Men I Might Have Known

by Brad Saunders

Everyone experiences it--that moment when you lock eyes with a perfect stranger and feel a shiver of requited lust. Too often, those opportunities slip by unexplored. But in this steamy, imaginative collection, Brad Saunders turns "what if" into "what happened," recreating the sizzling chance connections he's experienced--and playing them out in uninhibited stories that tap into our deepest fantasies about what can happen when we take the next step.From a glorious day on a sun-kissed Greek beach with a beautiful German man, to a college crush that turns out to be deliciously mutual, these stories are sometimes tender, sometimes torrid, and always deeply erotic. A gym buddy provides a workout to remember. . .. Venturing up to a Manhattan rooftop party yields a spectacular view--and not of the skyline. . .. And on a city crosswalk, saving a handsome artist from traffic earns the kind of gratitude that can't be conveyed in words. Hedonistic threesomes, hot nightclub trysts, sweet and sensitive first times. . .whether set in exotic locales or on in your very own bed, these intimate, provocative stories inhabit the space between fact and fiction--where nothing is too wild or too wicked and the only limit to pleasure is your imagination. . . Brad Saunders currently lives in Los Angeles and is hard at work on several books and screenplays. When he is not writing about the men in his life, he writes about food, travel, and the arts for several publications. This is his first book.

Genres: Gay

352 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Kassa · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

Author Brad Saunders delves into fantasies in this 11 story collection of erotica based around chance encounters. Here each story is based on a real person the author encountered. However, instead of the usual ending to such meetings which could be mundane or not very noteworthy, Saunders has asked the age old question of “what if?” What if instead of that sexy local in Finland walking away, there was an erotic encounter? Stories ranging over six years of the author’s life fill this collection which definitely establishes a similar type of man and delightful encounter.

The short tales all involve and revolve around a sexual encounter that is a fantasy based off a real occurrence or person. The settings vary from college to multiple cities in Europe and the sex varies from threesomes to sweet to raunchy. The encounters offer hints of future, but most are one night stands or brief flings before life moves on. The purpose is to entice and fulfill that fantasy of the hot guy with an instant spark but perhaps nothing came of it. The idea of the collection is fun and flirty, which is carried out in each short delight. The various European settings especially are interesting and bring a much needed texture to the entire collection.

Each of the stories offers a very similar pattern and prose so reading all these stories at once is a disservice, since they may blend together. This is one of the biggest drawbacks to the book. The pattern is set very early where the setting and introduction is made, flirting, talking, touching before the main sex which is usually trading blowjobs, rimming, then trading penetration. Most of the men have similar body types and there is a repetition of language especially that does little to differentiate the stories from each other. The writing itself lacks descriptive quality to the erotica, which is distracting considering the overwhelming majority of the book are the various sexual encounters.

The stories are fun and easy titillation and entertainment if read here and there instead of all at once. Then the delight of dipping into another’s fantasies of hot sex, gorgeous men, and exotic locales are brought to sharper relief and enjoyment. This is a strong first offering, but it will be interesting to see the growth of imagination and writing skill in future works.

[Sebastián Arcos · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed every single story of this book, relatable but also kind of aspirational. As a Spanish speaker it showed a whole new ways to name the dick… and I liked it 😛. Fun, light, entertaining and hot!. But I hoped for other body types and more imagination (if is about fantasies), toys, fetish and so were missing, but I really enjoyed till the end

[Kim · Rating 2 out of 5]

Wash, rinse, repeat. These stories all started to blend into one with interchangeable names and places. I gave this two stars mainly for the author's ability to come up with such creative names for parts of the male anatomy. He must have been hungry when he wrote some of these stories because food names kept coming up: doughnut, meat, sasauge, hot chocolate. The non-food descriptions were also amusing: stick, tool, chute, cave. I just wish the stories had been more entertaining and not so similar.