Yeah, that Roald Dahl.
Weird ( )

I had a conversation with a friend recently who said that the problem with writing adult stories is that it feels like you have to write gratuitous sex scenes into it just for it to classify as an adult story and get the attention that it deserves from that market. Reading this book, however, I have to say that Dahl has found a way around this without making his stories too dirty or too raunchy.
There are only four stories in this collection, four stories that are a bit longer than the other stuff I’ve reviewed by Dahl before (in terms of his short stories) but four stories that have so much to them. The collection is full of sex and adultery, but without it being crass, rude, or even just outright disgusting.
Two of the four stories centre around the same character – Oswald Cornelius, a man of world renown who loves opera, spiders, dressing well, and sex. Oswald loves nothing more than bedding woman after woman, having a personal rule that he never sleeps with the same woman twice and that he never lets a romance last longer than twelve hours (which he believes is pushing it, as even eight hours is already excessive). The first chronological story in the collection, Bitch, centres around Oswald and a business partner of his creating a perfume that is so chock-full of pheromones that any man who smells it will immediately want to have sex with the first woman that he finds. And violent, animalistic sex at that. The second story is claimed to be the last story that is known of Oswald before he passed away, written in his personal diaries. Called The Visitor, this story takes place in the Sinai Dessert, in which Oswald might be the unwilling participant in a plot to bring a wealthy family some good, intellectual company, and is left to decide whether he wants to seduce the lady of the house, or her equally sultry daughter. Both stories end in a wonderful plot twist that leaves you thinking that maybe, just maybe, there’s a lot more to Dahl than meets the eye with this kind of imagination.
A third story in this collection, the story that this collection is named after, is about two next door neighbours who decide to have a bit of fun and sleep with each other’s wives without the wives knowing that they’re sleeping with a different man. Nowadays, this story is incredibly problematic -though the women are willing participants in the act, it is technically rape as they’re not actually sleeping with the person that they thought they’re sleeping with. It’s rape by deception. I don’t condone this kind of behaviour whatsoever, but damn that ending leaves you wondering who really came up with the idea in the first place – the narrator who plotted it all, or his neighbour who seems to have been plotting it for longer.
Finally, the story The Last Act is one of the saddest Dahl tales I’ve ever read. All his other short stories centre around revenge, or mystery, or are just written in a way that the horror or terrible events happening at least have a sense of witty humour to them. This story centres around Anna, who lost her husband in a tragic car accident. The first three-quarters of the story centre around Anna getting over the death of the love of her life and leaving behind the throes of depression. She starts to work again, leave the house, and actually start to feel happiness again. Unfortunately, Anna’s tale does not have the happy ending I so felt she deserves, as Anna’s depression comes back in full force by the end of the story, and you’re left knowing that she didn’t make it out of the ending in one piece.
All in all I give this collection a 4/5, simply because I felt like The Last Act could have been so much better if it was just a little bit more witty or had a happier ending. I love that Dahl isn’t trying too hard to write a story that’s shockingly sexy or provocative, and that he spares the details of the sex altogether, even going so far as to never swear in any of the stories (though stories aimed at adults normally have quite a bit of foul language in them). Indeed, the only curse word I could find in the whole collection was ‘shit’, present in the last one in the collection.
I recommend reading this, though it definitely won’t take you long. Maybe two or three days, but it’ll be worth it for the way that Dahl drags you into a world of adult thinking and interest that we all sometimes forget is what we live in today.
( )

Man, hard to classify this book--it was entertaining. As always I enjoy Roald Dahl's style of writing, those parts were high quality, however, it's essentially 4 short stories that are akin to dirty jokes.

It's rather racist, sexist and classist, but it's done in such a way that could be considered less so, depending on what the individuals were actually like, although the sexism and objectifying women is irritating either way.

If the stories are thought of as jokes, it's less offensive, overall it's interesting to see what Dahl wrote that wasn't for children. ( )

Men being beastly
tricking wives, nursing grudges
everyone gets screwed. ( )

I enjoyed most of this book. The endings weren't perfect, but the rest was fun, and it's written in an accessible but well-crafted style. If you perceive mysogyny easily and aren't looking to get offended, maybe stay away from these. Otherwise have fun. ( )