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Customer Review
Reviewed in the United States on June 19, 2014
I completed this book over the course of one morning, and I could not be more impressed with it. Ms. Elstrom takes us under the wing of Meg Curtis to depict a stunningly honest and organic relationship between two women, two uncertain people coming to terms with kink as something more nuanced and intricate than a simple set of actions. Over the course of this book, we are privy to the thoughts and feelings of Meg as she grows and changes as a woman--we see her feelings change from muddled to exuberant, and her actions change from hesitant to purposeful as she and Regina discover each other's lives, bodies, and identities.
Owning Regina is not a book about fantasy kink. There is no magic telepathy between people, no porno-levels of endurance, no "perfect" interactions or scenes. Rather, this book displays kink as it is in real life: consensual, communicative, and imperfect, a dance between people.
To be honest, I'm impressed at the realism portrayed in this book. The conflict feels real and pressing; the characters are deep, well-developed, and likeable, and most importantly, the writing touches me on an emotional level. I found myself feeling what the characters felt, and (though maybe this is just from too much time in the scene myself) feeling every sensation described in vivid detail. This is a diary--it's not hardcore erotica, but it's not a documentary either. It's gritty, dirty, raw, and satisfying in a way that neither of the two are on their own.
The inevitable comparison will come to Fifty Shades of Grey--this is nothing like it. The portrayal of kink shown in Fifty Shades is like buying a bucket of sand and a plastic palm tree and calling it Hawaii. It's fake, fantastical, and indicative not of kink but of all the popular misconceptions surrounding it that are embedded in our mass media. The author even clarified (quite proudly, even) that she had never done any of the things she wrote about. Owning Regina, in those respects, is completely different--and that's why it's so good.
I would recommend this book to anyone who wants more than a cheap thrill out of their reading, to anyone who enjoys seeing positive, realistic, and consensual depictions of kink in writing, and to anyone who wants to understand what kink is--what kink really is.
Five stars for an amazing read, and hats off to Ms. Elstrom for writing such an exquisite book!
Owning Regina is not a book about fantasy kink. There is no magic telepathy between people, no porno-levels of endurance, no "perfect" interactions or scenes. Rather, this book displays kink as it is in real life: consensual, communicative, and imperfect, a dance between people.
To be honest, I'm impressed at the realism portrayed in this book. The conflict feels real and pressing; the characters are deep, well-developed, and likeable, and most importantly, the writing touches me on an emotional level. I found myself feeling what the characters felt, and (though maybe this is just from too much time in the scene myself) feeling every sensation described in vivid detail. This is a diary--it's not hardcore erotica, but it's not a documentary either. It's gritty, dirty, raw, and satisfying in a way that neither of the two are on their own.
The inevitable comparison will come to Fifty Shades of Grey--this is nothing like it. The portrayal of kink shown in Fifty Shades is like buying a bucket of sand and a plastic palm tree and calling it Hawaii. It's fake, fantastical, and indicative not of kink but of all the popular misconceptions surrounding it that are embedded in our mass media. The author even clarified (quite proudly, even) that she had never done any of the things she wrote about. Owning Regina, in those respects, is completely different--and that's why it's so good.
I would recommend this book to anyone who wants more than a cheap thrill out of their reading, to anyone who enjoys seeing positive, realistic, and consensual depictions of kink in writing, and to anyone who wants to understand what kink is--what kink really is.
Five stars for an amazing read, and hats off to Ms. Elstrom for writing such an exquisite book!
