Is the debut novel by a K. Mapson who I am given to understand is in fact our very own noder Pandeism Fish, written just this year. It's an erotic science fiction novel that he published for... some reason.
Now I didn't go looking for this. In fact, Mr Fish asked that I review it on here. He even offered to send me a copy. But no, I said, I'm going to buy it in paperback off Amazon like a paying customer. It is self published and print on demand and given that it doesn't appear to have sold many copies yet, my copy may be the only one in all of Britain. Physically, paper quality good, but the formatting was a bit thick of margin and left aligned, rather than justified, of text.
Well, I promised Mr Fish and honest review, so here it is. I have to give him some respect for his bravery. I have been writing myself (though thankfully not erotica) and I would not trust any of you lot with my writing knowing it was me. I don't write erotica, though, so maybe I could.
Executive Summary
Dare you step into Pandeism Fish's magical realm?
And in a bit more detail?
Well, it's that isn't it? If I didn't know Fish from here, I would assume that it was basically a journey through the man's magical realm. Our protagonist is a Shell Vreeden who is an anthropology student somewhere in America, and is picked from one of millions of aspirants to go through a portal over the Canadian plains into the world of the Vadyans, a beautiful purple-and-gold alien species who somehow have the ability to speak human languages and live in a utopia, or so people think. On the way there she's accosted by a G-Man and made to take some sort of a transponder through the portal with her. We're also treated to some infodumping about how she's basically a bisexual nymphomaniac and apropos of nothing bangs a fuck-buddy named Max as a sort of farewell thrust.
On the other side of the portal is the magical realm of Vadya itself. It's a utopia run by an AI superintelligence called 64 which handles all the work and leaves the Vadyans to their own devices. The Vadyans are all 11/10 supermodels of various varieties that look perfectly like normal humans though their skin is on a spectrum of purple and gold, they dress in designer lingerie type outfits all the time, and have seven fingers and a tail that's prehensile and retractile. They're also preternaturally agile. And they need to have sex three times a day to survive. And they're all bisexual.
Shell is soon enough boldly coming where no anthropology student has come before! After being genetically altered into a Vadyan herself. Suffice to say, there's a big infodump to justify why this is. Basically, all Vadyans have to subsist off sexual fluids - specifically, jizz. By a process that's not sufficiently explained, Vadyan males synthesise a nutritious fluid in their spunk and have no real refractory periods a lot of the time, so all their women (and there's a 4:1 female to male population ratio, of course) engage in multifarious orgies to swallow his seed. And each other's. Because their own vaginal juices are also nutritious. Also they can cum out their nipples as well, which is described as "nipplecum." I wish I had never read that word because now I have to type it. Oh, and none of them shit. But they still have arses, and their arses are prehensile and can milk a penis atop this. And they can have anal orgasms though I don't think these produce fluids. But their anuses are self lubricating as well.
I think you can tell where this is going next, don't you?
Yeah, lots of strangely tersely described alien fucking. And indeed it is terse. The same few terms for the same few things all the time. Strangely... perfunctory. Those prehensile tails? Yep, they go places. Just like you expect. There's also a whole load of ritual about it. We are informed that a Vadyan breakfast is some sort of ritual known as "Firstcum." This is rather baroque in its description. Basically, one woman is designated "firstwife" and is basically in pole position to make with the cocksucking. Number two is described as the Holder and her job is to massage his balls to ensure his cocksnot is suitably nutritious and abundant. The other two, well, they pitch in as and when. And now, a word about tastes. Apparently every Vadyan's cum and/or ladyjuices have their own taste. The males taste of savoury dishes and the females all taste of fruit. In fact, such is the variance in tastes that we're told later on about how one of the most popular songs on Vadya is about wanting to travel the world to find out the large variety of the ladyparts' tastes around the place.
Oh yes. They all move between households as and when. And they don't really need to do any work other than what they choose to. The rest of the time is spent fucking, listening to what I assume is an equivalent of K-pop, or talking philosophy, though those discussions don't generally get anywhere interesting and usually ends in more beige prose fucking. This is because 64, the omnipotent AI that runs their society, has an army of robots that keeps all the scutwork done.
The fucking takes up the vast majority of the novel and I'm afraid it's highly repetitive. There are large numbers of characters with individual names but little difference in personality because they seem to only exist as a name and a flavour of "pussypink." Once you've seen the tail up the arse and the lady who's cunt tastes of papaya, it becomes very, well, samey. Well done Mr Fish. You've made a utopia where everyone has loads of sex really fucking dull. But then again, I'm wrong, as we are told that the combinatorial explosions of different participants in a Firstcum, it is statistically impossible for it to be dull or samey. Well, maybe to do, no, but to read about? Nope, still dull. At this point I was very much "get on with the plot" and had gone from "wahey!" to laughing outrageously to rolling my eyes at yet more shagging described in exactly the same terms again and again. And sure enough, the plot was got on with but only at around the 80% mark. You know that transponder the G-man insisted that Shell take to Vadya? Well, it allowed a load of soldiers to invade Vadya for whatever reason by opening another portal, but they failed because other reasons, and basically Shell both got her doctorate by temporally shifted Zoom call, and stayed on Vadya where she lived the rest of her life as a seven fingered tailed sex rocket. Yay...?
And this is what really pisses me off here. This... is a missed opportunity. Maybe if it had a quarter as much banging and more discussion about the practicalities and even desirability of a free love utopia where work is unnecessary and the most conflict everyone has is whether atheism or pandeism is superior, there would be something here. But I'm afraid, as it is, it's just Pandeism Fish's magical realm, and now I have been to it, I do not want to go there again. Not least because it would result in me encountering the word "nipplecum" once more.
Also, the existence of this book on my shelf is going to make bringing a woman back to my flat rather awkward if she sees it. There's a reason I normally get dodgy PDFs of the books I review on here.