Electric Feather: The Tranquebar Book of Erotic Stories

by Ruchir Joshi (Editor)

The Tranquebar Book of Erotic Stories is an unadulterated, edgy look at sex and passion.

Genres: Erotica

202 pages, Hardcover

First published December 1, 2009

Reviews

[Gita Madhu · Rating 2 out of 5]

Smut Fest
The problem with Electric Feather: The Tranquebar Book of Erotic Stories is that it begins with a super orgy story. With all the bushes people dive into it read more like an adventure into some rain forest. For a moment I thought I had picked up the wrong one of the two I was reading and that, perhaps, this was a Gerald Durrell. It was no trouble extricating myself out of all those tangled and thrashing limbs and a mercy it didn't leave me with a throbbing headache considering all the tumescence I'd waded through. Samit Basu seems a promising writer, otherwise -and I'm sure The Wedding Night Or, Bachelor's Boudoir is very tongue in cheek although, in the story, tongues tend to go elsewhere.

The second one was a bit more to the tune of erotic with some sort of story veiling its scatological scenes - a girl, moist, melting chocolate, a film star hunk - suddenly transported to another time and place! Paromita Vohra also appears to be a writer of some worth, this short erotic tale apart.

Sheba Karim's Heavenly Ornament is quite delightful -evocative and imaginatively titillating.

Confessions by Abeer Hoque is hilarious and she displays a strong footnote fetish.

Sonia Jabbar's The Advocate is also fairly entertaining with a rather amusing twist in the tale.

A msm romp set in some European country forms Niven Govinden's contribution.

Love's Sonnet is a sweet and poetic story of love and heartbreak by Kamila Shamsie while Rana Dasgupta tosses us back into tangled masses of limbs, albeit in another land and with the added benefit of a swimming pool.

Tishani Doshi's juicy The Delicate Predicament of Eunice de Silva is a merrily interlaced with lurid sms messages all in all CAPS.

I was looking forwards to the Jeet Thayil but it was very sanctimonious and very self conscious.

Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan explores the lengthy deflowering of a young man who's first class in theory.

Girl on girl action, The Quilt, by Parvati Sharma, is a piece of vigorous handwork.

And we come, pardon the pun, full circle back to a wild romp by editor Ruchir Joshi

A must have for all horny readers but otherwise ho hum. Nice cover though - might make a nice and naughty wedding or anniversary gift ...

[Deepa Ranganathan · Rating 2 out of 5]

A decent collection. Some extremely well-written stories, some lost in oblivion, even others that are too shy to be called erotic. Was expecting more.

[Leander · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sometimes you find a book stuck in a dusty corner of a shop, and you can't help but wonder, should I buy it?
This deliberation did stalk me when I first saw this book in a bookstore.
I don't know if it was the cover photo of the bed, or how the light struck the pillow in it, giving it a feel that reminded me of a time before, when time still had to be, and something existed then that was beyond this inexistence.

Starting off, this is a compilation of short stories, erotica if want labels.

The ones I loved the most, was The Advocate by Sonia Jabbar, Missing Person Last Seen by Jeet Thayil, and Arles by Ruchir Joshi not in any order or anything.

What I loved about these is what I'm going to bore you with now (no the editor nor did any of the writers pay me)

The Advocate had a sort of Saadat Hasan Manto feel to it. Unabashed, it speaks out what it's about, 'why should boys have all the fun'. But, that isn't all there is to it, and if that's all you got, you surely need to reread it. It is about much more, the way advocate sahab addresses the protagonist at the beginning and at the end says much.

.

Missing Person Last Seen, has two redeeming factor, which save it from being a cheating wife/husband cliche. One, her husband not only knows about her infidelities, but also (she just hinted at it, but still), maybe even gets off knowing and hearing about her such escapades.
The other, is it's last paragraph. Which, for me, is one of the saddest thing that can happen.

"I watched her face as I moved into her because I wanted to see a reflection there of the act we were engaged in, some expression of cynicism or knowledge. But she was so detached she was absent from herself, willing and passive, the aggression gone. I could do anything, want anything, be rough or silent and she didn't mind; and though I lunged at her for hours it seemed, until the movement was meaningless except as parody, she didn't complain or turn away, but lay with me, breathing and solemn."

You make love to this beautiful woman, and she lays there, just lays there, an absent look in her eyes, oblivious to your thrusts and groans and even whispered Iloveyou's.
It's just is what is.
And though there's a reason for it (as everything usually has or warrants one), I would rather not have that mar this beautiful yet sad experience I had from reading it.

.

