Celestial Reviews 33 - Nov 1, 1995
Note: Thank you for the birthday wishes. However, it is not even
close to my birthday. The Celeste who has been posting stories about
her birthday is not me. As many of you have probably discerned by now,
I'm a Pisces; she's not.
Second Note: I sincerely appreciate the e-mail I receive from readers.
Please understand that I would like to respond individually and in
detail to everyone, but my time limitations often prohibit this. I
hope you will accept my column as my response to your communications.
It seems to me that people are enjoying my writing, and that makes me
feel good.
- Celeste
"Horny out of My Mind" by Frank McCoy (Sex & humor) 10
"Debt" by Deirdre (wild sex) 10
"Dip" by Deirdre (voyeurism and hot ff sex) 10
"Dive" by Deirdre (voyeurism) 9
"WERE" by ZeroNLN (Werewolves) No rating
"The Directive" by The Spook (Adventure & Sex) No rating
"The Chambermaid" by Delta (Sex on the rebound) 10
"Horny out of My Mind" by Frank McCoy (mccoyf@millcomm.com). About a
week ago I received in my e-mail several stories from this author.
Yesterday I received a follow-up message. In it the author apologized,
saying that he realized that I didn't like stories like these but he
hoped I would find time to read them anyway. So it was with some
trepidation that I sat down 45 minutes ago with "Horny out of My Mind"
on the computer screen.
I was lucky the house was empty. My family would have thought I had
gone crazy. Here I was in the late afternoon, laughing my head off in
front of the computer! Was this author serious when he said he thought
I wouldn't like stories like these? Maybe he was pulling my leg - or
maybe I took his really serious story in the wrong way. As I
understand it, this is a story about a young lady who gets knocked up
by a friendly guy who's old enough to be her father but is really a
stud and who requests his wife's permission before he has sex with his
new friend. The girl gets hornier and hornier as the ensuing pregnancy
progresses, and pretty soon she is screwing from sunrise to sunset and
beyond. There's not much I can say about this story; the plot is
summarized in the previous sentence, and superficially it sounds pretty
lame. There's not even much detailed description of heavy sex
activities - just clever summaries of what's happening. But I
thoroughly enjoyed this story. (Rating: 10)
"Debt" by Deirdre (an65862@anon.penet.fi). I usually read one of
Deirdre's stories, pause thoughtfully, and then write my review. This
time I thought I'd try writing it while I read the story. Here goes.
The doorbell rings and the guy answers the door. One of the two women
whom he meets says, "We're here because Claire lost a bet and has to
pay up." As soon as she says that, the other girl drops to her knees in
front of the man, unzips his fly, and begins sucking his cock. This is
an example of what the old literature texts used to call in medias res
- starting the story with a plunge directly into the action. Anyway,
after the blowjob the guy listens at his door and hears the two women
going to the next apartment, which is inhabited by the fair Diane.
Further eavesdropping reveals a major gambling problem: Claire also
appears to be eating Diane out to pay a debt.
Next our hero and Diane get invited to dinner with Claire and Shannon.
Shortly after dessert is served, the other two women dive under the
table; and one starts sucking the guy's cock, while the other is
invisibly doing a job on Diane, who is seated at the opposite end of
the table. At this point it is not clear whether the problem is
compulsive gambling, an eating disorder, or simple nymphomania.
