She was a sexual predator. She was finished being the prey and someone was going to pay; sadly, Samantha didn’t realize the one who would pay the most was herself. Wounded by Ben Burgess Jr. is the downward spiral of a young, sexually abused child who grew up to hate men, trust no one and to use her body to control those around her. As a stripper, she had the power to make men give up their money, as a lover, she tolerated men, but drove women wild. She made it her mission to awaken every woman to their lesbian side and sometimes she did her job too well, as they craved her like a drug. For Samantha, it was meaningless; a means to an end, to prove she had the power denied her as a child. She never thought of the pain she caused and what it could do her because she never thought she might fall in love, herself.
For any author to create so much darkness and pain within a character is a gift. For a male author to get inside the head and heart of a female character as damaged as Samantha and bring her to life so completely shows a truly creative sensitivity head and shoulders above many others. Ben Burgess Jr. is bold in his storytelling, never shying away from the grit and the darkness. His writing is erotic in the detail, yet as emotionally twisted as his character Samantha would feel it. Not for those who can look beyond the physical acts to the mental and emotional turmoil, each page can be painful enough to actually feel deep in one’s gut. Is there a true heroine? No, more likely there are several flawed victims, including the one with the greatest flaws, Samantha, a product of her environment and the dignity and self-worth stolen from her as a child. You will walk away from this one with a heavy heart for her past and a prayer she can finally move toward a brighter future. The real story is found between the written words where our own interpretation takes over.
In Ben Burgess Jr.’s Wounded, Samantha Miller is a beautiful stripper who preys upon women - specifically straight or married women – walking on the dangerous path of violence, seduction, and exploitation. Her precarious ways are due to her troubled past when she was molested as a child and subsequently forced into prostitution by her drug-addicted mother. As a result, Samantha has no trust in men. When the beautiful Sasha starts to work at the strip club as a bartender, Samantha chooses her as the next target. But Sasha is not just another woman to be bedded. Samantha is about to learn how to trust, love and be happy again.
Protagonist Samantha or Sam is sexual and tough at the same time. She makes enough money as a stripper at J’s Gentlemen’s Quarters. Yet we see the cogent side of her as she does not plan to be a stripper for long and is working on building her photography business. Ironically, she uses photography as one of her seduction tools to persuade women to come to her place. Sasha also has issues of her own, but together these women try to heal each other, making Wounded a beautiful, emotionally raw story. To be frank, I didn't like what happened to Sasha. However, Samantha’s life turns out to be better in the end. As a reader who loves a positive ending, it is enough for me. On the whole, the book particularly excels at depicting complicated and realistic characters, making it a worthwhile read.
Set in New York City, headliner stripper Samantha is a player – and she’s gay, beautiful, black and out. Seducing women all around her is her main pleasure in life, whether they are straight, bi or gay. But she can’t forget the abuse from childhood that rules her sexuality.
Dancing on stage felt second nature to me. As a child, I was forced to do so many horrible acts that dancing with my clothes off as a profession felt natural.
This very erotic women’s fiction is written by a man, Ben Burgess Jr, author of Monster, which told the tale of a womanizer. In Wounded, he turns this on its head to become Samantha, a lesbian dancer, who tells her story in time-jumping segments. It’s pretty juicy stuff with extremely detailed sexual description, and it’s hard to say exactly what gender or sexuality would go for this type of book the most.
While it captures a lesbian scene in New York that I have had some dalliance with, some of Burgess’ descriptions seem a little hard-hitting for gay women – although admittedly these sorts of tough bitches do exist. And boy, it’s bitchy. Mixing gay women in with the world of stripping is exhausting! Burgess must have researched strippers and their lifestyles, and there is a true-to-life vibe in the writing – the kind that can only exist from knowing your subject matter intimately and observing these sorts of women in order to capture their language and vibe. He also plays the race card well – and not too much, with little jabs that made me giggle, like this exchange between Samantha and a white client’s wife, as she skirts around trying to find the right word to use politely,
“My husband Marcus, wanted to find a nice ‘urban’ spot where we could both enjoy a beautiful woman. Our new driver, Tyrone, said he knew of a place that might interest us.”
“So, by ‘urban’ do you mean black?”
“Bluntly, yes. I’m attracted to women of color.”
The book is also well-edited, and Burgess has spent time with the cover to attract the right audience, which explains the good response to this book online. However, personally I am not a fan of mixing sexual abuse and rape with erotic sexual scenes. I have noticed many male writers are doing this lately as a kind of backlash to Fifty Shades-style fiction; but it’s not really sexy to me to mix the two, and in fact is pretty grim for me – as a woman, it was a bit raw. However, the other purpose of this juxtaposition is to show how abused Samantha was as a girl. I just wish it wasn’t back to back with sex scenes and strip club scenes as it all gets very overpowering. But that’s Burgess’ agenda I think, to have a very sexually charged book that concerns itself with Samantha’s sexual journey rather than any other story.
Samantha in real life would be an extremely high-octane person, and probably very difficult to get along with! But she does somewhat mellow out as she attends to the eponymous “wound” in therapy, and experiences a few life-changing events. The main thing is that Burgess’ characters are rounded with thoughts, dialogue and actions – and reactions of their own, unmistakable and sure, which makes his work stand out in the indie market today as a thoughtful, crafted writer.
A successful piece of writing albeit immensely sex-fueled!
