Review & Giveaway: 50 Ways to Play: BDSM for Nice People by Don and Debra MacCleod
Friday, August 24
Author: Don MacCleod and Debra MacCleod
Series: n/a
Genre: non-fiction
Publisher: Tarcher
Format: paperback & ebook
Date/Year: August 2012
Reviewed by: Andrea
*This book was provided to the reviewer by the publisher in exchange for an honest review
Summary from the publisher:
This simple and highly accessible non-fiction guide to BDSM (Bondage, Dominance, Sadism, and Masochism) features 50 edgy and erotic adventures to sample and is the perfect companion for the millions of fans of the Fifty Shades trilogy (Fifty Shades of Grey, Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed), the Anne Rice/A.N. Roquelaure Sleeping Beauty trilogy (The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty, Beauty's Punishment, Beauty's Release) and Sylvia Day's Crossfire novels (Bared to You and Reflected in You). This instruction book for couples contains one warning: you should try this at home!
From turning your ho hum bedroom into a “Red Room of Desire,” to exploring the fine art of Japanese rope bondage—and a few other ideas perhaps better not mentioned in polite company—50 Ways to Play invites couples who might otherwise think of themselves as “average” or “nice” to walk on the wild side. According to husband-and-wife writers Debra and Don Macleod, sex should pack a punch—it’s meant to catch you off guard. The fifty sexy and surprising “ways to play” offered up in this book are guaranteed to turn up the heat in your sex life.
From turning your ho hum bedroom into a “Red Room of Desire,” to exploring the fine art of Japanese rope bondage—and a few other ideas perhaps better not mentioned in polite company—50 Ways to Play invites couples who might otherwise think of themselves as “average” or “nice” to walk on the wild side. According to husband-and-wife writers Debra and Don Macleod, sex should pack a punch—it’s meant to catch you off guard. The fifty sexy and surprising “ways to play” offered up in this book are guaranteed to turn up the heat in your sex life.
I was offered the chance to review a book called 50 Ways to Play: BDSM for Nice People. I thought it might be interesting since my husband and I have played around with BDSM a little bit but never delved very deeply into it. I decided I had better run it by my husband first though, just in case he didn’t share my interest in exploring. His response was a very enthusiastic, “Hell Yeah!” so I agreed to do the review.
We received the book and I wasn’t expecting much. It’s a rather small book, just a bit larger than a regular paperback, and it’s right around 100 pages long. How much detail could they really go into in such a small book? My husband and I had a plan going into the review. We would both read it, discuss our thoughts on the book as a whole, discuss the ideas presented in the book, decide if we wanted to try any of those ideas, and then we would get to the fun part of trying those ideas.
I read the book first and then gave it to my husband. It’s a quick read and we were each able to finish it in a couple of hours. We both thought it was a very user friendly book and appreciated the small bits of humor that were thrown in. It starts out with the basics and gives easy to understand descriptions of the methods and tools used in BDSM. I liked that everything was presented and it was up to us to pick and choose which things were appealing to us. My husband was happy to see that the authors covered such a wide range of topics. They went from extremely basic concepts all the way through more advanced practices. We agreed that this book would be good for people just discovering BDSM or with only a little bit of experience. We fall into the slightly experienced category so it was great for us.
When we finally had some uninterrupted, child-free time, we sat down and discussed all 50 ideas in depth. My husband and I regularly talk about fantasies and turn-ons, so I was surprised at how many topics the book brought up that we had never discussed before. There were things we both dismissed immediately, some things only one of us found arousing, things we had been doing previously, and then the new things we both found appealing and wanted to try. We each learned some new things about our partner that day. We ended up talking and shopping for new toys online for a couple of hours. It was fun and a nice bonding experience for us.
