The Mile High Club - erotic fiction by Cleis Press Inc. - review by Kayla

The Mile High Club is a Cleis Press erotica book edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel. It has the regular format of most Cleis Press erotica books and sits at 187 pages. The book includes 19 different stories in those pages, so most of the stories are relatively long. As you could guess, this entire anthology is based around sex while up in an airplane. The front cover shows a couple getting it on in a hotel bathroom and says "The Mile High Club" is relatively large font, so I'd probably recommend you choose not to take this out in public.

Something neat about this collection is that not all of the stories just take place in the airplane bathroom like you'd assume. I know I did. In fact, only a couple of the stories take place in the airplane bathroom. For the most part, almost all of the stories take place in the cabin of the airplane itself usually under a blanket to keep others from watching. The stories vary in which "class" of the plane they are traveling in the plane and even if the partner is with them. For example, in one story the partner was talking to her through instant messenger while in another, the guy had given her strict orders before the flight not to remove the sex toys in her.

For the most part, I think almost all of the stories were heterosexual. In fact, off the top of my head, aside from a threesome, there really wasn't much homosexual activity included in this book. All of the homosexuality in this book appeared within the context of the main characters being heterosexual.

I must say that I was a little disappointed with these stories. While some were super hot, I honestly must say I was expecting a little bit more exhibitionism in the collection since almost all of the stories took place in the airplane. This meant they'd be surrounded with tons of people. However, only in a couple of the stories were there any sort of on-lookers which was slightly disappointing. I suppose half of the arousal of airplane stories is attempting to keep it a secret from other people in the plane though. However, when you read about things such as her face in his lap giving him a blowjob yet no one seems to notice, I just think it's a little unrealistic.

Most of the stories, however, were a little hot in their realism or fantasy. Some of them seem like they were meant to be one of those "exceptions" where you found yourself in a situation that wouldn't regularly happen in real-life. The book was a little longer than some Cleis Press books, and I found myself finished it in two and a half hours instead of a half an hour. Unlike other Cleis Press books I've read, I have to say that I wasn't riveted to the pages or anything like I was hoping for. However, it was still enjoyable to read - just not addicting.

My favorite story, "Bermuda Triangle" by Vanessa Vaughn is about a flight instructor who has been having a sexual relation with one of her students. When he shows up for his lesson today, she breaks the news that she had to double-schedule his time with another male student. Needless to say, this leads to a nice, fun threesome. (I know - two guys together!) The flight instructor tells one of the boys to trust her while she blindfolds him and makes him fly the plane while the other one gets down on his hands and knees and unzips the blindfold one's pants. The instructor sits back watching with her hand down her pants. It was just a downright hot story.

I found a neat plot in "Get On, Get Off" by Jeremy Edwards. Basically, airlines have decided to capitalize on the sex markets. Now you can choose to book a flight in M-Class - Masturbation Class. The seats are seated two at a person, and you are free to masturbate, have sex, and enjoy yourself. Each passenger is given a curtain on either side of them to give them privacy, and the curtain between passengers can only be opened with consent between the two people sitting next to each other. Needless to say, a man and a woman get sat next to each other, and after separately masturbating for awhile, they consent to open the curtain.

In "Bert and Betty" by Ryan Field, a woman and a man end up meeting on the plane. She finds him attractive, and apparently has a habit for randomly giving men blow jobs on flights. So she does. But the fun comes in because a gay couple in the next aisle over notices. One of the boys gets on his knees and chooses to copy everything that the woman is doing to the man. A very arousing story that I enjoyed. I'm not sure how the flight attendant didn't notice though.

Really, overall, I liked the collection. It included quite a few different stories that were just downright sexy to read. However, some of the stories were not arousing and boring as well as some of the plots were too unrealistic to believe but wanted to act like they were real-life plots. The shining stories still make this collection fun to pick up - especially if you plan on taking an airplane soon.

The Mile High Club was a good collection of stories. While I have no doubt that I'd revisit it were I ever to be on an airplane, until that time, I really haven't touched it since my first reading. It's a good book, and it has good stories, but I think those stories really become much more arousing if you happen to have a trip coming up. Until then, I'd prefer to read stories that could happen to me at any time.

The book still looks great though. It fits in amazingly with the rest of my collection of erotica books. I've had quite a few people pick it up and look through it.