THE FETISH BOX: WHAT REMAINS

TITLE: THE FETISH BOX Part 3:  

          WHAT REMAINS

Author: Nicole Camden

Pages: 125 (approx)

Date: 30/03/2013

Grade: 4-

Details: No. 3 The Fetish Box

            Received from Gallery, Threshold, 

            Pocket Books through NetGalley

Own/Kindle

The Blurb:

In an attempt to seek out the source of the violence against her friends, Mary takes on a role she’d never imagined she’d play—a role that requires Mary to embrace the darkest parts of her soul. 

For the first time in her life, Mary understands who she is and where she belongs. What remains when you take away the sex and fun and adventure…is love. Love for her new friends, love for her lover, and love for the mother she never knew. She’s willing to risk anything—do anything—to keep them safe… 

And so we arrive at the final episode of Mary’s introduction to and continuation of her mother’s kinky life. Again, since this book is not so much a third title in a trilogy but rather the third part of the same novel, we start exactly where the second story, “What Escapes”; ended with Max and Mary waiting for the police to arrive after people have broken into her house, forcing Mary to flee. 

After this second attack, Mary is more determined than ever to attend the fetish party her shop is preparing for. She may be inexperienced when it comes to kink, but she is determined not to expose her new found friends to danger that is aimed at her personally. If anybody is going to put themselves at risk it should be her, and nobody else. And although her friends, and especially John who is starting to care for her more than he’s willing to admit, worry about her safety they can’t argue with the fact that it makes good business sense for her to introduce her mother’s customers to the new owner of The Fetish Box.

Deciding what clothes to wear to the party gives John and Mary plenty and highly imaginative opportunities to explore new sexual games. And although the party does turn out to be as dangerous as everybody feared, all’s well that ends well, especially since it allows Mary to discover exactly what she wants to do with her new life.

It is going to be impossible to share my thoughts on this book without repeating things I already said in my reviews for “Open All Night” and “What Escapes”. Since this is in reality one story rather than a trilogy I’m not sure that it is possible to review this book as a single entity. In fact, if anyone were to read this book without having read the first two installments first, they would probably be completely lost as to what exactly is happening and why.  So, my objections to Mike’s Irish accent and to the speed with which Mary turns from a virgin into a sexy vixen still stand. At one point in this book our heroine is actually described as being “experienced” which is a bit of a stretch taking into account that it has been a mere few weeks since she was first introduced to the pleasures of sex. 

As far as this book specifically is concerned I have two remarks to make. I found the resolution of the suspense part of the story a bit rushed. After all the build-up in the previous two installments it only took a few pages for the bad guy to come out of hiding, stage his attack and be caught. I also think I would have preferred it if there had been a twist with regard to the identity of Mary’s opponent.

But, having said all that, I have to admit that I did enjoy the story as a whole. I liked the idea behind it, I liked the characters and enjoyed the interactions (both physical and verbal) between them. In fact, I think my rating would have been a bit higher if I had read this as one book, without interruptions rather than the way I was forced to read it now. I’ve got a feeling that there may well be a sequel to this story coming and if that is true I hope Nicole Camden will consider publishing it as one book rather than a serial. I do find myself curious as to how this story and these characters will develop further but I’m not sure I want to put myself through reading-interruptus once again.

THE FETISH BOX PART TWO: WHAT ESCAPES

TITLE: THE FETISH BOX; What Escapes

AUTHOR: NICOLE CAMDEN

Pages: 75

Date: 05/03/2013

Grade: 3.5

Details: no. 2 The Fetish Box

Own / Kindle

Warning: This is the second part in a serialised novel that will be published in three instalments. These stories should be read in order since they won’t make sense otherwise.

When the first instalment of The Fetish Box, Open All Night, ended we left Mary just after she’d been told by John to take all her clothes off. What follows is a sensual introduction into the world of intimacy and sexual vulnerability; a journey which scares Mary a bit but excites her far more and leaves her with deep feelings for John.

Mary isn’t allowed a lot of time to reflect on her night of passion though. She and John are woken up by a phone call informing them that Mary’s shop has been trashed leaving Max and Kaylee injured and on their way to hospital. Mary’s seemingly idyllic introduction to her new life is well and truly over, especially once she discovers that this is not the only threat her shop is facing. And when danger finds Mary again, but this time closer to home, she finds herself running to safety.

But even in the midst of violence and threats Mary can’t deny her sexual curiosity. And while she feels a connection with John, she can’t help being curious about the beautiful Max.

