Zalman King's Red Shoe Diaries: Forbidden Zone: Stacey Donovan and Elise D'Haene

Forbidden Zone consists of four erotic novellas, inspired by the Showtime series. Now, we've all watched Showtime and Cinemax porn and we all know that labeling these shows as "porn" is to use the term loosely, therefore I have a hard time referring to this book as erotica, with the exception of the second novella.

The Art of Loneliness

This story surrounds Elizabeth, a blind night-time radio talk show host whose boyfriend, Bobby skipped town a few months back and suddenly turns up on her doorstep in the middle of her show.

This story just completely flew over my head. The whole ambience had that jazz-loving, neo-hippy feel to it, which I just can't connect with. Why this story is considered erotica, I'm not really sure. The sex scenes were very short and non-descriptive.

Forbidden Zone

Angelica, the nineteen year old, soon to be bride to a sixty eight year old man, is kidnaped in the middle of the night by a band of anti-fundamentalists who are against the rules and strictures that The Authority have set for society. Angelica has been hiding the fact that she is a "Depraved One" for fear of ruining her family, but her kidnappers are about to change her mind.

During her captivity, she is sexually tortured as her captors try to make her realize her basic human and sexual instincts.

This story has definitely earned the right to be coined as erotica. While the story itself was a little strange with its political, futuristic, New World Order setting, and Angelica's mental state, it grabs the essence of what erotica should be: naughty, nasty, graphic, and sometimes downright painful.

Picnic

Rita is caught in the middle of a dangerous triangle. She is stringing along both Kit and Buddy, who are best friends. Buddy wants Rita for himself and plots to have Rita shoot Kit.

Ok, so the whole dangerous love triangle thing might have worked out OK, if it wasn't for the dialogue of the characters. It was like watching a weak, Skinemax flick set in the backwoods of Hazard County with Roscoe and Cooter as the male characters and a cheap, high-school drop out, trailer park stripper playing the part of Rita. Don't get me wrong, I love red necks, but I don't want to read the terrible grammar in an erotica story.

Sex in the Hamptons: The Writers' Confessions

This story is written in first-person by each of the authors of this book. Elise has her first lesbian experience with their agent, and both she and Stacey wind up in bed (at separate times) with the illustrator for their next project.

I give points for originality for the authors compiling this story as their own experiences, but it just didn't hold my attention. Again, the sex scenes were only so so and didn't give the book the strong ending that it needed to make up for the prior lackluster stories.

So....there's erotica then there's erotica, just like there's real porn and then there's Showtime porn (the watered down version). In the world of erotica literature, this is definitely the watered down version and isn't worth the time and effort that it takes to read.

--------------------------------------------

Publisher: Berkley Trade (August 1, 2006)
ISBN: 0425210103
Buy the Book