The Erotic Potential Of My Wife

The story of an OCD collector, who's gradually been shunned from society due to his habits of obsessing over collections of cocktail sticks, campaign badges, labels on melons etc. Hector, our protagonist, is driven to attempted suicide over his out of control hobby to collect things. On the brink of recovery he meets Brigitte, the love of his life and attempts to put all of his past behind him and settle down to a regular life. However watching her wash the windows in their flat one day, causes Hector to have the most erotic moment of his life, soon he's doing everything he can to turn the windows dirty again and re-live the sight of his wife's beautiful legs on the ladder as she washes them. One thing leads to another and before we know it, Hector is caught up in his need to collect moments of her teetering on ladders, as we read about how this affects the couple and their surrounding odd collection of friends and relatives.

I picked up this book after reading a staff choice card on it in Waterstones one day, that, and the fact that it's got a rather lovely pair of well illustrated legs on the cover sold it to me (foot fetishist, me? never!). I really really loved this book, it reads like a script for a Jean-Pierre Jeunet film. Hector's odd obsession over his wife can easily be transferred onto all the little fetishes that we keep amongst our relationships, and the way that they affect our lives. Although tragic at times, this is a love story, a story of understanding fetishes and learning to embrace and celebrate the oddities in each other. This isn't an erotic novel, per se, which is why I've not nominated it for our Erotic Book Club, however for anyone who's a bit sexually wonky, I would highly recommend this read. There are sex scenes, there are tales of nude dinner parties, and indecent exposure in it, however the true eroticism of the book comes from the relationship that Hector and Brigitte have, and how it develops. It's funny, it's a little kinky, it's poignant, it's a little saucy and most of all it's a great read.