tasteofsin

Kensington Publishing Corporation, July 2006
Contemporary Romance
280 pages
www.fionazedde.com

Rating: out of 5

Indulge yourself in A TASTE OF SIN, author Fiona Zedde’s
appropriately-titled second novel, a veritable smorgasbord of sexual
pleasures with protagonist Desiree Nichols as your guide through the
culinary delights of women.

Since declaring herself a lesbian at 14, Dez has had them all—women
of varying shades and hues, proportions and personalities. Her
acquired wealth has afforded her a life of leisure, and because of it
she’s treated herself to a fair share of sexual encounters throughout
her college years. Everything changes, though, when Dez falls for
Ruben, a man she finds absolutely irresistible, and deserts everything
to follow him. Two years later, she finds herself abandoned by
Ruben and facing a family emergency that calls her back home to
Miami.

When she arrives in the sunny city, Dez finally confronts the people
she left in her wake years ago—Claudia, a worrried mother and

Derrick, her twin brother—who were left to pick up the pieces she shattered with her coming out and
hedonistic behavior. Though Dez’s old friends, once devastated when she took off with a man,
welcome her back with open arms and help her seek other pleasures to take her mind off things.

Like her mother’s cancer scare.

And the fact that she and her brother have never really gotten along.

Both smart and attractive, Dez and Derrick could never see each other as more than rivals, especially
when it came to the ladies. He doesn’t care for her self-indulgent lifestyle, and when he introduces
her to his friend Victoria, he quickly declares her off limits to Dez.

That proves difficult because Dez finds Victoria so tantalizing with her gorgeous face and shapely
figure. She’s never met a woman she couldn’t have, and Victoria proves to be no exception. And
despite her hesitations about Dez’s love-em-and-leave-em persona, Victoria initiates a no-strings
attached affair, making the sex all the more exhilarating.

It’s all fun and games for both women—romantic getaways by day and hot sex by night—until Dez
finds herself caring more than she ever thought she would. This is all new for the heartbreaker who’s
never found herself in anything more serious than one-night affairs. Victoria’s fallen hard as well, but
doesn’t want Dez to destroy her heart.

As the title implies, A Taste of Sin is chock full of the delicious sex scenes one would expect from Ms.
Zedde. After all, she gave us the debut novel Bliss, a tour de force in black lesbian literature. Sin is not
as captivating as her first, but it is a page turner nonetheless. Dez, as the bad boy you always wanted
in your bed, is a character that grows on you, a woman whom Zedde swiftly paints into a stud with
heart finally taking a chance on love.

And don't we femmes wish we had that?

Reviewed Aug-Sept 2006