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From: Celeste801@aol.com
Subject: Celestial Reviews 163 - Mar 5
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Celestial Reviews 163 - March 5, 1997
Note: I offer a free proofreading service to any interested authors. I
don't proofread the stories myself, but I have a list of several volunteers
who are willing to read stories before they "go to press." Proofreading can
be an enjoyable experience, and submitting your stories to an interested and
competent outsider can greatly enhance your stories. Some of the best
authors who post on a.s.s. employ this proofreading service, and it is my
opinion that these volunteers often make suggestions that result in excellent
stories. If you would like to either volunteer as a proofreader or submit a
story for proofreading, please contact me. {Do NOT send me the actual story
unless it is ready for review - at the time you plan to post it. If you want
a proofreader, just let me know, and I'll match you up with a volunteer.}
- Celeste
"To Save the Ship" by Storysman (sci fi sex) 8, 10, 10
"A Little Afternoon Fun" by Dulcinea (water sports) 10, 10, 10
"The Price of Freedom" by Jefferson James (Civil War sex)
9, 10, 10
"Frisking The Cat" by Tooshoes (superhero sex) 10,10,10
* "The Adventures of Me and Martha Jane" by Santo J.
Romeo (emerging adolescence and romance)
10, 10, 10
* "Princess's Court" by Plainman (romance & adultery)
10, 10, 10
* = Repost of a previous review (because the story has
recently been reposted)
"To Save the Ship" by Storysman (rda1@ix.netcom.com). The narrator is an
officer on one of those interplanetary starships we hear so much about. It's
a lonely life out there, and John has brought along his wife, who not only is
great in the sack but is also an expert on alien relations. The first hint
of potential problems arises when it becomes obvious that John is not the
only one who becomes horny on long, lonely intergalactic voyages. To
complicate matters, the starship rescues some Prommelans, members of a
physically strong race who need to copulate at least every 30 days (whatever
a day would be out there) or else they go into a sexual fever that has the
side effect of telekinetically disorientating the starship.
Well, Vicki comes to the rescue of the Prommelan ambassador, and he recovers
from his fever and the ship rights its course. But then he discloses that
Prommelan sperm is lethal to earthly women, and so the Prommelan has
literally fucked John's wife to death - almost. But hope is not lost!
There's a loophole. Human sperm serves as an antidote to Prommelan sperm,
but it will take a large quantity - possibly the contribution of every man in
the crew. Shiver me timbers! We gotta save this ship!
Ratings for "To Save the Ship"
Athena (technical quality): 8
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
"A Little Afternoon Fun" by Dulcinea (ImDulcinea@aol.com). On this newsgroup
the term " water sports" usually refers to urination as part of sexual
activities. With regard to this story I use the term to refer to the use of
a squirt gun filled with ice water to tease a husband and a bucket of water
to douse the offender and render her the moral equivalent of a wet-tee-shirt
contest winner. This is a very, very exciting bit of sexy flirtation.
Ratings for "A Little Afternoon Fun"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
"The Price of Freedom" by Jefferson James (M.Shark@ix.netcom.com). The Civil
War is coming to its end. Clara is a southern belle who is not exactly
politically astute. When her slave, Ezra, announces to her that the Yankees
are about to overrun the plantation, she's basically clueless, until Ezra
notifies her that he's going to make love to her. This startles her
sensibilities, but she submits and soon discovers that she has suddenly
become Ezra's slave.
I guess it is POSSIBLE that this sort of scenario could have occurred at the
end of the Civil War, but my impression from studying history and watching
"Roots" is that very few slaves actually frolicked with their mistresses when
hostilities came to an end. Nevertheless, this is a very good story.
Ratings for "The Price of Freedom"
Athena (technical quality): 9
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
"Frisking The Cat" by Tooshoes (tooshoes@concentric.net). Our story begins
with Supergirl feeling lonely and horny on a late-night subway train. She
has group sex with some strangers on the train; but when they depart, she
realizes that they have taken her purse, which contains her superhero
uniform.
After this introduction we learn that Supergirl is having trouble making ends
meet in her dual identity persona. Since she majored in Liberal Arts, she
can't get a good job; but her platonic acquaintance, Andrew, hires her as a
sort of roving agent for the SSA (Superhero Surveillance Agency). He first
assignment is to apprehend Catwoman, a cat burglar who doubles as a sort of
Robin Hood vigilante.
Oh, there are a few details I forgot to mention - Supergirl has a libido that
won't quit. She also is a transmitter (but not a receiver) of ESP messages.
And Catwoman has this problem of getting to the point of a huge orgasm and
then just quitting. Somehow all this comes together into an interesting
plot.
