Archive | November, 2012

Talkin’ Sex on the Telephone

30 Nov

Woman on telephoneThe company where I work is setting up a new call center and we’re conducting testing to see if the reps who pick up calls actually know what they’re talking about. I’m quizzing them on various scenarios to make sure they’re giving out correct information, so I’m spending a lot of time developing a relationship with people I don’t know and can’t see. All of this recent phone talk naturally got me thinking about phone sex (hey, what do you expect? I’m a blogger for Lady Smut).

A friend of mine was once involved in a long-distance relationship and she and her guy used to have phone sex on a regular basis, even up to the point where he fell asleep on the phone afterward. That seems like a snooze (if you’re pardon the pun) of a way to end the experience, but hey, if it works for them that’s what counts. The whole notion of traditional phone sex is an interesting one. I can’t think of another situation in which you have a very intimate, personal experience with someone you can’t see. Even when you visit a convict in prison you get to look at each other through a glass wall (or so it is on TV, anyway. Luckily I haven’t experienced it first hand). But here’s the thing: when I’m reading a sex scene in a romance novel, an important element of the scene is the couple’s visual communication. Looks between the hero and heroine can portray so much – longing, arousal, excitement, love – and that unspoken communication is lost during phone sex. So those scenes in a romance novel leave me a little empty and dissatisfied, even when they’re masterfully described by the author.

Nowadays, of course, there’s a twist. You’ll recall above that I wrote about “traditional” phone sex. I was referring to those ancient times before Skype and Facetime became the norm. Now that it’s so easy to see the other person with whom you’re talking on the phone, it takes the whole phone sex thing to another level entirely. “What are you wearing?” becomes a pointless question when the heroine can simply point the camera to her scantily-clothed body and show her man the naughty garter belts she put on just for him. There are some pretty delicious possibilities here, but I have to confess that I haven’t come across a good romance, erotic or otherwise, that contain a phone sex scene in which the couple uses today’s technology. If you’ve have and want to let me know about it, I’m all ears!

In the meantime, I guess I’ll get back to my calls.

Have a great weekend!

Elizabeth

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Lovin’ the Cray-Cray: Q&A with K.M. Jackson

29 Nov

Today our Lady Smut Q&A guest is Kwana Jackson, who publishes books under the name K.M.Jackson.

MADELINE IVA: Kwana, thanks so much for being with us today.

KWANA JACKSON: Thanks so much for having me over Madeline, it’s a real treat. As you probably know from my tweets that I like a little bit of the over the top crazy especially in my TV viewing.

MADELINE IVA: Why does Nene of the show First Housewives of Atlanta have a special place in your heart? What is her special brand of crazy? On another note–How did the television show Bridezillas first suck you in?

KWANA JACKSON: I always had a thing for Nene from the as I call them “Not So Real” Housewives of the ATL. I felt that out of being not so real, Nene kept it the realest. Always telling like it was no matter if people liked it or not. And yes, she did have a moment in season 2 where she went over the top and lost it for a moment there and became a bit of a caricature of herself but I think she brought it back home and it shows with her now taking a step into acting with being on shows like Glee and The New Normal.

As for Bridezillas, though I don’t watch all the time I will get sucked in on a Saturday marathon from time to time. There is just something about those crazy brides that has me saying, well gee, I guess my husband really lucked out with me. LOL.

MADELINE IVA: Is there one particular bridezilla that you simply cannot forget? What makes her stand out in your memory?

KWANA JACKSON: There was one and I can’t remember her name but she was just awful and her voice just grated. She would say the grooms name over and over. I kept wanting him to just leave her already.

MADELINE IVA: You’ve said: “I’d give anything if they did a 6 month later follow up on those couples. There is no way most of them make it. Just no way.” Do you think the irony of presenting a bride showing her utter contempt towards everyone—when she’s supposed to be declaring her eternal love–gives the reality show Bridezilla’s it’s appeal?

KWANA JACKSON: I don’t know. I think folks just like to see people behaving badly but a part of me feels like it won’t last. At a certain point the audience just may grow tired of this type of behavior and there may be a backlash. Even I, who goes for the crazy, sometimes get a little exhausted and says can this really be real? Where are these people?

MADELINE IVA: We’ve also talked about our love for crazy things that happen in romance novels. For example, I’ll never forget the Laura Kinsale novel where at one point the hero and heroine are stuck on a deserted island and together they raise a penguin. [The craziest part is how good Kinsale's writing is--I'm not going to say how much I wept for that penguin. It's just embarrassing.]

You’ve said you love pirates and sheiks in cray-cray romance stories. Any titles you can recommend?

