Wicked: Sexy Tales of Legendary Lovers Book

What made Lincoln’s hat stand up? Did Chairman Mao keep a Little Black Book? In this collection, 21 wickedly gifted writers indulge their imaginations — and ours — by eavesdropping on the sex lives of the famous. Historical characters ranging from rock stars and film icons to royalty and men of science become the focus of erotic desire.

Lynda Schor’s “Seduction” follows Warren Beatty on his tireless erotic journey, with characters like Joan Collins and Joyce Carol Oates chiming in on his legendary prowess. In “The Ballad of Scott and Zelda,” Maxim Jakubowski traces the passion and the slow, bitter disconnection of those idols of the Jazz Age. “Love, Zora,” by Fiona Zedde, is a graceful, poetic evocation of a young woman’s affair with Zora Neale Hurston. Editor Mitzi Szereto brings together a playful and varied collection, not only gratifying our curiosity about acknowledged sex symbols like Marilyn Monroe and Rudolph Valentino, but exciting readers with the imaginary adventures of such unlikely figures as Toulouse Lautrec, Sigmund Freud, and God.