Goddess of Ivy

Clarion Rating: 4 out of 5

This is a heart-pumping, breathtaking trilogy filled with emotional and sexual tension.

Fans of explicit erotica get the whole package in Carol Madison’s Goddess of Ivy trilogy. No romp or position goes unexplored in this epic, lust-filled bacchanal.

Serena’s Plight introduces young, lusty Serena, who is heading to Cornell University not as a student, but as a high-end call girl. This first volume covers her trysts with six fraternity brothers and her growth as a professional girlfriend.

By Serena the Goddess, Serena has socked away a small fortune from her extracurricular activities but must deal with an unexpected marriage proposal and her growing attraction to her best friend-turned-pimp, Sam. All comes to a head in Serena’s Choice, when Sam and Serena return to Cornell. An explosive confrontation leads Sam to cease communication with Serena, forcing her to decide what she really wants out of life.

Though many fans of erotica often skip the plot elements and go straight for the sex scenes, there is enough of a story in Goddess of Ivy to keep readers engaged throughout its nearly seven hundred pages. After three books, Serena is unsure if being a call girl is the right life choice for her, and the sweet, elderly Mrs. Nobels becomes something of a maternal figure for the girl, whose biological mother is a train wreck.

For those uninitiated into the world of explicit erotica, Madison does a thorough job explaining various positions and terminology. There are plenty of unexpected, unusual sexual scenarios, and the descriptions are creative and non-clinical. They are also highly graphic, however, and the profusion of descriptive sexual passages can become overwhelming to the degree of sensory overload.

Serena is already an independent, high-spirited young woman in book one, but a certain lack of self-confidence belies her outward sassiness. Eventually, through her engagements with the men and women who come and go in her life, Serena’s development as a character is entertaining and surprisingly engaging.

Madison manages to craft a strong primary story line, that of Serena’s development from small-town girl to sophisticated, worldly woman. The sex, though plentiful, is a surprising secondary narrative. The author’s descriptive powers evoke a woman on a quest of self-discovery, with words that are at once lush and unequivocal—Serena may be a call girl, but she has feelings, too.

Goddess of Ivy: The Complete Trilogy is a heart-pumping, breathtaking trilogy filled with emotional and sexual tension and high drama. These are books that will surely find a devoted following.

Reviewed by Barbara Nickles

Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The publisher of this book provided free copies of the book and paid a small fee to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. Foreword Reviews and Clarion Reviews make no guarantee that the publisher will receive a positive review. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.

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