Incidentally, the Supergirl in this story is not to be confused with the one
in "Supergirl and X" by MD James, which was written with the most up-to-date
comic-book readers in mind and included numerous inside references. The
present Supergirl is the one that Ann Douglas also has written about. This
one appeared in the older DC Comics but was killed off several years ago and
was replaced by the newer Supergirl with very different powers. Just thought
you'd like to know that.
Ratings for "Frisking The Cat"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
* "The Adventures of Me and Martha Jane" by Santo J. Romeo
(73233.1411@compuserve.com). I first reviewed this story in CR 18, which was
posted on September 9, 1995. At that time I gave it a 5. It was a good
story, I said; but I was genuinely pissed off because it just ended in the
middle of nowhere. I further refused to read any more parts of the story
until the author would assure me that he was finished. I was tired of this
neverending story crap.
Well, the author has finished the story, and it has been worth the wait. I
saw a message on a.s.s. that compared the author to Harold Robbins. That
evaluation is not far from the mark.
The narrator is presumably a man in his fifties, retelling a story of his
youth. At the beginning of the story, the 6-year-old Steven (Speedy)
harbored a wonderful, non-sexual admiration for Martha Jane, who was nine
years older; and she showed a reciprocal respect for him. The two lived next
door to each other in a federal housing project around 1950 and shared a
common front porch. The focus of the story is the maturation and fulfillment
of their relationship.
Although the early lines of this story hint of sexual activity, the first
several paragraphs are devoted to demonstrating that the protagonist of the
story was a precocious child - not a sexually precocious child, but a
run-of-the-mill precocious child. This full-life focus continues throughout
the story, and it emphasizes that the hero and Martha Jane should be regarded
as whole persons, not as simple sex objects. The development of non-sexual
aspects helps set this story in a truly rich and interesting psychological
and emotional environment. The story is one of the longest coherent stories
I have seen on this newsgroup, but it is also one of the best.
Certainly there is moral ambiguity in the story. For example, near the
beginning the mother tells the young Steven that pregnant women get that way
by eating too many popsicles and that babies come from storks. Shortly
thereafter, Martha Jane corrects this stupid explanation by playing with his
penis to give him a hard-on, while giving him an accurate biological account
of the facts of life. If I had a son, I wouldn't try either of these
approaches to sex education. It's interesting that normal society rejects
Martha Jane's approach - to the extent that Redbook and the Sunday
supplements would never even consider publishing an account like this without
labeling Martha Jane a pervert; but sitcoms routinely laugh about the
mother's explanation.
I'm running the risk of preaching to the choir here: most readers of this
review are likely to be predisposed to want to like a story like this. On
the other hand, large numbers of equally civilized readers outside a.s.s.
would react to this story as an example of perversion. Most of us will
counter by describing these people as sexually repressed puritans. And so
forth. I think we should be willing to simply admit but tolerate the moral
ambiguity of the story. It's fiction and it's interesting. There's nothing
perverse in setting aside our moral scruples and enjoying a good story.
Millions of American high schoolers are required every year to read Edgar
Alan Poe's tale about a pervert who tears the heart out of an old man and
buries it under the floorboards in his house. We practically require these
students to set aside moral scruples and to enjoy the beauty of this
atrocity. I'm not recommending that we make "Martha Jane" part of the
sophomore curriculum; I simply think adult readers can set aside moral
reactions long enough to enjoy this story without taking a position that it
would be "better" if all children grew up this way.
When I myself was a young baby-sitter, I did not give head to any of the
children I cared for; and I would hope that my own daughters likewise refrain
from that practice. The psychologists and counselors who suggested to the
narrator later in his life that this activity was abnormal are quite likely
right (although, again, these sages would simply laugh about the goofy
explanations of sexuality given by the mother and other adults.). It would
be much better for little boys to receive accurate answers from their own
parents and for young baby-sitters to have internalized a code of ethical
conduct that enables them to understand their own and their clients' emerging
sexuality and to rule out genital contact without resorting to primitive
mythologies. But that still doesn't make this a bad story. One of my own
favorite novels is Betty Smith's "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn." I would never
raise my own children the way those children grew up in that story, but it's
still a good novel (and an excellent movie).
