By now, I've yammered on a whole bunch about how I don't - D. O. N'. T. - like reading books "cold" - without a trusted recommendation. I just don't. I don't like it, it makes me nervous, and if it doesn't grab me quickly, that feeling colors my perception of the book.
Tame just sort of fell into my lap. I ran into someone on a forum, who was talking about this great story, and being me, despite not knowing this person terribly well (this being a huge community), I had to know. What was it? What was so great? Turns out it was the first story in Tame, Club Dishabille. So I went over to Amazon, like the good little Saucy Wench I am, and picked it up.
Follow me through the jump, and I'll tell you the tale - was it cringe-worthy, or AMAZING!!?
Okay, I'm pretty crummy at suspense, so let me just say that Club Dishabille was spectacular. It's modern romance, with a kink. The genre is generally over loved right now, due to the success of a series of books that are going to movie that I may or may not watch solely to see Jamie Dornan in various states of undress. BUT! I was terribly disappointed in 50 Shades of Grey. I found it silly, trite and spectacularly unsexy. Club Dishabille? This story was everything 50 Shades was *supposed* to be - and wasn't. Club Dishabille is the first in a series of three stories that make up Tame. It features Alex, the brother of a fetish club owner, and Dahlia, a lonely divorcee who's looking for both someone to love, and someone who might just be willing to explore a mildly BDSM sex life with her.
Club Dishabille goes through a whirlwind romance, some incredibly amazing sex (okay, a LOT of incredibly amazing sex!), and left me vaguely unhappy - because now it was OVER! I grew attached to Dahlia and Alex very quickly - the characters are written so well, they felt like friends... just not in the creepy "I know what you did" sort of way. I knew them. And now the story is done, and I'm not going to hear any more about them, oh my god, I might just cry... And then I learned that there are two more in the series. Thank god.
The second story, Morphoses, follows Miranda, Dishabille's owner, and her interaction with the seemingly asexual Nick, who was Dahlia's husband. Miranda is an autoandrophiliac - she enjoys pretending to have, and use, a penis. Nick is newly treated for low testosterone. Putting them together is explosive - both in sexual tension and energy, and in the whirlwind of emotions. Nick is probably my least favorite of the leading men, but that's kind of like saying that I have a least favorite cookie. There really is no such thing. The story of Miranda and Nick, by dint of Nick's relationship to Dahlia, and that Miranda is Alex's sister, also features a fair bit of Alex and Dahlia, which appeases my sequel-bait self - I LOVE sequels. No matter what it is, if I loved it, I WANT A SEQUEL. I have to know what happened next. Which, of course, makes the setup of Tame so wonderful.
The third story, Force Majeure, follows Alex and Dahlia's friend Jeff. Jeff has this woman at work... You know how that goes, right? He thinks she's just the absolute shit, and he's seen her at Dishabille before, and... He wants this girl - Evan. Jeff is an extremely unusual character, and I love the hell out of him. Jeff is extremely bright, socially awkward, and has a difficult time relating to people who don't experience the world as he does. In all, Jeff sounds like quite a few people I know, which makes him easy for me to understand, and very likable, as most of his troubles are the same sort I'd have in the same situations. Jeff is also, however, what is colloquially called "damaged goods." He's been dumped, and badly, in the past, and it haunts him, not understanding what went wrong, or how to do things differently in the future. Evan is a sweetheart who just knows she wants... something. And when it happens, she'll know, but it's not happening yet. Force Majerue, as the name implies has a fair focus on the kink of overpowering force.
In all, each of the three stories have their strengths and weaknesses - most notably our love of all the characters, and our surprise at the end of Club Dishabille - but overall these books were what I was promised in the spring of 2012 when I heard "Oh, you'll LOVE it, they're sooooo amazing! You HAVE to read it!" and didn't find until this past fall when I read Tame. And so here I am, the woman who reads almost NOTHING that isn't personally recommended to me, in the position of saying "This. Book. Was. Spectacular." Tame. READ IT. Just do it. You won't regret it.
Wench Rating:
Tell me what you think - is there room on your 2014 TBR for a great new read?
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