With this being my first foray into the world of erotica (besides the occasional Penthouse Forum article) I must say I was very pleased. All of these stories touch us deep down inside, some more prevalent than others. The characterization of some of the main players in the longer stories is excellent. Not only do these sotries deal with sex and the physical please, but also emotional repercussions-good and bad. I have read this book numeerous times and look forward to purchasing other "Mammoth erotica" collections.

The cover of the book caught my eye and I wasn't expecting much as I picked it up to flip through. To my surprise, I was deeply drawn into the stories (yes the sex was great too!) as I started reading. I found that they were very well written and totally not what I had expected of such fiction. The great writing that vividly describes interesting characters in various "acts of love" makes you want to read story after story. Try it and see for yourself...I can't wait to finish the 5-hour-old book. What a gem I picked as my first book on erotica!

I can't imagine anyone being more qualified to put together this compendium of the great detectives of the world than Maxim Jakubowski! Maxim runs the Murder One bookstore in London which houses perhaps the greatest collection of whodunits in England. Right on Charing Cross Road it is, too. (Drop in if you're ever in the area! And he's usually right there at his desk, working on one of his books or answering questions about other writers!) In "100 Great Detectives," he presents 100 essays on various characters (detectives) of the genre. Short, they read quite well. Undoubtedly, you will find your own favorite detectives listed.

Among my favorites were the essays: John Malcolm on Reginald Hill's Dalziel and Pascoe; Deborah Valentine on P.D. James' Cordelia Grey; Bob Biderman on Tony Hillerman's Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee; Peter Robinson on Simenon's Inspector Maigret; Loren Estleman on Chandler's Philip Marlowe; Wendy Grossman on Christie's Miss Marple; Simon Brett on Sue Grafton's Kinsey Millhone; Ralph Spurrier on Colin Dexter's Inspector Morse; Robert Wallace on John LeCarre's George Smiley.

Other essays include V.I. Warshawski, Lord Peter Wimsey, Nero Wolfe, and Aurelio Zen, to name a few others.

What this collection does is to give our favorite characters even more meaning. Of course, as in any literary interpretation, it is just that--an interpretation--and the writers' views may be different from yours; no matter, it still provides plenty of insight into these unforgettable detectives!

Billyjhobbs@ tyler.net

This is one fine novel, as erotic as I've ever read and a excellent crime novel to boot. Maxim Jakubowski's walk on the wilder side of the European erotic scene is neatly played out. Love and Murder never went so well together. Do yourself a favor and take this steamy ride. It's worth the thrills.

This is a great book that celebrates various aspects of feminine beauty. Women are depicted from a variety of angles and the number of photos is astounding. My problem with the book is that it seriously lacks color and many of the photos are done in similar, artistic manners. It seems that many of the photographers enjoy experimenting with photography more than they enjoy bringing out the best in the women they are viewing.

I am very interested in photography, especially fetish fashion style photography. I found this book to be a great reference source for information about photographers in this field. Now this isn't one of those slick, flashy, fetish style books, it's full of B&W and toned images. One of the best things about this book is that there is a paragrah or so about each photographer, their style, or some other interesting facts and information about them. From this book I was able to get some good ideas of photographers that I liked and with their names I was able to in most cases find more of their work on the internet (a bit better way of searching, as opposed to entering fetish photos in a search engine).

Yes, the photos are small and black-and-white, but they are very artistic, high quality, and erotic. I was surprised by my reaction to the black-and-white thing, because I don't generally like black-and-white photography, feeling that too much important visual information is lost without color. But in these photos, I felt it worked very well. For the price, this book is an excellent value, and it would be my guess that the photographers provided the images to the publisher at not charge, or even paid a fee to have their work displayed in this book as advertising, hoping they can sell images at their websites. These photographers are quite talented, however, combining artistry and eroticism very well, so some shopping sprees for prints for the wall would not be a bad idea. Just to clarify, as these things might make a difference to some, there are very few men in these photos, and even in the few images that have men at all, the women are featured and are clearly the primary subjects. Those looking for "equal time" with erotic male photography, or erotic male-female couples photography, would be disappointed by this book. There are some softcore female-female shots. Eroticism as used in the title here does not mean hardcore images of sexual activity, but as images of female beauty, from many different viewpoints, which will arouse those who find artistically-presented, suggestive, b&w images of nude women stimulating. I would guess that about ten percent of the images feature softcore bondage, which I thought were among the hotter ones, but some people might find a turnoff.

