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Tough Love: The True Story of My Submissive Adventures
Kate is a successful executive in her early forties with a house in central London, a loving husband, beautiful kids and a toned body to be envied. But Kate remains unfulfilled. For as long as she can remember, she has fantasised about being dominated, about experiencing the harshest punishment and the most exquisite sexual pleasures at the hands of strangers. Tough Love is a true tale of how she made reality out of her fantasies, how she set out to explore her sexual limits and her capacity for enduring pain and humiliation at the hands of some of the most experienced and skilful BDSM Masters in London. This book is a portrait of a hidden side of the capital in the 2010s, one only a few get to fully experience, but which no-one who has can ever fully leave.
528 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 15, 2016
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15 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
July 1, 2016
Provided by the author through the BDSM group on GoodReads.
Simple curiosity pulled me in to read this book, and Kate is a charming guide on the voyeuristic journey through the largely hidden world of London's swingers and contemporary BDSM scene.
Unfortunately, I find her guided tour exceptionally circuitous.
So here's the thing, for as long as I can remember I have always been interested in the dynamics of human relationships. Whilst I personally choose to live a vanilla lifestyle, I am really interested in sexuality and more than happy to live vicariously in fiction and non-fiction alike. I like to think of myself as open minded.
Power exchange in particular fascinates me (most probably I suspect because I am not particularly dominant or submissive) so I am intrigued about what the draw might be. Much like as a contented atheist, I am fascinated by the concept of faith.
So yeah I am curious, about people, about life, about experience. Despite this, I wonder if perhaps I am the wrong audience for this particular book. Maybe if I was active in the 'lifestyle', I would be more interested in the blow by blow account (literally) and the minutia of the encounters.
Whilst Kate is very open and explains her experience frankly, I have difficulty maintaining interest. I was craving a good editor who would wield a blue pencil and cut a third or more like a half of the reminiscence. I would prefer edited highlights.
It felt to me like each experience is overly and rather pedestrianly repeated lasting page after page. I get it the first time, and am not sufficiently interested to have everything detailed quite as much.
Ultimately I found reading this rather tedious. The story meanders from one lover to another and admittedly I was bored and started skimming to get to the end.
Whilst Kate seems lovely and her choice of lovers is interesting, she fails to deliver much dramatic tension. I guess in a nutshell this is real life, but I think I would prefer time lapse overviews rather than moment by moment analysis.
Favourite quote: ' To our newest friends we may have seemed like wise gurus - albeit slightly more attractive, I should hope.'
Don't let my thoughts put you off, I am sure many would appreciate this unique autobiography written with sincerity and authenticity - just not what I was looking for.
Simple curiosity pulled me in to read this book, and Kate is a charming guide on the voyeuristic journey through the largely hidden world of London's swingers and contemporary BDSM scene.
Unfortunately, I find her guided tour exceptionally circuitous.
So here's the thing, for as long as I can remember I have always been interested in the dynamics of human relationships. Whilst I personally choose to live a vanilla lifestyle, I am really interested in sexuality and more than happy to live vicariously in fiction and non-fiction alike. I like to think of myself as open minded.
Power exchange in particular fascinates me (most probably I suspect because I am not particularly dominant or submissive) so I am intrigued about what the draw might be. Much like as a contented atheist, I am fascinated by the concept of faith.
So yeah I am curious, about people, about life, about experience. Despite this, I wonder if perhaps I am the wrong audience for this particular book. Maybe if I was active in the 'lifestyle', I would be more interested in the blow by blow account (literally) and the minutia of the encounters.
Whilst Kate is very open and explains her experience frankly, I have difficulty maintaining interest. I was craving a good editor who would wield a blue pencil and cut a third or more like a half of the reminiscence. I would prefer edited highlights.
It felt to me like each experience is overly and rather pedestrianly repeated lasting page after page. I get it the first time, and am not sufficiently interested to have everything detailed quite as much.
Ultimately I found reading this rather tedious. The story meanders from one lover to another and admittedly I was bored and started skimming to get to the end.
Whilst Kate seems lovely and her choice of lovers is interesting, she fails to deliver much dramatic tension. I guess in a nutshell this is real life, but I think I would prefer time lapse overviews rather than moment by moment analysis.
Favourite quote: ' To our newest friends we may have seemed like wise gurus - albeit slightly more attractive, I should hope.'
Don't let my thoughts put you off, I am sure many would appreciate this unique autobiography written with sincerity and authenticity - just not what I was looking for.
