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From: Celeste801@aol.com
Subject: Celestial Reviews 178 - May 3
X-Is-Review: yes
Celestial Reviews 178 - May 3, 1997
Note: Back in CR 174 I raised a question regarding the propriety of and
desirability of some of my reviews. As a point of netiquette, someone
pointed out on a.s.s.d. that it was somehow rude for me to have quoted
verbatim part of the message from the person who raised the issue. I
personally don't see how this sort of citation can be perceived as a breach
of etiquette. The writer had raised an issue in private correspondence with
me, and I wanted input from readers. I often respond to personal e-mail in
these reviews: it is impossible for me to respond to everyone personally, and
most people seem to be happy to let me share their ideas with others. I did
not mention his/her name in my note, and I even stated that the writer seemed
to have a valid concern. I did not intend to cause personal embarrassment
for this correspondent; and as far as I can see, I could not possibly have
caused any.
This person's comments and input from a few other readers have led me to
change my review policy slightly. If any author ever requests that I NOT
review his/her story, I'll probably honor that request. In fact, I believe
the person who sent me the original e-mail message has subsequently posted
other stories, and I have deliberately refrained from reviewing them.
The overall response to CR 174 has suggested that authors usually like to
have someone review their stories and that my reviews are often more useful
to both authors and readers than many other forms of feedback available on
a.s.s. Indeed, since I posted that message I have been overwhelmed with
requests from authors to review their stories.
I am aware that my "reviews" are in a strict sense often more than mere
reviews. Sometimes they are critical essays; sometimes the reviews contain
short stories; and sometimes they are something else that may be hard to
define. I write these reviews because I have fun doing so and because I get
the distinct impression that my reviews help bring a little joy and insight
into the lives of a lot of people. While I appreciate the kind words that
many people have recently written to me or to the newsgroup, I had no
intention of starting any sort of hostilities over my reviews.
Please note that there is a rationale behind the three-part ratings plus
narrative critique that comprise each review. I give separate ratings to (1)
style, (2) story line, and (3) my enjoyment for a good reason: these ratings
convey distinct sets of information, and readers/authors can use them
accordingly. For example, if I don't like an otherwise well-written story
very much and hence rate it 10,10, 5, a sensible person whose tastes are
different from mine might have reason to believe that this is an excellent
story for his/her tastes. Or the author might consider this to be evidence
that he/she has written a good story that did not happen to appeal to my
tastes. I suppose there could be a better system, but I developed this one
based on feedback from a correspondent, and it seems to work pretty well.
The narrative part of the "reviews" is designed to entertain readers, to
reinforce authors for their effort or to give them feedback, and sometimes to
discuss my insights about topics that arise in a story. Although I say I
don't write stories of my own, it's obvious to me that some parts of these
reviews are actually stories. I have tried to develop a relationship with my
readers and authors and to encourage them to develop a relationship with one
another. I think this has happened, and it thrills me to be a part of this
process.
Second Note: Some of my students in real life have been participating in a
competition that requires them to have a thorough understanding of Wuthering
Heights. Last week one of them said to me, "This is stupid. In real life
Heathcliffe would make Isabella into a sex slave and flaunt this fact in her
brother's face." Another girl added, "Yeah. Just think how Edgar would feel
to know that his sister was the village tramp." Those are actually pretty
shrewd analyses. My favorite comment, however, was this one: "Wuthering
Heights is just like a soap opera, only the people on the soaps have more
depth of character." At least these kids are thinking!
Third Note: Remember: even though someone else may be posting my reviews for
me, my e-mail address is still Celeste801@aol.com.
