I enjoyed this short story essay book. I did find this book a little graphic and caught myself looking around to see if anyone was watching me LOL. However, the only issue I have with short stories is that I usually want more of the story, I found that some of these short stories could have been longer and still considered to be apart of this book.

💘 happy valentine’s day 😈
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what better time to talk about kinks than on v-day?? sorry for the thirst trap, but i felt it necessary and followed in the recent footsteps of some of my faves on here.
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thank you to netgalley and simon & schuster for my gifted copy in exchange for an honest review!
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“kink: stories” is a collection of short stories edited by r.o. kwon and garth greenwell, and features contributions from some of the brightest and forward-thinking writers of our time. even though each story features a different cast of characters and plots, they are all connected by raw and subversive writing.
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leather, bdsm, pain, toys, masturbation, steamy hookups, orgasms… these stories have it all. i think it’s often hard (hehe) to write about sex and do so in a way that doesn’t seem smutty and overindulgent, but these writers did it so well. while sex is obviously at the forefront of these stories, it is written so exquisitely and beautifully, and moves each story forward, rather than seeming unnecessary and exaggerated. and not every story is fueled by voracious sex. they are about human connectivity, longing, desire, relationships, and heartbreak. full disclaimer, though: you WILL be thirsty reading this…i know i was.
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another important thing to talk about with a book like this is diversity and inclusion. i’m sure we’re all tired of reading about sex between a cis white man and a cis white woman, and these stories did not disappoint. i don’t think I’ve ever read about so many inclusive bodies and identities in one book. there are heterosexual couples, yes, but there are also trans and queer people, lesbians, black and brown bodies, drag queens, throuples, orgies, sex parties, etc. the authors did not hold back, and i cannot talk enough about how much i appreciate that.
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after reading this anthology, I want to go back and read every book and story from the amazing writers who i’ve just experienced for the first time. “kink: stories” is out now, and makes the perfect v-day read either alone or with someone(s)!
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💘💘💘💘\5

I generally love stories that are kink related so I was super excited to get the chance to read this anthology. Sadly I was a little underwhelmed with this collection. As with any anthology there were quite a few stories I did not enjoy and several that I absolutely loved. The ones that stood out the most for me were Best Friendster Date Ever by Alexander Chee, Safeword by R.O. Keon, and Impact Play by Peter Mountford. Overall I found most of the stories enjoyable and would recommend this anthology to anyone who loves kink stories.

In the introduction, Garth Greenwell and R.O. Kwon let the reader know that KINK is an anthology of stories that consider kink “as one of the tools we use to make sense of our lives.” This plays out through a man grappling with how to give his wife the submission and pain she desires (R.O. Kwon’s “Safeword”); a gay woman who decides to sleep with a man as a way of reorienting herself to her own desires (“The Cure” by Melissa Febos); an escort sees her own loneliness reflected in an unusual client (“Mirror, Mirror” by Vanessa Clark); a trans couple catches an intrusive neighbor (Zeyn Joukhadar’s “The Voyeurs”); and more.

Out of fifteen stories, nearly all worked for me. Among my favorites was "The Lost Performance of the High Priestess of the Temple of Horror" by Carmen Maria Machado, a graphic and tense story of an orphaned young woman in 1900s Paris with a fascination with the actress at a theater specializing in staged violence. I’ve never met a Machado story I didn’t like, this one is just as weird and wonderful as any in HER BODY AND OTHER PARTIES. I also loved Brandon Taylor’s “Oh, Youth”, about an architecture student putting himself through school by renting himself out to wealthy couples for the summers. As we know from REAL LIFE, Taylor can write a devastating dinner party scene - truly gorgeous. “Scissors” by Kim Fu was also memorable for how it straddles trust and fear; a sub is tied to a chair onstage and blindfolded while her domme / girlfriend impersonates the audience touching her (or does she?).

I expect one of the most divisive stories will be Godospor by Garth Greenwell, where a BDSM encounter spills into sexual violence. I don’t think a topic can be fully addressed without looking at the controversial parts. I don’t think you could have a book about kink without exploring that line of consent.

I enjoyed this! Some smutty goodness written by some fantastic writers I admire. I also enjoyed that there is a variety of different perspectives and voices for this. A great collection.

I always forget how much I love short story collections until I pick one up! This was all sorts of fun, kinky, weird, crazy, and a little disturbing at times- but I loved it! It's so interesting to read stories that are outside of our "norm" and open our eyes to a different world. Also, all of the writing was phenomenal! It didn't feel stuttered as I left one story to go to another. Even though they were each unique and stood out as their own, the stories flowed really well with one another- I highly recommend!

I rarely read short stories, and less likely to read an anthology. But I was drawn to this, seeing the list of authors and it’s unique mission. “Wouldn’t it be wonderful, R.O. thought, if stories like these could live together in one book, in the kind of book that could sit on artists’ residencies’ library shelves?”

Like most collections, its a mixed bag, liking some better than others. But the quality of the writing throughout is of course excellent. But it’s worth picking up for Brandon Taylor’s “Oh,Youth” alone. Just sooooo good!

