For all of us who've read our horoscopes while enjoying our morning coffee (or tea), and hoped those star-inspired words might hold some truth comes a series of two-story anthologies by Liquid Silver Books, each with themes of one of the twelve zodiac signs.

The Taurus anthology features two stories revolving around dates as well as bullish Zodiac characters. First up is Dee S. Knight's "Safe Sex", a tale of a blind date going horribly wrong – but ends up being oh, so right. When Cynthia agrees to meet Vern in a posh restaurant for their blind date, Vern is sweet and entertains her with reasons her Taurus traits mesh perfectly with elements of his Pisces sign. But Cynthia can't take her mind – or her attention – off the sexy, dark stranger sitting alone at the bar. After a quick trip to the restroom, Cynthia finds the stranger awaiting her at the door promising her a night of passion if she leaves Vern. Unable to dump Vern but unwilling to tell the stranger no, she follows him into the restroom and samples him for dessert.

Bill Hawk has no idea why Cynthia entrances him so, but when he offers her a night of passion and she fails to come to him instead of leaving her boorish date, he has to try to forget her for good. He's leaving tomorrow morning for home in Nevada, after all, and doesn't have time to worry about a woman he can't have –which is much easier said than done.

When Cynthia tries to prove her point to her employers by robbing a bank and runs into none other than Bill, sparks fly again in a heated exchange of passion. This time Bill promises to change Cynthia's life – in the worst possible way. Will he be true to his word or will the heat between them convince him otherwise?

"Safe Sex" is well written, engaging and full of passion. Ms. Knight makes us feel Cynthia's torment about leaving Vern for the promises of Bill, which make the heroine sympathetic. While the premise when Bill and Cynthia meet the second time is a bit far-fetched and totally divergent from the characterization we've come to know of Cynthia in the first part of the story, Ms. Knight's writing encourages the reader to suspend disbelief long enough to figure out what's going on and why. The intimate scenes between Bill and Cynthia are a bit out of character for Cynthia as we've come to know her, but again the passion is so well written and Bill and Cynthia such strong characters, the reader is convinced to keep reading to the satisfying finale.

The second story in the Taurus anthology, "Cosmic Sensations" by Maggie Casper, wasn't quite as satisfying. From the start, we're plunged into a first date scene again, this time between Zoe Hamilton, owner of the New-Age Cosmic Sensations cart at the mall and John Richardson, construction worker. Instead of coming to know and understand the characters and story, we're immediately in the middle of the first sex scene, trying to make sense of what's happening and why. There isn't much in the way of conflict – actually, the only hint of conflict in the story is that Zoe is intuitive and doesn't think John can deal with it.

What I miss most in "Cosmic Sensations" is a story. There's plenty of sizzling sex, hot looks and interaction between Zoe and John, but the story itself is very unrealistic to me. After Zoe and John share their first passionate night, Zoe leaves without word. When John encounters her the next day at her mall stand, she's hugging another man. Instead of asking questions, John promptly assaults the man. When Zoe demands an apology, John apologizes, sweet-talks her and has Zoe falling back into his arms again with a kiss within a page.

Zoe leaves the mall and goes home to shower — only to find John banging on her door, furious she rode her bike home. She finally screams at him to go away. Before he leaves, he manages to convince her to allow him to drive her to work in the morning. John's protectiveness is not reassuring and romantic; it's demanding and fierce. Zoe's ability to continue giving in to his demands makes her appear foolish.

John's anger continues to boil over again and again, and quite frankly turned me off from the story, especially the way he threatened to spank Zoe on more than one occasion. Combined with his predatory, angry nature what could have been playful promises were more ominous and controlling. Beyond the heated verbal exchanges and intense sex scenes, there wasn't much keeping my interest in the story beyond the fact that I had to finish it in order to write this review. The anger and possessiveness in John's character completely turned me off.

I had difficulty giving this anthology a 6.5 rating as I did enjoy Ms. Knight's "Safe Sex". Perhaps the antagonism and anger between Zoe and John in "Cosmic Sensations" will prove more engaging for other readers, but if I had to rank the stories separately, "Safe Sex" would receive a 4.0 and "Cosmic Sensations" a 2.5.

Reviewed By: Sashi Ketsel
© June 2005