Saturday, September 26, 2015

Five Star Review: Craving Flight by Tamsen Parker

Tzipporah Berger is thirty-seven and single, which is practically unheard of in the Orthodox Jewish community she now calls home. Her increasing religiosity and need for kink may have broken up her first marriage, but she’s decided it’s time to try again. And the rabbi’s wife has just the man in mind.

Elan Klein is the neighborhood butcher whose intimidating size and gruff manner hint at a deliciously forceful personality. But BDSM isn’t exactly something you discuss during an Orthodox courtship. Will a marriage to Elan solidify her place in the community that she loves and provide the domination and pain Tzipporah craves or will she forever have to rely on flights of fancy to satisfy her needs?

Craving Flight is a novella written for the Goodreads BDSM Group's Bring Out Your Kink writing event. Members provided a photo and letter to inspire writers to create an original story and writers picked the prompt that spoke to them most. Join the BDSM group now to see the prompt that inspired the story (prompt 16)!



And the best part? It’s FREE everywhere!

What I thought about Craving Flight 

I was immediately intrigued when I read the prompt and blurb for this story.  There's a theme regarding a religion that I don't know much about, and for that reason alone I was interested.  But coupling kink with the Orthodox Jewish lifestyle?  Those two things would seem to be at the opposite ends of the spectrum, so I really wanted to check this out.  

Tzipporah is a thirty-something religious studies professor. She's dedicated to her faith, and is still learning the tenets of her religion. She's not quite accepted by her new community. She's divorced and an outsider. I found her interactions with others of her faith fascinating, like a glimpse into a secret world.
  
She's basically setup with Elan, the butcher. He's a widower, and without much courting they marry, in what I'd almost consider an arranged marriage.  Somehow, they are super compatible in bed which makes for some very sexy bedroom scenes.  But their relationship outside the bedroom is strained by their strict religious practices and Tzipporah's acceptance by Elan's family.

In just a few pages, Tamsen Parker does a fabulous job of creating two characters that just grabbed my interest.  When the tensions in their relationship comes to a head, the question becomes whether their marriage can survive or will they crash and burn before they even get to know each other. 

For me, this was one of the best erotic romances I have read this year. Tamsen Parker blends the elements of romance, kink, religion, and community into a lovely romance that is still in my head two weeks after reading it. i loved the characters, the view into this secret world, and mostly the way Tzipporah's and Elan's relationship developed by the end of the story.

Recommended. 



About Tamsen Parker


Tamsen Parker is a stay-at-home mom by day, erotic romance writer by naptime. She lives with her family outside of Boston, where she tweets too much, sleeps too little and is always in the middle of a book. Aside from good food, sweet rieslings and gin cocktails, she has a fondness for monograms and subway maps. She should really start drinking coffee.


 

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