So, Addison is back with a sorta new novella. This is one that showed up in another anthology last year or maybe the year before. But it has been extended and tweaked up a bit, and well, the tentacle dick is always worth a reread. I have a lot of things to say about Strangeways, so buckle yourself in and see what I have to say, shall we?
Over the generations, male birth numbers have gone done, and what males are born are generally dead by 40. It’s considered the duty of every guy out there to get out and spread his seed far and wide, and women are supposed to be all happy and shit, yeah, whatever dude. Emily has worked really hard over the years to not end up as one of the women who is going to be left as a single mom. She has a brother who is nearing 40 who is married and has kids and who Emily is trying to help support. Pretty much everything she makes that doesn’t go to feed or house her goes to her brother and his family.
She is a waitress at a nice restaurant, and one day, Phi shows up. As she leaves, he’s there, and she ends up taking him home, and fucks him silly, even though he’s an alien. And it’s pretty awesome, because he has the magical cock that does all kinds of cool things. It changes shape, it moves around, and there are yummy tentacles at the base. No knots, but tentacles that tickle all the good places has to be great. Anyway, Phi pays lots of attention to Emily, and all things are good.
This story, when I first read it, seemed very un-Addison like. It’s pretty sweet, has a very nice happy ending, and all sorts of good things happen.
But…
Then I reread it. If you want to read my new opinion, you will have to read under the picture, because that’s where they are all going to be.
I really do like this story and I do like it from both of the POVs I have on it, and which one I have can change from day to day, so that will give me a lot of rereading fun.
So, here’s how I’ve changed my mind. If you look at the story, there’s a pretty deep level of dark going on, I think. I mean, Phi and his species are all doing this mind control thing, and the majority of the women that they are mating have been basically brainwashed into it. Plus, the aliens have used their powers to make the whole world feel very well disposed to them instead of afraid, like they might otherwise have been.
That makes me wonder if the guys are actually in love with the women that they are mating or if they have just picked a woman who they like and then brainwashed her into liking him so he can fuck her. And the women, of course, think that they are all head over heels, because of this whole urge thing, but do they ever develop real feelings about the aliens they have mated too?
And Emily, being who she is, does she decide that she’s going to just love him because it’s easier than fighting against him, does she actually catch the feelz, or is it a whole Stockholm kind of thing?
Like I said, I reread it and my perspective changed on it. I’ll have to go back and reread the original and see if I can pick up those things in the first one or if it is just in the extended version.
OK, that’s all I have to say about this one. Go check it out at your favorite bookseller. Happy reading!
In Between the Pages 