Again, I'm probably preaching to the choir. But someone is surely going to
label this story "pedophilia." There are legitimate gripes against many
pedophile stories; they essentially recommend the adoption of lifestyles that
would be destructive to children. What we need to do is acknowledge that
some stories that describe genital activities with children have the
potential to be destructive - especially those that are simply unrealistic or
that promote the exploitation of children. On the other hand, other stories
that describe genital activity with or among children are either harmless or
actually have the potential to lead to moral or emotional growth among
readers. To take a sexually-related analogy, there are numerous examples of
books and movies about adults having affairs. Some of these are badly
written or stupidly conceived and seem to have as their only goal to degrade
the value of marriage and other permanent relationships. On the other hand,
many of these books and movies are well conceived and have the overall effect
of enabling us to understand human emotions - and, indeed, marriage and other
permanent relationships - more perfectly.
Although the most important aspect of this story is the sexual relationship
between the narrator and Martha Jane, it's not really a sex story. Rather,
it's a story about the emotional development of two young people. Less than
a third of the lines in the story are even remotely devoted to their sex
lives. The non-sex scenes are extremely realistic and vivid, giving us
information needed to understand the background and personalities of the two
main characters.
If a reader wants a source of information about how much fun it would be to
have sex with a precocious little kid, this would be a good story for that
purpose - although all the details about the child's emotions would probably
be viewed as distracting. However, I really don't think this was the
author's purpose. On the other hand, if a person (like myself) is reading
this story to obtain sensitive insights into the personalities of two young
people as they mature sexually and emotionally, this is a good source for
serious reading.
Ratings for "Martha Jane"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
"Princess's Court" by Plainman (an10176@anon.nymserver.com). These seven
stories are interconnected to such an extent that I do not want to review
them separately. It IS reasonable to read one story, then stop, then read
the next a few days later. However, I don't think it would be a good idea to
read story 7, then 1, then 4, etc. The proper order is:
1. Confession
2. Pre-Trial Proceedings
3. Girl Talk
4: Crime Scene
5: Claire
6: Motion to Dismiss
7: Night Court
The author describes the series as mainly a married male-female romance, with
lots of adultery in the "wife-watching" vein, lots of consensual
brother-sister incest, a fair amount of female-female fun, several loss of
virginity scenes (in reminiscence), some anal sex, and a threat of fairly
harsh consensual (but protested!) punishment that hangs over the whole series
and is brought to fruition in the final part. There is no explicit male-male
sex, although one character hints of interests in that direction There is
also no pedophilia. The adult characters have children, whom they speak of;
but they take appropriate care to keep the children away from their sexual
activities.
Each story consists entirely of dialogue; we have to infer what else is
happening. It's like overhearing telephone conversations or listening
through a thin wall at a motel. Everything not spoken is left to the
imagination. Since the conversations are vivid, the reader's imagination is
likely to be busy.
Early on we learn that somebody referred to as Princess is married to a man
called Trooper. She has been unfaithful while away on a trip. She tells
Trooper about her infidelity, and although he seems titillated, he plans to
convene something called the Family Court to punish Princess. The other
members of the Family Court appear to be David, the sister of Princess who
has been sexually active with her in the past, and Judy, the Princess's
childhood friend and current sex partner who is apparently intimately
involved with David. The interrelationships among these characters become
clearer in succeeding stories.
Each story reveals its details in interesting ways. For example, in one
segment Princess discusses her infidelity with her husband by telephone from
an airplane, while she is in danger of being overheard by the people around
her. In another segment we hear Dave and Judy making love, talking about
their past experiences and integrating fantasies from the past with their
present lovemaking. The author uses flashbacks and innuendo to build some
really hot images.
The series was originally entitled "Family Court," but the author changed the
title, in order to distance the story from any suggestion of pedophilia. I
see his point; but the change lost something important. The term Family
Court occurs in the story, with obvious reference to the trial and punishment
administered to Princess. However, a second meaning of "court" (which is not
initially evident with the original title) is the group of people who hang
around a royal person - as in "the king and his court." As the reader moves
through the story, it becomes obvious that this second meaning is also
relevant - the Princess is not only SUBJECTED to a court, she also HAS a
court. The new title shifts the initial emphasis so far toward the second
meaning that it ruins the fun that comes from the insight of discovering this
second meaning. If you have any idea what I am talking about, this paragraph
may have been interesting.
I have a brother and sister and associated in-laws with whom I have never had
sex and don't intend to do so. However, I think there is a little bit of the
Princess in me; and I truly enjoyed the vicarious experiences I found by
eavesdropping on the Princess and her court. On another personal note, I'm
still not interested in getting into the punishment and humiliation stuff
that Princess gets off on. On the other hand, stories like this help me
believe that I really wouldn't be upset if my next-door neighbors were into
this kind of thing - as long as I had binoculars. I might even let my kids
play with theirs - as long as they didn't have binoculars.
This was an excellent, highly creative story.
Ratings for "Princess's Court"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
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