KWANA JACKSON: There are so many pirates and so little time but Susan Mallery has quite a few sheiks. [Note from Lady Smut: And Mallery's sheiks titles all have brides in them!] A new favorite sheik author of mine is Caitlin Crews. For best title go to Sharon Kendrick with The Playboy Sheikh’s Virgin Stable-Girl. Seriously with that title you get it all.

MADELINE IVA:  Right! I think Smart Bitches Trashy Books made hay with that book.  Meanwhile, I don’t enjoy actually doing crazy stuff myself. (Well, except for quitting my career to start writing romance novels. ;>) But I’m so drawn to hearing about it, watching it, etc. Do you think we’re hardwired that way? Does it serve a purpose to observe different kinds of craziness (like on reality television)? Do we learn from it in some way? Do we identify with it in some way?

KWANA JACKSON: I think that people like to escape from their own realities and if that means going a little crazy in their television or reading then so be it. It’s in a safe environment (for the most part) that way. In my book Through The Lens, a regular woman goes out of her comfort zone to have an island fling with her unobtainable boss, the man of her dreams.

MADELINE IVA: I mean, sometimes I identify with those bridezillas a little. Like the bridezilla who guessed most of her bridesmaids didn’t shave under their arms even though they were wearing strapless gowns. She pinned them down and made them admit it and then started busting out the razors. That there is pure problem solving in my opinion. I might have done the same thing myself. Do you ever read anything crazy in romance novels or watch anything crazy in reality television that you find you identify with?

KWANA JACKSON: Sure, I guess that’s why I liked Nene so much on The Real Housewives on ATL a lot of the things she said, I would have said myself. Like when she told Kim to, “close your legs to married men.” Bam! Perfect line, quick and to the point. Of course in the real world and on TV and in fiction nothing is perfect. Kim gave us so much crazy with her affair with Mr. Big and then Nene later with her own men, but this is why we love to watch.

MADELINE IVA: I ended up writing about a bridezilla throwing platters of shrimp off the deck at her wedding. [Of course it was bad shrimp that a sketchy caterer tried to foist off on the wedding guests.] It was so much fun writing that scene. Do you have crazy elements in your own romances?

KWANA JACKSON: I do have a bit of the crazy in Through The Lens. In one of my favorite scenes my heroine bites my hero’s tongue after a particularly passionate kiss. It was fun to write and wasn’t planned. I swear she just did it. I laughed so much after I typed the words.

Thank you so much for having me. Like I said this was a real treat and a pleasure. I’d love to hear what your readers like in their brand of wild and crazy.

Kwana can be reached via:

Her  website at www.kwana.com

On twitter at: https://twitter.com/KwanaWrites

On Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/KmJacksonAuthor

Email me at: kwanawrites@yahoo.com

A bit about Through The Lens:

Mika Walters is a normal woman working in the not so normal world of New York Fashion. As long time assistant to sexy photographer Alejandro Vargas she’s tired of being the girl in the background. Just once she wants Alejandro to look at her with the same smoldering look he gives his models and now she has her chance.

After a travel mishap where the rest of the crew and the models can’t make the remote location shoot for another three days Mika is taking her moment to catch Alejandro’s eye and put herself in front of Alejandro’s camera… at least until the real world catches up with them.

Alejandro doesn’t know what’s gotten into Mika maybe it’s the sand, maybe it’s the sun, he doesn’t really care. All he knows is that he’s finally opened his eyes and is seeing her clearly for the first time as the smart, gorgeous and incredibly irresistible woman she is.

But why can’t she realize that what he’s feeling for her is not one of his usual one, well, three night stands? What’s it going to take for him to prove to Mika that she’s the woman he wants? Now and forever.

 

Through The Lens is available at:

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

iTunes

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Yummy Dancing Men

28 Nov

It’s snowing outside my window as I type this, and holiday decorations abound. Twinkling lights, festive storefronts, and sexy male dancers.

Wait . . . what? I can hear you readers out there right now. You’re wondering 1) if Elizabeth Shore is off her rocker; and 2) if she does, in fact, have full control of her faculties, how did she get from twinkling lights to hot dancers? Elementary, my dear readers. It’s the Nutcracker.

You see, when I think of the Nutcracker, I think of ballet in general. I love it. So beautiful, so lyrical, so full of hot male dancers. Listen, I can’t be the only one who’s noticed this. The men’s costumes are made for displaying their physical attributes, particularly in the lower halves of their very sexy physiques. This time of year I traditionally attend a performance of the Nutcracker, so as I admire the pretty (albeit cold and wet) snowfall, I start thinking of holidays, and the Nutcracker, and then images of sculpted muscles dance in my head. I mean, what’s not to love about this?

