Customer Reviews

The Initiation of PB 500

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I read Vol. 2 first and waited impatiently for this book to get back into print. It was well worth the wait. The real story is the relationship between the master and slave, and the fantasy of how love conquers all. I like stories with a happy ending, even if it takes a lot of pain, literally, in this case, to get there.

Also recommended: The Slave, The Trainer, The Marketplace by Laura Antoniou Sara Adamson) and books by Grant Antrews.

An erotic tale about Micha Starion, a skilled Nebular Warrior, captured by a seemingly backward people, and trained to be the sex slave of Attland. While there is plenty of sex activity, it is well handled and not unnecessarily drawn out, the training and disciplining is severe, and above all there is an interesting plot. In fact it is quite revealing as regards the relationship between slave and master. A satisfying read. There is a sequel, The Citadel, and the book ends expectantly

This is an excellent example of BDSM erotica! The futuristic/scifi setting gives it an originality many such books lack. Micah endures harsh training & humiliation when he is made into a Personal Body Slave for the alien Kudites. When Micah finally ackowledges his submissive nature, he chooses life with his new master, but there are dangerous consequences...

My only criticism is the short length. The price is a little high for what is really a long novella. Despite that, I highly recommend the book.

I also recommend "Deviations: Submission" and "Deviations: Domination" by Jodi Payne & Chris Owen.

This is a hard core leap into the deepest darkest parts of the psyche - go!!!!! it's so worth the trip

I'm not ordinarily a big fan of erotic fiction, finding most of it dull and rife with poor authorship. If a sex novel does not entertain as well as stimulate, than in my opinion it fails its purpose. I particularly hate when every scene in such "novels" are merely set-ups for more sex. PB500 has plenty of sex, but it flows naturally without distracting from the entertaining plot. Indeed, the sex and the story are nearly perfectly melded into an engrossing read. From the first page it is full of intriguing imagery, arrousing sex-capades, and even, here and there, an original concept. And the sci-fi setting lends a great exotic element to the story that sets it apart from all the others of the genre.
The basic premise: an exceptionally attractive, blond, physically perfect young man is captured by a troop of semi-barbarous aliens and subsequently enslaved by them. Once he has recovered from his injuries, he is promptly sold to the local military leader, whom he quickly comes to worship. He then has to choose between happiness in slavery or loyalty to his own civilization----which do you think he chooses?
A few things that set this novel apart:
The conflict is fully developed: the main character (Chento) seems deeply torn between his sense of dignity and his desire to be submissive. Expertly woven into the subtext is his conflict between loyalty to his past life (and love) and his new one.
The S&M depicted does not seem artificial or contrived, as it does so often in such fiction; it's not a group of characters 'playing' at cruelty: the cruelty is an ingrained part of the alien society---this gave PB500's enslavement a very real quality that I found enthralling.
The alien culture is well developed and logical in the context of the story; it's not merely window-dressing. Unfortuantely, this comes at the expense of Chento's own background, which is given short-shift.

Overall, if you like reading about horny, masculine guys controlling each other, this is an excellent bit of erotic escapism, written intelligently. As another reviewer noted, it could easily have been expanded into a full-length novel without losing it's magic.

Having read so many favorable reviews of this book, I was shocked at how bad it was. I forgot that for most readers, if the sex is hot and plentiful, the quality of the book is irrelevant. 147 pages of sex, torture, abuse. That's it. If you took it all out, what you'd be left with is about 20 pages, and I'm probably being generous. Problems: no character development at all, only enough plot to hang the sex on, and clumsy writing.

What I was looking for was insights into the training of the slave, and the development of his mental adjustment to slavery. Instead, I found cliche after cliche, the most outstanding one being the slave going from hatred of his abuser to falling in love with him. From one extreme to the other with very little in between.

Warning: This review might contain what some people consider SPOILERS.

