Spanking the Maid

Written early in Coover's illustrious career, Spanking the Maid is an impeccable and spellbinding novel about a master, his maid, and the irresistible ritual that binds them. A bedroom and a bathroom are the only places where the two characters meet, and every day it is the same. The maid comes to the bedroom to clean. She inevitably forgets something -- the soap, fresh sheets, a bucket -- or does something wrong. The master has had a nightmare he can't quite recall that had something to do with when he was in school: lectures, or was it lechers? No matter, the maid must be reprimanded for her neglect, and out comes the handy paraphernalia -- a hairbrush, a cat-o'-nine-tails, a rod, a cane -- and the spanking begins. Included in Harold Bloom's The Western Canon and named by Daphne Merkin in The New Yorker as one of her "favorite" S/M books, Spanking the Maid is a spare, tantalizing, and perfect book by an American master.