Ten Great Books

[AwkwardlySet]

There is only ONE Mod that has edit access on the AH. Only ONE other than two Admins, Laurel and Manu can edit a post here. And no one other than one of those two would dare post [REMOVED BY ADMIN] within a post as in shown in the second post.

See those thingies in the right corner? It says last edited by a Moderator

So yeah, I have trouble trusting any word you say, especially considering that these things keep happening only in the threads where you participate and publicly express disapproval about something. Again, I would say it's you, or maybe some moderator buddy of yours. But it's not anyone with an administrator role, that's for sure, because their higher role would have been displayed in the right corner.

If this supposed ADMIN can show themselves and corroborate what you are saying, I am more than ready to apologize to you.

 

[lovecraft68]

There is only ONE Mod that has edit access on the AH. Only ONE other than two Admins, Laurel and Manu can edit a post here. And no one other than one of those two would dare post [REMOVED BY ADMIN] within a post as in shown in the second post.

 

[SimonDoom]

What do you mean, they weren't novels?

View attachment 2517034

Definitely a big influence for me. I was a regular Mad magazine reader as a kid.

 

[SimonDoom]

I think there is a significant difference between discussing underage sex in the context of a fetish and as an aspect of a work of mainstream literature.

To a rational person, yes. But you'll find wannabe bookburners and hallway monitors even at an erotic author's forum like this one.

 

[lovecraft68]

Definitely a big influence for me. I was a regular Mad magazine reader as a kid.

Cracked was fun too, but Mad was the best. Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions was the best.

 

[AG31]

My whole entry of a book and the associated description of its impact on my life was [REMOVED BY ADMIN]. I edited my post to contain only the name of the book. I see that my edit is gone (or never "took.") The book itself contains no banned content. What's going on? Why can't I edit my list to include that book?

EDIT: Will my edit is now showing up. Maybe it was just a timing thing.

 

[SimonDoom]

Also, I am pretty sure that quite a few of the listed books contain nonconsensual sex and eroticized violence, but I haven't seen anyone bellyaching about them.

Of course. The notion that simply naming an influential book that happens within its covers to violate the site's content rules should get one's post deleted or potentially get on punished is so absurd that it shouldn't be a matter of discussion, but some have no judgment. What I don't understand is why someone with no judgment would be entrusted with the role of moderator.

 

[ChloeTzang]

Getting back to the subject, a couple more popped into my head.....

Anthony Adverse.....by Hervey Allen -

The Walking Drum - Louis L'Amour

Count Belisarius - Robert Graves

The Seven Daughters of Eve - Brian Sykes

The Origins of Language - Merritt Ruhlen

Lusts of the Borgias - Marcus van Heller

Kim - Rudyard Kipling

 

[lovecraft68]

My whole entry of a book and the associated description of its impact on my life was [REMOVED BY ADMIN]. I edited my post to contain only the name of the book. I see that my edit is gone (or never "took.") The book itself contains no banned content. What's going on? Why can't I edit my list to include that book?

Rogue bully mods

 

[AG31]

Winsor denied that her book was particularly daring and said that she had no interest in explicit scenes. "I wrote only two sexy passages," she remarked, "and my publishers took both of them out. They put in ellipses instead. In those days, you know, you could solve everything with an ellipsis."

Now I'm wondering if I got the right book. I know the rest of my memories are well grounded, but it's possible a different book was the source of my info.

 

[SimonDoom]

Cracked was fun too, but Mad was the best. Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions was the best.

Yes, Cracked was fun but I didn't read it too often. Mad had brilliant cartoonists. Many of the best of an entire generation worked for Mad. I didn't realize until much later that some of them also did the Tales from the Crypt cartoons, which I didn't read until I was an adult. My dad told me about them because he read them when he was a kid until they were banned. His mother, of course, disapproved. My sensibility is much like my dad's.

 

[lovecraft68]

I'll toss in the Belgariad fantasy series (5 books) but stay the hell away from the sequel Mallorean, its like Eddings woke up one day and said "I'll shit all over my own work!"

 

[lovecraft68]

Yes, Cracked was fun but I didn't read it too often. Mad had brilliant cartoonists. Many of the best of an entire generation worked for Mad. I didn't realize until much later that some of them also did the Tales from the Crypt cartoons, which I didn't read until I was an adult. My dad told me about them because he read them when he was a kid until they were banned. His mother, of course, disapproved. My sensibility is much like my dad's.

Mad was part of EC and was actually a comic book for the first five issues. But when the comics code BS kicked in, EC got around it by putting everything in magazine format. Creepy, Eerie, Vampirella and a couple of less popular runs for horror, and they put mad in that format as well.

 

[SimonDoom]

Interesting thread from a generational perspective. Did anyone but me name any books published since 2000?

I don't mean that to be snarky, I just find it interesting. At what age do people become less open to influence?