Arles, is maybe even more a poignant write.
The protagonist makes love with a Korean, but what bothers him is that her breasts are not what he had grown to love, in D. D being the femme fatale. And the 'L'arlésienne' bit, (someone/thing a person waits for, pines for, but never gets) is symbolical and even ironical later in the story. For he sacrifices what he wants for what he had, and then discovers, that what he had was what held value for him, what he loved, what he wished would again be his.


A read I'd recommend 9.8/10
If you haven't been instilled with 'morality' by the society too much (read orthodoxness) then do give this book a try. It might arous- ahmm.. I mean, surprise you.

[Sonia Gomes · Rating 3 out of 5]

If I would be leafing through ‘Electric Feather -The Tranquebar Book of Erotic Stories’ a compilation of thirteen erotic short stories, I would wonder…are they sensuous, smooth as silk? Or are they as featureless as rexin?

Most of the stories in ‘Electric Feather - The Tranquebar Book of Erotic Stories’’ run through your fingers delicately, sighing just a bit, but there are others which clomp around with a great deal of fanfare.

There is this fine line between erotic and of course porn. Erotic is sensuous, moving slowly and delicately but not missing a beat ... porn on the other hand stumbles through, with an air of ‘here goes, I will display all my wares.’

Let’s just take a peek at the thirteen stories in ‘Electric Feather’ The Tranquebar Book of Erotic Stories’.

‘The Wedding Night Or, Bachelor’s Boudoir 9’: Samit Basu
I was filled with terrible sense of dread. There was nothing subtle about the story, it is something that a fifteen year old would hide in his bedroom for a quiet afternoon when he is alone at home.

‘Tourists’: Paromita Vohra
A film set? Well does sound a dreary episode with a great deal of galloping around, but Paromita weaves a tale, with chocolate smooth and silky and then slides into a time-slip where strange things happen. With a time-slip the end has to be quirky with of course a bar of chocolate thrown in.

‘Heavenly ornaments’: Sheba Karim.
A coming of age story, narrated delicately by an eleven year old girl, who comes to live with her grandmother. Here she meets her Munni Khala and finds a book that she devours whilst hiding in a deep wardrobe. She falls in love with her Munni Khala (her young aunt) who will be leaving for Saudi Arabia.
The little girl sees her uncle and Munni Khala together and wonders if that is what is expected from a woman if she wants to go to Saudi Arabia.

Confessions: Abeer Hoque
Abeer Hoque sounds quite a bit like the Kinsey Report, albeit narrated in droll fashion, but as it is the voices of many women, it sounds much as a report.

The Advocate: Sonia Jabbar
The advocate is a story that drives its hooks into you. How can a person with who you work, drink, talk, share anecdotes have such disdain and disrespect for you, a story that wounds one deeply.

The Cat: Niven Govinden
What draws you to ‘The Cat’, are the beautiful places in Amsterdam, but what is surprising is sullen Vik’s cruelty towards his partner Peter in whom he is no longer interested and wants to move on. Yes, a sad story.

Love’s Sunset: Kamila Shamsie
Their love, their marriage even their wedding clothes were full of bright sunshine until there wasn’t Sun anymore.

Swimming Pool: Rana Dasguta
The scare Boris gets when his partner/friend nearly drowns in a swimming pool.

The Delicate Predicament of Eunice de Silva: Tishant Doshi
This is the predictable story of a spinster in love with a married man but told in such a funny way, it had me in splits. Delightful story.

Missing Person Last Seen: Jeet Thayil
A young woman married to an old man meets her old friend a heroin addict, they try to have sex but it isn’t possible because heroin deprives one of the ability to ‘come’. A story that tugs your heartstrings.

The First Time: Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan
What happens when you a man are a virgin till quite old? You need a willing partner...a good friend who is ready to help you lose your virginity.

The Quilt: Parvati Sharma
This is the best ... making love...all the while discussing Manto and Chugtai. Unbelievably beautiful.

Arles: Ruchir Joshi
What happens when a man compares two of his lovers...beautiful.

[Prathap · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’ve been long curious about Electric Feather as soon as it was released but only got around reading it now. Though it’s a mix big of a collection with titilating erotica outweighing the significance of a solid storyline in some cases, it’s not entirely unworthy of my time. Some offer brilliantly scathing cultural criticism, wrapped enticing in a layer of erotica like Tishani Joshi’s story about a spinster starting an illicit sexual relationship with a married man or Jeet Thayil’s story about two junkies in New York using each other for casual sex. Some are just plain sexually charged stories offering no erotic literary succour, like Meenaxi Reddy Madhavan unleashing her lit-porn capabilities on a story about a young man in Delhi losing his virginity (still exciting to read but like eating way too many cotton candies on a hot summer afternoon). Some are just plan too short and way too less erotic to be included in the collection at all - Kamila Shamsie’s and Rana Dasgupta’s. Some stand out for their deeply felt chronicling of modern day sexual politics, like Sumit Basu’s crackling opener story about two friends secretly lusting for each other or Sheba Karim’s story on a lesbian sexual awakening of a Pakistani American school girl. In all, Electric Feather is a good first attempt that perhaps deserves a sequel (or many of them).

