Vox

Nicholson Baker is a writer in detail - and having read  Room Temperature  and  The Mezzanine  I was looking forward to Vox. The title doesn't warn you, but this is all about phone sex. It's quite short, only 169pp, and not offensive in any way. In fact it's quite funny - and unfortunately totally unbelievable. Jim is fixated on female masturbation, Abby, among other fetishes, gets off on significant monuments related to U.S. history. It just wouldn't happen that two people so finely attuned would find themselves on the other end of the phone with their ideal phone-sex partner. I did get a little bored around halfway through when they were talking around the sexual act and telling each other stories, but one has to admire the stamina and, I suppose, outlay in effort and the dollars supposedly expended. I admired it chiefly for Abby's remark in the closing pages, "That was - that was - man," she said, "I saw the great seal of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts when I came."

Book was in good condition and received earlier than expected. 5* for seller.Story is written as a conversation as a virtual blind date - written as if they were socially distancing.

Was really had read not a great book at all

Not the book I thought that I was ordering! An interesting read nonetheless!

Hardly any sex. Boring.

A strange book that gets more absorbing as you read it. Tons of fun.

No problems.

Apparently this slim novella was famously given to Bill Clinton by Monica Lewinsky. I can see why. The whole novel is a conversation between a man and a woman over the phone, over one night. It is one of those sex chat lines so popular in the early 90s. A version of Tinder I guess. They discuss their many sexual escapades with other partners, dress for each other, pleasure each other and discuss the nature of sex and love and modern relationships.The book places the reader in a sort of voyeuristic relationship, a menage a trois with these two callers. It is in turns interesting, uncomfortable and erotic. Is it something I would read again? Probably not. I like suspense and it is utterly lacking in that. I guess if there was any it would be in the sexual play between the two which you know will end up in a climax. Pun intended. But you know. The purpose of their call is clearly defined from the get go.