In Sleeping Beauty's Bed: Erotic Fairy Tales - erotic book by Cleis Press Inc. - review by TitsMcScandal

In Sleeping Beauty’s Bed is not your average erotica. If you want some smutty book or anthology, don’t look at this. This is involves a higher level of thinking. Not all the short stories within would really be called erotica by some of the population. It is a collection of short stories all written by Mitzi Szereto. The introduction can be dry and hard to get through, but really is indicative of the rest of the book. If the intro doesn’t hold your attention it probably isn’t the book for you. The intro goes into detail about the history of fairy tales. So who would this be of interest to? Well, literary history buffs would be its main target audience. However literary nerds (like myself) or history buffs (perhaps like you) or some fringe others who like intelligent adult literature that may not be straight up erotica.

If none of that sounds interesting, don’t get this book. If it does, this is probably the book for you. I knew from reading about it that I would enjoy it because I am a literary nerd. So when I got the book I was excited. I wouldn’t say this is the most public friendly book, it does have a slightly risque feel to it. Anyone looking at the cover would know it was something of an adult nature.

It is however easy to carry around if you were taking it back and forth between houses or something. I don't know what kind of circumstance that would be, but it would work. Another plus is that if just the binding is facing out (such as if it were on a bookshelf) most people would not be intrigued enough to pull it out to realize it is of a more risque nature.

Now the layout of the stories is a bit different than other collections that I've read. One nice thing is that instead of being a whole bunch of different authors contributing; it is one author. This means there is one consistent type of writing and relying information. This is great if you like her way of writing, but bad if you don't. The layout itself is two separate but equally important parts (sort of like Law and Order) the introduction and history of the fairytale, and then the adapted fairytale.

The history of the fairytale always come before the fairytale in a 1-3 page quick synopsis of what the tale is about and how the original piece had elements of eroticism. The adapted adult literary fairy tales vary in length but none are super short. I'd say to devote between 3-10 minutes to every story depending on how fast or slow of a reader you are.

The thing that I find fascinating are some of the literary devices. As a literary nerd they appeal to me. However, I did find myself chuckling at some of the phrasings. (A pomegranate is not a good euphemism for a pussy) This is the exact thing that will turn many readers off.

There are 15 adapted adult literary in this collection. All of them has some literary merit although some I probably wouldn't read again. There are only a few that I would read to actually get off. Although there is the overwhelming majority that I would read again (and again and again) due to their smart adult adaptions.

The one I specifically want to point out is the adaptation of Cinderella. It was brilliant in my mind. It dealt with foot fetishes but had some clever innuendos that made me smile. This is a great example of being able to overcome something you may not be sexually attracted to (foot fetishes) but really like the literary devices enough to ignore what you don't like and focus on what you do.

There are 316 pages in the collection, and the print is fairly large. Not the small tiny type that is some books. I read this in many sittings, but I would say that you could knock it out in a hour and a half to two hours depending on if you took any fun breaks.

Please do note though that I frequently use the term, adapted adult literary fairytales. I do not call these erotica. That is not how I would classify these, although there is definite erotic tones and explicit meaning in the stories.