I get equally keyed up thinking about male gymnasts. There’s something about a very fit guy with muscles that look chiseled by a master sculptor that just gets me going. And on top of that, dancers and gymnasts are flexible! My writer’s brain is plotting out spicy lovemaking scenes with a guy who can do the splits even as I type this. There are some very delicious possibilities here.

While we’re on the subject, how about figure skaters? Their costumes are generally not as revealing as a dancer’s or gymnast’s, but they’re equally fit and flexible, and skating backwards really works the glutes.

Lastly, I suppose no post about male dancers would be complete without these guys:

The bodies are undeniable and a thrusting pelvis isn’t all that bad from time to time. There’s a little bit of a goofy element to me with these guys compared with the true masculine beauty of ballet dancers, gymnasts, or skaters but they’re nice to look at so why not?

As you watch the tree lighting tonight, think of the Nutcracker, and ballet, and dancers . . . you’ll feel all warm and cozy in no time. :-)

Elizabeth

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Coffee Klatsch: Sexy Desserts

27 Nov

Photo by Sarah Robinson.

Welcome to Lady Smut’s first Coffee Klatsch, where in we discuss important topic, like, um, sexy desserts. Wherein our email conversations morph into our blog posts. And vice versa.

To me chocolate says indulgence. And when I think of indulgence, one of the things I think of is romance and of course, sex.

When I thought about writing about my top five sexiest desserts, it wasn’t surprising then that all of them have chocolate as a center piece. Through the years, I’ve become quite the chocolate snob, preferring to indulge in good dark chocolate, rather than a Hershey bar–though I have to admit there are times that only a Hershey bar will do.

And I have chocolate on the brain these days because while I’m writing CRAVINGS, I’m researching chocolate, which is the culinary theme of the book. Not sweet little chocolates shops, of course, but more cacao plantations and tropical settings. (Though by the time I’m done with them, my characters might be wishing for a nice little air conditioned shop in Paris.)

Here are my top five sexiest desserts. Well… sort of.

  1. Chocolate mousse. I love everything about it—the light, creamy puff in my mouth and the explosion of chocolate flavor. Sir in a raspberry or twoand I am yours.
  2. Chocolate covered fruit. Dark chocolate, of course. Strawberries, cherries, bananas. Dipped and eaten by hand—or even better yet, fed to me.
  3. Hot fudge sundae. Because well. C’mon. Cold. Hot. Vanilla. Chocolate. Indulgence.
  4. Brownies. Moist, thick, with or without nuts. Now some of you might think as brownies as more a “family” dessert. But I think a good husband is about as sexy as it gets. Imagine your hawt hubby with an apron on pulling out a batch of brownies from the oven. Yes, indeed.
  5. Okay. I couldn’t pick between chocolate cheeswcake and chocolate pie. I am a pie girl all the way. But cheesecake is near and dear to my hubs and me. So I mentioned this to the ladies and opened up a whole discussion.

From Madeline: Chocolate pie is sexier than chocolate cheese cake, for sure. Especially if you call it Chocolate cream pie, or silken pie, or something like that. :)

And this from Elizabeth: My secret confession is that I’m not really a fan of chocolate. I like it, but don’t love it. I do love pastries, though. I had an apple streudel in Munich once that was covered in vanilla sauce to thick and decadent that I wanted to lick the plate. Would have if I hadn’t been in public . . .

(Which reminded me of this cannolli I ate in Little Italy, but that’s another story.)

From Madeline:
See, this is what I was thinking.  Outside of chocolate the first thing that came to mind were custards–a naughty creme brulee beaten with the back of a spoon until it cracks, that kind of thing…. A thick vanilla sauce is exactly right in line with this.

But why custards? Why vanilla? Why, Elizabeth n Liz, why? Is it that mouth feel of silky fatty joy that bespeaks sex?

And final thought from me in answer to Madeline?

I think it’s about comfort on the one hand and decadence on the other hand. Creamy + comfort = love/joy/sex. And the fat joy is like “We don’t give a fig about the calories in this, we are just going for it!” Almost any kind of food can be sexy it someone is feeding you. I mean how intimate is THAT?

So readers, what are your thoughts on sexy food? Chocolate or not? And so on and so forth.

