Each month I will post my personal thoughts on recently read books. For a synopsis I suggest Amazon.com. Books will be rated 1 - 5 daises with 5 being the highest rating. Ratings are based solely on how much I enjoyed the book.

Pleasure by Eric Jerome Dickey
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

“You can’t put toothpaste back inside the tube.” pg. 101 Pleasure

This quote struck me because it defines how I feel when I read an Eric Jerome Dickey novel. Although I swore off his work after reading Sleeping With Strangers (not because it was bad but because he annoyed me with page after page of in-depth descriptions and then expected me to go out and buy a part II); I found myself searching bookstores, calling up “reading” friends, and traveling to three libraries in search of Pleasure. Why? Because I want to become more active in the book club I am a member of and this was the first book they selected that remotely moved me. And guess what, I was so deep into the book I missed the meeting.

Pleasure falls under the genre of Erotica and I am not a fan of erotica, at least not the erotica books I have read, which have no more value than a badly produced porn flick. But somewhere I read, with Pleasure, EJD had written a book of erotica that actually had a plot and pretty good story behind it, even if readers were torn…either you loved it or you hated it.

At moments I hated this book. Found myself skimming through some of the humdrum, repetitive sex scenes that often times mirrored the humdrum, relentless descriptions of thoughts and scenes that added no value to the story and merely served to stretch it out. At other times I loved the story because he painted a vivid picture of a character that I could relate to emotionally, even, if not physically. Then again this is my love/hate relationship with EJD. His ability to right a novel that flows so quickly that you get enamored with the characters as he takes you on a journey to places, here and abroad, that you never have visited; but just as quickly, you are agitated because he’s taken you off pace with pages of unnecessary words.

My only disappointment with Pleasure was my disappointment with erotica in general. Once you’ve described a sex scene once or twice the excitement is gone and it begins to feel dirty and nasty and I’m just over it already. Some things just need to be left to the imagination, especially when you have a pretty good story going. There is nothing sensual to me about people having sex with multiple people within the same day and not washing, not brushing their teeth, and definitely not using condoms in this day and age, and that is where my attention began to drift to as these descriptive narratives played out. I would have preferred more on the psyche of the twins and what made them tick. The book could have ended at page 421, and I would have been happy, even at page 433. But by the time I reached, “If my eyes had remained open….” on page 442, I had disconnected and was neither shocked, nor cared.

EJD gets 4.5 stars because I enjoyed the the story in its totality. Maybe I will resume my love affair with his work and go back and pick up Waking With Enemies.

Ghetto Resume by Freddie Simmons
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Ghetto Resume' by newcomer Freddie Simmons is a prime example of the untapped talent among independent authors. He has crafted a believable tale that with the right components in place could go on to be a bestseller in the Street Lit genre.

The book starts off with main character DeQuan “Goldie” Walker, still in the womb but already restless and aching for the good life. By the time he is 10 years-old, Goldie is challenging his fathers authority and acquainting himself with a local drug dealer who goes on to become his mentor. Circumstances arise leaving Goldie feeling that he needs to step-up his involvement in the dope game to survive. At this point some readers, depending on their background and upbringing, may debate some of the things Simmons has written but the fact remains that these things do happen in drug-infested neighborhoods across America.

As the story unfolded I was envisioning Goldie as the student who eventually becomes the teacher, but the author failed to take me on the journey I needed to get to that place. We have Goldie making decisions that lead to a relationship with street level drug king Marcus “Snake” Robinson who takes him under his wing. However, when Goldie reached the age of 13 the story changes focus. He goes from being an attentive apprentice to a well-endowed lover boy who is turning out girls ages 13 – 18. Simmons further deviates from Goldie’s journey, to focus mainly on Snake, leaving this reader longing for some form of interaction between Goldie and Snake that would justify the eventual changing of the guard. Although I am sure of Simmons intentions, it just didn’t translate onto the pages of the book. Even after he refocused on Goldie, the book never really regained the momentum I was experiencing at the beginning, or the build-up that would leave me yearning for the next installment.

I believe that the basis of the story itself is strong; the writer simply didn’t bring everything together to make it flow smoothly. There was a lot of telling, which is common amongst new writers and something I believe will correct itself as Mr. Simmons progresses.

The only true negative that I have regarding Ghetto Resume’ is the overuse of the suffix “ly.” Again, this is something that the writer will work through as his journey moves forward, but it was a big distraction for me.

My rating fluctuated between 3.5 and 4 stars. I have decided to rate it 4 stars based on it being a pretty good debut novel and I believe Freddie Simmons is passionate about his craft and will make the necessary adjustments to be around for quite some time.

Much Love,

Tracy


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