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Hot Blood #9
Crimes of Passion
Crimes of Passion, ninth in the multiple award-winning Hot Blood series of erotic horror, has a criminally good array of talent -- 14 stories by such authors as diverse as literary giant Joyce Carol Oates, mystery giant Lawrence Block, horror giant Ramsey Campbell, musician Greg Kihn, and the stunning Stoker Award finalist “Madame Babylon” by Brian Hodge. It’s “like a powerful handgun being cocked in your ear” (award-winning author Edward Bryant for Locus) and “should serve to warm your veins quite nicely during the long winters night” (Booklovers) Your eyes will be cuffed to the page until you finish this inescapable, essential volume. With some of the biggest authors and best stories, Crimes of Passion is erotic horror at its sinful, wonderful best.
336 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 1, 1997
16 people are currently reading
230 people want to read
About the author
Jeff Gelb
43 books38 followersJeff Gelb is a former disc jockey and music columnist who created the SHOCK ROCK series of music-based horror fiction. He has also written a number of short stories, including Graveyard Shift, The Last Victim and The Portrait. In 2001, he collaborated with Max Allan Collins to create the anthology series FLESH AND BLOOD, tales of erotic noir from some of the finest writers in crime fiction. Mr. Gelb is now in his fifth decade producing the comic book fanzine MEN OF MYSTERY.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
January 4, 2021
The Hot Blood series are tales of erotic horror, which is the best combination ever. When something as personal and sensitive as sex is mixed with horror, what could possible scare you shitless more? So I set out to explore them all, all 13 books of the series, thus Project Hot Blood.
First, some info about my rating system. The level of paranormal of each story is one to five, one meaning it surely can happen in real life, five meaning it’s utterly something paranormal. The level of sex describes how graphic is the sex in each story, one to five, one being tame a bedtime story told by a nun, five being a detailed script for a hardcore porn movie. My rating’s from one to ten, it’s based on the balance of horror and erotic, so getting five in ‘level of sex’ doesn’t automatically mean an above average rating from me. It’s based on the wtf-ness of the ending, how freaked out I am, how nightmare-generating it is. One being rubbish, ten being masterpiece. It’s time to move on to the ninth book in my Project Hot Blood. Let's begin.
The Limits of Fantasy
Ramsey Campbell
To be honest, not the strongest beginning to the book. ‘The Limits of Fantasy’ is long and boring, and I am not even sure what it was about after reading it. Something to do with a mysterious fog and some spanking sprinkled with elements of supernatural. And since there wasn’t anything remotely resembling sex in the story, I am not sure what is this story doing in a Hot Blood book.
Length: 17 pages
Level of Sex: 0/5 (there wasn’t any exactly)
My rating: 5 out of 10
Threshold
John Edward Ames
The scenario this story presents is pretty scary indeed. It goes into depth about why orgasms are called little deaths, the way the story describes them is quite beautiful really. But just as everything powerful can also be addicting and that’s exactly what happened to the lead character in the story. If you have a way to get powerful orgasms, almost out of body experience, but there is a risk of no turning back, would you still try them?
Length: 19 pages
Level of Sex: 2/5
My rating: 6 out of 10
The Great White Light
Greg Kihn
The devil got his ways with ripping souls, one of them being offering LSD from hell to horny people. Sex while tripping must be quite an experience, otherwise they wouldn’t be doing it so much during the ’60s, right? I expected some wilder sex scenes though, otherwise, the quality of the story is getting better.
Length: 26 pages
Level of Sex: 2/5
My rating: 7 out of 10
Hot Eyes, Cold Eyes
Lawrence Block
I really enjoy this one, it kinda kept you guessing the whole time but fortunately, it was short and sweet. The sex was actually quite sensual, until the end. It kept some nice sexual tension building up all the time, and the story definitely leads the reader to believe it’s going one way but in the end, the predator becomes the prey.