After finishing the introduction and first story, I knew this was going to be a special collection and I was not disappointed.

I wanted to read this because of all the amazing writers involved, and also because I realized there were so many things about sexual kink and the culture surrounding it that I didn’t know. I think it’s a shame that what little media portrayal we do have of it is either very simplified, a joke, or watered down to cater to a specific audience. (Yes, I am talking about the Fifty Shades of Grey series.)

You may be wondering: Why should I read this book? What do I have to gain from it if I’m not interested in exploring BDSM? I think the introduction, written by editors R.O. Kwon and Garth Greenwell, explains it best: “Literature is the great technology for the communication of the consciousness, and these stories are accrue in their exploration of psychology. But they also recognize that all experience is embodied, and that bodies are always situated in the realities of history and culture, the crucibles of class, race, nationhood, and gender. By taking kink seriously, these stories recognize how the questions raised in intimate, kinky encounters—questions of power, agency, identity—can help us to interrogate and begin to re-script the larger cultural narratives that surround us.”

These stories are beautifully written and filled with desire, yes, but they also depict longing and self-contemplation as we follow characters explore their sexual interests across different time periods and places. I think this collection would be a unique Valentine’s Day gift to a friend, partner, or yourself!

This book is a collection of stories that crawls into the nooks and crannies of sexual imagination. I suggest that only those that are open to BDSM and other forms of kink read this book, because it may be too much for some. That being said if you have experience in this subject in whatever form, or at least are open to it– then I highly recommend this! And if you try this book and it’s not your thing that is okay too. As the saying goes: “dont yuck someone else’s yum.” So even though some stories involve kink that I am personally not into, there are something to be said about the desire, pleasure, and what sexually excites others that is explored in this book. Some authors in this even explore the “why”. The best part of this book is that there are many relationships outside of the heteronormative which I find refreshing, honest, and necessary. In the review below, I will offer a one sentence though of each short story.

This story collectiom was very hit or miss for me with a lot of misses. Some of the stories felt preachy and lacking on the actually narrative side. Others were better. None of them blew me away.

If you have delicate sensibilities, this book is likely not for you. I think it is what romance readers call "steamy."

Overall, I was a bit disappointed and did not feel like this collection lived up to my exceptations.

There hasn’t been anything like this in a very long time. Kink is the exact representation of fantasy holds no barred. Kink is romance, desire, power, seduction and unapologetic fantasy. This isn’t your typical smut. It’s a unique collection of fantasies and interests across the sexual spectrum. Representation of all. This collection is an exploration into human psychology.
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Take a look at the writers listed on the cover. These are renowned fiction writers who have contributed to this collection of BOLD new fiction. I believe the goal of this fiction was to portray all spectrums across the board and it does in fact do that.
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Kink can be read as a form of communication and education in a sex positive world. I wish this would have been around for my Human Sexuality course in college when the professor made the entire class write fantasies and anonymously share them with the class. Kink is unique and I’d recommend to the reader who normally reads erotic fiction.

“Instead of pathologizing kink, the stories in this anthology treat it as a complex, psychologically rich act of communication.”

And so begins this incredible anthology of short stories that explore various “kinks” and opens up the discussion on some of the sexual acts that as a society we may giggle and look sideways at. These stories are a way to start normalizing these *consensual* sexual acts and the conversations we have around them.

Most of the stories explore BDSM, which I thought was interesting to be reading in light of the stories of that one actor coming out (completely non-consensual, he guilty). And yes, some of these stories toed the line, but mostly they begged the question, how far are you willing to take it?

Not only did these stories explore various kinks (*explicitly), but also their relation to peoples race, religion, gender, and childhood. Like the conservative, Catholic, Asian couple where the wife wants to be spanked and the husband has to come to terms with it:

““She’s been like this her whole life. In all likelihood, she’ll stay this way. People don’t change.” Something inside him flailed, upset. He hadn’t even realized he’d been hoping that somehow, all this would go away. That they’d have their little excursion into the foreign land in which he was expected to beat his wife, then they’d come back to their cozy, normal life in which they took care of each other.”

Overall these stories ranged from educational, to humorous, to touching, and tackled an array of relationships, and as with any anthology, there were some I really enjoyed, and others that were just ok for me. My favorites were ‘The Cure’ by Melissa Febos, ‘Trust’ by Larissa Pham, ‘Oh Youth’ by Brandon Taylor, and ‘The Lost Performance of the High Priestess of the Temple of Horror’ by Carmen Maria Machado.

There is one CW that I will add because so far I have seen *no one* discuss it and I feel it is important to add because I kind of went into these stories blind and was not expecting it all. The story is called ‘Gospodar’.

*CW*
Rape

Thank you, Simon & Schuster and NetGalley for the early e-copy!