July 5, 2016
Suppose you come home from work one day and find your husband online checking out a very kinky website and instead of freaking out, you say "Honey, that's so hot, let's check it out together." That's the premise of Tough Love.
Kate Julia White's a witty writer whose memoir nails the social norms of both British suburban living and the kinkster/swinger lifestyle. She worries a bit about the other PTA moms uncovering her kinky lifestyle at times -- like when the home where she's attending a swingers party turns out of be on the same street where her kids recently attended a birthday party. She doesn't sweat the possibility of discovery for too long, explaining "as long as you keep your guests from stealing parking spaces and stay within acceptable noise levels, there's not much your average English person will do, more than gossiping, even if they are curious or annoyed."
Reading her memoir is like having a glass of wine with a friend who's a bit of an over-sharer. On one hand, you're so enjoying listing to her sexual escapade and thinking "you did what????" On the other, you're thinking, "Wait, which guy is this again?" because she's told you about so many encounters it's hard to keep them straight.
As others have pointed out, the book could use a bit of pruning but as long as you don't read it in one sitting, or expect it to have a narrative arc, you could view the length as getting more crazy stories for your money.
And they are really crazy stories about what happens when she responds to men who post online ads looking for women who want to have dominant/submissive relationships, what happens when you go to a partner-swapping party and your spouse wants to, shall we say, "engage with" another couple but you're not so keen on the spouse you'll be engaging with, and how being naked in a group of 20-somethings makes you feel about your post-pregnancy (x2) body.
Note: I provided this review after reading a copy of the book White sent to me through the BDSM group on Goodreads.
Kate Julia White's a witty writer whose memoir nails the social norms of both British suburban living and the kinkster/swinger lifestyle. She worries a bit about the other PTA moms uncovering her kinky lifestyle at times -- like when the home where she's attending a swingers party turns out of be on the same street where her kids recently attended a birthday party. She doesn't sweat the possibility of discovery for too long, explaining "as long as you keep your guests from stealing parking spaces and stay within acceptable noise levels, there's not much your average English person will do, more than gossiping, even if they are curious or annoyed."
Reading her memoir is like having a glass of wine with a friend who's a bit of an over-sharer. On one hand, you're so enjoying listing to her sexual escapade and thinking "you did what????" On the other, you're thinking, "Wait, which guy is this again?" because she's told you about so many encounters it's hard to keep them straight.
As others have pointed out, the book could use a bit of pruning but as long as you don't read it in one sitting, or expect it to have a narrative arc, you could view the length as getting more crazy stories for your money.
And they are really crazy stories about what happens when she responds to men who post online ads looking for women who want to have dominant/submissive relationships, what happens when you go to a partner-swapping party and your spouse wants to, shall we say, "engage with" another couple but you're not so keen on the spouse you'll be engaging with, and how being naked in a group of 20-somethings makes you feel about your post-pregnancy (x2) body.
Note: I provided this review after reading a copy of the book White sent to me through the BDSM group on Goodreads.
June 25, 2016
I received this book in exchange for an honest review.
Honestly, I can't review this book as I was unable to finish it. I just couldn't find the interest or connection of any sort to pull me into this book. Maybe because this is supposed to be a autobiography...I'm not sure, but I just didn't find the writing to be entertaining or fluid. I found parts of the book to be intriguing, exciting, and even terrifying at points...but not enough to hold my interest and keep me reading. If you enjoy autobiographies and sexual relationships/encounters outside the norm, I'd say give this book a shot.
Honestly, I can't review this book as I was unable to finish it. I just couldn't find the interest or connection of any sort to pull me into this book. Maybe because this is supposed to be a autobiography...I'm not sure, but I just didn't find the writing to be entertaining or fluid. I found parts of the book to be intriguing, exciting, and even terrifying at points...but not enough to hold my interest and keep me reading. If you enjoy autobiographies and sexual relationships/encounters outside the norm, I'd say give this book a shot.
December 9, 2016
I'm a little on the fence about this book. On one hand it's well written and offers a very detailed look into the mind of a masochist. On the other hand…I'm not sure what the purpose of this was. I enjoyed the first two thirds of the book. The last third I read with growing horror, and the end of the book left a bad taste in my mouth. I think the author should have written this book a few years later once she had found herself a trustworthy Dom.
July 2, 2016
This one was a bit tedious for me….there was too much detail and it moved a bit slow. It would be better if an editor thinned it out quite a bit. Unfortunately as it is currently written I just couldn’t get in to the character.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews