Unrec: Bent by Sean Michael
As a general rule, I don't buy erotica written by men. This becomes somewhat trickier in the m/m erotica space where many women write under masculine pseudonyms. I assumed Sean Michael was one such pseudonym, and only discovered well after I read Bent that this was not the case.
There are three problems with this book, all of which are things most female erotica writers (especially those from fandom) writing for a female audience would probably avoid: icky consent issues, lack of emotional follow-through, and a long string of sex scenes to no purpose.
Let's start with the consent issues, since they're what I found most problematic about the book. The plot of the novel is that Marcus, dom, finds Jim, unjustly accused and now unemployed professor who doesn't take care of himself, in a bookstore and decides Jim needs someone to run his life for him. The consent issues start right at the beginning of the book where Marcus takes Jim home and spanks him with no discussions of expectations or consent at all. There are ways to do this that work really well - think of fandom's beloved dub con - but this isn't it. Part of what would make it work well is if Marcus were really in tune with what Jim wants/needs and his limits, which he is not. Later in the book, he takes Jim to get a piercing (his nipple), and afterwards Jim says he really didn't want to. Marcus asks him why he didn't safeword, and Jim says that it didn't occur to him to do so. Clearly there are consent and communication issues here. This could be a good place for some kind of actual discussion about it, but what there is is cursory at best. And Marcus still isn't tuned in to Jim. Later, when Jim does safeword, Marcus is totally shocked. That time, Jim walks out. You would think that this would be an excellent place for them to talk, work out their expectations and consent issues. Sadly, that's not what happens. Instead the characters and the author handwave their way past the consent issues to get back to the sex. Let me say that again: they handwave the consent issues. Not cool, and while there is one really hot scene involving piercings and a chain between them, I can't reread it without feeling vaguely slimy because of the consent issues.
If you do manage to find yourself getting through the consent issues, you will also notice a distinct lack of emotional follow-through. The biggest example of this is that Marcus tells Jim when he takes him for his first tattoo that tattoos and piercings are there to mark emotionally significant moments. And then suddenly Jim has a lot of tattoos. I don't want to just know they're there; I want to know what happened that led up to each one of them.
The third issue is closely related to the second and it's this: the book never ends. It just keeps going and going and going with sex scene after sex scene after sex scene. This would be fine if they were, say, going somewhere, but they're not. They're just there, without any kind of plot, character development, or relationship arc to give them a purpose.
There are three problems with this book, all of which are things most female erotica writers (especially those from fandom) writing for a female audience would probably avoid: icky consent issues, lack of emotional follow-through, and a long string of sex scenes to no purpose.
Let's start with the consent issues, since they're what I found most problematic about the book. The plot of the novel is that Marcus, dom, finds Jim, unjustly accused and now unemployed professor who doesn't take care of himself, in a bookstore and decides Jim needs someone to run his life for him. The consent issues start right at the beginning of the book where Marcus takes Jim home and spanks him with no discussions of expectations or consent at all. There are ways to do this that work really well - think of fandom's beloved dub con - but this isn't it. Part of what would make it work well is if Marcus were really in tune with what Jim wants/needs and his limits, which he is not. Later in the book, he takes Jim to get a piercing (his nipple), and afterwards Jim says he really didn't want to. Marcus asks him why he didn't safeword, and Jim says that it didn't occur to him to do so. Clearly there are consent and communication issues here. This could be a good place for some kind of actual discussion about it, but what there is is cursory at best. And Marcus still isn't tuned in to Jim. Later, when Jim does safeword, Marcus is totally shocked. That time, Jim walks out. You would think that this would be an excellent place for them to talk, work out their expectations and consent issues. Sadly, that's not what happens. Instead the characters and the author handwave their way past the consent issues to get back to the sex. Let me say that again: they handwave the consent issues. Not cool, and while there is one really hot scene involving piercings and a chain between them, I can't reread it without feeling vaguely slimy because of the consent issues.
If you do manage to find yourself getting through the consent issues, you will also notice a distinct lack of emotional follow-through. The biggest example of this is that Marcus tells Jim when he takes him for his first tattoo that tattoos and piercings are there to mark emotionally significant moments. And then suddenly Jim has a lot of tattoos. I don't want to just know they're there; I want to know what happened that led up to each one of them.
The third issue is closely related to the second and it's this: the book never ends. It just keeps going and going and going with sex scene after sex scene after sex scene. This would be fine if they were, say, going somewhere, but they're not. They're just there, without any kind of plot, character development, or relationship arc to give them a purpose.