Ooh La La!: Contemporary French Erotica by Women [Paperback]

Maxim Jakubowski (Editor), Franck Spengler (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 30, 2006

People say the French stay slim thanks to their good wine and regular meals. This might prove to be the case, but the hottest erotica currently being written flows from the sexy pens of French women of letters. On the basis that writers of erotica are often known to find inspiration in their own lives and experiences, one can only draw certain conclusions! Dominique Aury under the penname Pauline Réage wrote The Story of O in 1954 and opened the floodgates for a whole new, sulphurous tradition of female erotica, since appropriated by female writers all over the world, including Anne Rice in the USA writing as A.N. Roquelaure. But the wonderfully perverse imagination of French authors has continued unabated ever since, and the daughters of O are now legions, including leading lights like Catherine Millet, Regine Deforges, Francoise Rey, Vanessa Duries, Florence Dugas, Alina Reyes, and the famous fashion designer Sonia Rykiel, all of whom contributed to this collection. French literary sex is hot, elegant, gently perverse, quietly shocking, and always arousing — and these twenty-nine stories will leave no reader indifferent.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Maxim Jakubowski is owner of the renowned Murder One bookshop in London and author and editor of a number of books, including On Tenderness Express and a number of popular "Mammoth Books," including Illustrated Erotica and Pulp Fiction.

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Running Press (October 30, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1560259086
• ISBN-13: 978-1560259084
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #817,326 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A versatile collection of contemporary French erotica., October 4, 2009

By 

LWNORWAY "writer and fitness guru" (MI) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ooh La La!: Contemporary French Erotica by Women (Paperback)

While I'm have never been a major devotee of erotic fiction, this is very good for beginners in the genre, like myself. Fortunately, none of these stories are over-explicit to the point of perversion, like some cheap erotica that's published in adult magazines. Not to say the stories aren't graphic and explicit, because they are. The art of erotic literature is knowing the difference between what's arousing and what's vulgar. The only story that I found myself not enjoying is "The Horsewoman", by Brigitte Lahaie. After reading the first few paragraphs of the story, I assumed this was a story of bestiality (a woman's sexual relationship with a horse), which I could never stomach whatsoever. I may have read it wrong, but this is one story I've decided to skip. The ending of Julie Saget's "The Man from Albuquerque" was also hard for me to stomach. And not for religious reasons, either. My favorite stories in this book include

"The Garage", by Astrid Schilling

"Tarot", by Florence Dugas

"In Memory of a Cock", by Sandrine Le Coustumer

"Lies", by Geraldine Zwang"

"The Black Swan Hotel", by Nathalie Perreau

"Sacrifice", by Karrine Keller

"Mako", by Marie L.

"The Ecstasies", by Sophie Cadalen

Erotica is a genre I'm just starting to get into. As I've mentioned previously, it's not something I've been into, as far as reading. Nor am I good at writing it, personally. "Ooh La La!" opened my eyes up not only in the genre itself, but as to how immaculate female erotica can be. All of these stories are written by females and happen to be contemporary stories, that hasn't aged well. Pauline Reage, the female author behind "The Story of O" paved the way for female erotica and female writers to engage in this kind of mastery of erotic literature. Another erotica book that I've started to read is "Master/Slave", by N.T. Morley. The book cover for "Ooh La La!" is hands-down the hottest photo cover I've seen on a book since Trevor Watson's "Cheek" picture book.

4.0 out of 5 stars Another success story for the Kindle, November 28, 2011

By 

J. Abston "J.A." (Highlands, TX) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Ooh La La!: Contemporary French Erotica by Women (Kindle Edition)

Well I was flying through Amsterdam and had a 4 hour layover and decided to walk through the airport bookstore. I saw this book(obviously look at the cover) in the middle of a stack of other less eye catching books. Well I read the back and immediately wanted a copy but the line was long and I really didn't want to walk through the bookstore carrying a women's French erotica book. So instead I whipped out my kindle and decided to see if it was available for order through my FREE global 3g coverage. Just my luck it was and it was about half as much as the bookstore was asking for it. So I went and settled in on my seat surrounded by people and read an adult novel, really QUITE FUN! The stories were all very exciting though some of them were graphic and involved cat fights to the death (never actually heard of one of those before). It was definitely a page turner full of multiple unrelated short stories about multiple characters sexual escapades.