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Wives in Service
Three novellas about women who choose to service their husbands by following instructions from some source outside their marriage. The first follows a unique family tradition; the second instructions from her ex-husband; and the third, scientific principles. These stories are intended to be more thought-provoking than arousing. Though not primarily BDSM erotica, all stories include significant sexual masochism.
560 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 23, 2010
5 people are currently reading
39 people want to read
About the author
Ashley Zacharias
30 books63 followersI am a postmodern woman who lives a vanilla life but expresses her erotic bondage fantasies by writing fiction.
I blog on: http://ashleyzacharias.wordpress.com/ and comment on my own stories on: http://ashleyzachariascommentary.word...
I blog on: http://ashleyzacharias.wordpress.com/ and comment on my own stories on: http://ashleyzachariascommentary.word...
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
October 11, 2024
An interesting but perhaps troubling read. 3 stories, each completely different.
The Conjugal Clock - wife marries into a storied and close knit family. On returning from her honeymoon she finds a large clock rooted into her bedroom - it’s a family tradition/requirement. Husband is required to wind clock after sex - initially within 45 hr. Dire consequences for wife and/or husband if clock runs down. Lightest consequence for the clock running down is pretty severe corporal punishment for the wife.
Clock has many functions including pelvic training. And it keeps track of the type of sex being performed. It is meant to drive marital happiness and it seems to do so. I wonder how useful it might be for marriages in general??
Warning- do not read if you are uncomfortable with severe corporal punishment/sadism.
The Man in the Middle - Mark Orfield had a short and traumatic marriage to his ex who he describes as a “neurotic, narcissistic, vicious bitch”. Just before she’s about to be married again, she contacts Mark begging him to take her back. Mark is not to be taken in, so he devises a series of “tests” for ex-Marcia to pass before he’ll consider taking her back. He also devises an interesting communication plan so he knows what Marcia and her fiancée are thinking. It’s a fun story of escalating demands on Marcia
The Baby Machine - interesting premise - an exceedingly bright, almost 16 yr old wants to have as many children as possible. She is determined. This is her story. Not very erotic.
These stories are well written and edited. The viciousness of the corporal punishment in the first story and the lack of any passion in the 3rd left me flat. The ex-husband was very creative in the second story.
The 4 Star rating is based on how well the stories were written, not so much on how I liked the stories. Enjoy if this is what you want to read about.
The Conjugal Clock - wife marries into a storied and close knit family. On returning from her honeymoon she finds a large clock rooted into her bedroom - it’s a family tradition/requirement. Husband is required to wind clock after sex - initially within 45 hr. Dire consequences for wife and/or husband if clock runs down. Lightest consequence for the clock running down is pretty severe corporal punishment for the wife.
Clock has many functions including pelvic training. And it keeps track of the type of sex being performed. It is meant to drive marital happiness and it seems to do so. I wonder how useful it might be for marriages in general??
Warning- do not read if you are uncomfortable with severe corporal punishment/sadism.
The Man in the Middle - Mark Orfield had a short and traumatic marriage to his ex who he describes as a “neurotic, narcissistic, vicious bitch”. Just before she’s about to be married again, she contacts Mark begging him to take her back. Mark is not to be taken in, so he devises a series of “tests” for ex-Marcia to pass before he’ll consider taking her back. He also devises an interesting communication plan so he knows what Marcia and her fiancée are thinking. It’s a fun story of escalating demands on Marcia
The Baby Machine - interesting premise - an exceedingly bright, almost 16 yr old wants to have as many children as possible. She is determined. This is her story. Not very erotic.
These stories are well written and edited. The viciousness of the corporal punishment in the first story and the lack of any passion in the 3rd left me flat. The ex-husband was very creative in the second story.
The 4 Star rating is based on how well the stories were written, not so much on how I liked the stories. Enjoy if this is what you want to read about.
July 15, 2011
I found this one by accident for free on bn.com, and decided just to glance through the three stories. I really enjoyed the first one, just so-so on the second, and the last story was just too bizarre for words but at the same time obscenely fascinating. The first story was about a family's tradition for keeping the sex and romance alive in a marriage. While I question why the balance of responsibility was so significantly on the woman, I liked how the author explored accountability measures to ensure the couple made each other a priority through all of the different stages of life.
February 6, 2011
This was definitely not your everyday conventional romance. I don't know if I think it was a fantasy of a disgruntled man or an abused woman with low self-esteem. In any event, I do think the book is full of the unexpected and the characters quite complex. This book is a compilation of 3 short stories that focuses on the sexual interaction of three very different marriages. It can be a topic for hours.
In the first story: The Conjugal Clock examines how far generations of women will go to keep their family intact. Our heroine goes from a shared love to a level of servicing her husband that she seems to pretty much disappear. Moreover that if the wife ensures the husband's happiness, she will by extension become happier herself. Our wife here knows no limit to making her husband happy.
The second story: The Middle Man is an a study of 3 people in the relationship - but not in the manner that would immediately come to mind given the topic. It seems to stress the necessity of communication to keep the mundane at bay. Our protaginist goes to great lengths to keep a narcissist on the fringes of his life. Again our wife is the epitome of her husband's fantasy so that she can achieve happiness.
The third and final story: The Baby Maker is the authors admitted favorite story. Our wife uses blackmail to attain a husband and her goal is a foolproof scheme to allow her to have as many men and children as possible while she is young enough to have them. The husband here is very much a participant in his wife's far-fetched plan - but again in an unexpected way.