I know it's generally thought that most people lose interest in hearing new music around the age of 25. Is something similar true with literature?

I still read new books, but I can't think of a post-2000 book I'd put in my top 10, or anywhere near it.

I admit to a bias for older fiction. I think my tastes were shaped by reading when I was young, and I read a lot of "classics" from the 19th century and mid-2oth century American authors like Steinbeck, Hemingway, O'Connor, Fitzgerald, E.B. White, Bradbury. The style of more contemporary fiction sometimes seems contrived or convoluted to me. I still read it, but not as much as I should.

 

[AG31]

Interesting thread from a generational perspective. Did anyone but me name any books published since 2000?

I don't mean that to be snarky, I just find it interesting. At what age do people become less open to influence?

I know it's generally thought that most people lose interest in hearing new music around the age of 25. Is something similar true with literature?

I didn't name any books from when I was older than late twenties, most being from my youth, but your question made me realize that I left out a book that was really important to me that I encountered after I got involved in erotica late in life (for the second time in my life). It's Enslaving Eli by Billierosie (no longer available that I can find except as an Amazon audio book.) It crystallized for me just what my erotic tastes had become. I'll go edit my list.

 

[SimonDoom]

A few post-2000 books that I have enjoyed and/or been influenced by:

Russo, Empire Falls
Chabon, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Klay
Dawkins, The Ancestor's Tale
Kurzweil, The Singularity Is Near
Ridley, Genome
Dawkins, The God Delusion
Pinker, The Blank Slate
Annie Proulx, Brokeback Mountain -- it's a New Yorker short story, but it almost reads like a condensed novel. A lot happens. It's very moving and sad, like the excellent movie.
Millet, The Sexual Life of Catherine Millet. Recommended. A highly intellectual French art critic writes about her sex life and her lifelong desire for multiple partners and risky sex. Another book that intrigued me about sex stories from the woman's perspective.

Also, while I thought 50 Shades was crap from a literary perspective, I must admit that it influenced me. It got me interested in BDSM as an erotic subject and is one of the reasons I finally decided to start writing erotic stories.

 

[MelissaBaby]

Mentioning a book that contains content isn't the issue. Saying how it affected you and that you used it to teach other elementary school age children is. That most certainly falls under:

To that end, we DO NOT publish works of any type featuring the following content:

• Sexual activity involving characters under the age of 18 (including but not limited to explicit sexual discussion, voyeurism, exhibitionism, fantasizing, masturbation, and graphic sexualized descriptions, in addition to actual sexual intercourse). Literotica has always had a strict policy against any under-18 content, and any attempt to violate that policy is grounds for account termination.

https://www.literotica.com/resources/content-guidelines

"Saying how it affected you???"

That is pretty chilling. So, a story in which a young woman read a book and realized she was attracted to other girls is forbidden? Because I've written that, and it's been approved and on the site for years.

If a character says they were promiscuous in high school?

If an underage character admits to their parent that they are gay?

I've written those scenarios as well. If the rule is as draconian as you've described it, I've violated it a number of times. I've won awards for stories that violated your interpretation of the rules.

It does not seem to me that, at least on the story side, this interpretation of the rule is observed in practice. Nor should it be, in my opinion.

 

[Bramblethorn]

SM 101 - Lake
- Best published intro to BDSM I've ever run across. Gifted this several times over the years...

Did you mean Wiseman?

 

[MelissaBaby]

That especially is not allowed on the forum.

I've seen people banned form the site for less.

I have made dozens, maybe hundreds of posts referring to my actual life. Many of us have. Or are you specifically referring to comments about underage activity? Clarity is needed here, when we are talking about the potentiality of people being banned.

 

[MelissaBaby]

Mine was from 2019.

I'm not familiar with it, but I'm glad you included it. Not every influential book is a hundred years old!

 

[MelissaBaby]

But FWIW Jafo does side with the problematic picture issue, but the site overrules him on it.

I hope no one thinks this is about Jafo, or any of the mods personally, it's about site policy.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Interesting thread from a generational perspective. Did anyone but me name any books published since 2000?

Three of mine: Space Opera, Locked Tomb, and the Milans.

 

[jaF0]

Or are you specifically referring to comments about underage activity? Clarity is needed here, when we are talking about the potentiality of people being banned.

This whole thing got set off by a poster describing activity while a minor that involved other minors.

There is no room for that here and everyone on this thread knows it.

 

[MelissaBaby]

I hope no one thinks this is about Jafo, or any of the mods personally, it's about site policy.

(Having read further in the thread...)

Well, I was speaking for myself there...

 

[YmaOHyd]

Three of mine: Space Opera, Locked Tomb, and the Milans.

The entire Kushiel's Legacy series on my list is post-2000, as are The Outpost and "The Case for the Empire." I think Fire and Other Essays is post-2000, but I'm not sure, and if it is many of the essays in it are not.