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GJ Reads Grey, Chapter 8

Kate Sloan

Want to go back? Read the previous chapter or the first chapter.

I flipped through the first several pages of this chapter without finding anything worth remarking on. The first chunk of the chapter is mostly email exchanges between Ana and Christian; he’s bought her a new laptop (without asking her first, of course) and keeps checking in to determine whether she’s been doing her assigned research on BDSM.

He ascertains that she’s done her homework, based on the fact that she calls him “Sir” with a capital S. He also calls her a “sassy wench.” How sweet.

Christian’s also exchanging emails with his former domme, Elena. Her email signature tells us that she owns a beauty business called Esclava. As in, the Spanish word for slave. Subtle.

Ana asks Christian what she should Google to begin her BDSM research, and he says, “Always start with Wikipedia.” This seems like risky advice at best. Why not just recommend some specific websites you know are good, Christian? Or buy her some books? You’ve done it before…

After spending some time Googling, Ana sends Christian a curt email that simply says, “Okay, I’ve seen enough. It was nice knowing you.” If this was a book about a dude who respects when women say “no,” this would be the end of the story. She doesn’t want you in her life anymore, so you get out – easy. But this is Christian, so obviously he’s not going to do that.

I sit back in my chair, dumbfounded.
Nice? Nice. NICE.
She thought it was more than nice when her head was thrown back as she came.

Yes, amazingly, orgasms are not actually the same thing as everlasting consent.

Christian drives to Ana’s house to try to change her mind, chardonnay and condoms in tow. Dude, take a hint.

I’m uneasy; it’s reckless and too presumptuous of me to come here. Then again, I’ve already been here twice, though for only a few minutes.

Hey, cool fact: having been to someone’s house doesn’t entitle you to visit it again whenever you want! And likewise, having fucked someone before doesn’t mean you can fuck them forever!

Ana’s roommate Kate lets him into the house, and he sneaks up on Ana where she’s seated at her desk listening to music and looking over his BDSM contract. Does he ever stop watching her without her knowledge?

“Are you biting your lower lip deliberately?” I inquire, my voice sterner than I’d intended.
“I wasn’t aware I was biting my lip,” she whispers, her face pale.

CAN YOU STOP WITH THE LIP THING ALREADY?? I am so sick of hearing about lip-biting. Uuuuughhhh!

“Did you mean [it was nice] knowing me in the biblical sense?”
Her cheeks pink. “I didn’t think you were familiar with the Bible.”
“I went to Sunday school, Anastasia. It taught me a great deal.” Catechism. Guilt. And that God abandoned me long ago.
“I don’t remember reading about nipple clamps in the Bible. Perhaps you were taught from a modern translation,” she goads me, her eyes shining and provocative.
Oh, that smart mouth.

Ostensibly to “remind her how nice it was to know him,” Christian proceeds to have sex with her. It seems, actually, pretty consensual. Ana “launches herself at” him, and a few times he asks her check-in questions like “What do you think of that?” and “Trust me?” before going ahead with various actions. Okay, cool, yes. Why aren’t all the sex scenes like this? (Minus the creepy “sneaking into her apartment without her knowledge” beginning.)

There is one part, however, where he binds her and blindfolds her using a tie and her T-shirt, and then says, “I’m going to get a drink,” and does. Liiiiike… you probably shouldn’t leave someone unattended while they’re in bondage, particularly if they’re new to it.

Outside her room, I leave her door slightly ajar and enter the living room to retrieve the bottle of wine.
Kavanagh looks up from where she’s sitting on the sofa, reading, and her eyebrows rise in surprise. Don’t tell me you’ve never seen a shirtless man, Kavanagh, because I won’t believe you. “Kate, where would I find glasses, ice, and a corkscrew?” I ask, ignoring her scandalized expression.

Poor Kate. She has to put up with a lot of weird shit in this book.

When Kate asks Christian where Ana is, he replies, “She’s a little tied up at the moment,” as if no one in the history of popular culture has ever made this joke and he’s brilliant for inventing it. Excuse me while I roll my eyes forever.