These stories were hit or miss for me. This is a literary fiction collection with themes of kink, queerness, and self-discovery. I loved some of them (Oh, Youth by Brandon Taylor, Safeword by R.O. Kwan, Canada by Callum Angus). Others went over my head (especially Retouch/Switch by Cara Hoffman, which felt very abstract). A lot of the writing got repetitive for me. I expected this book to push boundaries, and I think it does. But many of the stories felt sort of distant and vague, and seemed to emphasize that this is literary fiction first and foremost.
I’m glad that a collection like this exists, it just ended up feeling a little uneven.

There are a lot of triggers in this book, so I'd encourage checking something like StoryGraph to get full crowd-sourced TWs. but these are the ones that I can recall, mainly because I hadn't expected their inclusion in the collection - TW: incest in Impact Play by Peter Mountford, rape in Godspar by Garth Greenwell

The stories told in this book are all uniquely their own. I enjoyed each one as it open up discussion that I did not know I needed to have with myself. I think this is a good place to start for people exploring their kinks and the erase the stigma and the giggles we might hide behind when we bring vanilla sex. There are some stories that were stronger than others and stories that kept characters nameless to help the reader understand that kink can be for anyone to explore. The work did let me meet new authors that I will be stalking goodreads to find skim through their backlist which is always a plus, Needless to say when we can start safely dating this book will be required reading material for date night (jk but not really)

***eArc provided by NetGalley and Simon & Schuster in exchange for an honest review.***

It's not wrong to say that Kink: Stories is dynamic and interesting. The types of sexuality, and sensuality, explored across its pages is vast. Some of them fun and sexy, some heartbreaking, and some as fantastical as they are sexual.

However, I feel as though Kink: Stories suffers from the unevenness that I feel like I expect going into an anthology. There are a few stories that completely floored me, and I'm excited to read more from those authors, but there are some that just didn't work for me. Certainly, they might work for somebody, it just wasn't me.

And that's something I think is great about this anthology. Whatever level of kink you're comfortable reading about, there's at least one story in this for you. If not a few. You're sure to find a new favorite author. I know I did!

This collection did an excellent job of honestly exploring sexuality. Kink states that it sets out to move away from pathologizing kink/sex and instead looking at it as a form of communication. I hadn't realized I how refreshing reading stories like this would be. While all of the stories in the book displayed varying levels of comfort with their characters' sexualities, they shared a similar goal of delving beyond what is happening on the surface and into how sex/kink was a part of the larger world. By letting go of the puritanical ideas about sex that set boundaries around the socially acceptable ways to talk about sex, the stories embrace the messiness of it all and all of the ways that that messiness impacts the characters' lives long after the "scene" has ended. I mostly decided to read this because I saw Roxane Gay contributed, but after reading this collection I found myself wanting to find other books that take this sort of approach. By accepting kink as an everyday part of life, it really opens up the opportunities to see humanity and sexuality in a new light. Not all of the stories connected with me personally, but I still feel I gained a lot from bouncing around to the different worlds.

The short stories that stood out to me were "The Lost Performance of the Priestess of the Temple of Horror" and "Emotional Technologies". I really liked the last one for taking a slightly academic approach. I'm sure it isn't everyone's cup of tea, but I found the combination of narrative and theory offered interesting context for each other.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC!

KINK is an anthology of short stories that aims to show that erotica has a place in literary fiction.This excerpt from the introduction really showcases the point that all of these stories are trying to get across to the reader:

“Kink in the stories is a way of processing trauma, and also of processing joy, of expressing tenderness and cruelty and affection and play. The emotional dynamics of kink are as varied as those of any other human experience, and the stories here explore the whole gamut of human feeling, from exuberance to anguish. Rejecting reductive ideas of normalcy and aberrance, these stories allow for investigations richer than etiology, treating kink as one of the tools we use to make sense of our lives.”

What initially drew me into this short story collection was some of the authors included. From Roxane Gay to Carmen Maria Machado, I knew I had to pick this up. However, like every short story collection, there are hits and misses. In this case, for me, more misses than hits. There are a couple of stories that stood out for me, including Machado’s “The Lost Performance of the High Priestess of the Temple of Horror.” This story left me feeling like what the fuck did I just read but in a good way. It had a lot of depth that some of the stories were missing, in my opinion.

If you are already planning on reading this, there is no harm in doing so. If you are still unsure, it’s worth checking out but do not have your expectations too high.

Big thanks to @netgalley and @simonbooks for gifting me this eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I wanted to like this book more, but to me it was okay. There were some notable stories and there were some I kinda glazed over and skipped altogether. I appreciate this book for what it is, a collection of short, erotic, stories for everyone, but for me, it did not deliver in the ways I hoped.

I enjoyed this anthology of short stories! As the title suggest, most of the stories focus on sex, sexuality, fetishes and human behavior. The human behavior and human spirit in each of the story were what I most connected with throughout the stories. I think the stories help to uncover that sex is just a piece of a human life. Emotion and empathy are both a big part of the way we experience sex and sexual experiences. I am excited to "reread" this one after publication audiobook!

Series of short stories. Not all of them made sense. Could not finish the book to be honest. Not what I was expecting.