Rating: 
Summary: Not so much erotica as romance with explicit sex
Review: This is the first Black Lace book I have read. I was expecting (hoping?) that it would be essentially erotica, but I found it to be mostly a romance story with some explicit sex scenes. These sex scenes I found hottish - not amazingly sensual and creative, but sufficient to warm me up a little. I did not find that the sexuality moved the story along (as I would expect in quality erotica), but rather the story stopped when the characters became sexual.The story itself concerns Chloe DuBois, an exotic dancer, who is rescued from some dimly imaged fray by David Imakita, a multi-millionaire executive of a computer games company. I suppose when you have beautiful people with lots of money, your plot can go most anywhere...I didn't really buy the plot, but I decided this wasn't intended to be Great Literature, and just kept reading. It's interesting that the author, Emma Holly, apparently did a fair amount of research on Japanese culture to write character David Imakita. I respected this, but was disappointed that it was not really woven into the plot in an integral way. Neither does she really tackle the issue of an interracial couple. Black Lace books are marketed as erotica for women, written by women. I would have thought that I'd find myself really in sync with the female protagonist, but instead I found her, while sympathetic, a simple "type," plucked from a made-for-TV movie. On the other hand, I was really intrigued by the male characters -- David and his bodyguard Sato -- and wished she had gotten into their heads more. This book was not so compelling that I raced through it, but it was interesting enough to finish. I found the erotic element rather ho-hum, but not dreary enough to keep me from trying another Black Lace (or Emma Holly) book again.
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