Christian bosses Kate into helping him put ice in the wine glasses and pour the wine. Does he think all women are his submissives?! Kate quite reasonably asks him if he’s going to help her and Ana move into their new apartment, and he reacts like a caricature of a commitmentphobic man:

Fuck off, Kavanagh.
No way am I going to help. Ana and I don’t have that kind of relationship. Besides, I can’t spare the time.

So you have the time to travel back and forth between Portland and Seattle ad nauseum for sex dates but can’t spare a few hours to help Ana pack some boxes. Nice! Good boyfriend award over here. And on that note: he finally returns to Ana’s room, where the poor girl is still tied up and waiting.

I release each of her breasts from her bra so they’re supported by the underwire cups; her breasts are pert and vulnerable, just how I like them.

He takes her to the edge of orgasm five times but doesn’t let her come, and then when he finally fucks her, she apparently comes after the first thrust. Um. I suspect this isn’t exactly realistic. I mean, I know this is a romance novel, but come on.

As she lies flat on the bed, panting, I pull out of her and remove the wretched condom.

Of course Christian has a hate-on for safer sex supplies…

“Please pass me my sweatpants,” she orders, pointing to them.
Wow. Miss Steele can be a bossy little thing.

But… she said please…?!

I start the car and begin the drive back to Portland, analyzing what’s taken place between us.
She e-mailed me. I went to her. We fucked. She threw me out before I was ready to leave.
For the first time – well, maybe not the first time – I feel a little used, for sex.

Christian’s middle name should be Hypocrite. He’s constantly complaining about Ana doing the exact same stuff to him that he does to her. His sense of entitlement is staggering.

This chapter, in summary: a decent sex scene surrounded by terrible writing and problematic relations. That’s a good wrap-up of the entire book, actually…

GJ Reads Grey, Chapter 7

Kate Sloan

Want to go back? Read the previous instalment or the first chapter.

Content warning: This instalment contains mentions of blood, rape, and emotional abuse. If those are triggering topics for you, I encourage you to take care of yourself and skip this post.

We already know, from heavy-handed literary references in other chapters, that Ana has a thing for Victorian-era romantic heroes. So it makes sense she’d be interested in Christian. His attitudes about women, virginity and “sin” are so archaic that they make the Victorians look well-adjusted.

I wake with a start and a pervading sense of guilt, as if I’ve committed a terrible sin. Is it because I’ve fucked Anastasia Steele? Virgin? … Ana sleeps the sound sleep of an innocent. Well, not so innocent now.

He lies awake in bed, hours after their inaugural fuck-fest, watching her sleep – like Chuck Bass in my favorite fanfic. (Don’t judge me, please.) Christian reflects on Ana’s “unbridled enthusiasm for sexual congress” and concludes that “fucking her was merely a means to an end and a pleasant diversion.” This is the dude who’s melting the hearts of female readers the world over? Huh?

It’s at this point that I start wanting to count the number of times Christian’s “cock twitches in agreement,” because surely it’s been at least five so far. E.L. James is notorious for repeating the same words and phrases far too many times, but this is one of the first I’ve noticed in this book. Maybe her writing has improved (marginally) or maybe Christian is just less annoying than Ana (unlikely).

Ever-pretentious Christian goes to his piano – “my solace, where I can lose myself for hours” – and plays a sad Bach piece. I know he hasn’t forgotten that Ana’s there, so I guess he just doesn’t care if he wakes her up? And indeed, she does wake up, and comes to see him. When she calls him “melancholy,” we get a brief flashback to one of Christian’s memories, in which a previous submissive, Leila, also called him that word. It’s a welcome reprieve from the narrative, but doesn’t really reveal anything new about Christian’s character, like a flashback should.

They go back to bed and there’s blood on the sheets. “Evidence of her now-absent virginity.” Ana’s deeply embarrassed upon seeing this, but instead of comforting her, asking her if she’s still in pain, or offering to change the sheets, Christian just says, “Well, that’s going to give [the maid] Mrs. Jones something to think about.” Helpful.

They fall asleep together. In the morning, Christian is awakened by the smell of the bacon Ana’s cooking, and he goes to watch her in the kitchen. She doesn’t hear him come in because she’s wearing earbuds (see, she’s more considerate than him: when someone is sleeping nearby, she keeps her music quiet). “Christian watches Ana without Ana knowing” is a disturbingly frequent theme in this book.