Rating: 5/10

PROS:
- Really well-formed sci-fi setting. The world of the story is rounded and complete; very little of it feels familiar or Earth-like at all.
- Good examination of the psychological transformation a sexual submissive goes through when discovering his/her natural tendencies.
- Interesting method of communication. The main character, Micah-slash-Chento, doesn't speak the language of his Master's race, so he communicates with the Kudites through a series of gestures that seem similar to sign language and/or the act of drawing symbols on someone else's skin.

CONS:
- A number of scenes that I found horrifying, terrible, gruesome, awful. Etcetera. (I could go on, but you probably get the point.) I lost count of the number of times the principle character gets raped--and most of those instances are gang rape. In fact, I perceived the majority of the sex in this book to be rape. I don't find that hot AT ALL.
- I found the Kudites' tactics for "breaking" Micah and turning him into the ideal sex slave for their leader to be barbaric. Attlad, Micah's Master, calls Micah his "love slave" at least a couple of times, but the story was way too severe for me to believe for one minute that it was about "love." Micah cherishes his submissive role, sure, and his Master as an extension of that, but I can't make myself think of their connection as love, as I can when I think of the relationship depicted in the Deviations series, for example.

Overall comments: This is BDSM at its most brutal: the slave has almost no freedom and is punished for things that aren't his fault and/or he has no way of knowing are wrong. I understand that it's a seminal work of erotic fiction, but the feeling I have upon finishing this is similar to that I had when I finished the first volume of Anne Rice's Sleeping Beauty series: it's a sexy book in that it has a lot of sex in it, but I didn't find it at all romantic...or enjoyable. I certainly believe that the book has merit, but if this had been the first m/m book I ever read, I doubt that I would ever have read another. At the very least, I think many non-practitioners of BDSM and/or beginners to the genre are likely to find this volume too severe to start with.

I read this book and its sequel a while ago, and thereafter I read most of what's currently available on M/m BDSM in the US. This (and its sequel) is still one of the best ever. If you liked "Mr.Benson" or any other of John Preston's works, do try this one as well. The setting is quite different (it's sci-fi / set in futuristic society), but the man who wrote is simply a genius. The writing style is outstanding, plot is highly original, and it's the hottest BDSM M/m erotica ever. A lot of the books are written on similar subject, but most of them are just glossy descriptions of sex (not that anything wrong with that, they may be still quite enjoyable yet rarely memorable), but this one also has deep psychological and philosophical content.

Other highly recommended hot BDSM M/m works that are really memorable to me are "What Worse Place Can I Beg In Your Love?" by Syd McGinley (a short yet extremely profound sci-fi tale), "Caged" by Sean Michael (another good sci-fi) and "I Once Had a Master" (a short story collection, my favorite from John Preston's works).

I read this quite some time ago and recently revisited most parts of the story. This BDSM is a fantastic read. I love dominating alpha alien males subjugating submissive men and this is the very essence of the story. But this BDSM is not merely an erotica. The sci-fi plot is exceptional and imaginative and the love is there though twisted. Sadly the sequel does not measure up. I have to say here I am disappointed with the turns of events in the sequel. But this prequel is one excellent M/M BDSM indeed.

This is considered a classic - or is it clever product placement? - so I had very high expectations about it. I think it's too close to erotica for my tastes. I like to see characters connect, even, or maybe more so, in a slave/master relationship, but I didn't get it. I felt more connection between Micah and Simon, one of his master's servant, than between Micah and Attlad.

I also think that there wasn't enough depth in the main characters. There was a very fascinating theme: the problem of the incommunicability due to the different languages was solved with a sort of sign language, therefore the sacrifice one of the slaves Micah meets makes for his master becomes very poetical and it moved me. As I said before, I saw the bond between master and slave represented better around the main couple.

The end was a bit rushed and the choice of alliance Micah makes at the end is not given enough space, I think it was a very defining moment in his life, it was the moment Micah could really own his submission, but it fell flat.

Or probably I am reading it all wrong, because Attlad is supposed to own and claim Micah as a property and nothing more can come out of it, except for the way he uses him and I am a hopelessly romantic reader who wants to see something more.