Dangerous Pleasures (Paperback)

by Bertrice Small (Author)
Key Phrases: lacy nothings, purple teddy, Mistress Anne, Nanny Violet, Mary Finch (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
A new novel from “the reigning queen of…erotica, romance, love, and lust.” (Literary Times)

New York Times bestselling author Bertrice Small explores the deepest recesses of the imagination where one woman’s sexual fantasies lie in wait…

Widowed with five children, stay at home mom Annie Miller has been just getting by—and growing restless because of it. Thinking Annie just needs a vacation, her sister enters her into a contest sponsored by The Channel, a network that caters to delivering women’s fantasies. Annie wins the grand prize, a week at a luxurious spa—and gets a treat when she turns on the flat-screen TV. The one working channel lets Annie program—and experience—her own personal fantasy each night. Suddenly she’s living out dreams she didn’t even know she had. But now that she’s experienced a complete sexual awakening, how will everyone in her former life handle this humble homemaker turned vivacious vixen?

About the Author
Bertrice Small is a New York Times bestselling author and the recipient of numerous awards. She lives with her husband George.

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: NAL Trade (August 5, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0451223977
• ISBN-13: 978-0451223975
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #204,446 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars An OK story with some kink, August 21, 2008

By	thekittenspaw (Arkansas) - See all my reviews

Ms. Small's latest installment in her "Pleasures" series introduces us to Annie, a widowed mother of five kids, aging from college to preschool. It is simular to the first book,Private Pleasures (Signet Eclipse) in that the protaganist is a mom on her own and fighting to keep things together for her kids. This book also brings back the Nora from book one. She acts as Annie's mentor through the changes in her life.

I was dissappointed by the lack of sexual tension in the book. While there were plenty of sex scenes there was none of the erotic pull one would expect from an erotica novel. In fact, some scenes were as short as one paragraph.

The language in the book was also off-putting for me. "Squealing," in deilight or for any other reason, brings to mind piglets, not excitement. Many passages read like bodice-rippers from 40 years ago.

I was also bothered by Annie's frequesnt reminders that she was doing everything for her children when, in fact, the book shows her pulling away from her kids. By the end of the book her most frequent contact with the children is over the phone or through updates from the nanny. Maybe that just bothers me because I'm a mom who's close to my kids, but I did find it troubling.

One thing I like about Dangerous Pleasures is that the heroine isn't the perfect 20-something with the right look, right body, right everything. She's a woman in her 40s with all the stresses that come with motherhood. Its nice to see a more realistic character in the starring role.

Overall, I don't think this book is worth the price. The story feels very superficial with no real emotional depth, The sex doesn't garner the erotic draw one would expect from erotica, and the plot is almost non-existant, with very little conflict to keep it interesting. Above all it reads like a little old lady's idea of a dirty book... granted, it's an adventurous old lady.

I'd recommend skipping it.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars This book is simultaneously intriguing and disappointing, September 4, 2008

By	April - See all my reviews

Since first reading Betrice Small's "Skye O'Malley" 20 years ago, I've greatly enjoyed diving into her novels. However, her latest offerings involving The Channel show such promise in the beginning, but halfway through just leave me cold.

First, the good:

1) Most women will relate to the heroine, Annie, and her struggles involving money and family. After all, who hasn't worried about how to pay for their children's college, missing work because of a vomiting child or dealing with their own aging parents?

2) I found it refreshing that Annie was in her mid-40s and a size 16 (although she later slims down to a size 12). Congrats to Ms. Small for incorporating such a realistic character. No matter our size or age, we can still be desirable and sexy.

3) The Channel. Until some brilliant woman actually invents a way to allow us to star in and control our very own porn movie, I enjoy the experience vicariously through Small's characters.

The bad:

1) All too familiar sex scenes. She's seriously running out of ideas.

2) Mr. Nicholas. Small's loyal readers already know it's going to end badly when he's involved. I sincerely hope she incorporates The Channel in upcoming novels, but please leave the devilish Mr. Nicholas out it.

3) Annie has sexual relationships with her male assistant and 2 other underlings, both at work and elsewhere. This is professional suicide and I speak as a woman/mother/wife who works full time. Simply cringeworthy.

4) The whole "I'm doing it for my kids" mantra. At the beginning, Annie is a stay-at-home mom to her 5 kids, 4 of whom still live at home. Within a year of Annie starting work, her children have a full-time nannie who is virtually raising them while their mother often spends the night at her work apartment having 3-ways. How exactly is playing with and casually discarding her boy-toys helping her kids?

Started promising, but I didn't even care what happened to Annie because she was virtually unrecognizable by the middle of the book.

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars pleasurable erotic tale , August 7, 2008

By	Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews (#1 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

In Egret Pointe, fortyish Widow Annie Elizabeth Miller raises five children by herself with no social life since her husband died in London. When her mom calls whining that her dad ignores her for golf, Annie knows this is an omen. Soon the high school calls to inform her that her two oldest Nathaniel and Amy are on detention; that is followed by the middle school informing her that her twins Lily and Rose are suspended. Finally her youngest stay at home Wills rejects the nap that Annie desperately needs.

Her corporate litigator sister Lizzie who knows Annie's "strength" façade hides a depressed miserable person, submits her name to a contest sponsored by Channel, a spa catering to female desires. Annie wins a week at the spa. She has the time of her life sexually and otherwise. Shockingly she is offered a position at the spa, which would eliminate her financial woes and her sexual abstinence, which she accepts. However, her family, especially her kids who depend on her, wonder how far will success and pleasure spoil Annie Elizabeth Miller.

The sequel to PRIVATE PLEASURES is a pleasurable erotic tale starring a fortyish mother of five who has no life of her own with the only person interested in her well being her sister. The transformation of Annie from only raising five kids to sex siren works; she classically displays defense mechanisms defending herself psychologically with initially altruistic and suppression states to altruistic rationalizations. She defends her changed behavior from a stay at home mom to BDSM and multiple-partners. Fans will enjoy Bertrice Small's fine character study while pondering the wise wisdom of teenage philosopher Amy that eventually you reach an age that sex does not matter (not).

Harriet Klausner