Tuesday, May 17, 2011

What is it about a bad boy?



There’s just something about a bad boy that sets something off inside me that I can’t explain in a few words. I’m not talking about “bad boys” who commit crimes such as murder, theft, rape, and the like. I’m talking about Bad Boys who can make you lose all thought, that can make you week kneed and breathless with just a look. The sort who use their voice to command the simplest of requests or the most demanding ones—they get me every time. The one’s who push the limits and don’t follow the norm as described by the general public of today’s society or that of yesterday’s. The one’s who dare you to tell them they are bad.

He can be that bad boy lawyer who comes within inches of over stepping the legal lines to prove his client innocent or guilty. He can be that bad boy doctor who refuses to settle on a diagnosis because it “seems” to fit his patient’s aliments and he has a full slate and a full social life. He can even be the taxi driver who pushes his luck to get his client to their destination without getting tickets on the way. Or, he can be the Dom in a relationship and this is where I’ll drive this particular short.

To me a Dom in a relationship is the “Bad Boy,” who pushes the limits on his partner. Never an easy person to read by any means. He’ll play on the edge with your emotions, your physical and sometimes mental limits. A bad boy who takes pleasure from your discomfort and sometimes pain. It fills his needs as well as your own. Why is it so fascinating to me that simple commands from a well-rounded Dom makes me quiver? Is it his eyes? The way he uses his voice? The way he expects obedience without question? What is it about that bad boy that just makes me pause and catch my breath? Honestly, if the guy says: “Drop your pants…(he is holding a flogger of some sort in his hand and gently hitting his thigh with it, warning you of what’s coming) face the wall and get on your knees...” My own excitement level goes UP. There have been times I’ve had to place the book down to catch my breath.

Now, none of that placing the book down catch the breath happens when I read a contemporary novel that is on the bestseller list in the New York Times. Nope, it only happens when I grab up a hot M/M book with a strong Alpha male and a sweet non-alpha male. Picture a Dom Vampire, with a submissive human. Talk about Bad Boy! Or, take two hot Vampires, both Dom’s trying to make their love work, something like, Mychael Black’s “Dark Needs.”

Or let’s switch over to a Het story and think Johanna Lindsey and her Alpha bad boys. For years I glued my eyes to her books, falling for all of her “bad boys,” the ones who kidnapped the women who would eventually fall in love with them. I loved the part of the kidnappings, the seduction of the “innocent” virgin, but quickly grew bored with the innocent and the damsel in distress plot. I needed more; I needed something else and didn’t find it until I switched over to the MM Genre. And boy-oh-boy did I find treasures. I believe I spent a small fortune buying the stories up.

When I stepped into the MM world first as a writer, then stepping it up to become a reviewer as well, I could not get enough of the BDSM titles read fast enough. It is well known it’s what I read/ review for the site and if we receive a request for a review I take them like a tiny goblin in the night and savor them until I am able to get to them. I like my bad boys on the darker side of life, same as I write. It’s not to say I don’t enjoy a sweet love story by any means, but if we have a bad boy linked in it, you can bet I’m loving him a tiny bit more.

There’s a mystery behind the bad boy’s eyes, be they black, blue, gray, purple, or green, there’s just something that you can’t read about them no matter how hard you look. You hear or read the words of command and for a moment you can get lost in that because in “real” life you’re nothing like the characters. Maybe in real life you’re the stronger one in your relationship and just for a little while you can get lost in the world of fiction bad boys. They’re safe to admire from there. In real life I could not give up control the way the characters do so well in fiction stories to the bad boys. It’s nice to dream though.

I love the mystery, allure, and the complexity of a bad boy. Someone who takes the initiative to show his partner another way of life without breaking the law and ending up in jail. Someone who can comfortably take control not only for himself but also for his partner with complete surety in his actions. Someone who can love with his whole being and still be that bad boy.

In BDSM stories, the limits are always pushed and to me a Bad Boy does just that: pushes the limits.

 Thanks for reading,

Michele L Montgomery