Customer Reviews

The Marketplace (The Marketplace Series, 1)

5 star:		(25)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

(...)The Marketplace series by Laura Antoniou is erotic literature of the highest quality and it will encapture your mind and heart as well as turn you on. This reissue is very welcomed and the new short story at the end covers a gap between this and the second book of the series, "The Slave" very well -- this short story alone is worth the cost of the book for any Marketplace fan. You'll meet all the important and reoccuring characters from Antoniou's series; you'll develop strong opinions about each too that may surprise some of you. This isn't soft and romantic BDSM though so if you can't handle DS without limits, serious punishment, and even sexual use to the extreme, you'll want to skip this series. It appeals across the board to all seuxal orientaions within the BDSM category -- in fact it plays around with the orientations in wonderfully engaging ways. I highly recommend this book.

I loved this book when I first read it several years ago - I love it even more now. To the experienced BDSMer many of the characters will seem familiar, even if you have never read it book before. The Do-Me-Queen Princess, The awkward Sissy maid, The delicate yet 'always proper' servant girl, The leather boy looking for something "more"... here is the Marketplaces newest arrivals. Maybe you've seen them in the clubs or even online? Ever wonder what would happen to such a person if they got what they say they want? Ever wonder what "REAL D/s" is? Ask yourself - do I have what it takes to train a slave? Read this and ask yourself again.

This book (heck this entire series) is what I go for whenever I hit a rut in my scene life. I've often referred to it as "the most realistic fiction" in BDSM literature. And I recommend it to EVERYONE in the scene.

This is the story of four slaves - Brian, Claudia, Sharon and Robert - who all have an inherent need to be "owned" in the fullest sense of the word. We follow their journey as they are trained in a crash course by Alex, Grendel and Chris.

Basically, The Marketplace is a secret society catering to those who wish to own well-trained slaves and those who wish to be sold as slaves. When we're talking about a slave in this context, we're talking about one with no limits.

I'm ambivalent about this book for a number of reasons. Firstly, if this was reality, the training provided in this book would be utilised by owners who can't be bothered training their own slaves and who want to buy one off the shelf. To me, that takes the dominant's authority away from them - isn't half the pleasure of owning a slave knowing that you've trained them yourself?

Secondly, there is a huge amount of sex in this book. I'm no prude and I don't have a problem with sex, but BDSM is not all about sex. If you want a lot of sex scenes mixed in with punishment, then you'll love this. But to me, it misrepresents what real-life BDSM is about and enforces the "kinky sex" stereotype that a lot of people seem to have about BDSM.

Thirdly, the grammatical and typographical errors throughout are horrendous. I don't know what device was used to type The Marketplace, but repeatedly mis-spelling "circumstance" as "circomestance" could easily have been corrected in most modern word processors. There are other oft-repeated and very annoying grammatical errors, which drove me to distraction. I admit that I'm fairly picky about things like this and I can live with a few errors, but this book is riddled with them.

However, I found this an interesting read overall. It is more than just a bunch of sex and BDSM scenes and it has a storyline.

The story line in this book is of 4 very different in personality, want to be slaves. I guess the basics of this book are good, if you wanted to just real it as a thrill, but I don't feel it would be something the BDSM community at large would hold as standard.
I did like the idea of the slaves in training not exactly knowing why a particular thing was taking place, and only finding out later that it had actually trained them in a particular way. That a particualr part of their training really ended up meaning something even if they couldn't see what it was to begin with.
What I didn't like about the book, was the cold feeling it leaves behind. This is definately not a loving domination/submission story. There are a lot of scenes that take place in this book that kind of made me feel empty, like there never being any kind of after care or hardly any compassion.
One of the other reviews I read mentioned the fact that the biggest part or a master slave relationship is in the training and if such a place as this exsisted then what would be the point. With this I agree. So if you were just reading it out of pure fantasy then you might like it, but if your looking for something with a bit more compassion and reality this book probably isn't for you. Oh one other thing, I don't know who proof-read this book before it went to print, but I found the typos in the book really annoying, there are a lot of them and when you read a sentence with one, spending a few extra minutes trying to figure out what they were supposed to be saying makes the book that much more annyoing.

This was an interesting read for me, as I have been finding S&M fantasies fascinating lately. It is not your average porn, nor is it really erotica. Instead it is the story of 4 people who submit to becoming complete slaves, even encompassing allowed sexual brutality and enslavement. The sex scenes are fantastic and the pyschological elements are good as well. Not perfect, but definitely an enjoyable and hot book for those interested in th topics.