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Unexpectedly Sexy…Elves

26 Nov

He has an unattractive name, long girly hair, and he hangs out with men who cry a lot.  Who would think that a minor character from a Y.A. novel could be so hot?  But he is— meltingly, drool worthy, crush-worthy hot.  Yes, we’re talking about the unexpectedly sexy today–and how unexpectedly melting an elf can be.

Legolas portrayed by Orlando Bloom in The Fellowship Of the Rings did what Tolkien had been trying to do in his writing for decades–convince people that elves don’t have to be tiny green men, they can be lithe, angelic vessels of perfection.

My obsession began many years ago when I was dragged over the holidays by a relative to watch The Fellowship of the Ring on the first weekend it opened.  I vaguely remembered a tiny bit about the book from reading it long, long ago.  I was watching it happily, when suddenly he appeared.  Wait–who is that? Who was he in the book again?  Watching then became an act of waiting for him to appear in each scene, sucking in each moment that was his, and when I got home for the first time in my life, I think, I did an internet search for images of him.  The geeky relative wanted to see the movie again.  And again.  I was happy to go.

Orlando Bloom, unfortunately, never quite lived up to the magic he created in the role of Legolas in that first film.  I watched, I waited, I saw him slide down from that magnificent potential into a less-than-central role in a massive Disney franchise.

And hey–did anyone notice the weird stuff they had going on in the third film between him and Aragorn? Why yes, a whole nation did.

In the trilogy Tolkien wrote, Legolas and Gimly the dwarf have chemistry together.  At the end they go off together to adventure some more.  In the movie, even though Aaragorn has a love interest, she’s off stage a lot, and lets face it, she was so good in that role, but they didn’t have the best chemistry ever.

Face it Arwen, he’s just not that into you.

Instead, Legolas and Aaragorn had chemistry.  Perhaps this was a mistaken move on the part of a studio suit who thought “hey, if we get the hotties of the film together into the same frame a lot, women would combust.”  Instead, Legolas who was so pretty and Aaragorn who was so bearded and manly fit into another kind of trope entirely and the whole thing spun out of control.

Here’s the scuttlebutt on that: the Rings project was so huge, there was no way that Peter Jackson could keep track of it all.  He had to delegate, and then delegate some more.  Since he wasn’t even on site for much of the shooting, crews had a lot of lee-way.  So a few men with a sense of humor used that wiggle room to set up moments and shots between Legolas and Aaragorn that they would later re-edit the film making it into a romance between Legolas and Aragorn.  It’s out there on the internet somewhere still, I think.

Yet it didn’t need a nation finding a bootleg edit of the film on the internet to catch on.   It’s all right up there on the screen.  There’s a moment in the third movie where Legolas thinks Aragorn is lost as he finds a necklace Aragorn’s love gave to Aaragorn and that Aaragorn always wears.  He keeps it, but later when Aaragorn turns up, Legolas has a moment with his compadre where he returns the necklace to Aaragorn.  This moment is observed by a woman who’s fallen for Aaragorn (she’s not his love interest).  She watches the return of the necklace.  Perhaps she’s supposed to understand by looking at the necklace that Aaragorn is carrying a sort of elf-engagement ring from some other girl.  But it looks and feels and smells to all of us in the audience like m/m romance going on right under our hetero-centric noses and this woman is figuring it out, and is crushed as a result.  And thus a thousand fan fiction sights are launched.  In these fan fiction sights Aagorn and Legolas overcome that girlfriend barrier, and other barriers to their secret love, and they’re gettin’ it on big time.

Don’t hate me, Aaragorn fans, but he never did much for me.  I guess I just don’t like beards.  Anyway, what Legolas did inspire was a story I’ve written about a Wicked Apprentice who mistakenly captures a half-man, half-elf.  This guy is a hottie, chained in a cell.  He’s her captive and the thought of him being under her control gets her feeling something quite strong.  She gets him all hot and bothered and when she does his eyes change from human green to elf black.  Which just makes her all the more curious to see what happens with their clothes off.  However,  her power to arouse him flips him into elf mode, and in elf mode, he has the power to seduce her until she can’t think straight. Under those mesmerizing black eyes, she finds herself doing things she never thought she would want to do…

The elf in Wicked Apprentice, Theodorus, has auburn hair, not long silver hair, but he started out with some of that same otherworldly purity of nature, only it’s been corrupted by the harsh world around him. The heroine, Zephyr is able to help him regain it, but Theodorus also has something in him that Tolkien put in a lot of his elves and that we don’t see with Legolas.  He has a fey side–a wild passion that often leads to perversity.  It comes out when his elf nature takes hold–as it frequently does when he’s around Zephyr.  It’s this willingness to plunge over the edge into the unknown out of sheer abandon that traps them both in a circle of magic from which they cannot escape.