This book is a great way to get started researching and learning about Jack The Ripper. It manages to give you ample information while staying objective when dealing with the many Ripper theories that have sprung up over the last 100 years. If you are looking for the facts behind the myth, then this is the book for you.

As I read this book for the first time I havent't got any knowledge about Jack the Ripper, but after this book I've a got a good view and description about the Ripper and London in the 19th century. In some sections of the book, I felt like ''overinformed'' by the pathological descriptions, you almost must have studyed some semestras in medicine to understand everything. On the other side , it comes along very well,without pictures, because of the explicit descriptions. You are impressed by all of these theories ,given in the book, and the sections are logically seperated from each other. At the end, a good book for a beginner.

I entered the Ripper world with little specific information about the case. However, after reading this book so much about the Jack the Ripper came into clear focus. The authors clearly outline the murders, suspects, police and newspaper accounts, witness statements and finally present a series of well written essays by Ripperologist, criminal historian and police detective alike. The book's greatest strength is how a variety of theories are offered in an attempt to finally unmask 'Saucy Jack'. The theories range from the plausible to the ridiculous. Yet each one leaves the reader with tremendous insight, intrigue and curiosity. In the end, The Mammoth Book of Jack the Ripper is a perfect read for either the Ripperologist or anyone who has had an interest in the Whitechapel murders of 1888 which continue, to this day, to be unsolved.

"Historical" is not, perhaps, the best way to describe this book. The stories use different time periods as their settings, with the preponderance of them focusing on either the Victorian period in England or France during and after the "Terror". Most of these are quite good. One of the best stories, however, is the tale entitled simply "Garden". This story goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden (not an historical period, but never mind). "Garden" is deliciously heretical, with hints of sexual awakening. The book turns inevitably to sadomasichism. This is due to the fact that one can only write their favorite words for genitalia so many times. Some of the stories are merely poorly drawn character studies where the author takes forever to get to the real business of erotica, if they ever do. Some of the tales fail to meet the "wet test" altogether. Recomended, as long as you don't mind skipping stories.

This anthology contains news stories written within a historical context. The time periods range from prehistoric to the 1940's. The stories are so well written that they seem to hail from the very era they are set in.

Some of my favorites are:

Evelina by Louisa Campion is an erotic peak into the lives of British Aristocracy in the 1800's. Think a sexier Jane Austin!

Succubus by Rosemary Hawley Jarman is about a whore rescued from a goal by a necromancer who works magic upon her in hopes of destroying a kingdom.

No Natural Magic by Alice Joanou suggests that his mother, Ophelia's lover, may have committed the murder of Hamlet's father. Though I liked the story, the author should have struck the distracting modern language from it.

The Brilliance and Misery of Bodies; Of War, Of Dreams by Michael Hemmingson, about a debutante who losses her fiancé in WWI and becomes a flapper in her grief, is a very moving story in many ways.

The Prescription by Carol Anne Davis, about a Victorian spinster's visit to a surgeon to investigate him for suspected improprieties, illustrates society's repression of women's sexuality and how beneficial certain therapeutic measures can be.

Camille's Resistance by Robert de Vel is set just before the French Revolution with a dungeon scene that is to petite mort for!

Wetnurse of the World by Val Weston purports to make wetnursing a new Olympic sport!

Amelia by Valentina Cilescu is an exquisite initiation story!

Crossing the Rubicon by Brian Levy is about boys in a private school coming of age thanks to their nurse.

The Missionary by Rebecca Ambrose is a tale of evolution.

When England Called by Debra Hyde is the story of a wealthy French woman, who escapes to England before the Revolution and courts the royalty from a brothel.

Enki by Angus MacMilian is about the supplication of a Prince to an enemy king and his Goddess. I fairly swooned!

Hall of Mirrors by Vivienne La Fay is the story of how illusion and fantasy greatly enhance the experience.

