Here are 100 books that Mr. Benson fans have personally recommended if you like
Mr. Benson.
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I am fifty-five years old, and I’ve been active in the BDSM lifestyle since my early twenties. My Safeword series was written because, at the time, most of the BDSM hitting the ebook market was clearly written by people who’d never felt the sting of a whip. I was certain I could do better, and eventually, after six attempts, I wrote something I thought a publisher might be interested in. Fifteen years later, I write mostly paranormal romance, but a fair amount of kink and power exchange still sneaks in. Vampires and werewolves aren’t known for submitting to others, after all.
The Beauty Series is actually three books, written as one long story: The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty, Beauty's Punishment, Beauty's Release.
When I read the books, sometime around 1989, I didn’t know Anne Rice had written them. I only knew this was proof that yet another person felt the same as me about sex.
These books aren’t written as consensual sex, but they’re pure fantasy, so it worked okay for me then and still does today.
Before E.L. James' Fifty Shades of Grey and Sylvia Day's Bared to You, there was Anne Rice's New York Times best seller The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty
In the traditional folktale of "Sleeping Beauty," the spell cast upon the lovely young princess and everyone in her castle can only be broken by the kiss of a Prince. It is an ancient story, one that originally emerged from and still deeply disturbs the mind's unconscious. In the first book of the series, Anne Rice (author of Beauty's Kingdom), writing as A.N. Roquelaure, retells the Beauty story and probes the unspoken implications…
I’m Kai Storm, author of reality-based urban fiction and erotica, erotica blogger, YouTuber, and Podcaster. I love reading books that feel real, that make you feel, and that teach you something as they entertain you.
This book was given to me as a gift, and the lessons it taught me as I read those ancient pages.
It had me clutching my pearls, and it disgusted me at other parts, but at the same time, I wanted/needed to read that book in order to write a book in that style.
The classic French erotic bestseller that preceded Fifty Shades of Grey
A beautiful young French woman, known only as 'O', is taken by her lover Rene to a splendid mansion near Paris. Here, she is initiated into an elite secret society, where she must learn to serve the sexual fantasies of Rene and his fellow members. But she must also explore the nature of her own darkest desires - and confront just how far she is willing to go for love...
I am fifty-five years old, and I’ve been active in the BDSM lifestyle since my early twenties. My Safeword series was written because, at the time, most of the BDSM hitting the ebook market was clearly written by people who’d never felt the sting of a whip. I was certain I could do better, and eventually, after six attempts, I wrote something I thought a publisher might be interested in. Fifteen years later, I write mostly paranormal romance, but a fair amount of kink and power exchange still sneaks in. Vampires and werewolves aren’t known for submitting to others, after all.
I’m actually recommending two books here: Carrie's Story and Safe Word – a duet telling the full story.
Whether these came before the internet was a “thing” is arguable, but they were certainly published before ebooks had a chance to change the publishing industry.
They are well written, and once again come clearly from someone who understands the lifestyle. These books are highly recommended, and come towards the end of my list mainly because I’m doing this (up to this point) chronologically.
Carrie's Story is regarded as one of the finest erotic novels ever written- smart, devastatingly sexy and, at times, shocking, Molly Weatherfield has penned a book that is standing the test of time alongside The Story of O and Justine in this new era of "BDSM romance," a la 50 Shades of Grey the whips and cuffs are out of the closet and "chateau porn" has given way to mommy porn. Carrie's Story remains at the head of the class, literally. Imagine The Story of O starring a Berkeley PhD candidate in comparative literature, who moonlights as a bike messenger,…
I am fifty-five years old, and I’ve been active in the BDSM lifestyle since my early twenties. My Safeword series was written because, at the time, most of the BDSM hitting the ebook market was clearly written by people who’d never felt the sting of a whip. I was certain I could do better, and eventually, after six attempts, I wrote something I thought a publisher might be interested in. Fifteen years later, I write mostly paranormal romance, but a fair amount of kink and power exchange still sneaks in. Vampires and werewolves aren’t known for submitting to others, after all.
I listed the first book, but I’m actually talking about the entire thirty-seven-book Gor series, which spans the fifty-seven years from 1966 through the present day.
However, I don’t necessarily recommend this series, which is why it’s in last place, but it’s an important footnote in the history of BDSM fiction and must be mentioned.
In this fictional world, women are slaves, and there are all kinds of complicated rules about how they must act around free men. The many slave positions described in the books have made it into the modern kinky lexicon, along with other phrases and terms.
If you’re going to read one, I would suggest picking a later book at random—Norman’s craft gets a little better over time. It wasn’t terrible to start, but it’s better, later. He wrote (and is still writing) an intriguing world that obviously hooked a whole lot of readers.
