Review of charming but odd Regency romance Lady Like by Mackenzi Lee

 

I was pretty sure I was going to hate Regency romance Lady Like by Mackenzi Lee when I started reading it.  For one thing, it's written in present tense, for no apparent reason, which is incredibly distracting.  For another, very early on heroine Harry steals a dog.  Yes, she just outright steals a dog.  A well-fed, generally well-behaved dog that is obviously not a stray.  No owner comes looking for him.  We don't know why.  Yes, I am obsessed with this.  Don't steal dogs, okay?

I also found Harry's career incredibly annoying.  She is a Shakespearean actress in an all-lesbian troupe.  She apparently always gets the lead roles.  She likes and understands Shakespeare's plays and has integrated them into her thinking about life.  But she is a terrible actress, who despite having been in the troupe for years has never gotten better.  In fact, the whole troupe is widely acknowledged as awful. Yet the theater seems to be doing just fine. It has a decent audience every night, and this does not appear to be some kind of Rocky Horror situation where people attend to enjoy a camp fellowship.  I have enough theater people in my life to find this incredibly annoying and also wildly stupid.

Now that I have those things off my chest: this book told a good story.  Heroine Emily is in London hoping to find a husband so she can get out of an engagement to a horrible man.  She has a meet cute with a duke, who is Harry's good friend.  Although Harry is gay she also wants to marry the duke, because she needs to marry well in order to come into her inheritance.  Harry's brother meets Emily and decides that she and Harry would balance each other out and be good influences on each other, so he suggests that they hang out.  Plot plot plot HEA.

What I really liked about this book is that as you're reading it you think you know how it's going to end -- how Harry and Emily will manage to have a lesbian relationship while navigating the realities of Regency England.  But it doesn't end that way at all. The ending is a little pat, sure, but very, very uplifting.  

Now, if Harry would just give the damn dog back to it's actual owner . . . 

Note from Jasmine Gold: As the name of this blog indicates, I write erotica. Check out my dark, dystopian novel about naked sex slaves, Mindgames. Your darkest fantasies, with a phenomenal plot and characters you will come to think of as beloved friends. Available on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited  and in paperback.  Or read my book of short stories about hot, consensual sex, The Mature Woman's Guide to Desire, available on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited.

 

Thank you ELust, for once again gathering together so much great smut and other sex writing!

 

 

Writing  can be lonely work, and writing smut can be very lonely.  There are no conferences for people who write dystopian fiction about naked sex slaves.  Some people are kind enough (or, very occasionally, mean enough) to rate or review my work, and some people reach out to me, using their own pseudonyms, which I appreciate as far as it goes. 

But then there's Oz Bigdownunder, who  gathers together some of the best erotica and articles about sex and links to them at his monthly magazine, Elust. Knowing that he will provide free publicity for my stories inspires me to get back to work (although in all honesty I haven't finished anything new in a while -- my real life, which has no naked sex slaves in it, interferes).  

The latest issue of ELust, 191, is excellent.  It includes the following:  

Sex News

The Sex Shed, The Sex Shed is looking for brand ambassadors & reviewers!   (Note from JG: Wouldn't you love to be a sex toy influencer?) 

Erotic Non-Fiction

Morgan Destera, What Can I Say…

Tantric Connections, The Longing Beneath Success: Remembering How To Feel

Thoughts & Advice on Sex & Relationships

Tantric Sexual Healing, Tantric Embodiment and the Alchemy of Power: Transforming Desire into Collective Awakening

Kristina J, Let’s Talk About Touch (and Why Communication Is The Sexiest Thing You Can Do)

Awakening Your Inner Essence, The Secret to Lasting Longer Isn’t Control — It’s Connection

Erotic Fiction

B.R.Saiph, Locktober Reward

Jerusalem Mortimer, In the Realm of the Sensei - Prologue 17

Jasmine Gold, Opening chapters of Mindgames, a dark dystopian novel about naked sex slaves  (Note from JG:  You asked for it, you got it -- sample my naked sex slave smut for free!) 

Fern River Club, After the Come-In (Part 1)

Product Reviews

Spices of Lust, Womanizer Peach Review  (Note from JG:  I recently bought a vibrator - not this one -- that I hated.  It had only one setting, which was way too intense for me.  Vibrators are not cheap, and vibrator reviews are key to not wasting your money.)  