To Get an Heir by Dominic Santi, about a barren man who hires a French rogue to get his wife with child, brought tears to my eyes at story's end. Romantic, sensual and erotic! A must read!

Of Waxen Figures and Screaming Tombs by Jasmine Sailing is a story set in ancient Egypt during the reign of Ramses II full of mysticism and intrigue.

The Concubine by Rosemary Hawley Jarman and The Tears of the Crocodile by Michael Cawley give readers a glimpse into the decadence of royalty surrounded by yes men slaves and hidden enemies a world so foreign to most 21st Century societies.

Plague Lovers by Lucy Taylor describes the lengths people will go to get love.

These by far are not the only stories in the book. The stories are very imaginative though some had inaccurate historical details. This is a great volume to share with your lover!

The Mammoth Book of Historical Erotica, edited by Maxim Jakubowski, contains 38 of the best historical erotica short stories that you'll find on the market today. The stories range from the garden of Eden and prehistory to 1940, encompassing varied periods and countries and featuring an assortment of well-known historical characters.

What continues to impress me most about this book and the stories within is that each story doesn't just hold a spicy complement of desire and passion, but each IS a story. The historical details, as well, are remarkable, and you are easily spirited away to the Highlands of Scotland with a lusty lass, or lost in the depths of the Marquis de Sade's nightmares.

Though not every story in The Mammoth Book of Historical Erotica is for everyone, there is just enough to cater to most tastes. Well-written, engrossing, and delightfully titallating, I highly recommend this book to any afficianado of erotica.

"The Mammoth Book of Pulp Fiction" certainly lives up to its name. Containing 32 stories and nearly 600 pages of text, it is packed full of hard-boiled crimes taless, many of them superior in quality. The best include, but are not limited to, "A Candle for the Bag Lady," a fine early Matthew Scudder tale by Lawrence Block; "So Dark for April," an excellent moody P.I. story by Howard Browne; "Stacked Deck," a masterful caper tale by Bill Pronzini; "We're All Dead," a heist-gone-wrong story by Bruno Fischer; plus a couple of good tales by the MacDonalds, Ross and John D.

On the downside, there are no author introductions for the individual stories to provide them context. Nor are all of the stories first rate. A couple of them veer into the supernatural, which doesn't seem to fit the theme. They range in time period from the early 1930s to the mid-1990s but are not chronologically sequenced. Nevertheless, as a reader you can certainly pick and choose, making this collection worthwhile for any fan of hard-boiled short crime fiction.

This book is filled with great little stories, each of which are pure art in their own way. Forget deep analysis, forget reading into heavy plot lines and meaning-drenched narrative, this book is good-old fashioned, great story-telling. And what makes it even greater is juxaposing current "political correctness" with the raw narrative of the old days. Sure, some of the stories don't cut it, but those that do will make you wish it was 1944 all over again.

The Mammoth Books do a fine job in their respective categories, however, this collection surpasses them all. It is perfectly conceived with representative stories from the masters of the noir/hardboiled style as well as underappreciated authors who created a few gems. Black Pudding by David Goodis is remarkable and probably my favorite in the collection, but it really is hard to pick a favorite since there are so many stories. The best part is that each story stands on its own and they don't start running into each other. Long after you put the book down, you will remember each story.

Fifteen more stories comprise this third instalment in editors Ripley and Jakubowski's effort to promote the best of "new" British crime writers. Three of the authors (the two editors plus Paul Charles) have appeared in earlier "Fresh Blood" anthologies, and the other twelve have all published at least one novel. The stories almost seem to come in pairs, Minette Walters and Denise Mina's stories both concern abuse of the elderly, and both end with justice served. Two of the stories are constructed as confessionals, Maxim Jakubowski's subpar (for him) "The Day I Killed Tony Blair," and HR MacGregor's "The Confession." Mike Ripley's "Angel Eyes" and Paul Johnson's "Frankie and Johnny Were Lovers?" are both kind of funny, bawdy, and harmless tales. Martin Waites and Manda Scott both feature genuine psychopaths, the first story being a rather predictable tale of a frustrated actor, the second, a stunningly nasty encounter with a vile dog owner. Scott's tale is even more foul considering it's entirely based on either personal experience or first-hand accounts from trusted sources. Two rather conventional stories contain last paragraph twists that undo their criminal protagonists Paul Johnson's throwaway "Crime Fest" and Peter Guttridge's somewhat out of place and cutely titled "The Postman Only Rings When He Can Be Bothered." For once, all three stories set in the US are believable and don't bear the mark of an outsider. Rob Ryan's "S••t Happens" is a fairly basic story of a couple of minor hoods messing up bad along the Jersey Turnpike. Adam Lloyd Baker's "Atlantic City" is a rather banal quickie about a falling out between two hoods. Lee Child's "James Penney's New Identity" is a very good fugitive story" set in the southwest and California, and he is the one writer in this anthology I definitely intend to keep an eye out for.