There were a few things we weren’t impressed with. We both thought that kitchen utensils as sex toys or spanking devices weren’t a great idea. My husband thought the detailed thrusting techniques for penetration were common knowledge and most of them should not have been included. I disagreed and told him that if he already knew all of them, he should have been using more of those techniques previously :) I thought the anal play and anal sex sections were lacking in a lot of details. My husband disagreed and said I have an abnormal interest in all things anal and it was more than adequate for normal people :)
In the end, we were already practicing 24 items, we dismissed 19 items due to lack of mutual interest, and that left 7 new things we plan on trying. We have a fairly well stocked toy box but decided to add a few more things to it. My husband has been wanting a special piece of furniture for a while now and finally convinced me that it would be a good idea with the help of this book. The others were variations in practice or behavior we plan on adding. Some of them have already been tried and approved and others are still waiting to be tried. None of them are going to drastically change our sex life, they will simply add a bit more variation in what we’ve been doing. I think the biggest benefit for us was getting to know each other and our turn-ons a little bit better and we have this book to thank for that.
We received the book and I wasn’t expecting much. It’s a rather small book, just a bit larger than a regular paperback, and it’s right around 100 pages long. How much detail could they really go into in such a small book? My husband and I had a plan going into the review. We would both read it, discuss our thoughts on the book as a whole, discuss the ideas presented in the book, decide if we wanted to try any of those ideas, and then we would get to the fun part of trying those ideas.
I read the book first and then gave it to my husband. It’s a quick read and we were each able to finish it in a couple of hours. We both thought it was a very user friendly book and appreciated the small bits of humor that were thrown in. It starts out with the basics and gives easy to understand descriptions of the methods and tools used in BDSM. I liked that everything was presented and it was up to us to pick and choose which things were appealing to us. My husband was happy to see that the authors covered such a wide range of topics. They went from extremely basic concepts all the way through more advanced practices. We agreed that this book would be good for people just discovering BDSM or with only a little bit of experience. We fall into the slightly experienced category so it was great for us.
When we finally had some uninterrupted, child-free time, we sat down and discussed all 50 ideas in depth. My husband and I regularly talk about fantasies and turn-ons, so I was surprised at how many topics the book brought up that we had never discussed before. There were things we both dismissed immediately, some things only one of us found arousing, things we had been doing previously, and then the new things we both found appealing and wanted to try. We each learned some new things about our partner that day. We ended up talking and shopping for new toys online for a couple of hours. It was fun and a nice bonding experience for us.
There were a few things we weren’t impressed with. We both thought that kitchen utensils as sex toys or spanking devices weren’t a great idea. My husband thought the detailed thrusting techniques for penetration were common knowledge and most of them should not have been included. I disagreed and told him that if he already knew all of them, he should have been using more of those techniques previously :) I thought the anal play and anal sex sections were lacking in a lot of details. My husband disagreed and said I have an abnormal interest in all things anal and it was more than adequate for normal people :)
In the end, we were already practicing 24 items, we dismissed 19 items due to lack of mutual interest, and that left 7 new things we plan on trying. We have a fairly well stocked toy box but decided to add a few more things to it. My husband has been wanting a special piece of furniture for a while now and finally convinced me that it would be a good idea with the help of this book. The others were variations in practice or behavior we plan on adding. Some of them have already been tried and approved and others are still waiting to be tried. None of them are going to drastically change our sex life, they will simply add a bit more variation in what we’ve been doing. I think the biggest benefit for us was getting to know each other and our turn-ons a little bit better and we have this book to thank for that.
Ratings:
Overall: 3.75
Sensuality level: It’s a non-fiction sex manual so it’s not exactly erotic on it’s own. The sensuality is up to you when trying what you’ve learned :)
For a complete understanding and definition of the ratings at Seductive Musings, click here
Other Reviews:
- Navigating the Finite
- Goodreads (avg rating as of 8/23/2012 3.62 stars)
To celebrate the release of 50 Ways to Play: BDSM for Nice People I have one copy of the book to giveaway to a lucky Musings follower. Here's how you can enter to win....
*Seductive Musings is an Amazon affiliate and receives a very small referral fee for purchases made via the links on the blog and through the Seductive Musings Amazon Store. Read the full disclosure here.
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