From the Top Shelf - Love's Passionate Frenzied Fury, part 1

You know those lurid bodice ripper novels? The kind that show some beefcake guy clutching a fair damsel and about to ravish her royally? Of course you do. But do you know where they come from? Rollin Hand does.

“Arthur, I need to speak with you for a moment.” It was Eleanor, Arthur’s wife. Arthur had just settled down in his study to listen to a brand new remastered recording. Bill Evans with Scott LeFaro and Paul Motian. Classic. Relaxing. Arthur sighed. It would have to wait. “What is it, dear?”

Eleanor bustled into the room. She was a bundle of energy as usual. Never stopped talking. She never just walked into a place, she burst in. She looked the part too--- a short voluptuous blonde with curly hair that cascaded in ringlets framing a round and very pretty face. They had been married for nine years. No children.

“I need help with my writing.”

Oh God. The latest of Eleanor’s nutty hobbies. Now she was writing these romances, for Christ’s sake. The kind with some alpha male in a loincloth on the cover clutching some quivering damsel who, incidentally, had exceptionally large breasts, said breasts having been revealed by the tearing action of said male’s oversized paw visited upon said damsel’s wardrobe. He understood they called them “bodice rippers”, an apt characterization. Before that it had been pottery (the garage was still a mess) and before that violin lessons (his ears had yet to recover).

“So how can I help dear?” he said smoothly. He hoped this wouldn’t take too long.

“It’s my latest novel, Love’s Furious Passionate Frenzy. You see I’ve reached a bit of a writer’s block and I need help. I am finding it difficult to understand my own heroine, get into her head, as it were.”

Understandable, thought Arthur. Nobody can figure out what’s in a woman’s head, not even another woman. “But I don’t know anything about damsels in distress or whatever it is, dear.”

“You don’t have to, you just need to help me understand her.”

Arthur was now totally confused and Eleanor could see it on his face. “No, well, you see Miss Cadivec, my creative writing teacher, always says that we have to live the lives of our characters, to experience what they do, and well, I need to actually be her to know how it feels.”

“How what feels? To have the buttons on your blouse popped off? I think not. It looks expensive.”

“No, no, not that. It’s ah…a bit more intimate.”

Arthur was now a little more interested. Eleanor was a very attractive woman, and to tell the truth, things had been slipping in the bedroom department lately. Arthur was always busy at work and Eleanor had her hobbies. They were drifting, it seemed.

“Well, er, you see, Miss Cadivec says that, ah… spankings are very popular in romance novels nowadays, and so I thought I’d work one into the plot. I have it all figured out. My heroine, Daisy is an English princess captured by Thorgar, the Viking, as a slave, only he falls in love with her and when they get back to Thorgar’s castle he wants to marry her only she runs away, against his express authorization, I might add, and he is very angry and when he catches up with her he decides to give her a good spanking…”

It was making Arthur’s head swim. Daisy? What kind of name was that? And if she’s a slave, of course she is forbidden to run away. Spankings? For grown women? Did Vikings do that? He’d always thought that Viking discipline usually involved something with an ax in it.

“….and so he puts her over his knee, tosses up her skirt and spanks her, right on the bottom!”

“It all sounds very intriguing dear but where do I come in?”

“Arthur, haven’t you been listening? I need to live Daisy, to be Daisy. I need a Thorgar.”

Arthur processed this for a minute. “You want me to spank you?”

“Yes. Yes. Precisely. I don’t know what that feels like. I can’t write about Daisy unless I know, you see. I need to have an authentic experience.”

This was too much. Arthur had to laugh. “Do I have to wear one of those horned helmets?”

Eleanor pouted. “Now you’re making fun of me.”

“Sorry, dear, but your request is a bit odd, wouldn’t you say?”

Eleanor remained firm. “Miss Cadivec says it is quite common in romances, historical or otherwise, and I should embrace the idea if I’m to write about it.”

“Hmm,” said Arthur. “All right, but how do we do this? I’ve never spanked anybody before.”