I love my character and I love his story…it’s out with agents and editors and such.  Hope you’ll get to read it one day soon!

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Happy Thanksgiving from Lady Smut

20 Nov

Expecting images of hearth and home during this Thanksgiving week?

Photo by Dollen.

You’ve come to the wrong blog.

All the bloggers at Lady Smut are with family and friends over the Holiday, even though we (might) rather be doing other things…um…like lounging on a couch. In the mean time, we wish you a Happy Thanksgiving, hoping you get a chance for some naughty reads.
xxx

Lady Smut

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Holiday Short Story: Cherries After Dinner

19 Nov

This romance starts, as many good ones do, with one too many glasses of wine.

My golden harvest soup came out perfectly.  Not so much the other stuff.   Oh you would like it all, but you dear reader, aren’t a certain Australian television chef  with whom I’ve been embroiled in a two year feud.

Holding back tears, I’m trying the various dishes.  The golden harvest soup is a fucking poem–a perfect combination of pears stewed with white wine and sweet potatoes cooked with cider and cinnamon sticks.  Blended together with white pepper and a dash of cream to finish and it tastes like some kind of squash that exists only in heaven.

But the rest was, I realize, is not spectacular.  Okay, maybe spectacular, but not spectacular enough. The clock is ticking, he’ll be here any minute.  I’ve already gulped down one-too-many glasses of wine.  I need to go change.  The duck is good.  I have my own secret methods for making a superior duck.  Boil duck to open pores in the skin.  Then use a hair drier (you heard me) to dry pores open.  Immediately, you see the fat start to render.  The melting fat bastes the duck while it cooks so it’s juicy and succulent, crispy on the outside skin.  The grease splatters everywhere of course, and just wrecks my oven, but it’s worth it.  Lingon berry compote goes with the duck.  Very simple, perfectly prepared.  Yet not…suddenly, it’s just not mind blowing enough.

I turn my mind to the mache salad with golden beets and walnuts.  Meh.  The panko and crushed almond yam cakes with mushroom ragout is…sigh…a hair too salty.  Arg!  Holding back tears of defeat, I zip up my hides-all-flaws stretchy purple dress, apply killer burgundy lipstick, and await death.  Okay, not death, just the firing squad.

See, there’s this certain Australian unbelievably good looking chef who has resented insinuations I’d made on my foodie blog.  Just a little innocent comment about some chefs being all form over content.  His ranting in the comments section was good for the blog, and we got some excellent newspaper coverage, but then during a TV show, he really went for the jugular.  He said he really wanted was to choke the life out of me, but he’d settle for having me eating every one of my words.  So the throw down challenge was Thanksgiving day at his house.  It was a good meal, I’ll give him that, despite about forty ingredients going into every component of every dish.  Then he insisted that while I could write about food, while I could appreciate food, I could never ever in a million years make anything half as good as he could.  Ha! I issued my challenge for the next Thanksgiving, and we spent the year happily carping and trading insults getting magnificent press coverage the entire time.  Now I had a meal that anyone reasonable would love–anyone but a three star michelin chef with an ego the size of Tasmania.  The doorbell is ringing — must go.

***

What a crazy night.

The first thing that happened is that I opened the door to someone who was not the Australian chef.  Not as tall, not as freakishly good looking, but with similar crazy-gorgeous brown bedroom eyes.  You know what I mean, the droopy lids suggesting he’s seen it all, but he understands.

“You are not XXXX!” I said, (sorry, but Mr. Australia’s lawyer now says he’ll sue me if I use Mr. Chef’s real name).

“No, I’m his brother Tony. XXX is in the hospital having his gall bladder removed.”

“That’s awful!” I said, relieved to the bottom of my heart.

“Yeah, well, he thought it could wait.  Apparently not. So he sent me with his regrets and this bottle of champagne so–”

“Come in–” I interrupted.

“Smells good in here,” he said, taking off his coat.

“Would you like to stay for dinner?” And maybe for breakfast? I thought, though that was probably the wine talking.  Or not.  This guy Tony was infinitely more to my taste than his ken-doll brother, the spray tanned wonder of television.

“No, but thanks.  I’ve got friends who are expecting me.” Tall enough so you’d need a couple running steps to jump his body, he was scrumptious.  Not that I feel I can be picky, since I have been told I look like a plump Italian peasant girl.  My last boyfriend said I should be barefoot in a vat of grapes, stomping away.  In other words, shiny black eyes, shiny black hair, a lotta curves, a lotta passion.  We’re a dime a dozen in NYC.

