Review: Great BDSM, bland story
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 03 31, 2013
I gave Safeword: Matte 3 stars. It was a good book, a quick read. The writing was good and the story flowed well.The BDSM scenes were very well written. I thought that Candace Blevins did a great job representing a healthy scene interaction - the negotiation, the D/s and SM interaction within the scene itself was all done well. I really liked that Ethan was a Sadist and that there was no stigma attached to it here. In many of the books I've read, SM is treated with kind of iffy attitude, often portraying the Sadist as damaged (Christian Grey comes to mind) or angst-y about trying to come terms with these desires... Ethan doesn't have these issues, he just likes to hurt women and he's totally cool with it. That's hot. Likewise, Sam knows herself and doesn't question her desires or worry that being a sexual submissive and masochist somehow undermines her in other parts of her life. Again - hot. When they came together sexually, some really explosive BDSM and sex came out of that.Aside from the BDSM and sex scenes, there was nothing remarkable about the story. The characters are nice and there's definitely potential... but nothing really happens. It's just all kind of middle of the road, trudging along and having fun sex in between. I kept waiting for something to go wrong or maybe more introspection or something.... It was just missing that edge to make it a book that I'd want to come back to. I haven't read any of the other Candace Blevins' books for fear that they'll all be this bland.I'd recommend this as a great BDSM book, if you're looking for more of a story then I'd skip it.If you enjoyed this review and/or found it helpful, please check out my blog where I review BDSM erotica (though I just started, so check back daily for new posts) - haydeereviews dot blogspot dot com.