Eleanor brandished a sheaf of papers. “Here is what I’ve written so far. Just read it and speak Thorgar’s dialog. I’ll be Daisy.”

Arthur squinted at the page. “What ho, Glondorf, are the thralls secured in their bindings? Odin sends a fair wind, I’ll warrant.!”

“No. No. Not there. The next page. Here,” she said pointing.

Ok. There it was. “I think perhaps I must needs teach you a lesson, wench. You sorely try my patience.”
Eleanor reads, “You brute. My father will hear of your mistreatment of me. He will bring an army to rescue me.”

“Ha ha! Before he arrives I will have tamed you, you tawny vixen.” Tawny vixen? What drivel! Who reads this stuff?

Eleanor throws her arm across her forehead and turns away. “Unhand me you Viking oaf!”

Then the page was blank. “What now?” said Arthur.

“Now you put me over your knee and spank me; then I write the rest of it.”

“Eleanor, now really, I mean…” But Eleanor had dragged Arthur over to the couch and pushed him down. He sat down in the middle of the long couch. Eleanor hoisted her skirts and climbed down across his lap. Arthur’s gaze was immediately directed to the twin plump mounds of Eleanor’s delectable behind, now covered by the thinnest of panties. She looked back at him and said, “Now Arthur. Spank me like I’m your naughty slave girl. Be Thorgar.”

Arthur rested his hand on Eleanor’s satiny bottom. He felt an immediate charge in his lower regions. Hmm, this is interesting. He brought his hand up and gave Eleanor’s bottom a little slap. The flesh quivered. He slapped the other side.

“Not like that, Arthur. Harder. Like you mean it. I’m Daisy, the slave who ran away. Punish me.” Arthur reflected that maybe Thorgar should have just let her keep on running, but he raised his arm and gave ‘Daisy’ a crisp spank that cracked noisily right on the crowns of her bottom cheeks.

“Ouch! Yes, yes. Like that.”

Well, ok, thought Arthur, and he proceeded to apply a series of crisp spanks that echoed in the study like rifle shots. He alternated with spanks delivered to both cheeks and was mesmerized by the way Eleanor’s bottom would wobble upon impact. Eleanor kicked her legs and begged “Thorgar” for mercy. Clearly she was still playing a game, so Arthur kept on spanking, one brisk spank after another until “Daisy’s” behind was uniformly red, like two bright stoplights. He paused a moment to rip “Daisy’s” panties down, now revealing his wife’s cheeky bottom in all its fully nude glory.

“Oh, my!” Gasped Eleanor.

By now the feel of Eleanor’s bottom under his hand and the vision of her shameless wriggling was giving Arthur a ferocious hard on. By God if she wants Thorgar I’ll give her Thorgar. Arthur kept it up, laying on stinging spank after stinging spank. Finally he became aware that Eleanor had stopped calling him Thorgar.

“Arthur! Arthur, Stop, Please!” She wailed.

“What? Oh…” He paused, arm upraised. “Sorry, dear. I got a bit carried away.”

“Let me up. I think that’s quite enough, darling.”

“Are you sure?” asked Arthur. “Wouldn’t your Thorgar want to make doubly sure that his slave girl wouldn’t be tempted to run off again? Perhaps a few more…”

“No, No, Arthur that’s quite enough,” said Eleanor quickly. Arthur let her get up. Eleanor looked at Arthur wide eyed as she knelt upright on the couch and rubbed her burning bottom. But then without further ado she grabbed Arthur and toppled him backwards. By then she was smothering his face with kisses.

Arthur was nonplussed but he responded. Clothing flew off and before long Eleanor was straddling Arthur and riding him like a cowgirl on a bucking bronc. When it was all over Eleanor confessed that she’d been quite carried away, that his masterful spanking had awakened something quite delicious and that she couldn’t help herself. She rearranged her clothing and bustled off to write about Thorgar and Daisy, now absolutely sure as to how to describe it.

Arthur sat there numbly, a survivor (barely) of hurricane Eleanor. Still, it had been most interesting and pleasurable. Maybe there was something to this torrid romance tripe after all.

Will the novel be a success? We will find out next week.