She’s whisking eggs, making breakfast, her braids bouncing as she jiggles from foot to foot, and I realize she’s not wearing underwear. Good girl.

After she notices him and they chitchat awkwardly about pancakes and eggs, Christian pulls on one of her braids and says, “I love these. They won’t protect you.” ??!??!

“Mr. Grey,” she replies, with contrived formality, and winces as she sits.
“Just how sore are you?” I’m surprised by an uneasy sense of guilt. I want to fuck her again, preferably after breakfast, but if she’s too sore that will be out of the question. Perhaps I could use her mouth this time.

This is so alien to me. I am starting to believe Christian might be a sociopath, because how else could he view Ana’s sexual debut so cavalierly? Having sex for the first time is always at least kind of a big deal, and you need some time to process it and recover from it, at least emotionally if not physically. How can he think, Her vag is sore from her FIRST-EVER fucking; better make her give her first-ever BJ, too?!

After talking to her friend Kate on the phone, Ana asks Christian if it would be okay for her to ask Kate a few sex questions. The NDA she signed prevents her from going into too much detail about her sex life with Christian (including the fact that it exists at all), but she still wants to learn some basic things about sex. Christian tries to convince her to keep these questions to herself, and in doing so, he’s displaying a key behavior of emotionally abusive partners: trying to isolate Ana from her support systems. Nice.

“I know that lip is delicious, I can attest to that, but will you stop biting it? Your chewing it makes me want to fuck you, and you’re sore, okay?”

Translation: “My desire for you is entirely your fault, and if you push me over the edge and I rape you, it’ll be completely because of you, okay?”

They take a bath together. He lathers up her breasts and then kind of fingers her through a washcloth, during which he says to her, “Feel it, baby. Feel it for me.” He’s the king of dirty talk, right?! Also, here is a literal thing he says about his penis:

“I want you to become well acquainted, on first-name terms, if you will, with my favorite and most cherished part of my body. I’m very attached to this.”

Then there’s some HJ and BJ action. To Christian’s credit, at one point he tells her, “Anastasia, I’m going to come in your mouth; if you don’t want me to, stop now.” Hooray, ongoing consent. I was enjoying this paragraph until I saw that the thing that finally makes him come is Ana using her teeth on his dick. Look, I’m not saying no man has ever enjoyed a very slightly toothy beej, but I do have to wonder if E.L. James actually asked any penis-havers about this before writing it.

After he comes, he tells her he “owes her an orgasm,” and then impulsively begs her to say yes to his Dom/sub agreement. Um, I’m not sure it’s ethical to make someone sign a contract when you’re implicitly blackmailing them with proverbial blue balls. How about you make her come first, take some time for both of you to cool down, and then talk legalities?!

Anyway, he doesn’t make her sign it just yet. Instead, he takes her to his bed, and there’s actually a pretty great cunnilingus scene. It’s only occasionally ruined by weird Christian-thoughts such as:

It’s been a long time since I’ve seen pubic hair up close and personal like this.

After some more fucking and two orgasms for Ana (yeah, girl!), they are interrupted by the arrival of Christian’s (adoptive) mother, Grace. They engage in some pointless small-talk. She leaves after about two minutes and we’ve learned basically nothing about her or her role in Christian’s life. Cool narrative development, E.L. James!

Christian and Ana go for lunch and he tells her part of his backstory: a friend of his mother’s, Elena, seduced him when he was a teenager, and he was her submissive for six years. He doesn’t say a lot about this relationship but it sounds pretty fucked-up, obviously. He also reveals to Ana that her devirginization the previous night was a first for him too: his first time having “vanilla sex.” (Ana doesn’t even know what this phrase means, and has to ask him for clarification. Oh, sweetie…)

Ana fidgets beside me as we wait for the elevator, her teeth on her plump lower lip. It reminds me of her teeth on my cock.

And with that haunting image, I’ll leave you til next week. I know you’re champing at the bit for the next chapter… just like Ana is champing at Christian’s dick.

