Review: DARK SOUL by Aleksandr Voinov

Stefano is a mob boss who, while attending a "family" event, meets Silvio, the effeminate bodyguard-with-benefits of one of the older dons. Stefano is immediately attracted to the gender-bending assassin with "dark soul" tattooed on his chest, but will Stefano risk his machismo rep and the trust of his wife by giving in to Silvio's slutty advances? I just don't know!

Gay mafiosi. They're right up there with gay cowboys. The Dark Soul series--consisting of five novellas--has been receiving quite a bit of buzz on the webbernets lately, and I wanted to read it because it sounded similar to Manna Francis' Administration series (reviews here), which I love. While Dark Soul is certainly intense, it doesn't come anywhere close to the Administration series in terms of writing and characterization. Honestly, I thought it was utterly ridiculous.

First of all, the sex. That's what you pay your money for, right? Dark Soul is one of those series where every story is merely a thinly-veiled set-up for the kinkiest sex scene the situation can plausibly allow. It's kind of porntastic.

I wouldn't have minded that so much, though, if the sex scenes were hot; unfortunately, they were REALLY awkward. There was definitely a titillation factor, but it never went beyond that. All right, there were times the sex scenes went beyond titillation and into eye roll territory (incest, really? Give me a fucking break). Maybe I just wasn't interested because I kept picturing the characters as looking similar to the guys on The Sopranos, but what else am I supposed to do with a bunch of Italian gangsters, hmm?


If the thought of Christopher and Uncle Paulie getting together causes your brain to bleed out through your eye sockets, DO NOT READ THIS SERIES!

And speaking of the characters, they are completely unbelievable. Silvio MIGHT be interesting, if he behaved with any consistency instead of just doing the sluttiest thing possible in any given situation (I don't like to throw the word slut around, but with Silvio it definitely fits) and didn't dress in a series of cliches. As for Stefano, a sensitive mob boss who wants to be faithful to his wife and asks other guys how they're feeling? I think my head just imploded from improbability. Oh, no, actually I was laughing my ass off.

The Dark Soul series is just... eugh. Kind of ick, totally unrealistic, full of inconsistent characters and enough convenient plot devices to hold together a really bad Skinemax movie (Stefano's bodyguard Vince just happens to have a "tube of oil" on him? Mmkay). If you want to read a really good m/m novel with BDSM sex and dangerous characters, you should read Manna Francis' Administration series. That is all.


Gratuitous Godfather scene. And now I'm going to drink a banana daiquiri.


Thanks to the publisher for providing me with a copy of Dark Soul via NetGalley!

Book Review: FAIRY CASANOVA by Gracen Miller

Sadie is lawyer who decides to treat herself with an anonymous hook-up in a Las Vegas brothel after she loses her job and her fiance in one day. Jace is the future king o'the fairies who wants to fulfill his dream of sexxxoring a human before being married to a fairy queen. Put these two in a hotel room and let convenient plot devices do their work.

This isn't the type of book I normally read at all. Did I buy it because the name Casanova was in the title? Because it was on sale for $2? Because I'd just drunk way too much and was really bored? MAYBE. However my purchase came about, this novella proved to be an edumacational experience.

Things I learned from this book:

• Real women are curvaceous.
• Fairy (read: fake) women are skinny. Like the bean poles, as they say.
• Real women also give head. Which is something no self-respecting not-real woman would do. I mean, fairies! Fairy women!
• Watch out for wing globules.
• Also thigh humidity.
• Osculate: verb. Def 1. Mathematics (of a curve or surface) touch (another curve or surface) so as to have a common tangent at the point of contact : [as adj. ] ( osculating) the plots have been drawn using osculating orbital elements. 2. Formal or humorous kiss.
• "... thick, uncut and nestled in a bed of..." lettuce? Is this a penis or a piece of meat? You decide.
  

I wouldn't call this book "good," necessarily. It was completely silly and ridiculous and there some INSANELY cheesy lines. It was fun, but was it worth $2? The jury's still out on that one.

The House of Dark Delights

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In a secluded valley in France is the Grotte Cachée and a fabulous chateau, inhabited by a cornucopia--a buffet, if you will--of supernatural creatures with insatiable sexual appetites.  There's an elf, a succubus, a satyr, a djinni, at least one person with supernatural powers, and the occasional vampire.  But these creatures (called follets) are not evil; they just want to help the humans.  By banging them.

I don't usually read erotica novels.  First of all, they come in trade paperback, which is too expensive for me.  Secondly, there's the whole TMI factor.  The reason I decided to read this one is because it's written by one of my favorite writers, PB Ryan, who wrote this great mystery series.  Yes, she went from mysteries to erotica... quite the leap.  How's that going to work, I wondered to myself.

Despite the plot description (which is really lame), this book was actually pretty good.  Or at least, the first half was pretty good; the second half was skim-worthy.  I think that evens out to okay.  The central love story is that of Elic, a Legolas-esque elf who has the rare ability to switch genders; and Lili, a former Akkadian goddess and succubus.  They love each other--or at least Elic loves Lili--but they can't sleep together because follets can only copulate with humans.  Not sure why, that's just the way the cookie crumbles.  So Elic and Lili just hang out together and sleep with other people.

As I said, the first half of the book was pretty good.  It doesn't really consist of one long continuous story; more like several short stories that take place at different times and are all about the Grotte Cachée.  The major story is about The Hellfire Club (yes, the Hellfire Club--how original, no?) and how Elic and Lili met.  At this point I was kind of enjoying the story because of the characters, but there was also the whole ick factor.  I was expecting the TMI, though, so it didn't bother me too much; and it wasn't as if the sex scenes didn't fit into the story.

But then the lamest vampire in the world showed up, and the whole book really went downhill from there.  In the last two stories, the characters took a backseat to the history of the Grotte and how Legolas Elic wound up there (like I might actually care).  Even the sex scenes in the second half of the book were boring; it was like the author was completely on autopilot. 

Overall the book was okay.  A review I read on Amazon said it "aspires to be high-brow erotica," and that pretty much sums it up.  The House of Dark Delights does aspire to a lot of things, but falls short of achieving all of them.  That being said, I did like the central characters.  I could see this book being turned into a soap-opera on HBO.  With more/better plotting, it could turn into a good series.

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