Customer Reviews

Chainmale: 3SM--A Unique View of Leather Culture

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Many how-to books have been written in the last decade, but no autobiographies that I know of. The author perceives his leather journey as spiritual, and shares that journey with the reader. The style includes flashback vignettes - simultaneously relevant and sexy -- that work uncommonly well. The domination and submission elements in the flashbacks were delicious without being lurid.

Everyone's life is unique and Bastian has wisely avoided attempting to make his own journey into and through the gay male SM world universal. The book is a combination of current reflection, memories and scenes that demonstrate not only how much Bastian has changed but how much his subculture has changed. However the book claims to talk about a leather family, a family that is similar to several I know of, yet very very little time is spent exploring who is in Bastian's family. Having a non-traditional family is difficult, add into it any power dynamic and it is even more confusing. Each kinky family really creates its own model -- I had been hoping this book could be one model and I was deeply disappointed it was not.

While the somewhat misleading title of "3sm" seems to promise a dialogue about Don Bastian's unique triad living arrangement, his book still offers a good insight into his journey into the world of leather. It is brief, but brevity in this case is the soul of its wit. Don details his personal discoveries and insights as to what he feels makes up the culture and kinship of Leatherfolk as a group. Between his pontifications, he peppers his book with real life scene and session activity that sometimes correlates to his thoughts. (And I must add, can be frustratingly inconclusive in the finality of the act in progress described!)

But if you allow yourself the time to follow Don's self-examination and discovery, then "3sm - Chainmale" will satisfy. I should include that I believe that "3sm - Chainmale" is a great book for kinksters at the entry level of discovery, since Don's personal descriptions, the journey and its beginnings are frequently universal. Revisiting this book some 20 years after I first read it gave me a shudder of flashback as I found parallels to my immersion into Leather Culture. I am glad to have rediscovered it.