Length: 10 pages
Level of Sex: 3/5
My rating: 7 out of 10
A Real Woman
Mike W. Barr
Another one of those supernatural ones. Started out quite normal, you know, a mysterious woman and a cheating man. Then it turned, and it got a little unclear, but if I understood it correctly, there was some intense unwilling gender-switching happening here. In a quite literal sense, I might add. 😀
Length: 15 pages
Level of Sex: 3/5
My rating: 8 out of 10
Madame Babylon
Brian Hodge
Okay, the weirdest thing. The author keeps switching up the use of he and she, that I wasn’t sure who was who and what was happening in the beginning. But after a shaky start, the story picks up and it turns out to be a terrific read. Sometimes, short stories feel really short and somewhat rushed, but ‘Madame Babylon’ really takes its time and pages to build a good back story. It’s all about exhibitionism and voyeurism in its most extreme forms. As the title suggests, it went to the proportion equivalent to the worshipping of gods of ancient times. This was almost too fascinating, and pity that it’s only a short story. Some kinks involved, but the sex itself is still on the tender side. But this definitely got me interested in other horror stories written by Brian Hodge.
Length: 31 pages
Level of Sex: 4/5
My rating: 8 out of 10
Sexual Predator
Stephen Solomita
Less smart of a story than it likes to think of itself is. In theory, a female psychopath going around playing games with strangers is indeed an interesting premise. But it lacks conviction. In the story, it was just mentioned that the psycho has an itch that only creeps can scratch, but I don’t exactly got what that itch was exactly. The ending revelation was pretty clever, if only the author could have been a little more specific about the itch, then the story would have made more sense.
Length: 13 pages
Level of Sex: 2/5
My rating: 6 out of 10
Loving Delia
Melanie Tem
A mysterious little story that doesn’t really reveal anything, guess it wants the reader to take a guess. It’s about Delia and someone that lives inside of him. It’s either something supernatural, or some hidden identity. But the sexual nature of their… affair, would be quite odd. The sex isn’t explicit or there wasn’t a lot of it but somehow… it’s quite beautifully written in an eerie way.
Length: 9 pages
Level of Sex: 2/5
My rating: 7 out of 10
Necros
Brian Lumley
Long, quite well-written build-up. All about vampire-like creatures that instead of blood, suck up the youth. But, the author seemed to have forgotten that he was writing for Hot Blood, and the fact that there was no sex, even a hint of it, is unacceptable.
Length: 22 pages
Level of Sex: 0/5
My rating: 5 out of 10
Tricks or Treat
Jeff Gelb
A pretty straight-forward homicide solving story following two cops, albeit a little unrealistic in how they approach it, definitely unorthodox. And as usual, for Jeff Gelb, the author of this story and also the long time editor of the whole Hot Blood series, his tone is usually quite harsh and might be turn-off-y for some people. And sometimes his stories don’t feel like Hot Blood at all.
Length: 18 pages
Level of Sex: 2/5
My rating: 6 out of 10
Curs
Tom Piccirilli
Finally, a story that feels like Hot Blood. It really dived into the horror part, creating a really claustrophobic and panic-inducing atmosphere, with the bitterness of past relationships, sibling rivalry, jealousy and other goodies sprinkled in generously. I wish the author could have elaborated with the erotic part the same way, cos he really opened up some really interesting boxes, like sadomasochism. This is the story I wish would have been a full novel.
Length: 18 pages
Level of Sex: 3/5
My rating: 8 out of 10
Quick
Robert J. Randisi & Marthayn Pelegrimas
A nice short story with some rough sex in a blood bath. Quite literally. I like that in a short amount of time, the story reveals the horror that’s going on, painting the bloody picture quite vividly.
Length: 4 pages
Level of Sex: 3/5
My rating: 8 out of 10
The Trouble With Hitchhikers
Michael Garrett
Too long, and the premise of an aging man pining after young girls and then ended up picking one up from the highway… the story as old as time and nothing really that surprising happened. No sex either, just some nudity. The ending was uninterestingly vague and confusing.
Length: 23 pages
Level of Sex: 1/5
My rating: 5 out of 10
Starr Bright Will Be With You Soon!
Joyce Carol Oates
Classic femme fatale story set in Las Vegas. Way too long, wasn’t really worth it in the end. Dislikable characters, both the leading man and the leading lady.
Length: 38 pages
Level of Sex: 3/5
My rating: 6 out of 10
***
Review of the whole book
Crimes of Passion was very average, just like the previous one. Half of the stories were pretty good (7 or 8), but another half was pretty bad. The most noticeable thing about this book was that the amount of sex and the explicit nature of it was pretty abysmal. Four books left in the Hot Blood series, hopefully the next one would be better.
14 stories
Average rating: 6,57
Stories with a rating below or is 6 out of 10: 7
Stories with a rating 7-8 out of 10: 7
Stories with a rating 9 out of 10: –
Best stories: Madame Babylon, Curs
Most erotic story: Madame Babylon
Most memorable story: Curs, Quick
First, some info about my rating system. The level of paranormal of each story is one to five, one meaning it surely can happen in real life, five meaning it’s utterly something paranormal. The level of sex describes how graphic is the sex in each story, one to five, one being tame a bedtime story told by a nun, five being a detailed script for a hardcore porn movie. My rating’s from one to ten, it’s based on the balance of horror and erotic, so getting five in ‘level of sex’ doesn’t automatically mean an above average rating from me. It’s based on the wtf-ness of the ending, how freaked out I am, how nightmare-generating it is. One being rubbish, ten being masterpiece. It’s time to move on to the ninth book in my Project Hot Blood. Let's begin.
The Limits of Fantasy
Ramsey Campbell
To be honest, not the strongest beginning to the book. ‘The Limits of Fantasy’ is long and boring, and I am not even sure what it was about after reading it. Something to do with a mysterious fog and some spanking sprinkled with elements of supernatural. And since there wasn’t anything remotely resembling sex in the story, I am not sure what is this story doing in a Hot Blood book.
Length: 17 pages
Level of Sex: 0/5 (there wasn’t any exactly)
My rating: 5 out of 10
Threshold
John Edward Ames
The scenario this story presents is pretty scary indeed. It goes into depth about why orgasms are called little deaths, the way the story describes them is quite beautiful really. But just as everything powerful can also be addicting and that’s exactly what happened to the lead character in the story. If you have a way to get powerful orgasms, almost out of body experience, but there is a risk of no turning back, would you still try them?
Length: 19 pages
Level of Sex: 2/5
My rating: 6 out of 10
The Great White Light
Greg Kihn
The devil got his ways with ripping souls, one of them being offering LSD from hell to horny people. Sex while tripping must be quite an experience, otherwise they wouldn’t be doing it so much during the ’60s, right? I expected some wilder sex scenes though, otherwise, the quality of the story is getting better.
Length: 26 pages
Level of Sex: 2/5
My rating: 7 out of 10
Hot Eyes, Cold Eyes
Lawrence Block
I really enjoy this one, it kinda kept you guessing the whole time but fortunately, it was short and sweet. The sex was actually quite sensual, until the end. It kept some nice sexual tension building up all the time, and the story definitely leads the reader to believe it’s going one way but in the end, the predator becomes the prey.
Length: 10 pages
Level of Sex: 3/5
My rating: 7 out of 10
A Real Woman
Mike W. Barr
Another one of those supernatural ones. Started out quite normal, you know, a mysterious woman and a cheating man. Then it turned, and it got a little unclear, but if I understood it correctly, there was some intense unwilling gender-switching happening here. In a quite literal sense, I might add. 😀
Length: 15 pages
Level of Sex: 3/5
My rating: 8 out of 10
Madame Babylon
Brian Hodge
Okay, the weirdest thing. The author keeps switching up the use of he and she, that I wasn’t sure who was who and what was happening in the beginning. But after a shaky start, the story picks up and it turns out to be a terrific read. Sometimes, short stories feel really short and somewhat rushed, but ‘Madame Babylon’ really takes its time and pages to build a good back story. It’s all about exhibitionism and voyeurism in its most extreme forms. As the title suggests, it went to the proportion equivalent to the worshipping of gods of ancient times. This was almost too fascinating, and pity that it’s only a short story. Some kinks involved, but the sex itself is still on the tender side. But this definitely got me interested in other horror stories written by Brian Hodge.
Length: 31 pages
Level of Sex: 4/5
My rating: 8 out of 10
Sexual Predator
Stephen Solomita
Less smart of a story than it likes to think of itself is. In theory, a female psychopath going around playing games with strangers is indeed an interesting premise. But it lacks conviction. In the story, it was just mentioned that the psycho has an itch that only creeps can scratch, but I don’t exactly got what that itch was exactly. The ending revelation was pretty clever, if only the author could have been a little more specific about the itch, then the story would have made more sense.
Length: 13 pages
Level of Sex: 2/5
My rating: 6 out of 10
Loving Delia
Melanie Tem
A mysterious little story that doesn’t really reveal anything, guess it wants the reader to take a guess. It’s about Delia and someone that lives inside of him. It’s either something supernatural, or some hidden identity. But the sexual nature of their… affair, would be quite odd. The sex isn’t explicit or there wasn’t a lot of it but somehow… it’s quite beautifully written in an eerie way.
Length: 9 pages
Level of Sex: 2/5
My rating: 7 out of 10
Necros
Brian Lumley
Long, quite well-written build-up. All about vampire-like creatures that instead of blood, suck up the youth. But, the author seemed to have forgotten that he was writing for Hot Blood, and the fact that there was no sex, even a hint of it, is unacceptable.
Length: 22 pages
Level of Sex: 0/5
My rating: 5 out of 10
Tricks or Treat
Jeff Gelb
A pretty straight-forward homicide solving story following two cops, albeit a little unrealistic in how they approach it, definitely unorthodox. And as usual, for Jeff Gelb, the author of this story and also the long time editor of the whole Hot Blood series, his tone is usually quite harsh and might be turn-off-y for some people. And sometimes his stories don’t feel like Hot Blood at all.
Length: 18 pages
Level of Sex: 2/5
My rating: 6 out of 10
Curs
Tom Piccirilli
Finally, a story that feels like Hot Blood. It really dived into the horror part, creating a really claustrophobic and panic-inducing atmosphere, with the bitterness of past relationships, sibling rivalry, jealousy and other goodies sprinkled in generously. I wish the author could have elaborated with the erotic part the same way, cos he really opened up some really interesting boxes, like sadomasochism. This is the story I wish would have been a full novel.
Length: 18 pages
Level of Sex: 3/5
My rating: 8 out of 10
Quick
Robert J. Randisi & Marthayn Pelegrimas
A nice short story with some rough sex in a blood bath. Quite literally. I like that in a short amount of time, the story reveals the horror that’s going on, painting the bloody picture quite vividly.
Length: 4 pages
Level of Sex: 3/5
My rating: 8 out of 10
The Trouble With Hitchhikers
Michael Garrett
Too long, and the premise of an aging man pining after young girls and then ended up picking one up from the highway… the story as old as time and nothing really that surprising happened. No sex either, just some nudity. The ending was uninterestingly vague and confusing.
Length: 23 pages
Level of Sex: 1/5
My rating: 5 out of 10
Starr Bright Will Be With You Soon!
Joyce Carol Oates
Classic femme fatale story set in Las Vegas. Way too long, wasn’t really worth it in the end. Dislikable characters, both the leading man and the leading lady.
Length: 38 pages
Level of Sex: 3/5
My rating: 6 out of 10
***
Review of the whole book
Crimes of Passion was very average, just like the previous one. Half of the stories were pretty good (7 or 8), but another half was pretty bad. The most noticeable thing about this book was that the amount of sex and the explicit nature of it was pretty abysmal. Four books left in the Hot Blood series, hopefully the next one would be better.
14 stories
Average rating: 6,57
Stories with a rating below or is 6 out of 10: 7
Stories with a rating 7-8 out of 10: 7
Stories with a rating 9 out of 10: –
Best stories: Madame Babylon, Curs
Most erotic story: Madame Babylon
Most memorable story: Curs, Quick
October 15, 2020
Compared with past HOT BLOOD compilations, this one was not as thrilling. There were too many stories that I had read before elsewhere or stories that were just not exciting. They seemed to lack a lot of passion and came across as monotonous and repetitive. Or they read well for the bulk of the story but then lacked any kind of decent ending; they just faded in to oblivion or ended too predictably. The ones that I did like are ...
"The Great White Light" by Greg Kihn - Two horny teens experiment with drugs and sex in San Francisco
"Tricks or Treat" by Jeff Gelb - Two LA detectives get to visit a nudist camp
"Necros" by Brian Lumley - An old Italian folklore returns. Unfortunately I've read it before so the punch at the end was already known
"The Great White Light" by Greg Kihn - Two horny teens experiment with drugs and sex in San Francisco
"Tricks or Treat" by Jeff Gelb - Two LA detectives get to visit a nudist camp
"Necros" by Brian Lumley - An old Italian folklore returns. Unfortunately I've read it before so the punch at the end was already known
September 30, 2015
I finished this morning, and as I did not keep track of each and every story, I will comment as best I can on each story -- stand by for a few *********************spoilers*******************
The Limits of Fantasy by Ramsey Campbell -- this is probably my favorite story in the book, and it started it all. It is primarily about putting something into the world, and making it happen -- seems the spanking fantasy can make this sort of thing happen. intriguing story.
Threshold by John Edward Ames - ug. It was just too sci-fi/technical for me. I got the basics of the story, but...eh.
The Great White Light by Greg Kihn -- skip it. Just go smoke some weed instead.
Hot eyes, Cold Eyes by Lawrence Block - another one that left me wanting.
A Real Woman by Mike W. Barr - YEAH for a good story, and I did not see the twist coming -- very nicely executed. A gender bender story for sure.
Madame Babylon - just a sad story. I did not really enjoy it at all.
Sexual Predator by Stephen Solomita - An okay story. A bit more of a detective noir type piece...i didn't not like it.
Loving Delia by Melanie Tem - I don't recall anything about this story. ??
Necros by Brian Lumley - a nice story. A bit of a twist on the vampire legend. I liked it.
Tricks or Treat by Jeff Gelb -- a cop story. I enjoyed it. And it kind of made me laugh to think of some of the cops I know getting themselves into this position. (investigating a nudist colony...how exactly do you go undercover there??)
Curs by Tom Piccirilli - a dark dark story. I felt dirty after reading it.
Quick by Robert J. Randisi & Marthayn Pelegrimas - exactly that...a quick little story about a quick little death. nice.
The Trouble with Hitchhikers by Michael Garrett -- A nice twist on the classic horror tale. I liked this one quite a lot.
Starr Bright will be with you Soon by Joyce Carol Oates - a story about a psychotic break. Multiple personalities sort of. I liked it.
Overall, an okay anthology. Not the best edition to the Hot Blood series, but...
The Limits of Fantasy by Ramsey Campbell -- this is probably my favorite story in the book, and it started it all. It is primarily about putting something into the world, and making it happen -- seems the spanking fantasy can make this sort of thing happen. intriguing story.
Threshold by John Edward Ames - ug. It was just too sci-fi/technical for me. I got the basics of the story, but...eh.
The Great White Light by Greg Kihn -- skip it. Just go smoke some weed instead.
Hot eyes, Cold Eyes by Lawrence Block - another one that left me wanting.
A Real Woman by Mike W. Barr - YEAH for a good story, and I did not see the twist coming -- very nicely executed. A gender bender story for sure.
Madame Babylon - just a sad story. I did not really enjoy it at all.
Sexual Predator by Stephen Solomita - An okay story. A bit more of a detective noir type piece...i didn't not like it.
Loving Delia by Melanie Tem - I don't recall anything about this story. ??
Necros by Brian Lumley - a nice story. A bit of a twist on the vampire legend. I liked it.
Tricks or Treat by Jeff Gelb -- a cop story. I enjoyed it. And it kind of made me laugh to think of some of the cops I know getting themselves into this position. (investigating a nudist colony...how exactly do you go undercover there??)
Curs by Tom Piccirilli - a dark dark story. I felt dirty after reading it.
Quick by Robert J. Randisi & Marthayn Pelegrimas - exactly that...a quick little story about a quick little death. nice.
The Trouble with Hitchhikers by Michael Garrett -- A nice twist on the classic horror tale. I liked this one quite a lot.
Starr Bright will be with you Soon by Joyce Carol Oates - a story about a psychotic break. Multiple personalities sort of. I liked it.
Overall, an okay anthology. Not the best edition to the Hot Blood series, but...
August 9, 2011
An interesting collection of short stories, with a curious mix of horror and lust that drives human motivation leading to horrifying situations. From new and established authors, both group turning out readable work. I really had low expectations from this book, so I was pleasantly surprised. The ultimate guilty pleasure! :)
February 11, 2016
A nice collection of short stories that are more erotic than horror. Recommended
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews