DNF. Whilst I found the premise interesting, I couldn’t engage with the story or relate to any of the characters. The story is very male heavy so it is not my jam

The premise of this book hooked me in but I couldn't get into this story. I felt that the professor and the counseler were both dull and that the antagnoist was mostly a caricature.

This wasn`t for me. I didn`t like the characters much and felt just awkward and bored of what was happening. Espesially the erotical scenes that was described by Stanley. it seemed that Victoria took control of their lifes in a way.

Thank you Spark Press and NetGalley for providing me with an e-arc in return for my honest feedback.
I am not the target audience for this book. You have been warned before you read ahead and trust my rating. I have decided to use the official description.

When Stanley Berman, a Jewish New York attorney, is appointed Chief Counsel at a North Carolina University, he opts to share a house with his good friend, Thomas McClellan, a professor in the school’s English Department. The men spend their evenings drinking wine, playing chess, and lamenting their ineptitude with women. Then the Professor, a Southern good old boy, former high school football lineman, and avid hunter, hatches a scheme to bring a young woman into the house, insisting that as a creative writing teacher, such women find him alluringly subversive and artistic. The Counselor is dubious but persuaded nonetheless—much to his detriment.
The articulate but bumbling Counselor and Professor find themselves outwitted at every turn by Victoria, a young woman who is clever, inscrutable, and superb at finishing what she starts. She initiates passionate sexual encounters with the men, but as time goes on, what she demands in return becomes untenable. When she goes missing, John Watson, the county sheriff—and the Professor’s lifelong friend—feels compelled to open a murder investigation.

Where shall I begin with? Shall I begin it with witty exchanges or should I begin it with the mindblowing usage of 'Chess' and its aspects that they adopt to explore their lives under its influence? Should I begin with how brilliant the dynamic and their conversations are? Or should I start with how realistically the characters and their thought processes were portrayed that includes their POV on women and just about everything?
There are scenes that equally awestruck and cringy, and no, they were not the sex scenes. One of the aspects that made me cringe was how Victoria was perceived by the professor and sometimes, even the counsellor. It came off as intentional misogyny.

Each scene is its own element that flows into another in such gripping transition. What really stood out for me was how the perception of the characters is clear as that is all they are- a perception of a character. And how it is written in such a clear way that the reader understands that.
I haven't seen such a brilliant piece of writing in a while! It deals over many important themes and takes you into exploring lives as such of the counsellor and the professor. And as someone who has no freakin' clue about chess except for the basics, I loved how easily understandable the writing made it.

I had so many issues with certain aspects of the book that I do not wish to enclose in my review because as I mentioned earlier, I am not the target audience. This is not my usual review and it is all for the right reasons. But I cannot deny that this is brilliantly written as I have mentioned a few numbers of times already. I cannot deny that this is a masterpiece, sadly, something I couldn't enjoy as much as I wanted to. I also cannot deny that this will have you in the edge of your seats with its arresting dialogue and surprisingly unexpected events unfolding as the plot moves on.

Would I recommend this book?
Yes-
a. if you are the target audience,
b. if you are someone who loves great dialogue involving chess,
c. if you looking for a unique type of erotic fiction that has a light touch of mystery and suspense to it,
d. if you are looking for a work that is written with a great amount of brilliance, or
e. if you want to step out of your reading comfort zone
this one is the perfect read for you.

The blurb is what drew me in, it sounded interesting. The story about two middle aged roommates wanting a little female company. What could go wrong? It was a light read and I pretty much got through it in 2 sittings.

I wasn't keen on this book. I couldn't work out the genre and it threw me as I tired to get to grips with the plot and the story. It was ok.. but not good and I wouldn't read it again.

Good storyline but in places it lagged for me. The characters are great though. The this is one story that has drama and intrigue with some steamy pages. I would not say this is a must read, but it is worthwhile read.

Two men living together have given up on finding love and joke if only they were gay. They opt to share a woman and Victoria enters into their lives. When she disappears, will one of them be charged with murder? Fast-paced read with plenty of drama, intrigue and steam. A good read.

i was given this book by netgalley and publisher for an honest review and opinion

i found that i did not really care for this book. i did not connect with the characters and was very long in certain places. also...i don't understand chess and it was filled with chess talk and was hard for me to understand.

I did not finish this book at about halfway through. I just couldn't get into the story and didn't connect with the characters at all.

I'm not sure what I'd class this book as. There's a bit of a mystery to it but it doesn't really go anywhere, there are relationships, but not romance. If anything it's perhaps about the friendship between two older men and as they are the only two characters that really have any substance to them, that's probably the best description. I think that I've seen it listed as erotica, but it's about as erotic as a visit from your aunt Violet on a Sunday afternoon when she regales you in detail about the bunion treatment she's been having.
I'm perhaps being a bit harsh. The idea behind the book isn't bad and most of the writing is passable. The dialogue leaves a little to be desired particularly from any female characters, but then every female character is very two dimensional.
This one started well, but as everyone started to annoy me and I really couldn't give a monkey's about what happened to any of them, it just wasn't for me.
I received a complimentary copy of this book through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

I found myself rushing through parts of this story because I don't know how to play chess and this story was full of chess. I couldn't relate to anyone in the book and maybe that is also why I rushed through it. I found certain scenes and conversations of the story to be drawn out and unnecessary and therefore confusing in their relevance to the rest of the narrative.

Stanley, Chief Counsel at a North Carolina University shares a house with his best-friend Tom, Creative Writing Professor at the University.

Both men are quite different from one another; Stanley's life is rather systematic, and he enjoys running in his free time, while Tom likes to go hunting; which repulses Stanley. However, the week-nights playing chess, and drinking wine unites the two roommates. One night they ponder than the one thing they are both missing is having a woman in their lives. Tom playfully suggests finding a women, who they can both have sex with, fulfilling the only missing aspect of their lives.
Little does Stanley know, Tom actually goes looking for a woman, and succeeds. He meets, and later introduces aspiring-writer, Victoria to Stanley. She is looking to save up money to work on her book and agrees to live with the two men, rent-free and in return taking care of the house, and of course them.
This arrangement starts out perfectly at first, but quickly goes south when Victoria starts complaining that the men are too messy, and moves their stuff around. She starts making demands that anger them both, until one day, Victoria goes missing.

Filled with chess references, Enemy Queen: definitely has a nice story line, but was unfortunately not my cup of tea, mainly because it is told from an older-Southern American male POV, which I found difficult to relate to.

DNF at 33%
I am so bored. I can't connect to these characters and the conversations between the counselor and the professor are just boring, which is like 90% of this story. The "artful eroticism" the blurb promised is just dull.

Warnings about the book: Consent issues, blackmail for sexual acts, talks about a sexual power imbalance involving a teacher and student, under negotiated kink play, and stereotyping southern whites as mostly being bigots to everyone that isn’t a white and Christian. If you have any problems with these things listed above, this is not the book for you.

This is book is listed under erotic on NetGallery. This is where I got a free copy from for an honest review. This book is different than most erotic novels that I have read. It had elements of mystery and the ending surprised me. I enjoyed the book, but I would never re-read it. I will explain more at the end why.

The story is told by Stanley, a lawyer. He is living with a Creative writing professor named Tom. They are extremely close friends who have spent a large amount of time together. They spend their nights drinking wine while playing chess. They both had trouble with women. Each one had been married at least twice before. The Professor mentioned that their lives would be better if they were gay. Then they could simply be together because they get along so well.

The solution to this problem is getting a go-between. The go-between would be a younger woman that they could control and would simply be there to allow them to have sex together. It was later noted that Stanley starts going soft if he touches the other man in the room while having sex. For example, just the weight of the professor on his legs was enough for him to go soft. The professor doesn’t seem to have this issue.

The professor suggests one of his students because creative writing students look up to their professor. They would be easy to control. Stanley turns this down fearing for their jobs. Instead, the professor meets a younger writer named Victoria who writes romance novels. She lives rent and food free if she cleans. She also has sex with them. She is using them for material in her books. They have scheduled nights for being her to with Stanley, for her to be with the professor and for threesomes. Her nights with Stanley introduce him to some kinks. This is farther explored later

Life isn’t smooth sailing as they would like. Victoria isn’t easily controlled. First, the guys are gross, and Victoria spends a lot of time cleaning after them. Then, mostly the professor but also Stanley has several sexist reasons to be annoyed with Victoria. However, there is an understandable reason to be annoyed with her. She keeps moving their things. Last, Victoria blackmails them into cock cages and other sexual acts. The men plan to get rid of Victoria and then one day she just disappears. What happened to her is what made the book so interesting. It wasn’t what I was expecting.