Review: NobEssence Seduction

Kate Sloan

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I have heard other reviewers describe G-spot stimulation as “addictive,” but I’m not sure I ever really understood that until the NobEssence Seduction.

Multiple orgasms are not usually my thing, but after the first time I came using the Seduction, it was less than an hour before I glanced over at it and thought, “Yeah, I need to use that again.” I did, and it was good enough to warrant the #GspotBLISS and #HOLYFUCK hashtags. That’s high praise!

I bought my Seduction in Portland when I was there for DildoHoliday. Epiphora took us to a local sex shop, and while the rest of the group wandered around looking at the store’s various wares, I found myself glued to the NobEssence display. In particular, I couldn’t stop staring at the Seduction. I’d only ever heard good things about it, and had wanted one for so long but had never even been in the same room as one. And now, here was a gorgeous black palm Seduction, right in front of me. So I bought it, even though it set me back a hefty $160.

When a sex toy is that expensive, it had damn well better be good. And let me tell you: the Seduction is incredible. Money well spent, as far as I’m concerned.

You know that “Oh shit, yeah” feeling that suddenly kicks into gear as you get close to an orgasm? That’s how my G-spot feels for most of the time that I’m thrusting the Seduction inside me. Its broad head is bigger than the G-spot toys I generally use, so it rubs over my entire G-spot with every thrust. There is no fucking around with this toy. Your G-spot cannot escape; the Seduction will find it.

Let’s be clear: everything I’ve said about this dildo so far has been about its larger end. The ball-shaped smaller end is good too, but it’s taught me something about my G-spot: it prefers broad stimulation, not pinpoint. Finely targeted pressure gives me more of that need-to-pee discomfort that sometimes puts me off G-spot play, while broader contact just feels good. As always, all bodies are different, but that’s how my G-spot rolls.

However, that’s not to say that I never use the small side of the Seduction. It makes for a terrific warm-up, helping my vag relax so it’ll be able to handle the significant girth (1 7/8″!) of the toy’s big end. And when that little ball is inside me, I can grind the Seduction’s shaft against my clit with minimal awkward angling. The motion is similar to jerking off a penis, and I like to do it while I idly read erotica or watch porn, as a prelude to serious self-fucking.

The orgasms I have from the Seduction (paired with a good clit vibe) are all-consuming and life-affirming. Panda says that hers makes her come so hard she cries, and I believe it. The combination of thickness, firmness, and a sharp G-spot angle makes for some very intense sensations. This dildo is not for you if you like your toys thin, gentle, or flexible.

But if your G-spot wants to have the wind knocked out of it… if you want to fuck your own brains out until you’re lying in a sweaty heap, possibly soaked in your own ejaculate… if you want orgasms that will make you weep and send fawning love letters to NobEssence… you need a Seduction.

Yes, it’s expensive. But pleasure this ridiculous is worth paying for.

GJ Reads Grey, Chapter 6 (second half)

Kate Sloan

Want to go back? Read the previous instalment or the first chapter.

Last time, we left off with Christian pinning Ana against an elevator wall and kissing her aggressively without checking in or ascertaining her consent in any way. Cool story, bro!

This time, we start with a smaller manifestation of that same contempt for consent: she asks him to call her Ana, again, and he still goes on calling her Anastasia, because evidently he doesn’t give a shit about what she wants.

“Why do you insist on calling me Anastasia?” she asks.
“Because it’s your name.”
“I prefer Ana.”
“Do you, now?”
“Ana” is too everyday and ordinary for her. And too familiar. Those three letters have the power to wound…

Christian drives Ana back to the apartment she shares with her friend Kate…

Kavanagh jumps up and gives me a critical once-over as she hugs Ana.
What did she think I was going to do to the girl?
I know what I’d like to do to her…

It’s like this dude has multiple personalities, and one of them is a murderer. He’s continually written to seem totally blind to his own creepiness. Ugh.

A lock of her hair has broken free, and without thinking, I tuck it behind her ear. She leans her face into my fingers, the tender gesture surprising me. My thumb strays to her soft bottom lip, which I’d like to kiss again. But I can’t. Not until I have her consent.

