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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. Indulge your secretive sensual side, peek into the lives of others and explore a complex pleasure of human existence. Find out more in our adult fiction category.
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.
Summer returns in the scintillating conclusion of The Pleasure Quartet series.
In Christian's own words, and through his thoughts, reflections, and dreams, E L James offers a fresh perspective on the love story that has enthralled millions of readers around the world. Christian Grey exercises control in all things; his world is neat, disciplined, and utterly empty - until the day that Anastasia Steele falls into his office, in a tangle of shapely limbs and tumbling brown hair. He tries to forget her, but instead is swept up in a storm of emotion he cannot comprehend and cannot resist. Unlike any woman he has known before, shy, unworldly Ana seems to see right through him - past the business prodigy and the penthouse lifestyle to Christian's cold, wounded heart. Will being with Ana dispel the horrors of his childhood that haunt Christian every night? Or will his dark sexual desires, his compulsion to control, and the self-loathing that fills his soul drive this girl away and destroy the fragile hope she offers him?
The book everyone’s been talking about, now a major motion picture. Young and innocent Anastasia Steele doesn’t quite know what to make of the smouldering industrialist Christian Grey when she interviews him for her student paper. Things get both troubling and extremely steamy when their obvious chemistry leads him to want to introduce her to some unusual pleasures. If you’ve not read it yet and you’re reading this that means you must be intrigued, quick to read, fun, engaging and certainly titillating it’s absolutely worth giving a go.
Lauren and Alexander's journey continues in the second novel in Pippa Croft's Oxford Blue romance series. It's the beginning of a new term at Wyckham College, Oxford, and a fresh start for Lauren Cusack. Her fingers were badly burnt when a whirlwind romance with gorgeous English aristocrat, Alexander Hunt, became too hot to handle - and now she's determined to keep her distance. Her resolve is shaken when Alexander appears on her doorstep - he's been completely torn apart by some devastating news. Lauren knows that she should stay away, but their chemistry is undeniable and she soon finds herself back in Alexander's arms. Can Lauren handle the drama that comes with Alexander Hunt? Or will she have to sacrifice the most exhilarating passion she's ever known...Fans of E L James, Tammara Webber and Beth Kery won't be able to get enough of Pippa Croft's Oxford Blue romance series. The First Time We Met and The Second Time I Saw You are the first two novels in the series, followed by Third Time Lucky, which is also available to pre-order from Penguin. Pippa Croft is the pen name of an award-winning romantic novelist. After studying English at Oxford, she worked as a copywriter and journalist before writing her debut novel, which won the RNA's New Writers' award and was later made into a TV movie. She lives in a village in the heart of England with her husband and daughter.
Gideon calls me his angel, but he's the miracle in my life. My gorgeous, wounded warrior, so determined to slay my demons while refusing to face his own. The vows we'd exchanged should have bound us tighter than blood and flesh. Instead they opened up old wounds, exposed pain and insecurities, and lured bitter enemies out of the shadows. I felt him slipping from my grasp; my greatest fears becoming my reality; my love tested in ways I wasn't sure I was strong enough to bear. At the brightest time in our lives, the darkness of his past encroached and threatened everything we'd worked so hard for. We faced a terrible choice: the familiar safety of the lives we'd had before each other or the fight for a future that suddenly seemed an impossible and hopeless dream...
A Maxim Jakubowski selected title. US-based Anglophile Szereto is one of the better anthologists in the literary erotica field and her standards are always set high, so any new collection she edits is definitely something to look forward to. Having offered us volumes of twisted travel yarns, subversive fairy tales and flesh-baring heroic fantasy, she now tackles the gothic and the dark side of life and sensual dreams. With generous encomiums by leading hot romance authors like Kate Douiglas and Rachel Caine, this literally hot off the press volume offers fourteen sizzling variations exploring the flip side of submission and seduction, many from new talents who all display a wicked imagination to revisit fantasy and the supernatural with often startling and sexy new perspectives. Pretty hot stuff.
A Maxim Jakubowski selected title. It's a shame that the success of FIFTY SHADES OF GREY hasn't given a boost (with a few rare exceptions) to the better writers of erotica who'd been writing much more superior books before E.L. James hit the bedrooms. Lloyd has long been one of the more interesting and challenging authors in the sometimes formulaic Black Lace stable and deserves her time in the spotlight. This erotic thriller is the stuff of dark, venomous fantasies and provides a mean kick in the gut and the emotions. A dead man in a swimming pool following a night of sexual excess is the departure point for a tale of obsessions and sometimes disturbing insights into the female psyche. No one does damaged characters better than Lloyd and has a clearer open line to the well of cravings and obsessions.
A challenging but ultimately rewarding (and even in its own wonderfully twisted way, comic) exploration of the perverse mind of an older female teacher who is totally obsessed with young boys. Set aside your inborn societal prejudices and read this as a dark, noir tale of perverse explorations with its own, inexorable inner logic. You might take a strong distaste to the book and its first person narrator, but it's a considerable achievement in creating a monstrous character who, murders apart, ranks with Hannibal Lecter in the pantheon of inordinately seductive grotesques.
Phoebe Henderson may be single but she sure doesn't feel fabulous. It's been a year since she found her boyfriend Alex in bed with another woman, and multiple cases of wine and extensive relationship analysis with best friend Lucy have done nothing to help. Faced with a new year but no new love, Phoebe concocts a different kind of resolution. The List: ten things she's always wanted to do in bed but has never had the chance (or the courage!) to try. A bucket list for between the sheets. One year of pleasure, no strings attached. Simple, right? Factor in meddlesome colleagues, friends with benefits, getting frisky al fresco and maybe, possibly, true love and Phoebe's got her work cut out for her.
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.