Hurts So Good - bdsm toy by Cleis Press Inc. - review by Lara

Compilations of erotic short stories always seem to come with an inherent risk attached to them. If one story flows into another, if the writing demands the reader’s attention, if the reality around you melts away when you drift into the world presented by the stories – that’s a job well done. That’s a compilation worth reading.

If the stories stutter amongst themselves and if the quality of writing is erratic, the compilation becomes almost painful (not in the good way). Like mediocre porn films, you skim through the pages, looking for something – anything! – just to get off and get it over with so you can move on with your life. Reading is no longer a pleasure but a means to an end and a pretty mediocre end at that.

Hurts So Good is an excellent example of that rare and decadent first type. While each of the stories are written with their own unique voice, there’s a constant erotic buzz in the background keeping the reader on edge and building that sense of internal sexual suspense.

There’s the James Joyce-esque rapture of a woman longing for her lover’s touch…

“I can’t smell his salt and gravy scent, or feel the dry rasp of his hand against me. I can’t see his eyes darting over me, provoking me and making me squirm. Nothing but the breeze that torments me, Mistral hot and Arctic cold, the dull blank and sweet sheets beneath me and the warm tug of the silk gripping my wrists, my ankles. My body is a blank until he grants me confirmation, until he wakes me with a kiss.”

There’s the slightly sardonic commentary of a man almost overcome by his passion for his slave…

“If I listened to my blood-engorged cock, I would fuck and fuck and fuck until neither Lily nor I could move. But my cock lacks judgment. I know that my enjoyment will increase as I bring Lily closer and closer to abandoning herself, to letting go of everything except me and my will. Then I can drive us both into that moment where pleasure is all there is.”

And then there’s always the reminder that when it hurts, it can hurt so good…

“I unleashed my sadism into him, grinding my boot into his dick until tears filled his eyes, slamming my boots into his thighs, raining blows into his chest, a whirlwind of pain to hold him still. I bent him over the horse, ripping his clothes open to my fists and teeth, and did not pause until my cock was poised at his asshole, opening him. He was whimpering around the head, trying to take it in, straining for me.”

I had my first orgasm around page 35. My second came around page 80. You’ll find your favorite passages and stories as well.

One of the book’s greatest strengths is the remarkable variety of its scenes. There’s ample girl spanking boy and boy spanking girl, but there’s also a touch of girl spanking girl and boy spanking boy. There are no transgender characters at all.

It would be inappropriate to take the presence of some homosexual action as an indication that this book is geared towards a LGBT audience. It’s really not. Because only about three of the twenty-one stories in the collection have same-sex characters, I’d guess that this compilation is speaking more to a heterosexual person’s lesbian/gay fantasies.

It’s difficult to identify any particular weakness of the book. There are certainly some stories that will speak to readers more than others, but that’s entirely a matter of personal preference.

If you pick this book up thinking that there might be something about bondage, pain, and/or control that could turn you on, you’ll find a story to push those buttons.