Introduction
There was a time a generation ago, or perhaps in the days of our grandparents, when marriage was sacrosanct. The role of husband and wife was well-defined, and each fulfilled that role knowing that their neighbors were constantly on watch for transgressions of the marriage contract. If the husband was less than satisfied with his marriage it was permitted for him to seek release through certain low-level women-but if the wife was dissatisfied, there was nothing for her to do but make the most of a bad bargain. At least she was presumed to receive some satisfaction in sexual matters from her husband's ministrations.
The role of the widow was much less happy, for there was no publicly-recognized channel of relief for her sexual energies other than that of remarriage And that done too quickly would earn disapproval as readily as any extramarital or pre-marital liaison. Our colonial forefathers had much the easier time of it, for in those days it was with winking eye and tacit approval that young men were encouraged to climb through the bedroom windows for the purpose of visiting carnally marriageable daughters.
We can particularly feel sorry for the widow in those days, for it is known that a woman can retain sexual desires even into her eighties, while many men are still potent into their late seventies. Indeed, many marriage counselors and doctors recommend the act of physical love as a way to renew an interest in living for their elderly patients.
What then of the young widow, the woman deprived in her prime of her husband's body, perhaps at the time when she most needs him? Mabel Love, the central character in Thomas Koch's fascinating study of just such a woman, is only thirty-one when deprived of her husband. She is at the very peak of her sexual needs-but during her marriage she has never been anything other than faithful. Indeed, her husband never gave her reason to be other than loyal to him; and for this reason Mabel does not know how to seek the release that she so desperately needs.
But we are no longer living in the days of our grandparents. It is no longer necessary for the widowed wife to withdraw from public life, forced to subsist only on her own inner energies, forced to go completely without satisfaction in such a necessary part of life. Social mores have changed completely during the past quarter of a century, until our parents would be shocked and even humiliated at our present lifestyle. Now it is considered natural for an adult to seek out every release necessary to mental and physical well-being. Indeed, it has even been suggested that, if present sociological trends continue as they have been building during the past two decades, marriage as a common institution and an expected way of living may soon be as old-fashioned as the butter churn. There are millions of young couples today who live together, knowing each other completely, with no intention of marrying now or in the foreseeable future.
Thus the release that Mabel needs is as close to hand as the body of her husband's assistant, Jack Hargren. And she takes every advantage of Jack, gives herself fully to him as she seeks the release her body so strongly demands. Yet she has been too long denied that release, and even the act of love is not enough for her. Instead, she turns elsewhere, seeking additional satisfaction. And it is here that she would earn the disapproval of all past generations, for she finds her further release not in the person of grown men eager to share the physical aspects of love with a beautiful and bountifully endowed woman, but in teenage boys. And not just once, with a single lad; no, Mabel Love finds that she must drive ever deeper into the depths of moral depravation as she seeks to satisfy her bodily hunger. There are six boys readily available to her, and she takes full advantage of each and every one of them.
Is this wrong? Is this the ultimate in depravity, that an adult woman should satisfy herself with teenaged boys? What harm can she do them, to their young minds?
Or is it possible that there is really nothing at all wrong in sharing of sex with the young -who are after all physically matured enough to enjoy such a relation. The author examines these questions fully in this novel, and comes to conclusion that you the reader will find both shocking and provocative.
-The Publisher