“Come into the kitchen big boy, and tell me all about it,” I said my voice going a little Mae West-ish on me.  Yes, the wine was in control. Tony was polite enough, telling me about big brother keeling over on 5th after a chinese meal and being rushed to the hospital. I tskked for a second then changed the subject.

“So what do you do Tony? In the food biz ?”  I asked, standing close to him to hold my spoon next to him as he tasted the soup. I made sure to keep my eyes on his chin.  I needed to retain my coordination.

“I’m not.  Look, you made all this food, why don’t I call my friends and cancel?” he suggested.  Those bedroom eyes only flicked to mine once then went back to the soup.  Once was enough.  I smiled involuntarily at him and stumbled into him only once on my way to pop the cork on the champagne bottle.

Great relief combined with concern for XXX (I mean I’m not totally heartless) combined with the wine in a rush.  Words left me for the next ten minutes.   Tony talked to his friends on his ‘mobile’ as I wandered the kitchen, talking to those bedroom eyes with my own.

I am not with men a lot these days.  I like men, but I can’t stand modern dating conventions.  Call me crazy, but I’ve never appreciated someone wanting to sleep with me, yet being downright touchy about waiting to get to know me a little first.  It’s much worse in the city, of course, but I maintain my standards. I expect a guy to have my name firmly stuck in my brain before I’m willing to go down on him.  There’s nothing worse than hearing “Oh, that feels good….Cindy?” I just won’t go there. This, my close friends say, is why I’m still single at 34.

Dinner was really going along fabulously at first.  Tony showed every sign of wanting to get to know me.  I mean, I’ve seen interrogators use similar tactics.  I did not mind at all.  It was refreshing.  I wanted to get to know him deeply too. Underneath our in-depth conversation about careers, family, NYC vs. Sydney, etc, was the speculation, the flirty play. Tony is an anesthesiologist, divorced with a particular love for rugby and my way of hair-drying a duck.  Yum.

Then around the time we finished the duck we started joking about my feud with his brother.  Tony liked to yank his brother’s chain, it turned out.  He was delighted with my blog.  How we took a turn from all this delightfulness into our own spittingly furious disagreement is hard to analyze, especially with my hangover this morning.

Okay, somewhere around the yam patties and mushroom ragout I probably made a joke about XXX’s extravagant love life.  Yes, and Tony responded that if you stacked all XXX’s one night stands from end to end, they go from port of Los Angeles to Hobart and back.

Then I made some quip like I wondered with those eyes of his how far Tony’s one night stands would stretch?  Then I maybe said something harsh and judgemental about one-night stands.  Tony took offense.

Spitting at each other furiously, we debated the matter. Tony asked if I seriously thought two people using each other for pleasure was really so wrong?  

I said no, not necessarily.  Unless what was called “two people using each other for pleasure” was really almost always “person A using person B for pleasure, while person B silently fumed because  she wasn’t getting off and she was going to be expected to lie about it.”  That situation was in fact very wrong.

Tony claimed that never happened where he was concerned.

I said these are total strangers–so how do you really know? At that point I was so drunk.  I challenged him, mainly by taking the cherries out of the pie on the table and throwing them at him.  He responded by…well, we wound up on the dining room table, and there was a food fight going on, but somehow my dress also came off.

Since I was definitely getting off, I had to give him that one.   However, I still stuck to my guns.  When I could stop panting I said that while I’d never had a better Thanksgiving in my life, (true enough) it was a struggle not feeling sad, because now he probably wasn’t even going to call me.  He gave me this look that I couldn’t really make out because there were two of him so I closed one eye, but that didn’t help.  An hour later when he was getting me into my bed I thought I heard him say something like, after all that arguing, you think I don’t get it?  I know you’re a woman that you don’t have a one night stand with.

So now I’m really happy, which is making me grin, which is really hurting my head.

I keep thinking about our food fight on the dining room table and its consequences. Yes, the consequences.

a) I’m crushing out on him so bad I can’t stand it

b)I’ve got some flowers that were delivered oh so early this morning.  (Being woken to the sound of the buzzer was horrendous) The card says  I agree.  Best Thanksgiving ever.

c) I’ve also got an email, a text, and yes, even a Western Union telegram from him–all underscoring the idea that he’s ready to move forward whenever I am.  Clearly the guy likes to yank my chain.   

Sexy Saturday Round-Up

17 Nov

Photo by Dollen

Hello Sexy! This week I’ve been writing so much on Cravings, the second in my culinary romance series,  that I feel like my fingers need a break! There’s a lot of good writer-stuff in this week’s round up and a few sexy surprises thrown in. Enjoy!