The first novel in the long-running sword-and-planet series set on a Counter-Earth, where warriors rise above the chaos of bondage and brutality.
Tarl Cabot has always believed himself to be a citizen of Earth. He has no inkling that his destiny is far greater than the small planet he has inhabited for the first twenty-odd years of his life. One frosty winter night in the New England woods, he finds himself transported to the planet of Gor, also known as Counter Earth, where everything is dramatically different from anything he has ever experienced. It emerges that Tarl is to be…
As a queer, nonbinary author and lover of historical fiction, I’ve spent countless hours thinking about how to tell stories I care about in a genre that has traditionally excluded people like me. We all know that life was hard for LGBTQ+ folks growing up in, well, basically any time in recent history. There’s a time and place for realistic depictions of those hardships, but we also need space to imagine ourselves in more joyful, fantastical depictions of the past. After all, if straight people can enjoy Jane Austen without thinking too hard about the legal rights of women during that era, why can’t queer people do the same?
By some bizarre coincidence, I’m not the only writer publishing a queer YA retelling of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde coming out this year! Luckily, this retelling is a much different take from mine, envisioning the story from the perspective of two young Black boys growing up in Victorian London.
Too many films, television, and books still seem to think that people of color didn’t exist in Britain before, say, the 1960s. (which is ridiculous, as London was a major port city for centuries, not to mention the seat of the British Empire.)
This book helps set the record straight, cleverly deploying the original novella’s themes of respectability and duality to explore the unique pressures faced by gay Black men during that era.
In the Remixed Classics series, authors from marginalized backgrounds reinterpret classic works through their own cultural lens to subvert the overwhelming cishet, white, and male canon. This gothic YA remix of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde subverts the cishet white perspective of the original, starring a Black queer teen searching for the reason behind his best friend’s disappearance and the arrival of a magnetic stranger.
London, 1885. Gabriel Utterson, a 17-year-old law clerk, has returned to London for the first time since his life― and that of his dearest friend, Henry Jekyll―was derailed by a scandal that led to his…
As an author of historical fiction, I have a number of time periods that I go back to again and again. Both the 1960s (specifically, the late 1960s) and the 1990s are two of those eras that I just can’t get enough of. The parallels between these two time periods are very compelling: both were times of political upheaval and amazing music, with young people leading the charge, hoping to create a better world than the one they were disenchanted with.
A wonderful coming-of-age novel set against the tumultuous backdrop of the Vietnam War.
Two young men are lucky enough to find kindred spirits in one another and then suddenly, they are wrenched apart – one off to college in Wisconsin, and the other drafted off to fight in the Vietnam War.
The two men take up a correspondence, leaning on each other and sharing their thoughts, fears, hopes, and dreams through the only avenue available to them: the written word. Their letters are a lifeline for both.
This novel is a journey through the heart and mind of two young disillusioned men who learn all about friendship and love through letters, finding themselves again through each other.
An LGBTQ coming of age story about fighting for someone you love, brought to life in this Vietnam War era historical fiction.
It seemed as though Anthony and Sam had just found each other, and now they were already being torn apart. Sam to college in Wisconsin; Anthony across the world fighting in the Vietnam War. Through their separate journeys, they discover themselves, and rely on the one way to share their secret together. Corresponding with secret messages, scary truths, and fears about the war, readers will follow Anthony and Sam’s path to friendship, love, and survival.
I’ve been a longtime reader of romantic historical and fantasy fiction, and I love to see positive queer representation in those genres. Regardless of who we love, we all need a little escapism in our lives, and it’s even better when it has heart and depth as well as romance and humor and happy ever afters (and plenty of plot). My favorite relationship dynamic is not quite enemies-to-lovers and not quite opposites-attract…it’s more direct-vs-sneaky. I hope you enjoy my five favorites in this very specific niche!
You’d be forgiven for thinking the ex-highwayman is the sneaky character in this one. Still, in fact, it’s the aristocrat with the outlandish plan to rob his own father (or perhaps it’s not so strange that the reformed working-class shlub is more honest than the privileged rich man!).
Percy is very upfront about one thing: his attraction to the sober coffee purveyor, the Kit of the title, who reluctantly agrees to teach him stand-and-delivery tactics. This makes for a funny and refreshing dynamic between the leads. I find it an enjoyable light read with a great deal of heart.
"The Queer Principles of Kit Webb kept me up all night! I simply couldn’t put it down."— Tessa Dare, New York Times bestselling author
“Sharp, smart, and oh-so-swoony, The Queer Principles of Kit Webb reminds me that Cat Sebastian is an author at the absolute top of her game.”— Rachel Hawkins, New York Times bestselling author
Named one of Goodreads "Readers' Top 100 Romances of 2020-2022"
Critically acclaimed author Cat Sebastian pens a stunning historical romance about a reluctantly reformed highwayman and the aristocrat who threatens to steal his heart.
