BDSM RTV NEWS!!!!

29 january 2009


Book: I Was A Teenage Dominatrix - Shawna Kenney

Source: www.encorepub.com encore Online - Wilmington,NC,USA


IT WAS CLOSE TO MIDNIGHT ON A FRIDAY NIGHT, and the Drift Wood on Western Boulevard-Jacksonville’s most notorious strip club-is packed with cars and trucks, no doubt full of hungry Marines ready to unwind from a long, stressful week.

“I want to see what that’s all about,” I said to my husband.

He looked at me like I was marinated in blueberry martinis. “Normally the guy slips up and says that-only to end up sleeping on the couch,” he replied cautiously. “Are you serious?”

“Definitely,” I said. As a teenager my life was quite sheltered due to surgery. Much of my experiences came from living vicariously through writing and reading. Visiting a strip club is on my “bucket list.”

“The question, then, is not where do you want to go, but when do you want to go?” he asked.

Before I answered, thoughts of our next book-club read flooded my mind. Shawna Kenney’s first memoir, I Was A Teenage Dominatrix, breaches the proverbial adolescent door wide open, proving that good girls can go bad and not only emerge unscathed but richer, both financially and through experience gained.

Finally, I answered. “Now.”

This 122-page steam machine I Was A Teenage Dominatrix tells the story of how Kenney put herself through Washington’s American University by inflicting pain, punishment and kicking the fat, white asses of lawyers, lobbyists and, unsurprisingly, politicians while playing the role of a dominatrix.

“There were all kinds-doctors, Washington policy wonks and elected officials,” Kenney says of her clientele in a previous interview done for Salon Media Group. “I had at least one congressman, very old and wealthy. A Republican, of course.”

Focusing on the S&M subculture and her role as a paid dominatrix, Kenney not only pledges to provide us with arousing thrills, juicy professional tidbits and painfully funny personal accounts, but also a riveting romp with intellectual, sexual content in an extremely personal and universal way. In other words, encore book-club members, we’re in for a total page-turner that may rival the popularity of our Southern Fatality series. (But be forewarned: This book is unlike anything our club has seen before and is not for the faint of heart!)

However, do not mistake this work as a dull, smut-invested attempt at erotica or an infertile study on sexual perversion. The struggles and sacrifices of Kenney’s real-life experiences bleed through the pages vividly. Like a true coming-of-age piece, we’ll witness Kenney transform from a young, broke and miserable teen into a confident, dominating and cultured woman.

As Kenney herself writes, “I learned so much from this business and these men. Like that everyone gets their kicks in different ways. As long as no one’s being held against their will (my clients came to me, after all), there’s nothing wrong with desire. Whether porno movies, strip clubs or S&M games, none’s better than another.

“I’m no longer a scared girl struggling for anything. Now I know the power of being a woman, and it has nothing to do with what Madison Avenue wants us to believe-a dress size, a hair color or fragrance. It has to do with the essence of femininity. . . . I’m lucky because I got to experience what I’ve always felt every woman deserves: love, adoration, worship, confidence, respect.”

From fetishists, to feminists, to curious culture-vultures, there’s something within this work to please everyone as Kenney tells her story in a conspiratorial tone without resorting to pornographically explicit descriptions. Through this exciting work we’ll follow 19-year-old Shawna Kenney from the Maryland sticks to the ad in D.C.’s City Paper that forever changed her life: “Get Paid for Being a Bitch.”

“The spanking was my favorite part,” Kenney continued. “I think it’s fun and funny. And, anyway, most men deserve it.”

But what will keep Kenney’s coming-of-age, slap-and-whip memoir from becoming stale? Simple: her writing ability. Kenney appears to have a talent for describing even the most prosaic scenes with a fresh and amusing perspective reminiscent of her generation.

Not all handcuffs and nipple clamps, there will be plenty of eye-opening moments during which readers will understand why Kenney is said to be a “Gen X Judy Blume.” Attending college by day, while degrading men by night, this month Kenney will prove to us that the pen is mightier than the sword-or, in this case, the whip!

To join encore’s Book Club, go by Pomegranate Books to pick up a copy of the next book, I Am a Teenage Dominatrix. Book-Club members receive a a 15-percent off discount simply by mentioning encore. E-mail reader reviews to tiffanie107@hotmail.com by February 25th.