[Amit Gupta · Rating 3 out of 5]

The editor of the anthology gives the readers the background of the book in the preface, which has the curious title “Repairing Brindaban”. When he asked his select group of authors to send unpublished, original writing 'about and around the erotic and the sexual', predictably not all jumped at his proposal. Some stayed mum, some showed disdain and some thought it was beneath them to write ‘porn’. But some young, promising and upcoming authors responded with their fare which found their way into the Contents.

Samit Basu’s The Wedding Night is nothing but unadulterated sex amidst games on the night of a wedding. Sheba Karim's gentle story of a girl down on vacation, and infatuated by her aunt was subtly nuanced and written with the kind of restraint that makes writing effective. Niven Govindan's story about a pair of gay lovers in Amsterdam, who are bound to each by a painful bond of hurting and pleasure makes for fascinating reading.

Tishani Doshi and Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan, both surprise us with non-confessional stories about inexperience. In Madhavan’s story, a 27-year old man loses his virginity, courtesy of a colleague. In Doshi’s, a matronly woman in her first relationship pleasures herself on a train, text messaging her married lover through the night.

On the other hand, couple of stories completely baffled me and made me question their presence in the anthology. The one by Abeer Hoque is straight out of some research paper on sexology and is utterly distracting by the insertion of those irritating footnotes. Same with Rana Dasgupta's 'Swimming Pool' which may appear to be a bold editorial choice but failed to made an impression despite an edgy premise.

There is a nice mix of what i call as highbrow erotica for the literary snobs and titillating, drooling stuff for the young teenagers and arguably, that is the best marketing way to sell more books. There is something for everyone here. Read when your sex hormones are in over drive, guilty pleasure at its best.

[Ashok Krishna · Rating 1 out of 5]

Sometime back, I had written a blog denouncing a book by Khushwant Singh as cheap erotica. A friend of mine caught up with me offline and during the discussion over my writing and poetry, we wandered over to that post. My friend said that I cannot just like that wave away the works of a great author like him. Moreover, my friend was of the opinion that since I have never ever read any erotic literature I am not supposed to write it off as cheap. And, my friend suggested the book 'Electric Feather' to sample that genre.

Sorry, my friend. I still remain displeased with that genre. In fact, I can even use the word 'disappointed'. This book has nothing new that Paulo Coelho, in his own plagiaristic manner, didn't write in 'Eleven Minutes' or 'Adultery'. There is nothing different from what Taslima Nasrin, in her pseudo-feminist hypocrisy, did graphically depict in 'The French Lover'. This is in no way different from what most of the 'modern' Indian writers, in an urge to garner the attention of the adolescent readers, do puke with their pens and spell out in obscene terms. This book causes as much revulsion in me as I first felt when I stumbled upon the writings of one 'Chandilyan' during my formative years.

More than halfway through the book 'Electric Feather', which is a compilation of erotic tales, I feel no thrill, no emotional pulls, no bliss springing in my being, as I feel when I read the love poetry of a Gulzar or even a Kamala Das. Stripping down the man-woman relationship - literally - down to the mere union of the physique is not amusing in any way. Mere copulation, for the sake of it, is as revolting as excreta.

Love is what is worthy. Lust, when it is not within the bounds and privacy of love, is ugly. There is more thrill, more pull, and more addiction in love than in lust. Erotica still remains a third-grade and avoidable genre for me. Sorry, my friend.

Love is, indeed, more inebriating than lust!

[Krishna makwana · Rating 1 out of 5]

I would say it was nice try to compile all different kind of intimate relationships in one, including homosexuality. but the whole idea of including everything in one doesn't work when u r not sure who ur reader vl be. most of the stories were oblivion. only one story I remember in whole book, first one with threesome concept. would not recommend it to anyone.

[Prasad GR · Rating 3 out of 5]

Three stars only for Tishani Doshi's story with everything else hovering between the passable and the horrible. Only Tishani's story carries enough passion and intensity to make it a well-rounded one!

[Book'd Hitu · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the stories were really intriguing.
This book proves that good erotica writers exists in India.