As the story reaches its denouement, we discover that the other two
women have made it their personal project (apparently as a result of an
unspecified bet) to get the guy and Diane into the sack together and to
become their servants, with the goal of enhancing the sexual happiness
of the new couple. The guy seems to like all this but can't quite
figure out what's going on - which is pretty much my own reaction to
the story. Another weird but excellent tale from Deirdre! (Rating:
10)
"Dip" by Deirdre (an65862@anon.penet.fi). Deirdre has the ability to
catch my interest at the very beginning of a story and to hold my
attention right up to the abrupt ending. This story exemplifies that
magical power. A woman finds herself physically attracted to her
sister-in-law and goes shopping with her. Soon she finds herself
swimming in the nude with her and then in a stranger's apartment making
love to the sister-in-law and the other woman. (Rating: 10)
"Dive" by Deirdre (an65862@anon.penet.fi). The author dedicates this
story to all women who have been asked by their men if they would do it
with another woman. In brief, two couples are fooling around by a
swimming pool and start taking pictures of various pairs in positions
of feigned intimacy. Emotions get hot, and the couples retire to
private spots for sex. Even though the actual sex is not very
explicit, the anticipation is quite hot. (Rating: 9)
"WERE" by ZeroNLN (ZeroNLN@aol.com). This story is in a class with
Milton's "Paradise Lost." By this I mean I haven't read it. The
author was kind enough to send it to me, and I have sat down to read it
several times; but I just can't get interested. It's not that the
story is badly written; as far as I've read, the style seems to be
clear and creative. I just cannot get excited about the subject
matter. The story is quite long and it looks like its about a warrior
queen with magical powers who is going to torture a werewolf in sexual
ways. This is not something I would even remotely enjoy reading for an
hour. It was the same with Milton. When "Paradise Lost" was assigned
to our class, I dutifully tried to read it; and as near as I could
figure it was a mishmash of religious myths that could not possibly
have any relationship to reality. The main reason anybody cared about
it, I thought, was because it was written by a nasty old blind man (who
was lucky to be able to write anything) at a time when people actually
believed that there really had been a war between good angels and bad
angels that settled the fate of the world. I set "Paradise Lost"
aside, traveled to the bookstore, purchased Cliff's Notes (or maybe it
was the Monarch Study Guide), and proceeded to get an A on the exam.
Unfortunately, neither Cliff, Monarch, Barron, nor anyone else has a
study guide for WERE.
Please note that I am *not* saying that this is a bad story. Many of
my most esteemed colleagues disagree with me about Milton - especially
those who take biblical mythology seriously. What I am saying is that
I don't care about or understand occult topics like werewolves,
vampires, and magic. (There are exceptions. Sometimes the story makes
clear the ground rules so that outsiders like myself can enjoy the
story without bothering to embrace the ideology in any detail. This
was the case with Backrub's vampire story.) If I would try to review
the story, I think it is almost certain that I would not enjoy it and
would give it an improperly low rating because of my own personal
feelings. I would rather spend my time reading something I am more
likely to understand and enjoy. I think there is an audience for
stories like this - perhaps a very large audience; and I hope someone
else who has read WERE will be kind enough to write to the author and
discuss it with him/her. This author has obviously devoted
considerable time and effort to this project and deserves feedback from
people who have profited from this activity. (No rating)
HOT TIP: "The Directive" by The Spook (Adventure & Sex). I am trying
to abstain from rating stories before they are completed. This is
because I have been burned by stories that start out good but either
drag on forever or stop abruptly when the author loses interest.
Nevertheless, I feel obligated to call this serial story to your
attention. (At the present time the author has posted four chapters.)
The combination of action and romance reminds me of Ian Fleming or Ken
Follet - with more explicit descriptions of sexual activity. This
author also wrote "The Final Mission," which received a rating of 10.
There are several authors who write long stories (including The Spook,
Walter Slaven, and Delta) that I watch for and download each chapter as
their new stories appear. If I don't have time to read the stories, I
set them aside for a day when the weather is nasty and I need something
to do. If I were you, I'd start collecting "The Directive." (No
rating yet.)
"The Chambermaid" by Delta (an248969@anon.penet.fi). I am familiar
with Delta primarily as the author of some of my favorite *long*
stories. My all-time favorite is "Strip Chess" - because of that story
I still cannot concentrate properly on strategy during a chess game.
This is a much shorter story - the kind of thing that Ann Douglas or
Sue do so effectively. I was impressed that Delta could write so well
in this different format.
The story is about a woman who has recently broken up with her lover.
