interesting, isn’t it? I turned it into an rtf document and didn’t get to see the cover and the first thing I saw was the word count, so I was already reading with the ‘this is going to be too short for my taste’ assumption and naturally found several places where I wanted to see more in-depth story.

I bought it and read it, and liked it a lot. Just the kind of forceful without the humiliating bits I like to read. There was one little thingie I wasn’t that excited about but it wasn’t a squick.

That said I was very disappointed about how short the story was for the price. I guess I should have read the review better because it says ‘short novel’, although at 19k I’d at most call it a novella and it would have been nice to see some of the issues explored more in depth. Dahl can definitely write. Now, however, I feel like I ate dinner, but there wasn’t enough and I’m still hungry…

The BDSM worked for me, although I’m normally a little squeamish in that area. What really worked, as Joan/SarahF says, was the joy the characters felt in finding someone who fulfilled their desires.

Sorry for the inconvenience!
~Amy from Harlequin

@Keri M: Yes, I agree that there was some difficulty in blending these two parts of the story.

If I had written a full length review for TWW, I would have commented more about the subplot and its effect on the relationship between Lily and Tom. I am not a big fan of the ‘peril to one person generates emotional closeness in the relationship’ element, and TWW was no exception, but it was such a short piece, I can see the expediency and efficiency of developing things that way. And because this was a text within a text sort of thing, I wasn’t sure how much of it was riffing off the ER genre and how much was straightforward plot development (or both).

Spanking, rough sex, sexual commands?

That kind. Personally, I’m not a huge hardcore BDSM fan, but there wasn’t anything in here that turned me off.

I enjoy reading non-vanilla, forceful sex but some aspects of BDSM push my personal buttons to the point I get physically ill, so I thought I’d better ask before buying. Thanks.

I’ll have to pick this up as I enjoyed Talk Me Down.

ETA: Loving Jack was the other book.

I love how e-publishing makes shorter works possible as stand-alone purchases, too!

Great review, thank you!