I enjoy the plot even if I hated most of the characters. The plot was great and the answer to the mystery was great. It would have been a 5-star read if it had been for the heavy-handed stereotype of Southern white and some women being bigots. I felt like every character (minus the black people, some Jewish women, and the Jewish men) highlighted their bigotry like twice in every scene they were in. This led to it being a 3.5 and why I would not re-read like this, but I round up to 4-star for Goodreads.

I would like to think NetGalley and SparkPress for letting me read and review this book.

This book is about two mid-life aged men living together as roommates. While they enjoy their routine together, they both admit the wouldn't mind the company of a woman from time to time. To help satisfy their desires, they invite a younger woman to come live with them spend the night in there beds from time to time. Everything seems to be going fine until she starts trying to control their lives outside of the bedroom. When one of the men returns from a business trip to find she has randomly up and left leaving behind some of her items, he is suspicious of where she went.

I would consider this book a quick and light read. I found myself racing through it to see where it was going to go. While there is not a lot of fluff, there is also not a lot of in depth details. The author does a good job of giving essentials of the story, but it left me wanting more. Part of the reason I kept on reading was hoping that I was going to get more details of what was going on. The story itself was interesting and I found it to be different that anything I've read before. I just wish that it had a little more meat to it's bones.

I was given this book by netgalley to review. All opinions are my own.
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Spoiler ⚠️Warning ⚠️
The premise of this book is what drew me in and while there were some good parts overall it was disappointing. I never felt a connection the the characters. The professor and the counselor were kind of dull in their daily life and conversations. Vickie was crazy and awful. I just couldn’t get attached to them and so that made it hard for me to enjoy the books.

Enemy Queen by Robert Steven Goldstein is an interesting new novel. I cannot exactly say in which genre category I would put it in... perhaps general fiction, or mystery? It is certainly adult fiction.

Well, well, well... this is quite a unique book. I enjoyed it very much. There were moments when I got a bit bored and wanted to put it down for a moment, however, in general, the book was engaging, fun and interesting.
The story follows two friends: Professor and Counselor. They are both older men (age isn't specified, but I guess around fifty years old). They both have a few failed marriages behind them. So, when the Counselor had moved to their little town a few years ago, it had been natural for them to move in together after quickly becoming good friends. They found many common interests, the most pronounced ones being wine and chess. Throughout the years they had built an enjoyable routine for themselves. After coming back from work they would cook together, drink wine (and sometimes bourbon) and play chess. As they spent so much time together, their love lives had been pushed to the side. Until one evening, while enjoying a bottle of wine, they jokingly started talking about sex. They agreed that after all the women they had, not one of them was truly their friend.

„Do you realize, Counselor, that all our sexual problems would be solved if we were gay? Think about it. We'd play chess, drink wine, have dinner, read or whatever, and then we'd have sex before bed. We'd be a self-contained unit. We wouldn't need anybody else.“


They had discussed it a bit but came to the conclusion that they simply couldn't do it since they were heterosexual. And that was the moment they had an idea that would change their lives forever. The idea was to find a willing young woman that they could share and through her, the two of them would be together. Fast forward, they'd found a woman named Victoria, however, their happiness didn't last. Very quickly the two men found out that Victoria wasn't what they bargained for.

„Well, it's time! We have drunk and procrastinated long enough. The moment has come to get naked and engage in debauchery!“


One of the main reasons I enjoyed this book is the peak I got into the relationship between the two men. Since the author of the book is a man I paid better attention to the dynamic they had.
I found the character development great, but exclusively to male characters. The women felt one-dimensional and almost as the encapsulated a singular stereotype about women. The best example is Victoria herself. Her personality is based only on the fact that she is sexually emancipated. We are presented with the fact that she is incredibly intelligent and a writer, but none of that is actually shown. However, the story is told from the Counselor's point of view, so we are only presented with the image of Victoria he has.
The presentation of women does evolve and by this, I actually mean the Counselor's view of women, in this case.

I especially liked the chess metaphors used in this book. They were both educational (for someone who's not that good at playing chess) and well-executed.

The ending of the book was a wild ride... I can't say I'm satisfied with it. It was a bit unbelievable and idyllic to be real. Also, even though I understand it was supposed to represent character development in our two main characters, I dislike how their stories ended.

This author is a nice discovery for me. I sincerely wasn't expecting much, but I am pleasantly surprised. I would recommend this book to anyone looking for something different and new. This book explores the evolution of a platonic relationship between two men and the way it was affected when they brought a third person into it.


I received this book in exchange for an honest review.

I liked the friendship of the two main characters. It was slow for me at first but then I really got into it. It was funny and suspenseful.it is worth reading.