- Celeste
"Forks" by Uther Pendragon(romance & marriage) 10, 10, 10
"Hard Candy" by Dafney DeWitt (pseudo mind control) 10, 10, 10
"My New Stepsister" by Anonymous (emerging adolescence)
9, 9, 9
"In the Next Room/Director's Cut Version" by MrSpraycan
(art museum sex) 10, 10, 10
"Romancing the Stone" by S.L. Jarva (magical sex) 10, 10, 10
"Teasers 2" by Vickie Tern (short subjects) 10, 10, 10
"Mad About You" by Frost (sitcom parody) 9, 9, 9
* "Vials" by Uther Pendragon (pseudo mind control)
10, 9.5, 10
* "Good Lord, Jeeves, It's Her!" by MrSpraycan (sexual humor)
9, 9, 9
* "Mayberry" by Richard Dale.(sitcom parody) 9, 10, 10
* = Repost of a previous review (because the story has
recently been reposted)
"Forks" by Uther Pendragon (anon584c@nyx.net). Since this is a story by
Uther Pendragon that begins with "For...", we know from the beginning that it
is about a married couple named Bob and Jeanette Brennan. In this
continuation of their saga we find them arguing over petty things. The
bickering is very realistic. These people sound like my husband when he
doesn't quite have his head on straight and he starts picking on me for
little things. In fact, for a while the story started to be a bit of drag,
as these two people with head colds continued to bitch at each other over the
dumbest things. But then they made up. Have you ever noticed that in real
life it's almost worthwhile to have petty arguments just because of the great
sex you can have when you make up afterwards?
Incidentally, the title refers to the concept that a place setting should
always include a fork, whether the people who are dining will need one or
not. That's something worth arguing over as the basis of a permanent marital
relationship.
Ratings for "Forks"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
"My New Stepsister" by Anonymous. The young boy's mother remarries, and (as
the title indicates) therefore the narrator inherits a new stepsister, who is
more knowledgeable than he about sexual matters. A favorite memory of his
childhood is the "game" the narrator used to play with his stepsister, when
they would cuddle up and she would go to sleep and he would explore her body.
Not only did he get turned on, but she also had some major orgasms in her
sleep; and in retrospect the narrator has begun to wonder whether she really
was asleep all those times.
Ratings for "My New Stepsister"
Athena (technical quality): 9
Venus (plot & character): 9
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 9
"Hard Candy" by Dafney DeWitt (dafneydewitt@juno.com). One man is offering
another a product that he can feed to women that will bring them under his
control. Just slip a little of the magic stuff into a woman's drink and
speak firmly to her and she'll do whatever you want. The seller lets the
potential buyer try it out on a woman in the bar; and by Jove, it works! He
buys it. Then we discover that the woman was in cahoots with the seller, and
so the stuff doesn't really work. Or does it?
There is a strong similarity between this story and "Vials" by Uther
Pendragon. I'll repost my review of that story, and perhaps Uther will
repost "Vials" for you. I checked with both authors; and while they
acknowledge the similarity, they also state that neither had read or relied
on the other story. Actually, the similarity arises from the fact that both
plots are based on the concept of a confidence game. The plot in "Vials"
uses a variation on the "Pigeon Drop"
con game by placing the drugs in a sealed envelope. The plot in "Hard Candy"
uses a variation of the "Murphy Man" prostitution confidence game by placing
the Mark, The Con, and The Accomplice Woman in the same place with The Con
pretending to be unaware or not associated with The Accomplice.
I think it is interesting to imagine that instead of becoming sexual
perverts, a person reading these stories might turn to a life of crime by
running con games on little old ladies who need their roofs fixed.
Ratings for "Hard Candy"
Athena (technical quality): 9
Venus (plot & character): 9
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 9
"In the Next Room/Director's Cut Version" by MrSpraycan
(mrspraycan.an@edtec.com). The author of this story claims to be waging a
"One Man Campaign For Intelligent Filth." Here he asks us to believe that
there are slutty people in New York who are willing to engage in sex in a
public museum. Hmmm... I guess I can accept that premise. At least it's fun
to think about people engaging in bizarre sexual activities in the display
rooms and restrooms of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This is a
well-written, creative story.
I have seen this name often in the postings, but the only other story I have
reviewed by this author is "Good Lord, Jeeves, It's Her!" I'll repost that
review, and maybe the author will repost the story. He has a web site at
http://www.SineWave.com/spraycan.