This is a very interesting colletion of the "New Wave" of English crime fiction. Don't expect a re-hash of the "Pulp Fiction" craze that has permeated the American crime fiction lately. This stories focus more on the odd and strange personalitites of criminals. I would recommend this book for fans of Ian Ranklin.

Jakubowski is well known as an editor and writer of both erotic and crime fiction (see the Fresh Blood anthologies), but this is his first full-length crime novel. That said, it oozes sex at every pore-not just the obligatory plain vanilla sex found in many thrillers, but rather all manner of fornication is rendered in very explicit detail (including anonymous bathhouse and extreme S&M torture scenes). Indeed, the sex somewhat overwhelms what little mystery there is. P.I. Martin is engaged by two clients to find different missing women. His story is alternated with that of Cornelia, a stripper/book-collector/hitwoman first introduced in the short story "Femme Fatale Blues" in Fresh Blood 2. This narrative construct guarantees their eventual meeting, dispelling some of the suspense. More unfortunately, the giant "twist" revealed in the final chapter is telegraphed far too obviously from the very beginning, and fails to surprise at all. Still, it's hard not to feel a little sympathy for all the lonely characters Jakubowski trots out in this rather bleak novel.

Maxim Jakubowski's first foray into the Private Eye Novel is a success. On Tenderness Express is a novel of a burnt out PI's quest to find two women...and finds trouble instead. On the trail of a missing (and valuable) book, Martin Jackson must travel the world in the search for two women, whose stories interconnect very interestingly. While on the trail, he crosses paths with the ellusive, sultry Cornelia; a hitwoman who has a thirst for books (and other things). This globetrotting jaunt is filled with sex and mystery as the main character does his all to fit within the confines of PI genres.

If you're looking for something new in regards to mystery fiction, this is not the book for you. But if you're looking for a book that evokes the muses of noir as well as a little (more like a LOT) of sensual delights, this is the book for you.

While these fifteen stories representing "the cream of Britain's new wave of crime writers" comprise a stronger collection than the standard mixed-bag anthology, they are decidedly more mainstream and less edgy than the stories in the first "Fresh Blood" collection. The only ones worth totally skipping are John Tilsley's San Francisco-set tale and the throwaway coda contrivance by RD Wingfield. The cream of the crop (somewhat surprisingly given the mainstreamedness of his novel Not the End of the World) is probably Christopher Brookmyre's "Bampot Central," a hilarious tale of two idiotic Scottish bank robbers. Phil Lovesy's "Stranglehold" is a tight little story, done in real-time. Both the editors turn in strong stories, although it would be nice if Jakubowski could weed out the Anglicisms from his U.S.-set stories. For some reason I quite liked John Baker's "Defence," even though it's not apparently a crime story until the last two paragraphs. John Williams provides another quality story in his ongoing series on the Cardiff underworld (the story was later reprinted in his collection, Five Pubs, Two Bars, and a Night Club). Mary Scott and Lauren Henderson's stories fine, though nothing special, and Ken Bruen (Rilke on Black, The Hackman Blues) once again doesn't do anything for me. Two homages, (Charles Higson's to "The Tell-Tale Heart" and Christine Green's to "Psycho"), are quite effective, as is Carol Anne Davis's (Shrouded) typically creepy "The Ghosts of Bees." Iain Sinclair's "No More Yoga at the Night Club" is an East End number whose appeal will largely lie in the reader's own affinity for that particular place (cf. Jake Arnott's The Long Firm).