Oz Bigdownunder, Nothosaur Avoyo - Centaur Horse Ejaculating Dildo - Review  (Note from JG:  Now that's a review, exactly what i would expect from our hero Oz.)  

Sex Work

Sex worker Search, A Guide to Selfie Photo-Shoots For Sex Workers

Lita Mackenzie, An Imperfect Quick Guide to Finding – and Verifying- a Companion

Ulla Burns, No Safeword for the Soul -Maternal Domination without a script

Sierra Skyy, Feminism and Sex Work; Have We Lost the Plot?

Elizabeth of London, A naughty Nurse

Hellga, Sit On My Face and Tell Me That You Love Me

Book and Movies

Liz Black, Two New Bimbo Releases Are Here - Two Series Completed

History of BDSM, Nine and a Half Weeks (1978)  (Note from JG: Excellent review)

Remember the Zipless Fuck? Modern romance How to Sell a Romance by Alexa Martin will remind you

 

In a book published in 1973 called Fear of Flying, author Erica Jong gave the world the concept of the zipless fuck -- you meet a hot stranger, you have amazing sex with them, there are no repercussions.  Zipless because in this fantasy the sex is so easy that there is no fiddling with the flies on jeans; clothes just fall away.  

SPOILERS:

Towards the end of the novel the narrator, protagonist Isadora, is on a train, sees a hot man, and has an opportunity for a zipless fuck -- and she is horrified.  Who would want to have sex with a complete stranger without any conversation?  It is scary and gross.  

How to Sell a Romance, by Alexa Martin, begins with a zipless fuck and ends SPOILERS

 

with a zipless happily ever after.   

Heroine Emerson goes to a crowded rooftop bar after attending a conference for a fictional MLM skincare company.  (For the uninitiated, MLMs, or multi-level marketing companies, are pyramid schemes aimed at women who invest a lot of money in products but can only make the money back if they recruit other women to sell the products.)  Emerson doesn't know anyone at the bar and is planning to leave but manages to snag a table.  Suddenly an impossibly handsome man asks if he can sit with her. They exchange a few words.  She asks if they can go to his hotel room.  He enthusiastically agrees.  She hasn't had sex is years and he has the biggest cock she has ever seen.  They don't need to ask each other what they like, sex-wise, because I guess they can read each other's minds or because in this world everyone likes the same things so you don't need to communicate.  The magic giant cock brings only pleasure.  

Things go south the next morning when it turns out that magic-cock-man, a/k/a hero Lucas, is writing an expose on the MLM that Emerson is joining.  Apparently in this world no one has ever heard of or researched MLMs because Emerson is shocked -- shocked, I tell you! -- that anyone would dare question the business savvy of investing money she doesn't have in overpriced skincare products in the hope of recruiting other people to sell them.

But, wait, there's more!  Emerson is a sweet as sugar kindergarten teacher who has been recruited into the nefarious MLM by her boss, the principal.  We learn over the course of the book that the principal spends all of her principal-ing time recruiting teachers to the MLM, and firing those who refuse to be recruited or who quit.  I guess the school runs itself, despite what must be incredible turnover?  

And --  you could not have seen this one coming! -- Lucas's daughter is placed into Emerson's kindergarten class.  And, Lucas's ex-wife, mother of Moppet (™) is also in the MLM and is good friends with the principal.  

At any point does anyone in this book say, it is inappropriate for a principal to run an elementary school as a front for an MLM?  At any point in this book does anyone say a kindergarten teacher should not be having sex with the father of a student?  No! and No!  Well, okay, the principal gets fired in the end, not for running the school as a front for an MLM but for getting mad at Emerson for secretly recording their conversations (which is definitely illegal in some states, FYI).  And everyone agrees that Emerson should be able to continue to have sex with Lucas and that Moppet (™) should not have to switch classes.  Yay for the HEA!  

Note from Jasmine Gold: As the name of this blog indicates, I write erotica. Check out my dark, dystopian novel about naked sex slaves, Mindgames. Your darkest fantasies, with a phenomenal plot and characters you will come to think of as beloved friends. Available on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited  and in paperback.  Or read my book of short stories about hot, consensual sex, The Mature Woman's Guide to Desire, available on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited.