GR Cleanup Read May 2011

This one starts out as more of a straight up erotica novel than your everyday romantica. Ella’s having super sexed up dreams that feature her being forced to watch various scenes of sexual debauchery as she’s tied up and above the action. There’s some light bondage and spanking that really gets her going. When she discovers that the hot man she’s been watching have sexy times with other women looks exactly like Phillip, the gorgeous trial attorney who works in her office she’s soooo embarrassed! But Phillip’s been having the same dreams and also recognizes Ella whose uninhibited dream self undid him the previous night. Instead of being embarrassed Philip wants to get to know her outside of their shared dream world and get to know her he does . . .

This book starts out as pure erotica and I’m good with that. We know neither character as we’re thrust immediately into the dreamy sex. The dream sequences are filled with various scenes of BDSM that start out mild and turn far more violent (be warned it involves some bloody genitalia) as Phillip and Ella get together in the real world. During dreams both Phillip and Ella are pleasured by others and it’s super hot, well written erotica. Their real world relationship is much tamer and develops at a snail’s pace in comparison. They go on several chaste dates and spend much of their time attempting to figure out what the dreams are about and what outside force is controlling them. This portion of the book didn’t interest me overmuch because I was more interested in the D/s relationship that Phillip was dying to start with Ella than all of the dream research. But that’s just me. I’m sure many will find it all fascinating. Towards the end some major WTFery appears when the culprit is exposed and I just wasn’t swallowing any of it. Still, I thought their relationship development was nicely done by the author and thought it clever the way she was able to incorporate the erotic bits into her real life sweeter romance (which did get hotter eventually). I’d definitely check out any sequel that took their blooming D/s relationship to the next level if it was as saucily written as the opening sequence and didn’t get into blood play.