The Ludic Reader

I’m not going to lie – I enjoyreading erotica. But I have standards, people. And Kim Corum’s ridiculous novella, Breaking the Girl doesn’t meet any of them.

Kristine is a stripper in New Orleans. She didn’t set out to be a stripper. She’d gone on holiday with her friend to escape her recent marital break up and suddenly she and her friend found themselves bumping and grinding on stage at a strip club. The money was good so Kristine – who doesn’t have any other talents besides sex – stuck with it.

Enter Frank. Handsome and rich (although we never find out what he does), he takes a shine to Kristine and invites her to come live with him. Yeah – it really is that simple.

Thus begins her training. To the untrained eye beating someone with a belt until they’re so disoriented they fall down the stairs might be considered abuse, but everything Frank does is for Kristine’s own good.

Breaking the Girl is meant to be a novel about domination and submission. Okay, I’m down with that. But this book just doesn’t have anything to recommend it. The sex was pretty tame (and let’s face it, isn’t that why we read this stuff?), the characters were cardboard cut-outs and Corum tries to add heft to the story with a bunch of hooey about why Frank needs to “break the girl”.

So, so mediocre.