A major problem in her life, she feels, is that she is too fastidious
and predictable. She is staying in a motel, and she mistakenly puts
the "Clean room" instead of the "Do not disturb" sign on the door knob
while she takes a shower. When she comes out of the shower and is
surprised to find the chambermaid (a guy) in her room, she impulsively
decides to be a lot less predictable. You'll have to read the story to
find out what this means.
I have a personal insight into how this story was written that makes it
even more impressive to me. When Delta sent me this story, she told me
that she had written a message to a.s.s., but it was obvious to her
that the message really belonged on a.s.s.d. However, she knew that if
she posted it with the latter newsgroup, very few people in her target
audience would see it. So she solved the problem by immediately
writing this entire story, and then she appended the message to the
story - and she could now legitimately post the combination on a.s.s.,
since it was a story and her message was part of the disclaimer!
Actually, this is not a new ruse. You possibly know that there is some
dispute over the authorship of Shakespeare's plays. As I understand
it, the real story is that those plays were written by a woman who was
in love with her landlady, at a time when such things were viewed
askance (women writing plays, that is). Anyway, whenever she sent in
her rent check, she enclosed another scene or act (depending on her
level of passion at the time) or a sonnet (if she was really hot).
This is only one hypothesis, but I think it makes a lot more sense than
the Francis Bacon theory; and it also explains why some of the passages
make so little sense. From one perspective, Delta's effort pales in
comparison - "Shakespeare" also put her plays into iambic pentameter
and her sonnets sort of rhymed sometimes. (Rating: 10)
TIP OF THE WEEK: In each issue of Celestial Reviews I present one of
the guidelines from Celestial Grammar, which I have posted on alt
sex.stories.d. and which I'll continue to develop and revise from time
to time. My theory is that if all of these tips were followed, about
95% of the really distracting errors in a.s.s. stories would be
eliminated. (The other 5% will eventually be covered in Advanced
Celestial Grammar.) I was going to name this part of the column TIP OF
THE {something sexual}, but I thought the innuendo might detract from
the sober serious business at hand. Here is this week's Tip:
LIE/LAY.
LIE means to recline. (It is an intransitive verb - it cannot take a
direct object.) Its past tense is LAY, and its perfect tense is LAIN.
Of course, a serious source of confusion is that LAY (in addition to
being a word in its own right - discussed later) is also the past tense
of LIE.
LIE also means to state a falsehood. This is a completely different
word that has a separate dictionary entry. Its past tense is LIED and
its perfect tense is HAS LIED. (This meaning is easily understood and
usually causes no confusion. Its main relevance with regard to sex is
its poignant use in country western songs: "She was sound asleep in our
double bed/And I let her lie.")
LAY means to put something (or someone) down. (It is a transitive
verb.) The past tense is LAID. The perfect tense is HAS LAID.
The three most common problems with LIE/LAY are: (1) using LIE when you
mean LAY (and vice versa), (2) Using LAID (instead of LAY) as a past
tense of LIE, and (3) using LAID (instead of LAIN) as the perfect tense
of LIE.
INCORRECT: We continued to lay in bed after our orgasms.
CORRECT: We continued to lie in bed after our orgasms.
INCORRECT: I had been watching her lay in bed for nearly an hour
before she woke up.
CORRECT: I had been watching her lie in bed for nearly an hour
before she woke up.
INCORRECT: She told me to lie the dildo on the night stand.
CORRECT: She told me to lay the dildo on the night stand.
INCORRECT: After lying the dildo on the night stand, I fucked her
brains out.
CORRECT: After laying the dildo on the night stand, I fucked her
brains out.
CORRECT: After laying her in the hay loft, I went inside and laid
her sister too. (This is grammatically correct, but it may constitute
a social faux pas.)
INCORRECT: I should have lain the key to the handcuffs out of her
reach before I left the room.
CORRECT: I should have laid the key to the handcuffs out of her
reach before I left the room.
(See Dear Grammar Goddess for more!)