YES! CONSENT! I would be cheering and pumping my fists in the air right now, if I didn’t know that by “her consent” he means “her signature on a creepy BDSM contract.”

Then Christian gets in the car with his brother Elliot, who’s apparently dating Kate now, and they have another one of their classic bro-y conversations. It’s filled with stilted dialogue out of bad ’90s teen sex comedies, like “Man, I need some sleep; that woman is voracious” and “How about you, hotshot? Did she pop your cherry?” (Can we have an Elliot spinoff novel? I bet he’s more fun than Christian.)

The results come back from the background check Christian ran on Ana’s friend José (remember?). No sexual harassment charges; only “a ticket for possession of marijuana.”

And the little prick smokes weed? I hope he doesn’t smoke around Ana – and I hope she doesn’t smoke, period.

Grey has his assistant print out a non-disclosure agreement and a copy of his “standard Dom/sub contract” for Ana. Oh, the romance!!

For the first time in a long time, I have a sweet sense of anticipation. I’m excited.
Will she say yes to my proposal?
I picture her sleeping beside me, soft and small… and my cock twitches with expectation. I could have woken her and fucked her then – what a novelty that would have been.
I’ll fuck her in time. I’ll fuck her bound and with her smart mouth gagged.

It’s gross that for him, the appeal of fucking Ana is that it would have been “a novelty.” Not that he likes her, or wants to make her feel good, or wants to explore an equitable and mutually enjoyable sexual connection… but that she would’ve been an interesting new way for him to get his dick wet. Sigh.

Christian picks her up after her shift at the hardware store. “She’s dressed in black jeans… Jeans again.” Dude, it’s probably unsafe to wear a skirt when you work around sharp and splintery objects all day! Can you cut her some slack for wearing jeans to a goddamn hardware store?! She’s not here to please your eyes and your dick!

He’s taking her out on a trip in his helicopter, which is called Charlie Tango. I have italicized the name of the helicopter not for emphasis but because it is literally italicized every time it’s mentioned in this book. This is probably too boring and journalism-nerdy to even get into, but dammit, it annoys me. Who copy-edited this trash? I even just Googled “do you italicize the name of a helicopter?” but the results were unhelpful.

“Over there,” I order, pointing to the front passenger seat. “Sit. Don’t touch anything.” I’m amazed when she does as she’s told.

Really? You’re amazed that a small, college-age woman feels intimidated by the commands of an older, authoritative multimillionnaire in an aircraft she doesn’t know how to operate and won’t be able to escape from? What is confusing about that?

Do you remember the shot in the movie where Christian straps her into the seatbelt-harness of the helicopter, like she’s a literal child? That part is even creepier in the book. He’s “trying not to imagine her naked” while he does it, breathing in her “sweet, evocative scent,” and conceptualizing the straps as some kind of bondage device. “You’re secure. No escaping,” he tells her, and then, “I like this harness.” So glad I’m not Ana right now.

“You’re safe with me,” I reassure her, and add, “Well, while we’re flying.” I give her a wink, she beams, and I’m dazzled.

Is this what serial killers’ flirty banter is like?

Before and during the takeoff, there’s lots of technical jabber about helicopter motors and dashboards, etc. E.L. James: always a riveting writer. (Just wait til we get to the BDSM contract, y’all. It leaps off the page, with its many salient details about nutrition and living arrangements and clothing. Yawn.)

“Do you always impress women this way? ‘Come up and fly in my helicopter’?”
“I’ve never brought a girl up here, Anastasia. It’s another first for me. Are you impressed?”

Can we talk about how she used the word “woman” and he immediately switched it out for “girl”? This encapsulates so much about this damn book.

He takes her to his house, which is called Escala. I wonder why its name isn’t italicized like Charlie Tango. (Okay, I’ll stop being a copyediting nerd now, I promise.)

“Do you play?” She looks at the piano.
“Yes.”
“Well?”
“Yes.”
“Of course you do. Is there anything you can’t do well?”
“Yes… A few things.” Cook. Tell jokes. Make free and easy conversation with a woman I’m attracted to. Be touched…

Yikes. Just… Yikes.

