Product Description

Famous for taking her readers to undiscovered places, Susie Bright has changed the rules for writing about sex. Erotica is no longer under-the-covers reading; it's thrilling literature that showcases the best writing around.

In Best American Erotica 2006, Bright chooses stories that toy with desire in excerpts from some of the most sexually charged and fearless writing of the year. John Updike's story recalls his narrator's first love and how they began to have sex. David Sedaris takes us into his strip poker card room. Tom Perrotta portrays a bored married man whose wife busts him as he navigates his Internet swinger life. Helen Walsh's diary shows a college student in England who drifts from a promis-ing academic career into the arms of prostitutes.

In Best American Erotica 2006, today's most popular writers add their voices to a collection for any reader -- straight, gay, curious -- seeking memorable sex and riveting storytelling.

John Updike, David Sedaris, Tom Perrotta, Steve Almond, Lynn Freed, Maxine Chernoff, Carol Queen, Helen Walsh, Stephen Elliott, Rachel Kramer Bussel,Bob Vickery, James Williams, Will Heinrich, Peggy Munson, Sera Gamble, Salome Wilde, Bianca James, Donna George Storey, Mr. Sleep, Gwen Masters, Gaea Yudron, Kweli Walker, L. Elise Bland, and Sidney Durham

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #133211 in Books
• Published on: 2006-01-03
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

From Publishers Weekly
With raunchy cable TV and porn readily available, fiction has to go deep, so to speak, in order to compete. This book doesn't always score on hotness; what it does best is push mainstream boundaries. While there are pieces from David Sedaris, John Updike and Tom Perrotta, it's the lesser-knowns who, um, go the furthest, and their inclusion shows just how far the sexual revolution has come. "Fairgrounds" by Peggy Munson is narrated by a teen who is smitten with transvestite "Daddy Billy," a "boi" whose rubber member electrifies his charge as he takes her to a carnival and pretend-pimps her to another person with a "not-so-certain gender situation." There are other stories with similarly "involved" scenarios and positions on the gender and sexuality continuum—and liberatingly so. Bright, who has edited the series for more than 10 years, hosts the audible.com show In Bed; her intro notes that it was antiporn activist Andrea Dworkin who inspired her to "question authority, to fly to a new dimension." While this book isn't transportive all the way through, its spirit of adventure is consistent. (Feb.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author
Susie Bright is the editor of The Best American Erotica series and host of the weekly audio show In Bed with Susie Bright on Audible.com. She has been a columnist for Playboy and Salon, and has been profiled in USA TODAY, Los Angeles Times, Esquire, Rolling Stone, Mother Jones, and Vanity Fair, among other publications. An international lecturer on sexuality and feminism, she won the 2004 Writer of the Year Award at the Erotic Awards in London. Ms. Bright lives in Santa Cruz, California.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Introduction

After Andrea

The week I put this edition of The Best American Erotica 2006 to bed, Andrea Dworkin died.

There was a time -- when I started editing and encouraging erotica writers -- that Andrea Dworkin's name would have inevitably been brought up in the first ten minutes of any conversation. Nowadays, I realize that I might have to explain who she was, due to the speed of American historical amnesia.

Andrea Dworkin was an influential political activist and writer, and was so charismatic that she molded a generation of attitudes toward sexual expression. She particularly dissected the image of women in literature, media, and pornography, where she saw it as evidence that our culture thrived on violence toward women as a gender, and humiliation of them. She didn't think sexism was naughty-cute -- she found it deadly, and culpable.

As far as she was concerned, "erotica" could go fuck itself. It was just a prettied-up word for pernicious and patriarchal pornography. Yes, she was that blunt. One of the great whammies of Dworkin's antiporn rhetoric was that she used the most visceral pornographic language to describe and condemn her nemeses. Like Pandora, she invited every woman she encountered to open the lid of sexual magazines, books, and movies, and take a hard look at what came out.

The problem was, we did -- and many of us came to different, or at least more nuanced, conclusions than Andrea. The day after she died, I wrote in my blog:

Dworkin used her considerable intellectual powers to analyze pornography, which was something that no one had done before. No one. The men who made porn didn't. Porn was like a low-culture joke before the feminist revolution kicked its ass. It was beneath discussion.

Here's the irony...every single woman who pioneered the sexual revolution, every erotic-feminist-bad-girl-and-proud-of-it-stiletto-shitkicker, was once a fan of Andrea Dworkin. Until 1984, we all were. She was the one who got us looking at porn with a critical eye; she made you feel like you could just stomp into the adult bookstore and seize everything for inspection and a bonfire.

The funny thing that happened on the way to the X-Rated Sex Palace was that some of us came to different conclusions than Ms. Dworkin. We saw the sexism of the porn business...but we also saw some intriguing possibilities and amazing maverick spirit. We said, "What if we made something that reflected our politics and values, but was just as sexually bold?"

