson in a variety of styles. However, this reviewer prefers two editors to one for anthologies like this: a series editor for continuity and a consulting editor for a different viewpoint. Two heads together would have interpreted “best” less subjectively.

The anthology opens with "Animals" by Rachel Kramer Bussel. In this story, the female narrator tells the man in her life that she wants to be treated like an animal. He responds beyond her expectations:

With just his bare hands, he became an animal for me, one who wouldn't take no for an answer because he didn't even speak any language, let alone English. He became exactly what I hadn't known I needed until then, his paws digging at me, burrowing deep inside, stretching not only my pussy but my boundaries as he bit and dug and pinched and thrust.

This story sets the tone for the collection, which is not exactly leather or noir but is beyond sweet romance. Kathleen Bradean's story, "Chill," is one of the more extreme fantasies here, since it focuses on necrophilia. (Luckily, no characters are actually killed in this story.) It is told by a female narrator who wants to be the succulent corpse herself, if only temporarily.

"Call Me" by Kristina Wright and "Voice of an Angel" by Teresa Noelle Roberts are both about the erotic appeal of the human voice. In "Call Me," a woman who thinks she is making an "obscene call" to her boyfriend learns that she is seducing a stranger. The mutual attraction between her and her "wrong number" seems likely to create complications in her formerly monogamous relationship.

In "Voice of an Angel," the female character is a costume designer who must design perfectly-fitting breeches for a male opera singer, a countertenor with the kind of high but powerful voice that used to be characteristic of castrati, singers who were mutilated as young boys to prevent their voices from deepening. Despite stereotyped assumptions about men with high voices, Daniel the singer is attracted to Jessie, the costume designer who must touch him during fittings. While she is thrilled by his sexual attention, she can't reach the release she wants until he sings for her.

The fine-art theme continues in "Just Watch Me, Rodin" by Cate Robertson, in which an artist pushes his model further and further for his art, and she shows him that she can deliver all that he could want. In "Amy" by Heidi Champa, a Dominant man torments his former lover by sending her DVDs that record the submission of other women.

In "Rear Window" by Scarlett French, (a reference to the 1954 Alfred Hitchcock thriller by the same name) a woman who has just moved into a new city apartment is inspired by the sight of two men in another apartment. Apparently they are tricks, not established lovers, and the thrill of discovery extends to the witness, or voyeuse. In "The Upper Hand" by Saskia Walker, an older woman discovers that a group of young college-age lads has been spying on her, and she resolves to make them pay.

On the theme of voyeurism, or one-sided fantasizing, "Another Assignation with Charles Bonnet" takes a woman's fascination with a man she doesn't know to the ultimate extreme. She is determined to find him again by his smell alone, and she succeeds. 

On the theme of literary or cultural allusion, "Fly" by Valerie Alexander is a brilliantly sexual interpretation of that classic children's story, Peter Pan. In this version, Peter is an irresponsible boy who kidnaps the virginal Wendy from her bedroom, watched by Tiger Lily, a completely different kind of girl, the one he has overlooked. By kidnapping Wendy, (who really doesn't mind) Tiger Lily is able to lure Peter into a confrontation. The magic trick of "flying" in the original story takes on another meaning:

What I want, she [Tiger Lily] thinks, is to fly. And then it's happening, his cock pushes into the initial tightness of her pussy, demanding and inexorable yet torturously slow.. . Already she's beginning to throb as they start to thrust, his heat and his hardness driving her up and up into blinding wet bliss, and then they're really fucking, faster and faster until at last Tiger Lily is flying.

Erotic punishment is predictable in a collection like this. "Becky" by Kay Jaybee is a classic BDSM fantasy about an office where female employees are spanked by their male boss. "Penalty Fare" by Jacqueline Applebee is a more unusual story about a rushed, clandestine encounter on a train, the female passenger's penalty for boarding without a ticket. "Cruising" by Lee Cairney is an atmospheric story about anonymous sex in the dark woods where a woman is not supposed to invade the local gay-male "cruising" area.

My least favorite story (based strictly on personal taste) is "Heat" by Elizabeth Coldwell. If "Becky" is a fun fantasy about erotic pain and humiliation on the job, Coldwell's story is a grittier and more realistic version. In this story, the narrator is working in a pub during an unusually hot summer. In the absence of the easy-going owner, a hardass manager arrives and immediately warns the two barmaids that he will not tolerate any slacking off, and he will be watching them. As the heat and the tension mount, they both come to hate his contemptuous scrutiny, yet the narrator can't help wishing he would fuck her. When she gets her wish, nothing changes between them. He is still the boss, and he makes it clear that he doesn't consider her special. He doesn't give her any promises (or contact information) before he leaves, yet afterward, she seeks him out in all the places where he might be working. Urggh. This story is all too believable, and this is a tribute to the author's descriptive skill.  

Another story that disappoints, although it is effective in its own way, is the mysterious "Lost at Sea" by "Peony." The narrator begins with questions:

Has it been that long? The clocks and the calendars are conspiring once again. Surely not? Have I been wandering, trapped in this haze, paralyzed by the thought of you? What day is it?

None of these questions are really answered as she seems to be submerged in an altered state of consciousness brought on by sexual surrender to an unnamed "you."

In general, this volume is guaranteed to appeal to fans of the series. Besides the stories mentioned, it includes work by Alison Tyler, Donna George Storey and Kristina Lloyd, among others. The passion can almost be tasted.

What do women want?  Freud’s perennial question recurs again and again in my wanderings as a reviewer through the thickets of contemporary and classic erotica.  Violet Blue’s latest anthology of erotic fiction by women, and presumably for women, offers a possibly surprising answer.  Women want the thrill of an anonymous encounter, the sensual high of breaking taboos, the peak experiences of pleasure or pain without the complications of a long-term relationship.  Almost all the stories in this excellent volume fall into the category of sublime quickies with near strangers.  One might almost call the anthology “erotic non-romance.”

Violet Blue sets the tone with her compelling introduction, “For All the Johnnys.”  She begins by telling us that introductions are boring, but then treats us to a smoldering and possibly true account of sharing a lap-dancer with her fuck buddy and maybe-lover, Hacker Boy.  “I never saw Johnny again,” she writes, “but I wish I could read this entire book to her.”  The tale reeks of alcohol and come, garnished with tattoos and desperation, but it is sexy as hell.

Jacqueline Applebee’s “Penalty Fare” offers a furtive blowjob in the cramped bathroom of a train, an exchange for a deliberately lost ticket.  Jordana Winters’ “Peekaboo” gives us a plain Jane who discovers at a sex club how much fun it can be just to watch.  Saskia Walker’s lovely “Winter Heat” offers a bit of sweetness as a woman reminisces about her first orgasm, but still, it’s at the hands of a young man chance met at a bus stop.  EllaRegina’s prize-winning story, “The Lonely Onanista” is an original account of a woman who lives inside the Washington Square Arch and screws any passerby who knows how to find her.

One of my favorite stories in the collection, probably because it taps into my own fantasies, is Xan West’s “Please.”  The narrator meets an intriguing guy in a bar, and he fucks her, body and mind, in the bathroom.

“Here are the rules.  I do what I want to you.  You don’t touch me without permission.  If you want me to stop, you say ‘stop.’  That is the only word that will stop me, but if I hear it, I will stop immediately.  I won’t do anything to harm you, but I may want to hurt you a little, and I definitely want to fuck you.  Are you game?”

Imagine hearing these words from a stranger, and then discovering, at this stranger’s hands, the purest pleasure, the truest release, that you’ve ever known.  In a sense, this story distills the essence of what Violet Blue is trying to present – the intoxicating notion that the ultimate sexual experience waits for you, just around the corner, in the most unexpected places, with people that you haven’t met but who are destined to fulfill your dreams.

Of course, there are some stories in Best Women's Erotica 2008 that don’t exactly fit this mold.  In “Strangers in the Water,” R. Gay’s narrator returns with her uncomprehending American husband to her native Haiti, to the river where her grandmother conceived her mother in a furtive tryst with a fugitive.  Alison Tyler’s “Matthew, Mark, Luke and John” is a high-spirited romp that will make you want to return to college.  Donna George Storey takes us back to the Japan of her novel, Amorous Woman, in the elegantly sensual story “Wet.”  “You Can Do Mine,” by Cerise Noire, gives us a couple who have been living together for a while, pushing their limits.  And then there’s A.D.R. Forte’s deftly-written tale, “Mercy,” about three co-workers whose pair-wise relationships meld into a scorchingly original ménage.