The new edition of the Marketplace is ever so much better than the old edition. Not only visually prettier (it's trade size and has a beautiful cover - not those ugly out-of-print Masquerade things), but also a 'bonus story' that adds to the joy of re-reading this favorite s/m classic! After devouring The Academy, reading the Marketplace again, reacquainting myself with the original characters was like slipping between the covers with familiar play partners - fun, and a few surprises. The added story gives us even more insight into the complex relationships between Grendel, Alex, Rachel and Chris, the slave trainers who we all learned to love when they were teaching Sharon, Robert, Claudia and Brian how to prepare themselves for a life of a slave in the mysterious Marketplace. It's a must-read for Marketplace fans, and a must-have book for people who appreciate classy erotica.

This well-written, well-developed, and lengthy novel delvesdeep into the motivations, emotional conflicts, and obsessions of thebdsm world of slave and master relationships. There are few works offiction dealing with this subject that do so in a way that deliversboth literary excellence and erotic stimulation, but The Marketplacemanages to do just that.

The Marketplace introduces us to awell-constructed, complex world of sexual slavery and mastery. We areintroduced to the the trainers, some students, the rules and thrillsof being a sexual slave, and the purchase process in a way that holdsyour attention, interest, and arousal at a nice, steady levelthroughout the book--which is a very impressive feat for such a longbook!

I will admit that I've read works of erotica that were muchmore stimulating, but I've read few that were able to make sense,deliver interesting and complex characters, and keep my attention forso long as this one did. And the best part is that it's the first ina line of such great works.

This is a book of fiction about the training and selling of slaves and the process they go through. While offering some components of BDSM, I do not think it is intended to offer a "real-life" look at it. If that is what you are looking for, I don't think you will find it here. It is purely fictional and not intended as a guide. In my opinion it was written strictly for the enjoyment of the reader. There is lots of sex and punishment. It also gives you a look at different types of people and the reasons they each want to be a slave(or think they do). There are other books that follow and they get better as they go along.

Laura Antoniou is, in some circles, considered to be one of the best authors of sadomasochistic fiction. And that isn't much of a surprise, since she really has mastered the art of creating intense sexual scenarios mixed with beautiful ways of writing. The Marketplace, the first part of her (at least within the BDSM scene) famous Marketplace-series, was originally published in 1993, and has all over the kinky and fetish world been celebrated as one of the best creations ever when it comes to the genre known as BDSM erotica. Since 1993 Antoniou has written four sequels, and these days not too many people argue against the fact that she's become one of the leading authors of BDSM literature.

The book focuses on the four slaves Robert, Brian, Claudia, and Sharon, who all get accepted into a rigorous training program under Master Grendel and Mistress Alexandra on a beautiful estate in the countryside. Grendel and Alexandra are representatives for an international organization devoted to trading in submissive slaves, and Marketplace - the name of this organization - is the largest but also most secretive organization in existence for people with these unique interests. For a few weeks the four slaves are drilled into being perfect servants, and throughout the book steaming sex is mixed with moving portraits of people with but one goal in life: to become the perfect servant to a Master or a Mistress.

And these people are: Robert, a shy, heterosexual man with great capacity but low self-esteem; Brian, a homosexual who has never doubted his own excellence; Sharon, an erotic bombshell used to being able to pick and choose any man she ever wanted; and Claudia, who already serves under Mistress Madeleine but nonetheless is sent to the Marketplace in order to improve her skills.

The Marketplace is a book that both beginners and more experienced people within the BDSM scene can enjoy tremendously, partly because it doesn't contain any off language or terminology that only the initiated will understand, but also because it isn't all about sex all the time. True, people have sex to the left and right, but the book also contains very interesting characters whose growth is quite fascinating to follow.

This might not be the first book to give to your spouse's parents for their anniversary, but if you want some exquisite inspiration for your exploration to the world of kinky sex and role-playing, then The Marketplace comes highly recommended indeed!

Unlike some standard erotic fiction these books by Laura Antoniou have plots, humor and good character development with interesting characters. If you expect straight vanilla erotic reading you will be disappointed, if you are looking for a story as good as you will find in "mainstream" literature you will not be disappointed. Very well crafted story of one slave who is stuck in one role that she does perfectly and three wannabes who are really unpromising. This introduces Chris who is a central character in the series as well as two other trainers who own the training house and also appear off and on in the series. I wanted to give a 3.5 star rating because of some disappointing proofing but decided that I should in all fairness round up not down.