Ratings for "In the Next Room"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
"Romancing the Stone" by S.L. Jarva (LadyScribe@aol.com). A woman can never
really have romantic sex with a statue, can she? Never say never! We have
mythological precedent in the story of Galatea, a statue loved by Pygmalion,
CEO of Cyprus, who prayed to Aphrodite, CEO of love, that the statue might be
given life. His prayer was answered, and Pygmalion and Galatea fucked their
mutual brains out, although both Bullfinch and George Bernard Shaw tell a
tamer version of this story. In the present story the statue sports an
erection in the middle of the night, and the narrator impales herself on it -
to their mutual interpersonal gratification. It's a nice story!
Ratings for "In the Next Room"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
"Teasers 2" by Vickie Tern(VickieTern@aol.com). I first met Robert Browning
under the sterile tutelage of a nun whom I shall refer to as Sister Mary
Poetry. I was shocked that semester by the comment of one of my classmates,
who said that what SMP really needed was to get laid. I met this nun at a
subsequent class reunion and discovered that several years after I graduated,
Sister left the convent and did indeed get laid - probably more often and
with richer variety than almost anyone we have read about on a.s.s. However,
by the time of that reunion, she had a Ph.D. in English, was a Little League
mother driving a station wagon, and was happily married to her third husband.
Anyway, under her instruction I discovered that Robert Browning was boring as
hell, and I could not understand what Elizabeth Barrett saw in him that would
make her want to count the ways she loved him. Then in college I had an
English prof who read "My Last Duchess" out loud to me correctly, and I
discovered that it was a magnificent but concise revelation of the character
of the person who was describing his previous wife in that poem. All of this
has nothing to do with the present set of "teasers," except that some of them
reminded me strongly of Browning's poetry. That is, I thought at first that
I was reading a really simple description, and then suddenly I realized I was
reading about something a lot different and substantially more shocking than
had been my original impression.
These "teasers" vary greatly in quality and in subject matter, but they
generally have a narrator telling a story in which a sudden twist occurs that
left me with a completely different impression than I thought I was going to
get from the story.
I like these teasers. I like them so much that I am going to proclaim the
Third Annual Celestial Writing Contest. The rules are that the story must in
some way be about sex and must be restricted to 500 words or less. In
addition, the story should include some sort of unusual twist - like the
unexpected self-revelation in "My Last Duchess" or the surprise endings in
several of Vickie Tern's or Deirdre's stories. If you wish, you can submit
several super-short stories together (as this author has now done on two
occasions), or you can post them separately under separate titles. However,
I'll give first prize to the best STORY, not to the best collection. The
deadline for submissions will be June 3, which my calendar tells me is the
date on which the Catholic Church will celebrate the feast of St. Charles
Lwanga and his companions.
Ratings for "Teasers 2"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
"Mad About You" by Frost (THC Archives). Although I have listed this as a
sitcom parody, that description is slightly inaccurate. A good parody (like
those of "Seinfeld" which I have reviewed in the past couple of issues and
"Mayberry" which is reviewed later in this issue) runs parallel to and pokes
fun at the show which it satirizes. On the other hand, in the present story
the author takes the main characters from the "Mad About You" television
story and puts them into a lengthy story that is really not at all parallel
to the sitcom format. Nevertheless, the resulting pastiche is an interesting
story. Paul and Jamie have discovered that their love life has lost some of
its spark. Paul treats Jamie rather roughly during a sexual encounter, and
they both are surprised at how much they enjoy it. Pretty soon they really
get into some bondage and submission routines that they really enjoy.
I have often criticized D&s or bondage stories because they assume without
evidence that a "normal" person being subjected to harsh treatment is likely
to enjoy various sorts of degradation. This author at least raises the
question, letting us see that Jamie and Paul are concerned about their
enjoyment of apparently rough sex and are still legitimately in love with
each other. As I read the story I personally was not convinced that this
kind of activity would be immensely enjoyable to me, but I could at least see
the point in it, and I did find the descriptions in most cases to be quite
sexy. It was a good presentation of a point of view that differs somewhat
from my own.