I remember walking into an old-fashioned "Adults Only" store in 1977 when I was nineteen years old. I was there (with an older female friend holding my trembling hand) on assignment from my college women's studies class, where we had been told to take a firsthand look at some "pornography," and write an analysis.

I thought I was going to throw up. First of all, the store smelled like stale smoke and chlorine. There was a surreal display of fishing and hunting magazines up front, which I later learned was part of a local zoning requirement to keep the business open as a "legitimate" retailer. Next to the glossy covers of giant salmon, there was a title called "Lactating Lesbians."

I was horrified. I was fascinated. I had to open that magazine, the way kids have to stick beans up their nose.

It was so easy to feel guilty, like an outsider, like a pervert of the first water. I realized right away that I had deeper reactions than what Dworkin had prescribed. I was ashamed to be seen as interested in sex. I was shocked to realize I'd never seen a woman express milk, even in wholesome circumstances. I felt concern for the models of the magazine, who I imagined must be desperate to pose for such pathetic photos. I was paranoid, wondering how many men came into this enclave, and whether this was what every man was thinking about -- morning, noon, and night. Then I came back to the same bit about how much I privately thought about sex myself. I couldn't get out of that store fast enough, and I'm sure my resultant essay was something along the lines of: "This is sick, sick, sick."

Driving home, I thought about the "classier" erotic literature I had seen on my parents' bookshelves. They had elegant photo albums of the Khajuraho temples, formerly banned copies of Lady Chatterley's Lover, and volumes by Henry Miller. I remember his passages in The Tropic of Capricorn about "The Land of Cunt." Miller was so prejudiced in every aspect you had to wonder if he was a misanthrope. But he was also transcendent and lyrical on this subject of cunt, and his absolute submission to it. His words were poetic and a turn-on, and I wondered, Is this erotica? If I was a "lactating lesbian," could I write something about my breasts and my sexual feelings that would be authentic, that would inspire as much integrity as arousal?

I wasn't the only one wondering. So many women, and men, at the time, were determined to make sexual liberation their own, rather than a marketing device or a punch line at someone else's expense. That was the mainstream media's portrayal, certainly, but they were clearly out of the loop. It was already quite in vogue to laugh at women for going braless or taking birth control pills, as if the joke was on them -- that they could only be exploited for their trampy ways, never in charge of their sexual destiny.

I resented that depiction; it played right into the hands of Dworkin's steadfast acolytes, who wanted every pornographer in a pine box or behind bars. In their view, the sexually outspoken woman was a dupe, a tragic victim, or a Judas. They thrived on these black-and-white distinctions, much like religious fundamentalists. If erotic creativity was doomed in a sexist world, if equality in the bedroom was impossible until "after the revolution," it didn't give you much room to breathe. They treated sexuality like a decadent, soul-sucking luxury that could be deconstructed with abstention.

But what if we start with the premise that sexuality is an integral part of human nature? Let's compare sex with another appetite: eating. There's no doubt that our food and water supply is compromised, and causes us no end of health problems, as well as screwed-up notions of what's good or bad for us.

Do we begin fasting; do we reject the planting season? Of course not. Many of us eat, shop, and cook as judiciously as we can. Many of us influence public life to promote sound practices in producing, consuming, and enjoying our food. The organics movement, for one, wouldn't exist without this change in consciousness.

Erotic artists and innovators have refused to treat sexual relations as expendable, or desire as a hopeless ruin. In our efforts, we have turned a lot of stereotypical conventions of pornography upside down.

The first revolution was self-definition. When I began writing and editing erotica, it was shocking for women to write about their sexual lives. We were delighted to kick the door down. The Lactating Lesbian pushed her phony proxy into a ditch and wrote her own damn manifesto.

Men also were anxious to break through the har-de-har-har routine of standard male conquest. They wanted to talk about sexual desires that had more substance than braggadocio.

Another sea change was the notion of "Who can be sexy?" Dworkin and her peers claimed that if you were old, fat, hairy, disabled, or nonsymmetrical in any way, you were eliminated from the porno casting call. Ironically, this had never really been the case with hard-core porn, for which producers were not that picky -- but it is certainly true in Hollywood and high fashion.

The 1980s erotic renaissance changed that picture for good. Just looking at the material in this collection of BAE, I'm aware that there are characters of every age and appearance, every circumstance, who are the heroes of their erotic story lines. They are desirable and they desire; even when they aren't fulfilled, they are not pathetic. Erotic writing has been the cutting edge of positive body self-image; I've grown accustomed to it. The conformist appearances promoted by celebrity media are the ones that seem strange and out of touch.

Looking back on it, re-creating sexy bodies was the easy part. The more complicated flavor of the sexual revolution is how we advanced the discussion of power, dominance, and submission in our erotic imagination.

