Review: Living M/S: A Book for Masters, slaves and Their Relationships

Living M/S: A Book for Masters, slaves and Their Relationships by Dan Williams

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



This was one of the buddy reads in the BDSM group. Since I'm interested in D/s relationships, a M/s book was right up my alley. I found this book to be written in an easy format to understand.

It's not a manual, just as they said. Instead, it's more of a journey sharing of experiences which worked and didn't work for them. In addition, it gave us insight into their background as to why they wanted their M/s relationship to work they way it it did. It seems their vanilla relationships really burned them and the ones they know of are kind of dysfunctional too. It makes more sense why the M/s works so well for them.

Many of the M/s "twist" on a marriage I find would help any marriage. Because honestly, communication and trust is required for any relationship to work and be healthy balanced. I particularly enjoyed two pieces in this book. The first one was dawn showing how she is perfectly capable and strong as a leader yet she chooses to submit and be a slave to Dan. The balance of his loving caring and Mastery of her is moving. This is what power exchange represents to me. I loved it!

The second one was Dan's explanation of peer to peer mentoring. I particularly enjoyed this part and it was as if a lightbulb went off in my head. Well, not for kinky play, more for my style of "mentoring/teaching" at work. Totally non personal and non kinky.

For the most part, the observations of both Dan and dawn I can agree with and find insightful. I particularly liked Dan's violinist analogy. I also liked dawn's perspective of things and why she likes to serve Dan coffee.

The only part which made me feel queasy was the poly section. I understand how poly works and the ways it can go wrong so easily. Reading the couple of chapters of Dan and dawn's experience, it's painful because while it seems to try and come across as hunky dory. For me, it looked like a train wreck happened. It personally gasped when I read about the uncollaring and the packing of bags. But hey, it's not my kink and it's not for me to judge. If it worked for them, more power to them. But still, I want to state that it looks like a painful bloody scene in one of the chapters that made my heart hurt for dawn. And it also made me question Dan. Regardless, everyone is different and what works for them is all that matters.

As a side note, I was a little surprised how small the world of Kink can be. One of the people they thanked, I know of that person. I can't say I really "know" that person because we haven't had coffee together or shared experiences. I have attended a class they taught. I've also had the pleasure of seeing that person again in another class which we both enjoyed. Sitting next to them and getting their perspective of the electricity class was fun. Plus, the gentle dominance exuded by this person was heady. I digress.

This book is recommended to kinky readers who want some insight into how a M/s relationship can work. I also recommend it to vanilla folks who have problems in their marriage. I'm not saying they need a M/s relationship or to go poly. But I am stating that these communication pieces, transparency and intent is powerful and can only help a marriage.



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