Kit Webb has left his stand-and-deliver days behind him. But…
In Villa Air-Bel, I wrote about an extraordinary man, Varian Fry. A journalist sent to France in 1940 with a list of 200 artists to save, he expected to stay 2 weeks. He stayed 15 months, establishing the Emergency Rescue Committee. By the time the Vichy police expelled him, he’d saved 2,000 people. Who has the courage to put their lives on the line for strangers? In The Betrayal of Anne Frank: A Cold Case Investigation, I recorded how five people risked their lives to hide the Frank family until they were finally betrayed. Two of the helpers were sent to concentration camps. It takes courage to resist Fascism. Would I/ we have that courage?
The Irish writer Colm Toíbín is one of our greatest novelists.
The Magician, a fictional biography of the German writer Thomas Mann, is a madcap family epic. So immediate are Toíbín’s portraits of Mann, his wife, and his children that one thinks one knows them. But Toíbín also offers a brilliant portrait of Mann as a writer.
We get inside his mind as he writes about his unfulfilled erotic desires. But perhaps what is most compelling for me is Toíbín’s portrait of Germany in the 1930s. Mann fled Germany for Switzerland in 1933 when Hitler became Chancellor, and eventually moved to the U.S. He was one of the few ex-pat German writers to speak publicly against the Nazis.
What is most impressive is how Toíbín examines, through Mann, what made Germany susceptible to Nazism. I have not read it more subtly and more compellingly explained.
THE SUNDAY TIMES TOP TEN BESTSELLER WINNER OF THE RATHBONES FOLIO PRIZE 2022 SHORTLISTED FOR THE WALTER SCOTT PRIZE FOR HISTORICAL FICTION 2022
From one of our greatest living writers comes a sweeping novel of unrequited love and exile, war and family.
The Magician tells the story of Thomas Mann, whose life was filled with great acclaim and contradiction. He would find himself on the wrong side of history in the First World War, cheerleading the German army, but have a clear vision of the future in the second, anticipating the horrors of Nazism.
I’ve always loved retellings of all kinds, but my favorites subvert expectations, and I believe queer retellings provide the richest opportunities for subversion. In my own writing, I try to balance honoring the source material while also providing new perspectives, and nothing helps me achieve that more than reading widely. Retellings were also the subject of my master's critical thesis for Hamline University’s writing for children and young adults program.
What I loved most about Ferraro’s retelling of The Mysteries of Udolpho was his unique take on the classic YA love triangle. Not only does this love triangle stand out because it’s queer (all three characters involved are young men), but because it wasn’t obvious to me from the beginning how the love triangle would resolve. Typically, in love triangle stories, I can tell who the character – and thus the author – prefers. I’m pretty confident about who is going to win out in the end.
But Ferraro took his time developing each love interest, and his main character’s struggle to pick one over the other is palpable and well-written. I was left guessing until the very end, and the way the love triangle resolved was both surprising and satisfying.
In this queer gothic romance, a young marquis caught between freedom and passion, honor and love will have to unravel a centuries-old curse to find his own happy ending.
Trapped in a world of straight expectations, queer marquis Emile longs for independence. So, when his aunt declares he must marry to produce an heir or be disowned, he runs away disguised as a servant until he can come of age and reclaim his inheritance.
All Emile needs to do is keep his head down and bide his time, but he quickly stumbles into a mystery beyond his imagination. While working…
I grew up feeling invisible in media, and absent in history. My Iranian history was hidden from me by a culture that believed shielding young people from trauma was the right thing to do, and my queer history was hidden from me by a homophobic time. I’m passionate about the power of seeing yourself represented in storytelling and in history, and have devoted much of my life to telling queer stories, and queer historical stories. As a parent, as a queer Iranian storyteller, as a passionate believer in art as a tool for empathy, these are books I think will both entertain readers and inspire them to love their fellow humans a little more.
My novel received a Stonewall Honor, which was one of the great thrills of my life. But the winner of the Stonewall Award that year was The Black Flamingo by Dean Atta, and let me tell you, this is the book you want to lose to, the book you want to laugh to and cry to and cling to.
I’ve read it multiple times. Written in brilliant poetic verse, it’s a celebration of Blackness and queerness and all the complex emotions that make us human. I love it and cherish it, and you will too.
'Atta's bold verse novel calls to its readers to find their own blazing, performative inner truth' - Guardian
WINNER OF THE STONEWALL BOOK AWARD
A boy comes to terms with his identity as a mixed-race gay teen - then at university he finds his wings as a drag artist, The Black Flamingo. A bold story about the power of embracing your uniqueness. Sometimes, we need to take charge, to stand up wearing pink feathers - to show ourselves to the world in bold colour.