“Picture the cast of characters:  Rhys — dark hair just a little too long at the neck, tie loosened slightly because it’s hot here at the hotel bar, pretty-boy mouth set in that unintentional but totally fuckable pout so at odds with his seriousness; Kyle — half a head taller than every man in the room, blue eyes, wearing the power suit to end all power suits; charisma and control in different ways.

And me, staring at both of them over my glass of cabernet, my mind so deep in the gutter I’m afraid I’ll need scuba gear to find it and drag it out again.”    

Finally – well, not finally, because I haven’t covered every one of the excellent stories of the book since I want to allow you to discover some by yourself – still, I have to mention the strange and poetic “Lost at Sea,” by Peony.  This story is hazy and potent, like a dream; I read it three times and I still wasn’t sure that I understood it all:

“You.  A synapse fires inside my head.  Somewhere near the surface I can see a faint glow fractured by surface ripples.  I must be a long way under.  We shouldn’t have.  We did.  It’s done and cannot be undone.  We’re on the other side of that which had grown so large between us, the lust that devoured us, swelled fat from the absurdity of it.” 

In a way, this tale echoes the exhilaration and desperation of Violet Blue’s introduction.  This is what lust can do, these stories say: strip you naked, rip you open, leave you with scars that you will finger longingly in the future, when your lover of the moment is long gone – remembering.

Best Women’s Erotica is an annual anthology offered by Cleis Press. For the past several years, the editor has been Violet Blue. I believe this will be her last BWE. While the strength of this series may be partially due to the occasional change in editorial vision, I’ve enjoyed Violet Blue’s years at the helm. If this is indeed her last BWE, she’s chosen to go out on a high note.

In a Best Of anthology, you’d expect every story to be well written, and Best Women’s Erotica 09 delivers on that promise. So the stories that work for you are going to be the ones that speak to your desires. Lucky for you, there’s a wide range of fantasies covered here – finding joy in her body, pleasuring his, taking control or giving it up, forbidden fruit, and role playing.

“On Loan” by Lauren Wright and “Fast Car, Not For Sale” by Trixie Fontaine are at opposite ends of the forbidden fruit spectrum. In “On Loan,” the woman goes to a hotel room for a tryst set up by her husband. The man waiting for her turns out to be her father’s best friend. Wright handles the reality of the awkward situation believably, and then lets the characters use that to make the fantasy even more forbidden and tasty. In “Fast Car, Not For Sale,” the character seduces a barely legal boy with the assurance of a woman who can handle turbo-charged power.

“Switch” by Vanessa Vaughn is a sweet, hot look at gender play. At home, gender roles often reflect tradition rather than the contemporary mores of society, and Vaughn uses this to her advantage.  

Exhibitionists and voyeurs will enjoy Elizabeth Coldwell’s “Live Bed Show,” “Waiting for the River”by Kris Adams, and “Decorations” by Sommer Marsden.

If power exchange is your thing, “Lucky” by Xan West, “The Bitch In His Head” by Janne Lewis, “Good Pony” by Scarlett French, “The Girl Next Door” by Kay Jaybee, or the “Secret History of Lust” by Donna George Storey will fulfill that need.

And for those looking for just some good, hot, sweaty sex, “Snug Designs” by D.L. King, “Cardio” by Elisa Garcia, and “What If” by Cheyenne Blue are a good place to start.

According to the introduction of Violet Blue’s Best Women’s Erotica 2010, editing anthologies is a lot like professionally tasting chocolate.  I can embrace this opinion because I’ve worked with some editors who seem equipped with nothing more than the skill to masticate, and most of those types often appear to have a mouth that’s filled with brown stuff. 

Not that all editors are like that.  I can name at least three I’ve worked with who aren’t like that.  Four, if you include Violet Blue with whom I don’t think I’ve worked, but who has always struck me as a dedicated and competent professional.  And Violet Blue’s Best Women’s Erotica 2010 shows (as always) that she is capable of producing a world -class anthology of high octane erotica brimmed to bursting with exciting explicit fiction.

Alison Tyler’s “In a Handbasket” is a witty tale of ostensibly mismatched lovers finally finding each other.  Kay Jaybee’s “Equipment” is a raunchy yarn of one woman switching roles on her partner.  Emerald in “Shift Change” is tempted by an Apple and shows that computer repairs are not always interminable drudgery.  I could go on and praise the abilities of Sommer Marsden, Angela Caperton, Kristina Lloyd or Rachel Kramer Bussel and a host of other sensational authors.  This really is a wonderful anthology of highly-charged stories that are filled with surprises, sex and scintillating scenarios.  

So, call me a curmudgeon, but I always wrinkle my nose with disapproval when I see the words ‘women’s erotica’ on the cover of an anthology.  Don’t get me wrong.  There’s nothing else annoying about the title.  The word ‘best’ deserves its place.  The date 2010 (even though I’m reviewing this title at the arse end of 2009) is close enough to be accurate.  But I have to shake my head with dismay at the words “women’s erotica” and wonder if this isn’t an anachronistic holdover from an antiquated age.

As I say, the stories in this anthology deserve the word “best” because they’re all bloody good.  But why do we need to differentiate between ‘women’s erotica’ and other erotica?  (Notice there that I didn’t say “men’s erotica.”  There are no titles out there that I can find that market themselves as ‘men’s erotica.’  There are some books listed as ‘erotica for men’ but that is semantically and pragmatically different.  Presumably the reason there is no ‘men’s erotica’ is because it’s a known fact that men can usually tug off to nothing more erotic than the memory of partially glimpsed underwear in a launderette).  But referring to a collection of world-class erotic stories as “women’s erotica”strikes me as labeling for no good reason. 

In the publishing world it was once commonplace for people to discuss “women’s fiction” as a separate genre.  The term referred disparagingly to romantic stories, usually with ubiquitous purple prose and an obligatory “Happily Ever After.”  The term was seldom used as compliment and even Ms Blue, in her introduction to BWE 2010, suggests that the sight of too much florid euphemism is enough to send her heading to Harlequin HQ with a pitchfork, a can of gasoline and a road flare. Which makes it all the more puzzling as to why the term “women’s erotica” is so warmly embraced. 

Could it be that this collection is only for women?  Admittedly, the possessive ‘s’ in the title would suggest as much (in the same vein as the words women’s clothes in clothing stores and women’s studies in academic disciplines) but I personally think this is unlikely.  I thoroughly enjoyed reading BWE 2010 and I’m guilty of being very male.  I’m so male I drink beer, never go shoe-shopping and drive a Ford with a stick-shift.  That’s how very male I am.  If I had any interest in competitive televised sports I’d be exceptionally male but I can only honestly carry a stereotype so far. 

Admittedly,  the stories in BWE 2010 have all been written by women, but does the author’s gender ever make a difference to the style or quality of the story?  Literary theorist and philosopher Roland Barthes famously said, “the author is dead.”  Barthes assertion has been used predominantly in literary criticism to indicate appraisal of a text from the reader’s interaction solely with the words, rather than a mystical relationship between the reader and the distant (and invariably unknowable) author.  It’s an attitude that makes sense to me.  It also circumvents issues of whether the author is a man, woman or kangaroo. 

Sweet Love is a collection of scenes that are both realistic and staged. In each story, a heterosexual couple acts out a shared sexual fantasy. In some cases, the more adventurous person seduces a shy-but-willing partner into going where he or she has never gone before.

I'll demonstrate. Here is the opening scene from "A Little Push" by Felix D'Angelo:

How had I let her talk me into this?

As Bolero pounded slowly toward its climax, Carrie stretched out on the bed with legs spread wide, thick pillows under her hips. This position tipped her perfect ass upward at just the perfect angle. Her asshole, glistening and virgin, beckoned to me between her slightly spread pale pink cheeks.

If you've guessed that this game involves anal sex, you're right. So why is the male narrator made nervous by the sight of Carrie's virgin asshole? The agreement between him and her is more complicated than it looks at first, that's why.

Kay Jaybee, author of The Collector, a book of sex fantasies presumably collected from new acquaintances in coffee shops, introduces the first-person story, "Searching for Her," like this:

Fifteen years ago I read my very first erotic story. From that moment I had a powerful recurring fantasy based entirely on its contents. Each relationship I've enjoyed since has had that one sexual expectation wrapped up in it.