Pieces of the book could be termed erotic but this isn't your typical steamy short story. I even found myself sharing with a friend at work. Who in turn shared it with another
In the first story: The Conjugal Clock examines how far generations of women will go to keep their family intact. Our heroine goes from a shared love to a level of servicing her husband that she seems to pretty much disappear. Moreover that if the wife ensures the husband's happiness, she will by extension become happier herself. Our wife here knows no limit to making her husband happy.
The second story: The Middle Man is an a study of 3 people in the relationship - but not in the manner that would immediately come to mind given the topic. It seems to stress the necessity of communication to keep the mundane at bay. Our protaginist goes to great lengths to keep a narcissist on the fringes of his life. Again our wife is the epitome of her husband's fantasy so that she can achieve happiness.
The third and final story: The Baby Maker is the authors admitted favorite story. Our wife uses blackmail to attain a husband and her goal is a foolproof scheme to allow her to have as many men and children as possible while she is young enough to have them. The husband here is very much a participant in his wife's far-fetched plan - but again in an unexpected way.
Pieces of the book could be termed erotic but this isn't your typical steamy short story. I even found myself sharing with a friend at work. Who in turn shared it with another
September 14, 2011
Very interesting, very strange tales.
"The Conjugal Clock" tells the tale of a family tradition for keeping marriage sex-lives happy through regulation by a complex time clock. The device is creative and interesting and, while the characters weren't fully developed, they were intriguing. I'd love to read the male perspective on this strange family tradition.
"The Man in the Middle" is a wonderful psychological story of an ex-husband who gives his ex-wife explicit instructions to improve her current sex life. The scenes were devious and just funny enough to be light-hearted while still sexy enough to be titillating.
"The Baby Machine" was perhaps the strangest tale of all. Describing a woman who decides that she desperately wants to have as many babies as possible with the best possible gene pool, the story excites and disgusts with the tales of anonymous sex and the ending was satisfying for this reader.
Better than most freely available fiction of its type.
"The Conjugal Clock" tells the tale of a family tradition for keeping marriage sex-lives happy through regulation by a complex time clock. The device is creative and interesting and, while the characters weren't fully developed, they were intriguing. I'd love to read the male perspective on this strange family tradition.
"The Man in the Middle" is a wonderful psychological story of an ex-husband who gives his ex-wife explicit instructions to improve her current sex life. The scenes were devious and just funny enough to be light-hearted while still sexy enough to be titillating.
"The Baby Machine" was perhaps the strangest tale of all. Describing a woman who decides that she desperately wants to have as many babies as possible with the best possible gene pool, the story excites and disgusts with the tales of anonymous sex and the ending was satisfying for this reader.
Better than most freely available fiction of its type.
August 20, 2011
OMG! It's like a psychiatrist wrote erotica just to give us a mind-f**k. These stories are so twistedly well-written it is impossible not to keep thinking about them. There is alot of sex in each story, there was only any discernible love in the first one, but I would be hard pressed to put this book in a porn/erotica genre, but I couldn't put it down.
"The Conjugal Clock" was my favorite. Absolute genius, potentially life-changing, certainly cringe-worthy in a few spots and totally beautiful love.
"The Man in the Middle" was totally fun. Mark is so cool, he is my hero.
"The Baby Machine" ugh. I have this love to hate Mindy thing going on, she was a total train wreck, fascinating and very unsettling.
"The Conjugal Clock" was my favorite. Absolute genius, potentially life-changing, certainly cringe-worthy in a few spots and totally beautiful love.
"The Man in the Middle" was totally fun. Mark is so cool, he is my hero.
"The Baby Machine" ugh. I have this love to hate Mindy thing going on, she was a total train wreck, fascinating and very unsettling.
August 3, 2011
The clock - amazing idea! I wish I had one with all the bells and whistles but without the harsh punishments.
The ex and the emails - interesting concept. Sounds like she finally got what she needed in the end.
The baby maker - as another reviewer wrote "obscenely fascinating"!
The ex and the emails - interesting concept. Sounds like she finally got what she needed in the end.
The baby maker - as another reviewer wrote "obscenely fascinating"!
October 11, 2024
Wives in Service has three completely different stories in this anthology.
The first The Conjugal Clock was a unique view of how a woman should keep her husband happy with family punishment when she failed. The idea is for wife keep her man happy at home to keep him from looking elsewhere for his pleasure. Too bad more of our society today doesn't believe in this concept.
The second story, The Man in the Middle was a fun read and had some good laughs.
The third story, The Baby Machine contained some interesting ideas from a scientific point of view on reproduction and had some interesting ideas on personal relationships too.
All three stories kept my interest and I recommend this as an interesting read. The author has a good sense of humor, if unique.
The first The Conjugal Clock was a unique view of how a woman should keep her husband happy with family punishment when she failed. The idea is for wife keep her man happy at home to keep him from looking elsewhere for his pleasure. Too bad more of our society today doesn't believe in this concept.
The second story, The Man in the Middle was a fun read and had some good laughs.
The third story, The Baby Machine contained some interesting ideas from a scientific point of view on reproduction and had some interesting ideas on personal relationships too.
All three stories kept my interest and I recommend this as an interesting read. The author has a good sense of humor, if unique.
March 5, 2011
Ok... this guy has some awesome ideas, but the pacing is way too slow, and there is not enough "action" in the book. I got pretty bored rather quickly. I do not recommend it
July 16, 2011
Although this was a good read, it was a little nasty at times.
September 8, 2012
this is sooo NOT YOUR MOTHERS LOVE STORY.. it has a very dark story line that would not leave me when the book was over.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews