FEVER: Sensual Stories by Women Writers

Editor Slung (Slow Hand, 1992, etc.) has compiled another collection of erotica written by women. Most of the authors are not well known, and all of the pieces are being published for the first time. Each author has added a note about the writing or the meaning of her story. Slung has selected carefully -- to give a sense of range and inclusiveness (aesthetic as well as sexual). There's some basic sweaty bump-and-grind action, some lesbian sex, and some ""wow-I-never-knew-it-could-be-like-this"" writing. And most amusing and hot in its own way is Jenny Diski's ""Yarn,"" a feminist fairy tale in which the narrator, a miller's daughter who speaks disparagingly of someone named ""Chaser, or Chooser, or Chancer,"" also turns the tables on Rumpelstiltskin by giving him such a good roll in the spun straw that he forgets his name.