Maybe part of the reason women and couples are wielding more purchasing power in all facets of the adult entertainment industry is the prevalence of books like Violet Blue's Ultimate Guide to Sexual Fantasy. This book will get neophytes out into the adult stream: the porn outlets, BDSM clubs, sex clubs, adult book stores, or any adult "community" that revolves around your favorite sexy fantasy.

If you're already in that stream and have been able to experiment a little, Blue's book may not amaze you. But what the book does do is give people a good idea of what to expect from these exotic worlds. It's designed for people who are not part of a community who can initiate them: a group of buddies to drag them to their first lap dance, a fellow perv to introduce them to dungeon etiquette, a savvy partner to initiate them into how to tip a peep show performer. This means that it's a great book for most women. It's also a book that takes the viewpoint of couples looking to improve their sexual play with fantasy. For example, one fantasy that Blue discusses is the local peep show booth. Connected as they often are to adult book stores with a high density of horny men, peep shows are something a woman on her own, unless she is brassy and insistent, will have trouble exploring comfortably. "While not an atmosphere for refined trysting," Blue says, "these seedy little booths often have what it takes to give a fantasy that gritty edge, and they make a great spot for an exceptionally nasty lunch-hour rendezvous." Think about it, all ye who like to taste forbidden fruit -- meeting the hubby or the little woman on your lunch break for a quickie in a peep booth!

After that tip, Blue goes on to talk about strip clubs and call girls for two. The man in a couple may think of these things, and may even suggest them, but it's always nice when the woman feels equally as comfortable with the ideas and can come up with her own creative, nasty little variations on these fantasies -- plus have the confidence to pull it off.

In this way, The Ultimate Guide to Sexual Fantasy is doing the sex industry a great service. It's not that the information is how-to precise, getting you from point A to B like a science manual. But it gives the adventurous person a sense of familiarity with the their fantasy world. Gives them a glimpse of its inner operations. It's an orientation that may be just enough to help the adventurous sexonaut (especially when the extra hormones of arousal kick in ) step out and experiment.

The fact that books like Blue's are available to tell you how to procure a call girl or indulge in a fetish (the chapter on fetishes includes everything from looners -- balloon fetishists -- to Giantess fetishes), is probably the very reason Blue can now say that "While the media depict topless bars, peep shows, and strip joints as populated by male patrons…in reality that scenario has become dated as more and more women and couples join the audience."

For this reason, the more experienced partner in a relationship may want to hand The Ultimate Guide to Sexual Fantasy to her/his less experienced partner; or the more fantasy-oriented partner might use it to intrigue and inspire their mate with fantasies.

Each chapter discussing a type of fantasy concludes with a delicious 2 or 3 page, first-person story by Alison Tyler bringing that chapter's fantasy to life. Often these stories open up the potential of a given type of fantasy -- say gender play. In "Not Tonight," for example, Tyler writes "Sounds silly, I guess, but sometimes I don't want to fuck him I want to be him." And she goes on to tell a short, hot story of her and her boyfriend switching roles.

One of the final chapters, the one on "Sex games," offers some creative games. Some are light enough to have appeared probably in films, "the treasure hunt," for example in which you leave a trail of messages (or undergarments) "until they reach the final prize -- you." And it goes all the way to setting up a web cam for erotic online entertainment.

Since Blue's book attempts to cover the gamut of fantasies out there, space considerations require that she treat most subjects in a cursory way. But to offset that, the book includes plenty of information guiding you to targeted sources. There are resources in the chapters and more resources at the end of the book. For example in the chapter on fetishes, Blue recommends an insightful article on the amputee fetish, the title of a photo collection for people into bandage fetishes, a book and a web site for people who have a fat fetish -- there are companion sources for just about every fetish in the chapter and you could lose yourself on some of them.

Overall, the book is not overly advanced, but it is handy and tasty and stimulating -- a good way to whet your own imagination.

[See our interview with author Violet Blue in our "Sexpert's Corner" column.]