Ratings for "Mad About You"
Athena (technical quality): 9
Venus (plot & character): 9
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 9
* "Vials" by Uther Pendragon (nobody@flame.alias.net). The guy has failed to
get past first base with the girl. Then he happens to meet a guy who will
sell him an aphrodisiac - not magic, mind you - just a little something that
will lower a woman's inhibitions and encourage her to do what she really
wants to do with a rich, handsome guy. And to top it off, the salesman is
willing to let him try one vial of the aphrodisiac for free, provided that he
agrees to purchase the remaining 19 vials for $5000 if the sample works. It
works like a charm; and the guy is only too eager to gobble up the other 19.
And then there's the surprise ending.
Ratings for "Vials"
Athena (technical quality): 10
Venus (plot & character): 9.5
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
* "Good Lord, Jeeves, It's Her!" by MrSpraycan (mrspraycan.an@edtec.com).
Bertie Wooster and Jeeves are characters in a series of books by the British
humorist P.G. Wodehouse. I first read Wodehouse many years ago in a bad
English class in college, and I had forgotten about him until an Unknown
Author posted a couple of stories about a person named Bertram and his valet
Cheeves. I liked those stories a lot and received encouragement from some
British readers to read some Bertie and Jeeves stories. I did so, and I
found them to be delightful.
In the original Wodehouse stories Bertie Wooster is a member of the British
ruling class who is totally jobless and clueless, but lives the quaint,
insipid life of the British aristocracy. Jeeves is his valet, or a
gentleman's gentleman, as Bertie refers to him. Bertie gets into trouble,
usually involving women (mostly his aunts) and Jeeves saves him from various
fates worse than death. That is the standard plot. The literati from the
Motherland will already know this, but we Colonials would be clueless as a
crown prince without this commentary.
The earlier Bertram stories were very much in the style of Wodehouse. For
example, "Bertram I" was an adventure with Aunt Agnes, in which he
successfully utilized the one-man band technique on her pussy and asshole,
followed by a vigorous double-holing with the assistance of the sainted
Cheeves. In "Bertram II" the chap was again summoned to his Aunt Agnes's
house on the occasion of his cousin Wilhelmina's 21st birthday. "Cheeves!"
exclaims Bertram, "this is a disaster! Whatever shall I give her?" What
indeed! As usual, Cheeves is happy to be of service. If someone would like
to repost these two earlier stories, I'm sure readers would appreciate it.
The present story is not quite as good a parody of Wodehouse, but it's still
a good story. The setting shifts from bygone days to contemporary times,
with Bertie being hunted down by a stripper and his dance partner, a muscular
black gentlemen who carries an AK47 and who Bertie seems to have sodomized in
the course of a playful strip show. This is the first of a multipart series
that looks like it's going to be pretty good.
Ratings for "Good Lord, Jeeves, It's Her!"
Athena (technical quality): 9
Venus (plot & character): 9
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 9
* "Mayberry" by Richard Dale. The THC Archive has recently reposted four
chapters of this parody of "Andy of Mayberry." In the first chapter, Sheriff
Andy Taylor makes it in the squad car with his insatiable girlfriend Helen,
who is "just about the finest piece of ass this side of Pumpkin Center! It
shorely brings a smahl to my face, yes it duz." In later chapters, we can
read about other characters from the series engaging in sexual acrobatics.
We even discover that Aunt Bea's friend Clara is the town exhibitionist.
The sex isn't as hot in these stories as in the Home Improvement series, but
I think the author does a more clever job of relating the stories to the
original television series. The metaphors even sound like the ones Andy and
the gang would have used themselves: "It felt like he shot enough {cum} to
fill up a box of night crawlers -- the double-size box of the big juicy kind
that Goober sold down to the gas station." However, we never do find out why
a nice guy like Andy would name his son Opie.
Ratings for "Mayberry"
Athena (technical quality): 9
Venus (plot & character): 10
Celeste (appeal to reviewer): 10
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