I like sexy historical novels, and when they're spliced with humor too, it's almost an unbeatable pairing. ( )

The love story is not the real draw for me here, though it's sweet; the portrait of Heian court life and the erotic tales framed thereby are what I love best about this charming book, especially "The Phosphorescence of Ise" and "The Cold Fish" ( )

This book is a novel about life in 11th century Japan. The heroine is a poetess who has a lover who doesn't please her, but she wants to please him so she has a verbally skilled stable boy tell her "sexy" stories in a very quiet voice while the apparently deaf lover makes love to her & this way she can reach orgasm.

The writing is well crafted. I think the feelings & relationships are very anachronistic. I don't think the author has the ability to imagine what the lives of her characters were really like, or to understand (or even care about) how those lives felt to those who lived them. Many of the "sex" stories are quite violent and brutal. There is a sort of explanation for this but I don't think it makes sense.

Read for historical reference and to taste the mores of sexual play of the era. More of a reconstructed historical memoir than a real memoir. ( )