Review of Not Guilty by Brit Ryder

Since I read Shameless, the erotica novella by Brit Ryder, a pen name of lesbian fiction author Kris Bryant, I was anxiously waiting for another one. Four years later, not only Ms. Ryder is back, but we are lucky to have a full-length novel.

Claire Weaver is determined to succeed professionally and as a newly appointed judge in Kansas City, she hasn’t got the time for anything else. Well, maybe except for a quick hookup with a gorgeous butch in a museum. When her one-off fling appears in her court as an expert witness the following day, it will be hard to stay away from her…

Not Guilty partly retells the story of Shameless, this time switching from Emery to Claire’s point of view and develops the rest of their story completely. You don’t need to read Shameless to understand the events at the beginning of this novel but I strongly suggest reading it first. Firstly, because the points of view switch make it really exciting even if you know how things are going to develop and secondly because there are some subtle details that you are gonna miss if you don’t. Shameless is super hot anyway so why shouldn’t you indulge yourself?

It’s hard to write a full-length erotica novel and keep the reader’s interest throughout and I can think of very few lesfic authors who can pull this off. Ms. Ryder cleverly combined erotica scenes with a mixture of intrigue, drama, and romance. All perfectly balanced to keep readers turning pages.

Ms. Bryant’s fans know that she can write hot sex scenes and she doesn’t disappoint here either. In the book acknowledgments the author recognises that it was hard to take the emotions out of the sex scenes, which makes perfect sense. But this isn’t an unemotional book, the feelings eventually catch up with the story, along with some light intrigue and no-strings relationship drama.

If Ms. Bryant wasn’t such an accomplished romance author, I’d be tempted to ask her to dedicate herself to writing erotica exclusively. But that would be a shame so, at least we can hope that we won’t have to wait another four years for Ms. Ryder’s reappearance. Lesfic erotica fans deserve it. 4.5 stars.