Once again, the public conversation evolved because of our personal observations. We started to confess our questions to ourselves, and then to our intimates. It seemed odd that an individual could be a paragon of social justice and equality during the day, but at night dream of pirates and wenches, tops and bottoms, hellcats and quivering flowers. We didn't want to be hypocrites; we didn't want to be closet cases. We wanted to let the erotic fur fly, but we didn't want to damage anyone: was it possible? We craved some psychological depth, not just wonky literal translation: "You want to be spanked because you are brainwashed by the patriarchy to think you are evil and must deserve abuse -- Beep."

To accept the Dworkin orthodoxy, all fantasy, all dreaming, all whimsy, all wishing was wicked. But she forgot that she had let Hope out of the box, too, and no one else has been willing to let go of that.

When S/M activists began to use the terms "safe/sane/consensual," it didn't make a lot of sense to Dworkin's followers, who saw the whole scene as straight out of the Inferno. However, it was just the ticket for people who said, "Look, I'm not crazy or dangerous, but I am a lover who thrives on risk, sensation, and taboo."

Naturally, the themes of erotic power and conflict make for great drama and theater -- that's why you see more S/M in fiction than you do in real life. It is all of our comedy and tragedy writ large. Even people who will never give up their vanilla tastes can still be aroused by explosive erotic stories, where our most anxious taboos are steadily squeezed into erotic juice.

That's the nature of sexual creativity: it just won't sit at the beach and watch a sunset wit...

Customer Reviews

Won't be to everyone's taste but does contain plenty of variety
There ought to be at least a few selections in here to please nearly everyone - along with some that only a select few will truly enjoy. I give credit to the the compiler that she included not only some well known authors but a few lesser knowns as well.

Call me a prude but some of the selections went beyond my "comfort zone". I like pushing the boundaries (who wants the "same old, same old"?) but there were some selections that I just couldn't relate to, including a story about an encounter with a transvestite. Not to my taste.

But that is really a minor quibble. All in all, there IS plenty of good erotica here, although much of it is NOT traditional. It reflects the gender bending and alternative sexuality of our times, crossing boundaries, etc.

If you're open to that, this one is worth a look.

Read, Love, and Learn
[...]

1. Every year, Susie Bright attempts to orchestrate an ensemble of stories that represent every taste, or almost every taste, but that's an impossible feat, as demonstrated by reviews of pervious collections. Another thing to note is Susie solicits nominations for each year's collection, so I hope reader/reviewers at Amazon will nominate selections for upcoming editions of BAE.

2. The job of a writer is to entertain readers while holding a mirror to the society he or she lives in-which can make a lot of people uncomfortable. Writers of erotica or writers whose work appears in erotica collections are no exception-or shouldn't be. Erotica is fluid and multi-dimensional, like all literature, and the writers whose work appear in Best American Erotica 2006 offer the complexity of our human condition, sexuality included. BRAVO!

While every single story in this book is good, I have my favorites: "Mille," "Under the House," "Full House," "Drunkie's Surprise," "Ukiyo," "The Clay Man," and "The Nasty Kind Always Are."

The last mentioned, written by Steve Almond, dick-lit maestro that he is, made me gasp at the end. Almond created a story that manages to be social satire while also being downright sexy-and in this case, shocking. I was taken aback.

Sera Gamble's "The Clay Man" is now one of my favorite short stories in the world. I first heard about The Golem watching X-Files. He came up again in graduate school. I intend to read Gamble's story again and again to figure out how it works so well. Let me just say the premise is clever, the protagonist is intriguing, the relationship between the two sisters is complex, and the writing is really-really good. The overall implications of the story venture into deep, uncomfortable terrain.

"Ukiyo," by Donna George Storey, is another well written story that is lush with eroticism and Japanese culture. What I loved best about this story was its ability to take me somewhere I'd never been and experience customs I knew nothing about-all through a writing professor protagonist.

I'm not sure where Susie Bright found Kweli Walker, but I'm grateful she did. Who knew "gumming" a man could make for such a fun and sexy read. The voice in Kweli's story is bawdy and bold, and I loved the mentoring relationship that takes place between the protagonist and the stripper. Excellent stuff!

"Full House is another terrific read by a terrific writer. David Sedaris is always marvelous.

"Under the House" is another story that takes readers to dark and disturbing terrain. Its subject matter pushes the envelope and blurs the line between right and wrong, taboo/socially acceptable, and I dig ambiguity like this. The writing, again, is terrific. Actually "Under the House" is an excerpt from a novel, The Curse of the Inappropriate Man, by the writer, Lynn Freed, which I plan to get sooner than later.

Last but not least, "Mille" is another novel excerpt from Helen Walsh's, Brass, and the excerpt reads as beautifully as a prose poem. I finished reading it then went back and read it again right away.

In fact, I've no doubt I'll read several of the stories in Best American Erotica 2006 again, not only for the sheer enjoyment but to learn something as well.
Peace.

A fun time was had by all!
I bought this for my boyfriend for fathers day. He loved it. We took turns reading the different stories to each other. Most of the stories were great, although a few went into areas of sexuality that didn't do much for either one of us. There was a great variety, however, and I think probably a story for everyone. Highly recommended!