A Gay Bondage Manual

How to Kill a Superhero #1

by Pablo Greene

Music roars inside Fortress nightclub. Roland dances into the night, hoping to find a brief escape from his professional life at Kansas City’s Arkum Hospital. That night he bumps into Rick, a jet-setting executive who shares his fetish for superheroes in bondage. Together Roland and Rick travel into a world of masks, rope, and sexual slavery. That is, until monstrous transformations start raging through Roland's body and mind, and their game of superhero fetish takes a very bad turn. Time is running out, and Roland is losing control. The only thing that can help him understand the danger he faces is a rare book that can reveal the mysteries that lie beyond the borders of pain and bondage.
How to Kill a Superhero dares to visit the darkest corners of the superhero genre, where horror, science fiction, and sex converge. This tale takes readers on a ride into the erotic they won’t soon forget.
How to Kill a A Gay Bondage Manual is the first book in the Gold Apocalypse series, which follows the adventures of Roland in his quest to harness the powers of the Golden Man. The next two books will be released in Spring and Fall of 2014 from Beast Within Books.

Genres: Queer, Novels

135 pages, ebook

First published October 7, 2013

About the author

I am the author of the "How to Kill a Superhero" series of novels. The first book, "A Gay Bondage Manual," released in 2013. The third book, "Transformation Fetish", released in Spring of 2016. You can check them out on paperback and Kindle on Amazon. Join us and explore your own superhero fetish.

Reviews

[Jesse · Rating 2 out of 5]

At first glance, this looked to be a cheap, shitty erotic novel with absolutely nothing new or interesting to say. And for the most part, it kind of is. The author writes pages and pages of gay S&M flavored sex, with little imagination or insight, characters are motivated primarily by their cocks, and overall the thing feels a bit skeevy, as if the author is blatantly airing out his personal fetishes for the world to see. But what keeps me from writing off this novel completely is that it shows a surprising amount of imagination for what it is. Pablo Greene throws everything but the kitchen sink into this story, mixing erotica, superhero fantasy, and even a smidgen of Barkeresque horror into the proceedings. Using sex and fetishism as a jumping off point for a story about men undone by their own sexual desires is interesting, and the author even throws in references to esteemed horror affiliates, such as Salvatore Argento and H. P. Lovecraft. Unfortunately, while the novel is loaded with potentially interesting themes and ideas, Greene simply doesn't have the talent to make them coalesce into a pleasing whole; his writing fluctuates from pleasantly poetic to stunted and obvious, there's lots of spelling and grammar errors, information that we already know is repeated constantly, and his grip on historical accuracy is lax at best. This makes the whole thing a frustrating read, as one can sense the good novel aching to get out, but Greene doesn't possess the skills to release them. If this book went through a couple more drafts before its publication, if the prose was tightened, if the plot was less scattershot, if the characters were more well-defined... Basically, if the whole thing just felt fuller and more well-rounded, then I might be looking at this as a small cult hit. As it is, it occupies that agonizing grey area where it isn't bad enough to reject, nor good enough to recommend. Oh, and the title is completely awful. It has nearly no relation to the story, and it makes the entire thing seem like a cheap porno. Such a shame.

[Pupblue · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was really excited for this book to be release, but I must say I was somewhat disappointed. The storyline felt very rushed to me, and I feel like a few things that were skipped would have made for better character development. For example, we miss Roland's third actual meeting with Rick, which would have been an important scene. After the whirlwind experience of his second encounter it would have been nice to see Roland's thought process and how he deals with the events of the second encounter in the third encounter. While it is not necessary, it would have made a good set up for character development I also feel that Roland's transformations felt rushed even though they were described as being quicker than average
My biggest problem has to do with the editing of the book. I found several instances where a paragraph was repeated right after itself. However, this may just be an error in the E-book format

[Steven · Rating 4 out of 5]

The grand debate with a novel like Pablo Greene's book How To Kill A Superhero is what exactly is it. Is it an erotic novel or a novel about the erotic? In this case, it's an erotic novel in that sex plays a key factor into almost very chapter and every character that is introduced and that is how the novel should be judged. Greene knows how to write sex. He is vivid in description and plays with the intensity between the characters. Outside of the sex, we will find an interesting story of Roland who exists in his day job, but disappears in his personal world and thusly the introduction of Rick spins Roland from his everyday existence. Without telling too many details, we see the evolution of Roland and his sexual earnings become larger than life, violent, dangerous and these images do stimulate. That being said, Greene seems to be longing for more with this story. The path of Roland is not a usual path and it does twist and turn, but there are sometime inconsistencies in Roland's character (his judgements and his behaviour away from sex versus during sex) and sometimes as a reader, I wanted to slow the story down to let Roland exist outside the sex. In fact, at one point, Roland reflects on the idea of love and yet we never see him really ever see where that sort of path would lead. Some minor characters arrive and disappear far too quickly, but it is firmly the story of Roland. There is little of the usual superhero image within the pages but with a continuing story coming soon, we may see the hero and character of Roland evolve over time and find a path that becomes more real and connecting.

[Zoro]

I think the best way to enjoy this novel is to approach it with no expectations, an open mind, and to allow yourself the ability to enjoy an escape.

I like how the author, Pablo, introduced us to a young man in his late 20's named Roland. Not really exploring his own desires and not having that side part of him fulfilled. Day in and day out of his regular job. He is taken by surprise by a good looking gentlemen who allows this unexplored side to blossom.

I found Roland relateable because I also had not openly explored my kinks and fetishes until I realized I could do so later in my life. A leather daddy helped me realize freedom with exploring kinks and trying to teach me the ropes. Roland is on this journey to learn the ins and outs as well and you realize he is a real neophyte with little common sense, but that makes that exciting.

Now, the thing is, Pablo never asks us the reader to establish a safe word with him. Pablo, enlaces the reader and is the dom. Interlacing fetish, sex, fears of what Roland felt when asked to do certain things that made me be like, "don't do it! Oh wait there's a singlet? Well, fine I'm curious too".

Just as Rick played with Roland, Pablo plays with the reader. Giving you that same rhythm sex has. A stop and go. In the book, sex is the secondary escape and the go, while Roland's life is the stop.

I suggest you just let your senses go, don't read this on the beach as it was difficult to not reveal my excitement while reading. Maybe read this on the plane, read it somewhere you feel you will know you're hiding a secret. It will make you a little bit exhilarated to know that Pablo is egging you on to let go and submit.