Interested in BDSM or writing about it? Check out this blog. The BDSM Authors Play Room.

How to write niche erotica.

Sex scenes stuck in a rut?

The keys to conflict in romance writing.

Very useful post if you don’t know the difference between proofreading and editing.

Desiree Holt’s story about book covers and how they affect sales.

Jane Friedman on the power of book clubs.

Sugar Jamison on things writers shouldn’t do.

Just for fun, check out the sex experiment.

Stay hungry,

Liz

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Outdoor Playtime

16 Nov

On a trip to Italy last fall, my husband and I were in Siena when a sudden downpour overtook the city and had tourists scrambling for cover. Most of the tourists, that is, except for one intrepid young couple who remained alone in the middle of Siena’s large main square, kissing passionately while the rain soaked them through and onlookers clapped and cheered. This display of youthful lust and bravado reminded me of an erotic romance I’d read in which the hero and heroine, having been cooped up in a cabin for some period of time, decide to throw caution – and modesty! – to the wind for a good ol’ fashioned outdoor quickie. It was a really hot scene because not only were they outside, but they were rollicking in the midst of a ferocious rainstorm. The couple in the book, unlike the one in Siena, was naked, and the description of their wet, slippery skin while they made love was nothing short of scorching.

I like romance novels that include love scenes taking place out of the bedroom and into the great outdoors. The uniqueness of the outside setting adds interesting elements that can’t be replicated in the bedroom. First off, there’s the weather. A blazing hot sun can make for some blazing hot sex when the couple is sweating and humping beneath it. Hair blows beautifully in the wind. Foggy nights are often equated with mystery novels, but I say fog could be an excellent cover should the hero and heroine be overcome with need and just have to find release outside, shrouded by fog. Even snow makes an interesting contrast when heated bodies are pelted with frigid flakes.

The other obvious element with sex outside is, of course, the allure of discovery. What better way to satisfy a couple’s exhibitionist leanings than by placing them outside amidst risk – or in their case, hope – of discovery. I read a hot ménage not that long ago called Midnight Madness by Olivia Starke in which the heroine happens upon two hunks going at it in the middle of the woods. The combination voyeurism and exhibitionism scene made for a satisfying read indeed.

Outdoors scenes often occur in the woods since there’s convenient built-in camouflage. Oceans and beaches are good choices as well, as well as down and dirty construction sites or garages (door open, of course). I like the fact that the outdoor sex setting brings with it the unique combination of freedom and restriction. There are no boundaries outside, yet there are inherent constraints because the hero and heroine can’t just do it anywhere they please. Or . . . can they? In the hands of a skilled writer, I’d be open to reading about outside sex taking place just about anywhere.

How about you? Do you have favorite outdoor settings, or is lovemaking just way too private of a thing to be taking place where prying eyes might get a glimpse? Share your thoughts!

An awesome weekend to all!

Elizabeth

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Teledildonics? Q&A with Nara Malone

15 Nov

NARA MALONE is an erotic romance author with a cutting edge vision of the future.  Forget e-pub–Nara talks to you about transmedia fiction.  Part of an elusive techno-tribe, this Ellora’s Cave author trolls the internet horizon to explore the boundaries of Second Life, researches potential medical evils in biomedical-engineering and also applies her writing chops in the video-gaming world.  I emailed with Nara about how she takes her fascinating interests and applies them to her writing.  

MADELINE IVA: Your book SNATCH ME takes place (at least half the time) in a virtual world.  It may sound odd but, is there a real virtual world online where this kind of hunt n ravish thing happens?

NARA MALONE: While there is nothing exactly like the premise in Snatch Me, there are several regions in Second Life where similar role play takes place– Hard Alley and Kingdom of Pleasure come to mind.

MADELINE IVA: Did you enter this world and research it? Was it easy to navigate at first?

NARA MALONE: I did visit these worlds. I did the trailer for Snatch Me in Hard Alley. Navigating in Second Life is sometimes frustrating because of something called lag–basically a delay between the time you send a signal to your avatar to do something and the time it takes the avatar to respond. You might click repeatedly on a mouse several times because nothing happened and then all of a sudden your mouse clicks are registered and your avatar walks off a cliff.

I once had a very long conversation with an invisible fellow in Hard Alley. I was certain he was playing some sort of game because no matter what I tried, or what he suggested, I could not see him. It turned out that my slow connection just was lagging behind downloading information and twenty minutes into the conversation he materialized in front of me. You have to admire the patience of the players in the game that they accept such quirks as facts of life in virtual worlds and are willing to work together to get beyond them.  Fortunately lag isn’t constant. Like bad weather, it comes and goes.

