'Delta Of Venus' by Anais Nin

Anais Nin penned an exotic erotic world made up of individuals writing their illustrious desires in order to make a living, desires that were not always raunchy but beautiful, instinctive and sensuous whilst remaining accessible.

I did not pick 'Delta Of Venus' up with the intention of seeing it as an erotic novel, and I do not think it should be. Yes there is sex but it feels real, Nin has crafted such stunning techniques that her stories are not all about 'the money shot' but working for it too. The read stirs you, pulls you and envelopes you to the characters, their wants, their desires and their relationships and not just the raw sex of it all. And whats more is that she does all of this despite instructions to leave the poetry of it all out.

Anais Nin brings out this eloquent female perspective to what felt like a male dominated genre and what is now a convoluted mess of poorly written trash erotica (do not get me started). Recently it feels like sex is thrown in our faces, either rough and ready or tastefully lit with gentle behaviors - it seems to lack a midway of natural emotions and reactions. So despite 'Delta Of Venus' been written in the 1940's you could place these stories, relationships and characters in any time and they would work as flawlessly as they do in the book.

Characters are not just over stepping what they feel are the decorums of sex but of gender, class and war revealing an insight into human behaviors and psychology.  Windows blocking the light from overhead planes, opium dens filled with entangling hands, voyeurism and becoming someone else. Not all these stories may be for you - but not all of them are to get you off, 'Delta Of Venus' is a window into the sexual world around you that you may never enter. And the beautiful thing is that they are trapped within these pages, you have no choice but to keep reading, you cannot skip to the end, Nin holds you with her characters until you have felt what they felt, witnessed what they have witnessed and explored what they have explored.

Nin has given a language to sex, and women a place within it. You may not revel in sexual abandon but you have witnessed it with the characters in the pages of 'Delta Of Venus'.  You have felt every tension, every doubt, every touch and every thought as they pushed boundaries and relationships.  Nin has brought you to examine human life in its most basic form and it is not always erotic, but natural delving into stories and desires that could have stemmed from any of us.

Get it here: Delta of Venus (Penguin Twentieth Century Classics): Written by Anais Nin, 1992 Edition, (New edition) Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd [Paperback]