In my review of “Open All Night” I reflected on the fact that it was not a complete book; the story ended abruptly in the middle of a story-line. The fact that this instalment starts with Chapter Nine (and finishes at the end of Chapter Sixteen) confirms the fact that here we’re dealing with a novel being released in instalments. And I’m not quite sure how I feel about that. I’m quite aware of the fact that Nicole Camden is not alone in presenting her work like this and that this way of publishing is nothing new. After all Charles Dickens’ books were routinely published in instalments, to name one very famous example. On the other hand, I personally don’t much like it. When I start a story I want to be able to finish it. I don’t like having difficulties remembering who exactly all the characters in the book are or what exactly has been happening earlier on. So there is a big part of me that wants to say that this is enough for me and that I won’t continue reading this story.

But… I do enjoy this story. It seems a bit farfetched at times, especially when it comes to Mary’s sudden and rather drastic conversion from virgin in to sex-vixen, but I do like other parts of it a lot. The interaction between the characters is fun, the writing is smooth and the sex is hot. The attack on the shop adds an exciting edge to this story and ensures that it is about more than just sex. And all of that is good and all of that makes me curious about what is going to happen next.

So, where does that leave me? If there were still an undetermined amount of instalments to come I would stop reading this story right now. But since it seems that there is only one more instalment to come I am tempted to just read it in order to find out what happens next. After all, I’ve come this far and have mostly enjoyed myself so it would be a shame not to finish the story. I’ve learned a valuable lesson though; in the future I will be making very sure that the books I order are actually the complete work. I have no problems with proper trilogies but have to draw the line at receiving a story in this chopped up way.

I also feel that I’m probably not doing this story justice with my ratings; I’m fairly sure that the rating would be higher if it was based on the whole book rather than a just a few chapters. I guess the jury is still out as far as The Fetish Box is concerned.

THE FETISH BOX: OPEN ALL NIGHT

TITLE: THE FETISH BOX: Open All Night

AUTHOR: NICOLE CAMDEN

Pages: 74

Date: 13/02/2013

Grade: 3

Details: no. 1 Fetish Box

            Received from Gallery Threshold Pocket

  Books through NetGalley

Own/Kindle

Twenty-two year old Mary Deupree has inherited a sex-shop from the mother she never knew. Having been raised by her strict and religious father and grandmother she has no experience when it comes to sex or sex shops, but enough curiosity to make the journey from California to Florida. Shortly after arriving in Hollywood, Florida, Mary meets the two men who played important parts in her mother’s life. John, a scarred veteran from Afghanistan lives in the apartment over the Fetish Box and Max the Irish bartender with whom Mary now co-owns a bar. Much to her surprise Mary discovers that she reacts strongly and sexually to both men. But while Max seems to promise a night of wild abandon, John offers Mary the opportunity to experience everything she’s been fantasising about as well as learn all she needs to know to successfully run the business she has just inherited.

Before I go of on what will sound like a bit of a rant let me say that I did enjoy reading this story. It is written in a nice and easy, at times chatty, way. I enjoyed that the reader gets to see the story from Mary, Mike and John’s perspective. And I liked what I saw of the main characters so far, even if the two men seem to be stereotypes; exactly what an Irish man and a wounded veteran are supposed to be in romance novels.

I have a few issues with this book though. The biggest one being that this isn’t actually a book. It is the start of a story and it stops before it really begins. All we have here is an introduction of the main characters and hints of potentially interesting and sexy things to come. I don’t know or understand why it is suddenly okay to publish instalments and call them books, but it seems to be wide-spread these days. This is, of course, a review copy so I didn’t pay for it. But I don’t think I would want to pay for it either. I don’t mind paying for short books provided they give me a completed story. And that is not what I found here.

The rest of my issues are much smaller. First of all, Irish men don’t really sound the way Nicole Camden writes it. They do not use “yer” instead of “you” all the time. And I should know; after living in Ireland for 15 years and having been married to an Irish man for even longer, I’ve got a pretty good idea what they sound like. In fact, this particular Irishman sounded more like a Scot a lot of the time. Secondly, how likely is that that a girl who has stayed a virgin for 22 years would suddenly decide that she wants to sleep with not one, but two men she’s only met for the first time that day? And if that seems unlikely, don’t even get me started about the fact that she willingly agrees to have one of them introduce her to the ins and outs of BDSM. I mean; really? Finally there was one wardrobe malfunction that bothered me; Mary went from wearing a skirt to wearing jeans and back to wearing a skirt without ever changing her clothes.

This book didn’t contain a lot of explicit sex although there are one or two erotic scenes. I really don’t think there is a lot, if anything, in this book to offend anybody although the story seems to suggest that that may change in future instalments.

And that leads me to the big question; will I be reading the next book in this series. As I stated above, I don’t like paying money for what I feel are unfinished books. On the other hand I did like this story and the characters enough to want to know what might be happening next. There were enough hints about future events in this story to make me curious about how it will all play out. So I guess the jury is still out on this one. I will have to wait and see if my curiosity is stronger than my opposition to books published in this way. Only time will tell.