MADELINE IVA: Explain: do the guys in this world just have at the women? Or is there consent involved? Or is a woman consenting just by entering the world?  Were there any surprises that came up during your research?

NARA MALONE: For another avatar to have any power at all over you in Second Life or any virtual world, you have to implement software that will give them that control. You have to use a viewer (like a web browser for virtual environments) that implements restrained love features. You have to turn that feature on in the viewer. In addition, a player wishing to take a submissive role has to wear an object, such as a collar or tag, that allows a dominant to take control. By nature of the programming scripts involved the game demands a certain level of consent to participate. Beyond that, if a dominant is someone the submissive decides she doesn’t wish to play with, or if there is some aspect of play that exceeds her limits, she can say no. That no is respected by all players and region owners. If it’s not, she can make a complaint to the region moderators or owner. As a final safety, all a player has to do to stop something from happening is to log off the viewer. So there are multiple levels of consent.

MADELINE IVA: (trying not to snort) What’s a “talking penis”?

NARA MALONE: (laughing.) I first discovered the phenomena of talking genitals when I took a role play class. The instructor mentioned that having genitals on automatic in public places filled the chat with comments from genitals and was considered bad manners. If you have genitals with those features, you’re supposed to turn them off in public.  I try very hard not to come across as too much of a noob, but really, who could let a comment like that go? The penises talk? Vaginas too? What did they say? Why did they talk?

I asked.

Programmers being wonderfully creative and helpful beings, love to solve problems. One problem that came up quite a bit, from what I can gather, is that when a scene between avatar lovers got hot and heavy, their typing skills started to suffer, first spelling went south and as things really heated up, speed slowed when the participating parties shifted from two hands typing to one hand. One inventive fellow decided it might be handy if the avatars genitals could insert canned phrases into the chat while the real life people were…um…taking care of business. I believe the comments are activated by the level of excitement experienced by the participants and those might be interfaced with something called teledildonics. So the comments might move from “Oh, baby” to “ohhhhhh” as things heat up. We’re way past the level of my research here. I have never seen or tried teledildonics and I didn’t own any talking avatar genitals and didn’t know anyone who did. I’m clueless as to what a penis might actually say, but it’s fun to imagine ;)

MADELINE IVA: Your next book BLIND HEAT involves a heroine with face blindness.  What is face blindness–does it really exist?

NARA MALONE: Face blindness does exist and unfortunately my research on that front was gleaned from my experience with the condition. I have normal vision, but for some as yet undetermined reason face blind individuals cannot imprint a mental image of a face. The more severe cases, like mine, can’t recognize close family members. I depend on other clues like hair, body shape, the place where I normally expect to see certain people to give me clues to identity.

MADELINE IVA: In BLIND HEAT there are human-animal embryos in a science lab.  You’ve said elsewhere that this is actually happening in the real world.  Why? What’s the point? How is the science in your world different from what’s going on in this world?

NARA MALONE: Why create hybrids? Some say to help them better study human health issues. Some want to make money from patents. I imagine there could be military reasons to do so.

Here’s a paper at the NIH discussing human/rat chimera http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2220020/ Here’s an article in the Washington Post http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19781-2005Feb12.html about the patent office refusing to patent a research project where the resulting chimera would be “too-human”. That’s a point I mention in the book, at what percentage of human is a non-human/human chimera considered human. What percentage human does it have to be to have human rights? I’m always surprised by how many readers don’t realize that this research has moved way beyond science fiction and has been reality for many years.

MADELINE IVA: What’s your favorite kind of erotic romance? What do you look for in an excellent read?

NARA MALONE: I’ve recently been reading capture romance. Two of my favorite authors in that genre are Claire Thompson and S.J. Lewis. I think the key to capture romance is the suspense and conflict. Claire Thompson goes for the quick capture and keeps you in suspense over how it will all end. S. J. Lewis excells at prolonging the hunt, that dance between hunter and hunted.

MADELINE IVA: For writers out there who struggle with pitching their work to editors and agents– how easy was it for you to pitch your first book to Ellora’s Cave?  Was your first pitch successful?
NARA MALONE: It’s never easy to pitch a book, but if you have a good book and can manage to convey that despite the nerves, you will have a successful pitch. I think my first pitch to Ellora’s Cave wasn’t a great pitch, but I was lucky that the book, The Tiger’s Tale, was far better than the pitch and I managed to get that  across. My manuscript was requested and a contract offered.

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