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Find out moreIt could be said that we are in a Golden Age for Provocative fiction. With more and more authors releasing books that explore the various realms of sexuality while still offering social commentary and a concentrated examination of human feelings and attitudes throughout. So with that in mind, why not test your fictional limits and see the range of provocative prose we have on offer!
EVERY SHADE OF BLACK is the continuing, heart-stopping love story of Sebastian Black and Suzanne Perry-Jackson, both previously introduced in EVERY SHADE OF BLUE, published in 2016. However, the sequel is a stand-alone read. The erotic tale continues as Sebastian, the beautiful blue-eyed surgeon, falls head over heels in love and lust with Suzanne, the stunning blonde mother of teenage twins who is in the process of getting a divorce. Astonishingly handsome, charming and successful, Sebastian has no trouble in finding dates, but abandoned by a violent father as a child, he is haunted by his past. He has always controlled his emotions, had been too scared to commit, and yet in Suzanne he feels he's discovered the love of his life. But Sebastian believes that before he can truly embrace a future with his soulmate, he needs closure from the brutality that filled his early life. In EVERY SHADE OF BLACK, Sebastian makes the difficult decision to seek out his father which reveals a shocking truth that leads him on a path of self-discovery. Meanwhile, Suzanne has serious complications of her own. Tatiana, her ex-husband's gorgeous young lover seems determined to ruin Suzanne's perfect new life. And Angelo, a psychotic, one-night stand who Suzanne encountered briefly before meeting Sebastian, is out there lurking in the shadows ready to make his move. Set in London, Surrey, Vancouver, the snowy delights of Whistler, British Columbia and Dubai, EVERY SHADE OF BLACK is an explicit love story that will leave the reader breathless.
It's a beautiful day in Manchester and four friends are meeting for a birthday lunch. But then they witness a shocking accident just metres away which acts as a catalyst for each of them. For Laura, it's a wake-up call to heed the ticking of her biological clock. Sensible Jo finds herself throwing caution to the wind in a new relationship. Eve, who has been trying to ignore the worrying lump in her breast, feels helpless and out of control. And happy-go-lucky India is drawn to one of the victims of the accident, causing long-buried secrets to rise to the surface.
A bold, hugely original, multi-genre, cracking read. A private eye in a reimagined New York, where the internet and electronic data is as dead as a dodo, is asked to trace a woman. Within the first few words Maxim Jakubowski thoroughly set the scene, within a short time I felt a part of this world, could stand in the streets and take a gawking look around me. The clipped sentences of the investigator hark back to private eye novels, yet this is no caricature. The characters sing with intensity, sitting on the edge of larger than life, they feel as real as real can be. I smirked, raised my eyebrows, and flinched (oh how I flinched), as we cleaved through dystopian, slipped inside erotica, and smashed into supernatural. Right up my street, I absolutely adored this read. ‘The Louisiana Republic’ is a tale that refuses to be labelled, it is quite simply a raw, provocative, unique experience for lovers of the written word. ~ Liz Robinson
There are success stories - and there are true stories. How would you feel if everything in your life suddenly started to go . . . right? Six months ago, Alex Moore was stuck in a dead-end job, feeling her potential quietly slip away. Then, seemingly overnight, she launched her dream start-up and became one of London's fastest rising tech stars. At thirty-one, her life has just begun. But Alex's transformation isn't easy for those around her. Her friends are struggling to accept her rapid success, her parents worry she's burning out and her fiance is getting cold feet. Then weird things start to happen. Muggings, stalkers - even a wild claim that she murdered a stranger. But when Alex visits the Orkney Islands to recharge, weird turns into WTF. Because there she discovers the world's oldest secret - and it's a secret that Alex's stratospheric rise has royally messed up.
E L James revisits the world of Fifty Shades with a deeper and darker take on the love story that has enthralled millions of readers around the globe. Their scorching, sensual affair ended in heartbreak and recrimination, but Christian Grey cannot get Anastasia Steele out of his mind, or his blood. Determined to win her back, he tries to suppress his darkest desires and his need for complete control, and to love Ana on her own terms. But the horrors of his childhood still haunt him, and Ana's scheming boss, Jack Hyde, clearly wants her for himself. Can Christian's confidant and therapist, Dr. Flynn, help him face down his demons? Or will the possessiveness of Elena, his seducer, and the deranged devotion of Leila, his former submissive, drag Christian down into the past? And if Christian does win Ana back, can a man so dark and damaged ever hope to keep her?