The narrator's fantasy sends her on a search for the right woman to join her and her husband for a threesome. Along the way, she has various encounters which don't involve any man at all. When the expected three-way scene finally happens, the two women seem to have as close a bond as the narrator and her man, who imagines himself as sultan of the harem.

The format of most of these stories (sexual adventures in the context of established relationships) allows for some violent scenes of "rape" and bondage, which would be much more disturbing if presented outside a framework of trust and communication. More reassuringly, the "rapes" are eventually revealed to be deep-seated, long-term fantasies of the female "victims," whose chivalrous, understanding lovers or husbands have agreed to act them out despite the risk that concerned witnesses might intervene or call the police.

Here is the heart-pounding opening scene of "Playing Rough" by Kat Black:

Click, clack, click.. .

The woman's heels spike the concrete floor, staccato beat rebounding off the hard, straight lines of the subterranean tunnel. Each step echoes, a solitary sound in an otherwise oppressive silence.

Soon, however, the silence is broken by a resounding thud when an exit door to the car park is closed by someone who then approaches with a steady masculine tread.     

The sinister setting (where no help is available), the terse assailant and the polished but increasingly frightened, disheveled and excited career woman are all so effectively described that for most of its length, this story looks out of place in an anthology about "sweet love." The ending of the story allows the reader to come down from an adrenaline high, but it also reveals the sex scene to be misleading, since it is not the account of a random, opportunistic attack.

All these stories are well-written, well-paced, hot and juicy. As the editor's introduction makes clear, they can be used as scripts for real-life scenes, since every scene in the book is plausible, and most can be acted out in one's own home with minimal props and costumes.

So why do I feel as if some essential ingredient is missing? Because most (not all) of these stories are about breaks or digressions from the daily routine of a long-term relationship. Fantasies always reveal something about the fantasizers, but in too many of these stories, the characters come across as cliched or undeveloped. This reader, at least, would like to know more about the individual and combined histories of the players of these games.

There are some exceptions to the general trend. In one exceptional story, "Storming the Castle" by Andrea Dale, the reader is shown why the female narrator has begun masturbating alone: her relationship with her boyfriend has become boring. Here she confides the problem to the reader:

I loved Joe. That's what made it so damn hard. I loved him and respected him. We fit well together at work and at home, with similar interests and habits. Everyone thought we were perfect for each other, and I was hard-pressed to come up with a good reason why we weren't. It was just that the spark was gone.

As it turns out, the shared vocation of the narrator and her man (archeology) enables them to reconnect on the site of a castle in Wales which is scheduled for demolition, much like a relationship which appears to be crumbling despite its strong foundation. Their passionate coupling in the moonlight is both romantic and "feudal," suited to the setting, and it neatly resolves several dilemmas.

In another exceptional story, "Jump or Fall?" by Janine Ashbless, the female narrator is far from bored with her fellow-performer in an acrobatics act. On the contrary, she finds him intriguingly hard to read:       

Blayne is a locked box and I don't have the key.

Izzy the narrator pushes Blayne for a closer relationship until he tries to warn her away from him:

He grins without any amusement.  "There's this thing I do. It's. . . a part of my life. It doesn't come as an optional extra. And it's not something you'd be at all happy with."

Izzy is still intrigued. She can't be sure she would enjoy the same kinks that Blayne can't live without, but she also knows she is interested enough to "jump" into a new act which enables her to discover a side of herself she has been afraid to acknowledge. These two characters seem made for each other, and their performances together are integral to their relationship.

In general, however, these stories are focused on the pleasure of the moment. As one-handed reading, they are resolutely upbeat, even though this requires being oblivious of the deal-breaking potential of some sexual adventures “on the side” – and of the hard work involved in being truly polyamorous.

Is a woman who is eager to "try out" various women for a threesome really doing this only to please her Master? When a woman discovers her husband's stash of man-on-man porn films (in "Better Bent Than Broken" by Amanda Fox), can she afford to trust him when he tells her, "No, I'm not gay" - and can she completely satisfy him by herself? The denials in these stories are only convincing if one believes that a primary male-female relationship is the basic human connection that everyone needs, and that any heterosexual commitment can be saved by sexual variety.

For couples looking for new fantasies, this book would make a good anniversary gift.