When I read the back-cover for All Tied Up, the first novella in the Pleasure Inn series by Cathryn Fox, I knew I was in for something delightfully mischievous. “Warning:” it reads, “Smokin’ hot sex with creative use of toys, frank language, and a dash of magic.” HA! I hope someone else finds that as hilarious as I do. If you don’t, you’re a stoic bastard just like my humorless fucking father. That shit is funny. I wish people described my articles that way. A dash of MAGIC? Like Aragorn fucking Frodo while dwarves watch kind of shit? I immediately pictured a witch growing a snake-cock out of her pussy and sticking it in that little hobbit’s mouth. This is why I love women’s erotica, I thought, as I hurried off to the bathroom to read Chapter One.
Well, it got weird. And not in the way I had hoped. The story begins with an introduction to some sort of Pagan goddess of love named Pamina and her maybe-lover/maybe-colleague who she long ago turned into a black cat. I don’t understand why this sex goddess would want to hang out with a cat and not a dude, but I guess the gods are into bestiality. Remember when Zeus morphed into a bull and fucked that chick and then named Europe after her? That’s the rape of Europa, my friends. Go back to school. But the goddess Pamina is tamer than that. Her presence in the story as a love-master is mostly lame. I can see why the magic was just described as a “dash” because Pamina is basically just a Fiddler on the Roof-style Yente and the protagonist is like one of Tevye’s daughters. There ain’t no snake cock-suckin’. But whatever. Even if I didn’t like it so much, Pamina is the incites the action in the story, and though I was skeptical, by following her lead I arrived in sublime masturbation territory.
Pamina has made it her personal goal to find lovers for three ladies who are sooo great but have just had one too many bad run-ins with men folk, and have sworn off love and sex. To be fair, we’ve all been there, and that celibacy vow NEVER lasts. So — spoiler alert — they do have sex. With men folk. These three women characters resemble sorority girls but with brains. They’re all the kind of girl you want to hate, but then they’re pretty nice and fun to hang out with, and they get real jobs and shit and don’t just marry doctors and worthlessly pro-create like you expect them to. After the chicks are introduced in the story, there are about A MILLION pages of Pamina listening to the thoughts of the women, which basically consist of “Oh my god I’m so over men bla bla bla.” Yeah right, sluts, I thought. I bet the second a cock walks into this story, you’ll be hopping on it. Pamina/Yente will make sure of it. And as mentioned above, I was so right. The protagonist of All Tied Up, Lindsay Bell, is under the thumb of the love goddess to design a BDSM playground room at a pleasure hotel. When the handyman arrives, Lindsay is under “his spell” (or is it…Pamina’s spell? So mysterious!). Immediately, they are attracted. “Forget nailing jelly to the wall,” the book reads, “She wanted this guy to nail her to the wall. Right here. Right now.” And eventually they fuck using the BDSM toys lying around. That is the story.
And though it may not be a page-turning potboiler, or as magical as I wished for, the sex made my heart pump and my fingers inch toward my “aching bud,” as Ms. Fox describes it.
An important factor of the sex in this novella is that Lindsay and the handyman actually begin to “care” about each other, and they communicate this through each other’s eyes, even as he punishes her with very titillating toys. I guess that’s what happens when a love goddess is setting you up. Now, I’m a fan of personal connection of any kind during sex. But I was a bit annoyed by the over-the-top, “Oh my god I thought I’d never love anyone else again but this chick I’m tying up seems to see me as brawny, fuckable, and worthwhile as a human being!” Apparently, girls usually only like this handyman for a good fuck, but while he’s flogging Lindsay’s “twin folds,” he feels there’s more to her than meets the eye. Maybe, finally, he’ll find true love.
Though this love crap annoyed me, I understand why the author wanted the sex to include “safety” for the sake of the reader. Many women don’t actually express their fantasies, and some of them may only feel truly comfortable with sadomasochism when that corny emotional aspect is included. As I read, I did begin to develop an appreciation for the sensitivity of Cathryn Fox toward her more timid (rigid) female readers. She definitely has an ability, though sometimes incredibly annoying, to use emotion to make sex even hotter. Though I still wish I didn’t have a run-down of the handyman’s feelings, and I think that the fucking didn’t need to build up for 40 damn pages and fill my mind with vapid chicks and a wiccan goddess’ horny animal boyfriend, it definitely sets up a “safe” relationship.… and I get it. In reality, you want somebody “punishing” you to be a good person who likes you. If they weren’t… well, you never know if you’re with Ted Bundy or Lorena Bobbitt, I guess. Shit can get dark real fast.
Once the story gets there, the sex is ridiculously good. I was reading All Tied Up while biking at the gym. As I was pumping my thighs, I got to, “A second finger joined the first. He pushed deep inside her until he found her G-spot. With a light brush, he stroked her until her body quivered. He knew she was close, so close… but since it was too soon for her to tumble over, he pulled his fingers out. Her lids flew open… ‘Stand up.’ She did as he requested.” Immediately, I felt the throbbing of my clitoris against the front of the bicycle. I started to gasp when the character gasped. The bicycle at the gym is a really good place to cum in public because if you do it right, no one can tell if you’re feeling the vagina juice flow or if it’s just a really good work-out. As I read and biked, I rubbed and rubbed. Unfortunately, right as the handyman penetrated Lindsay, some old bastard told me I’d used up my 45 minutes of cardio and it was his turn. “I almost came, you fucker!” I yelled. No, I didn’t yell that, but I should have. And it was Cathryn Fox that almost made me kill this old man while achieving orgasm. Despite her flaws, I gotta hand it to her.
And now I’m going to go read the rest of the series pronto and use that hand on myself. What can I say? I’m a book worm. So in the end Cathryn Fox’s All Tied Up won me over. When I finished, I realized that my resistance to her odd style of matchmaking in the story dissolved when I reached her masterful descriptions of sub-dom dynamics. I realized that this experience as a reader was similar to what Lindsay Bell was going through in her conflict over accepting both the handyman as a lover and in taking Pamina’s spiritual guidance. Or maybe it just made me horny. Who cares? I have to go rub one out like the wiccan submissive I’ve discovered I am.
—Lolly Gagger
[...] All Tied Up, the first novella in Cathryn Fox’s Pleasure Inn series (reviewed by WHACK! Magazine last month), we are introduced to three lovely bffs who are giving up dick. Apparently, since [...]