A Maxim Jakubowski selected title. Jane and Bill, a London couple whose relationship is enduring the pressures of time but harbours some element of dissatisfaction, come across Lilah in a pub. She is sex incarnate, a creature of a thousand temptations, and her allure instantly attracts both of them. They invite her back to their home and we are introduced to a veritable bacchanal of an odyssey of sex, taboo-breaking and the most devious of psychological manipulations as seductions follow in quick succession and a point of no return is soon reached. For Lilah is a supernatural sprite and predator intent on dominating both men and women in a runaround dance of emotions, lust and extremes which sees the married couple suffer all the possible permutations from desire to hate as they regress to their primal nature. A curious erotic novel from a prize-winning established novelist hitherto working in different areas of the novel and none the worse for it. ~ Maxim Jakubowski
A Maxim Jakubowski selected title. It's Romeo and Juliet modern grunge style when Elise Perez, a girl from the wrong side of the tracks and colour meets Jamey Hyde, the scion of a rich family studying at Yale. The attraction is raunchy and immediate and they soon move to Manhattan. What develops is raw, a clash of worlds and sensibilities, mental health frailties and exacerbated emotions. When Jamey's family vengefully attack their relationship, the couple embark on an odyssey of lust, drug taking and despair that can only lead to a dark conclusion at the end of the twisted road. Despite the basic set up, this is not a book for young adults, but rather a tale of young adults abandoned by hope and hanging on to the anchor of their love, inarticulate, drowning and on a slippery road to nowhere. Libaire (and Elise) has a distinct voice, sardonic, sad and picturesque, with a wonderful touch for the telling details (such as Elise's coat, which gives the book its title). A familiar but fascinating tale. ~ Maxim Jakubowski
What Grey and Ana did next... Soon she is learning more about the harrowing past of her damaged, driven and demanding Fifty Shades than she ever thought possible. But while Grey wrestles with his inner demons, Ana must make the most important decision of her life. And it's a decision she can only make on her own...
Acclaimed author Mitzi Szereto explores the many complexities of desire, love and lust in this rich and varied “best of” collection of erotically charged short stories. In these 17 provocative and often witty offerings, Mitzi Szereto travels expertly between genres with tales that explore both the light and the dark sides of sexuality. Oysters and Pearls gives the reader a glimpse into worlds that are as ordinary as they are fantastical and mysterious. Like a skilled lover, this sensuous and imaginative compilation will leave you wanting more.
A much talked about novel of female alienation, US poet Essbaum's is a curious blend of Madame Bovary and Anna Karenina brought into the modern post-feminist age. Married to Bruno, a stolid Swiss banker, American middle-aged wife Anna Benz is stranded in middle class Switzerland, feeling trapped in her marriage, with three children towards whom she is highly ambivalent about, her German language skills imperfect, isolated in a spider web of trains running on time, mountain peaks, her own secrets and the depressingly clean Zurich suburbia. A curiously passive character she almost accidentally falls into an affair, then another, finding sex a momentary relief from her assigned role in society. Inevitably, between language classes, few close friends and psychotherapy sessions, her life begins to unwind. Even the eroticism of her liaisons, albeit reasonably explicit, has a bland Swiss monotony until tragedy strikes and engufls her. A book that could both fascinate and annoy you. Make your mind up. ~ Maxim Jakubowski
This is from number one international bestselling author Sylvia Day. The final chapter in the global blockbuster Crossfire quintet Gideon Cross. Falling in love with him was the easiest thing I've ever done. It happened instantly. Completely. Irrevocably. Marrying him was a dream come true. Staying married to him is the fight of my life. Love transforms. Ours is both a refuge from the storm and the most violent of tempests. Two damaged souls entwined as one. We have bared our deepest, ugliest secrets to one another. Gideon is the mirror that reflects all my flaws...and all the beauty I couldn't see. He has given me everything. Now, I must prove I can be the rock, the shelter for him that he is for me. Together, we could stand against those who work so viciously to come between us. But our greatest battle may lie within the very vows that give us strength. Committing to love was only the beginning. Fighting for it will either set us free...or break us apart. Heartbreakingly and seductively poignant, One with You is the breathlessly awaited finale to the Crossfire saga, the searing love story that has captivated millions of readers worldwide.
Yeong-hye and her husband are ordinary people. He is an office worker with moderate ambitions and mild manners; she is an uninspired but dutiful wife. The acceptable flatline of their marriage is interrupted when Yeong-hye, seeking a more 'plant-like' existence, decides to become a vegetarian, prompted by grotesque recurring nightmares. In South Korea, where vegetarianism is almost unheard-of and societal mores are strictly obeyed, Yeong-hye's decision is a shocking act of subversion. Her passive rebellion manifests in ever more bizarre and frightening forms, leading her bland husband to self-justified acts of sexual sadism. His cruelties drive her towards attempted suicide and hospitalisation. She unknowingly captivates her sister's husband, a video artist. She becomes the focus of his increasingly erotic and unhinged artworks, while spiralling further and further into her fantasies of abandoning her fleshly prison and becoming - impossibly, ecstatically - a tree. Fraught, disturbing and beautiful, The Vegetarian is a novel about modern day South Korea, but also a novel about shame, desire and our faltering attempts to understand others, from one imprisoned body to another.
Literature has addressed sex throughout history. The joys and complexities are shown in 'The Song of Solomon' in the Bible. Byron, Chacer and Donne are famous for their compemplations on sex and desire.
Provocative prose is not simply pornographic, and product created simply to excite and arouse. Provocative prose stands apart as it is able to offer excitement while also deliviering social commentary and an examination of human feelings and behaviour. This genre can help you to think more deeply about sex, desire and how are attitudes to this topic are formed and what impact they have.
One of the most famous literary erotica would be Lady Chatterly's Lover by D.H. Lawrence, which manages to combine titilation and provocation while also offering character development, and an examination of the theme.
While some will still find these books shocking and a step too far. However there are marvelous modern authors such as Henry Miller, Anais Nin, and Annie Rice with her 'Sleeping Beauty' series which was published under the name Anne Roquelaure. With the development and exploration of this genre, there is a wide and varied selection of books for those interested in indulging.