Brie Learns the Art of Submission: Submissive Training Center by Red Phoenix

Obsessed.
It's the only word I can think of that can describe the way I feel about this book.
I know I said I'd wait until I came out of my Brie Stupor to write this review, but I want to write it while it's still fresh in my head, and before I move into the sequels.
Every once in a while you will find a book that will completely absorb you. You get so into it that your reality kind of skews. You can't remember if it was a conversation YOU had with someone, or a dream you had, or if it was just a scene from the book. You have to go out and eat the foods the characters are described to be dining on. You crave to try the things that are written in such detail because it just sounds so...damn...wonderful...
Then the book ends, and you are thrown back into the real world. But this book...this book sticks with you. It has somehow changed you, gotten into your blood, making you want to be...different. More like one of the characters. You recognize something in the character, you feel a connection, as if it were an alternate universe that YOU would be living if given the choice.
That is how this book made me feel. And I wouldn't be surprised if every woman who reads it feels the same way because of the way this amazing author has written it.
Brie Learns the Art of Submission: Submissive Training Center is a compilation of 9 novellas. Our main character, Brie, is living a pretty boring life, working at a generic retail job and no excitement in sight. We know nothing of her family, there is no sob story that she struggles with thats holding her back from being happy, there is no drama.
"Miss Bennett is twenty-two, with a bachelor's degree in fimmaking outside these walls..."
This pretty much sums up all we know about our heroine in the beginning. There's so little of a backstory that it allows us to fill in the rest with whatever we want. But there's ENOUGH of a backstory that you feel like you KNOW her and root for her, and want her to succeed. I always say a big part of what makes me love a story is if I'd want to be the main character's friend. I love Brie so much that not only would I be her bff, I'd love to BE her. She's such a strong and determined person, yet vulnerable at the same time. She wants nothing more than to please the one she is with.
When I first started this book, I was hooked after the first page. I immediately started "pimping" it without even finishing it first which I usually don't do. I made a BIG mistake though. In the beginning I told my friends it was NOT a love story. I said it was not a romance. But I was wrong. With this book, above all other's that I've read, it is very important not to have spoilers. Even the slightest hint at the later chapters would completely ruin the journey you are taken on, so let me just say that this is very much a love story.
But more about the plot... Brie is at her retail job restocking the shelves on a normal day, and is slipped a business card by a gorgeous customer. She discovers that it is a Training Center for Submissives. After researching, a little self evaluating, and finally the creative registration process, she enrolls. She is then trained by Dominants who are world renouned, the best of the best.
I think I love this book as much as I do because we get to go right along with Brie. We get to sit through the classes with Mr. Gallant. The students ask all the questions that we would ask if we were sitting in the desk next to them. We get to hear his answers that are so detailed that we understand exactly what he is trying to teach us that day. Then they move to Practicum and we feel the trainers eyes on us, we feel the embarassment when we get reprimanded, and the pride when they compliment. Then when they move into the auditorium for the final period of the day, we get the butterflies in our bellies from nervousness, the fear when they make us face something unknown, and the excitement when our fantasies are about to be fulfilled.
Never have I felt like a book had been written just for me. I've always loved reading, and I've tried writing before but I just can't put a story that's in my head down onto paper. I can't articulate an entire alternate universe and make it sound...right. But this story...it feels like Red Phoenix somehow got into my head and put down onto paper a world she knew I'd absolutely love.
This book won't be for everyone. If you don't like BDSM, or multiple partners, or anything beside "vanilla" love scenes, then I wouldn't recommend this book. But if you are feeling adventurous, naughty, or even just a little curious then I'd say READ THIS BOOK. Read this book because you will love it.
To the author Red Phoenix: you have earned yourself a die hard fan for life. I will read anything you ever put out...hehe...put out.
Red Phoenix is all over the place:
Facebook Author Page: Sensual Erotica
Twitter: @redphoenix69 (heh!)
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5557309.Red_Phoenix
She also has a personal fb page that she accept friend requests from fans, a website, a pinterest, a blogspot...geez I'm such a stalker...but you can find her the same way I did...how, you might ask?
"I googled it, Sir."
<3 Kayla The Bibliophile