He has her sign the non-disclosure agreement, which she does willingly. Then she asks if he’s going to “make love” to her tonight and he delivers one of his most well-known lines: “I don’t make love. I fuck, hard.” He invites her to check out his “playroom” and she delivers one of her most well-known lines: “You want to play on your Xbox?” Oh, honey…

He takes her in there and they have an incredibly awkward conversation that seems to indicate pretty clearly what any astute reader knew was true: Christian has very specific desires for Ana and she doesn’t have much knowledge of or interest in what he’s telling her. She seems confused, unsettled, and unwilling. Any half-decent human would have abandoned this whole endeavor if they were in Christian’s shoes, seeing how uncomfortable Ana is. But he’s Christian, and he puts his own agenda first, always.

“So you’ll get your kicks by exerting your will over me.”
Spot on, Miss Steele.
“It’s about gaining your trust and your respect, so you’ll let me exert my will over you.” I need your permission, baby. “I will gain a great deal of pleasure, joy even, in your submission. The more you submit, the greater my joy – it’s a very simple equation.”
“Okay, and what do I get out of this?”
“Me.” I shrug. That’s it, baby. Just me. All of me.

Then he shows her the bedroom where she’ll stay, Fridays through Sundays, if she agrees to the terms of his contract.

“I’ll sleep here?”
“Yes.”
“Not with you.”
“No. I told you, I don’t sleep with anyone, except you when you’re stupefied with drink.”

Christian, you dumb shit!! You just gave her a powerful incentive to get blackout drunk more often! Not to mention, after he says this, he continues plying her with wine, even though she won’t eat anything and it’s probably not safe for her to be drinking so much on an empty stomach. Ugh, someone please delete this book from my Kindle before I throw it out a window.

“I will punish you when you require it, and it will be painful.” For example, when you get drunk and put yourself at risk.

Like right now, perhaps???

He gets frustrated with her (quite reasonable) series of questions, so he shows her the rules laid out in the BDSM contract. Their ensuing discussion leads to the revelation that Ana is a virgin.

How the hell did I get this so wrong? Anger lances through me. What can I do with a virgin? I glare at her as fury surges through my body. “Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?” I growl, and start pacing my study. What do I want with a virgin?

After he calms down a bit, he tells her he wants to “rectify the situation right now.” HOW are women worldwide swooning over this character?! HOW is it at all romantic or exciting for someone to express their desire for you as wanting to “rectify [your] situation”?? A bit later, he rephrases it to, “Please, Ana, let me make love to you,” and that’s better, but still. He should have led with that.

He takes her to his bedroom and there’s a sex scene that is, actually, not terrible. He makes her come by just sucking on her nipples (unrealistic, maybe, but she does admit she’s never masturbated, so maybe a first orgasm would be that easy?) and then they fuck twice in two different positions. You know, if it weren’t for the horrible, awkward dirty talk, E.L. James might not be too awful at writing sex scenes, I will concede.

The chapter ends with Ana falling asleep next to Christian, devirginized and sated and happy. Yes! Get it, girl!

Can we just end the novel here before shit starts to get really scary?

Want to keep reading? Go to the next chapter.

Review: Magic Wand Rechargeable

Kate Sloan

magic-wand-rechargeable

For a long time, I felt about the Hitachi Magic Wand the way I would feel if I met my favorite movie star in person and he turned out to be a sexist asshole.

It just didn’t live up to its cultish following. Certainly, it’s one of the strongest vibrators you can get, and I guess that’s why so many people like it. But vibration strength cannot be the only thing a vibrator has to offer, just as a good-looking man can’t sweet-talk his way into my pants if he also happens to be stupid and rude.

I developed tricks and techniques to make the wand work for me, but still, it tended to languish in my bottom drawer, gathering dust. Eventually I gave it away to a friend… and then, like a scorned lover who keeps returning to the one who hurts her, I bought another one for myself.

It felt like something I “had to” or “ought to” own, not something I wanted to own or liked to use.

But all that has changed now. The Magic Wand has been overhauled in a major way; dropping the “Hitachi” label is the least of these wonderful changes.

