The contortions of the ebook retail giants in recent days to retain a squeaky-clean image are a sight to behold; this bears all the hallmarks of  tragi-comedy, i.e. you just don't know whether to laugh or cry. But it also shows that in their rather unseemly haste to clean up their (inadvertently, of course) 'filthy' act, they have pushed some powerful moral panic buttons, judging by the predictably outraged and prurient prose of the Daily Mail, triggering emotive adjectives such as 'horrifying', 'sick', 'vile' and 'disgusting'. So what exactly has happened? Well,  it seems The Kernel, a techie internet magazine based in the UK discovered that the e-retail departments of British bookshops such as WH Smith, Foyles (good grief!) and Waterstones were selling 'amateur' literature (i.e., self-published ebooks) that glorified rape, incest and bestiality, sometimes combining all three. Then Amazon and Barnes & Noble were found to have even larger 'catalogues of filth'. If you want an excellent resumé of the unfolding story, plus some good comments thereon, read Laura Hazard Owen's piece in GigaOM. read more

Shunga: sex and pleasure in Japanese art. 3 October 2013 to 5 January 2014. Explicit and beautifully detailed, these works, produced between 1600 and 1900, have continued to influence manga, anime and Japanese tattoo art. The exhibition sheds new light on this taboo art form within Japanese social and cultural history. Parental guidance advised for visitors under 16. Tickets £7.00 More information here. read more

The Feminist Times has arrived. Check out their brand new website at www.feministtimes.com. See our interview with their editor Charlotte Raven here. Congratulations, women!

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Comprising newly commissioned painting, drawing, sculpture and wallpaper, Di Massimo’s exhibition introduces his ongoing project The Lustful Turk, initiated in 2012 and inspired by an erotic epistolary novel of the same name. First published anonymously in 1828, the book tells the story of Emily Barlow, an English girl who is abducted by the Dey of Algiers, incorrectly described as a ‘Turk’ and with whom she ends up falling madly in love. Read more, plus exhibition details HERE read more

An exhibition of Joachim Devillé's work is opening this Friday for one week only; his work shows that urban decay can be extremely beautiful – even from the inside. Click HERE to see more images and exhibition dates and venue read more

To coincide with the release of Lovelace, the Linda Lovelace biopic, Television X will be screening the uncut version of the classic porn film, Deep Throat. Telling the touching tale of a woman unable to orgasm until her clitoris is located deep in her throat, it stars the charming Linda Lovelace and a vaudeville-esque turn from Harry Reems's moustache. Deep Throat will be broadcast at 10pm tonight on Sky and Virgin, and will be available on demand on TVXflix, YouView and via the Television X website.

On Thursday August 15th at 7pm (FREE) The Museum of Art and Design (New York) will screen the film An Evening With Quentin Crisp and Penny Arcade for the first time since that iconic performance in Vienna in 1995. read more

The expense of spirit in a waste of shame is lust in action; and till action, lust is perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame, savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust... read more

Our colleagues at Erotic Review Books, over in the West Wing of Erotic Towers, announce that they have been beavering away (no that's a terrible pun, really, totally unintentional, sorry George, sorry Georgina) to produce a book of the incomparable Nnenna Marcia's short stories which contains a novella, too. It's called Africa Hot: West African Stories of Sex and Love and it's published today. You can download it to your Nook, your Kindle, your iPad or iPhone, indeed once you have purchased it for a trifling £4.30, you can read it on just about any computer or tablet or smartphone you care to. And if you are one of those picky shoppers, you can even download a sample short story, for free. Sheer madness not to. We have, and take it from us, Africa Hot is hot, alright. In fact it's probably making no small contribution to the current heatwave. read more