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I first tried the Magic Wand Rechargeable at #DildoHoliday. I borrowed Piph‘s wand and immediately understood her penchant for “casual Hitachi-ing“: this is a toy that lends itself well to idle, lazy, absent-minded usage – say, while reading fanfic or watching porn. The lowest setting is pleasurable but mild enough that it doesn’t act like clitoral novocaine. I can sit with the head of the wand wedged between my thighs while I scroll through Tumblr, check my phone, or hunt through my drawers for a particular dildo. It turns me on but requires almost zero effort or focus. Neat.

You would think, from the fact that it’s called the Magic Wand Rechargeable, that the most notable change to this toy is its rechargeability. And yeah, it’s great not to be chained to an outlet. But what really excites me about this new wand is that it now has four settings instead of two.

This is a Big Fucking Deal. The old Hitachi’s two settings were ridiculous – I would describe them as “jackhammer” and “jackhammer in an earthquake” – so I usually had to use mine indirectly for it to be comfortable. The two new settings introduced in the rechargeable version are a blessing, a godsend, a revelation. (I am making a lot of religious references… #AllHailHitachi!) The first speed is low, but still pretty stimulating; the second speed, however, is my jam. It’s rumblier than the other settings, making for a deeper, bolder sensation that can get me off with alarming consistency.

The upper two settings are roughly the same as the ones on the original Hitachi. I almost never use them. The toy is quite a bit louder on those high speeds (though the sound reminds me less of a food processor now than the old version did), and they’re also fairly buzzy and numbing. You’ll like ’em if you liked the O.G. Hitachi, but I didn’t, so I don’t.

magic-wand-rechargeable-head

The wand’s head is now made of silicone. HALLE-FUCKIN’-LUJAH. The old head was made of some gross, foamy, porous material, and I’d read far too many horror stories about it getting stained by menstrual blood and all manner of other things. Sex toys should not be stainable! The new wand’s silicone head is entirely smooth, so if your clit loved the texture on the old one, you might be disappointed – but come on: nonporous materials are always better.

The controls aren’t as simple as the flip-switch on the old Hitachi, but they’re still pretty damn simple. One button turns the toy on and off, one cycles through the speeds, and one cycles through the patterns. Easy-peasy. I don’t love vibrators that make you go through the higher speeds to get back to a lower one, but I’m used to dealing with the We-Vibe Tango so that controls scheme doesn’t bug me too much anymore.

The rechargeable wand has a new “feature” where it automatically turns off after 20 minutes, ostensibly to prevent overheating. Weirdly, overheating is an issue that the old wand had but that the new one seems to lack, so this “safety measure” doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. And, as Piph notes, it can seem almost shaming, as if taking longer than 20 minutes would be taking “too long.” Luckily, you can turn the toy right back on again when it turns off.

I actually haven’t encountered the shut-off feature at all, because a) it usually only takes me 5-10 minutes to reach orgasm and b) I typically turn the wand off and on many times during each session so I can get back to the lowest speed. But, before you decide to buy this wand, you should think about the way that you usually use vibrators, and determine whether a loss of power after 20 minutes of continual use would be a potential boner-killer for you.

The rechargeable wand lasts forever on a charge: hours and hours, especially if you tend to use the lower settings. You can use it while it’s plugged in, too. Nicely done, Vibratex!

magic-wand-rechargeable-attachment

As with the previous iteration of the Magic Wand, I tend to use this one with an attachment a lot of the time. It focuses the sensation into a more pinpoint shape, so I can get in between my labia and direct the vibration right onto my clit without buzzing the surrounding area.

However, if you like broader stimulation, obviously the Magic Wand can deliver that smashingly well. My inner labia – not normally a major source of pleasure for me – really enjoy the wand’s vibrations from time to time.

Overall, the Magic Wand Rechargeable is the dependable toybox workhorse I always wanted the Hitachi to be. It does the job and does it well. It’s become a bedside staple for me, and I don’t use that phrase lightly. It’s more than double the price of the original, but that price hike is actually justified.

The Hitachi has often been lauded as the “Cadillac of vibrators,” a one-size-fits-all vibe that could satisfy anyone – and while that’s not true of any sex toy, the Magic Wand Rechargeable is certainly a lot closer to that goal than its predecessor.