“She knew what he’d brought”: Updates 4/19/17

The paperback of MoFo Pub’s Wanderlust anthology is now available from Amazon. That gorgeous cover will look great on your shelves (something about photography and hot pink lettering does things to me, okay?) and even better open in your lap. While you read it. Which you’ll thank yourself for.

This is the one featuring my story “Soft, Rough.”

But the MoFo goodness doesn’t stop there. “My Body is a Haunted House”–an f/f story that takes its title from C.S. Lewis, yes really–will be one of the stories in Hotel, the second volume of the Mofo Pubs Presents series. The ebook is currently available for preorder before its June 25th release.

If reading these stories gets your imagination going, MoFo has two current calls for submissions: Religion, closing April 30, and Haunted, closing August 5. Speaking, I guess, of C.S. Lewis and haunted houses (okay, I modified his quote–originally in A Grief  Observed, he compared his body to an empty house. The larger point stands. The larger point being that grief is a bodily experience as much as an emotional one, and also I hold nothing sacred).

Best Women’s Erotica of the Year Author Interviews

I just realized how much I have to catch up on, posting-wise, from those long and dreary months I spent without a website. And there’s a whole sob story about what else was going on that getting the new website up wasn’t a priority for me, but who needs to hear that? Sob stories aren’t that sexy.

Well, they can be.

Eroticism and grief, loss, and tragedy are kind of a thing for me. Hauntings–supernatural or psychological–appear again and again. I’m struck by the kind of intimacy you can or can’t have with the past, what forever eludes your touch. There’s also the intensity, the whole-body experience of each emotion, idea, and sensation. It’s why Shakespeare’s tragedies are so beautiful. It’s also why grieving people may suddenly find themselves powerful. The grief story that resonates most strongly with me is: “I just went and stood there, sort of trying out my anger against theirs, I guess. And mine won.”

Or as the narrator of “Phone Call, 3 a.m.” puts it:

Grief and fear are rare aphrodisiacs. Deep mourning isn’t, and depression certainly isn’t. Anxiety makes you clammy and numb inside or makes you let loose recklessly. In my experience merely anxious sex has always felt somehow cheap. But grief unlocks something. Maybe it strikes so deep that it gives us permission to feel. It excuses us. Or makes us so desperate that we’ll have anything in place of the loss.

Anyway, what I was getting to when I started this post is that I forgot to share here when my author interview went up on Best Women’s Erotica of the Year’s Tumblr page. On the other hand, waiting until now to post about it means I can share the complete set of author interviews from all 21 contributors; you’ll find them under the tag for Best Women’s Erotica of the Year, Volume 2. They’re all fascinating, and I think you’ll love the chance to hear about the inspirations for these stories, read each author’s favorite lines, and find out what’s coming next!

If you’re interested in being part of the series yourself, the call for Volume 4 is up, seeking themes of “outsiders and risk.”

New Release–Wanderlust: a Literary Erotica Anthology

“Turn-ons include well-placed commas, devastating allusions, ten-dollar words, social commentary, moral ambiguity, alliteration.” As soon as I read the description on the website of MoFo Pubs, I knew this was somewhere I wanted to submit (fiction, that is).

The best turn-ons, the kind that weave the strongest spell, are those that engage your brain as well as your body, that serve up sensuality with flair. Such is what I try to deliver. I don’t see “literary erotica” as an oxymoron. For all the beliefs, emotions, sensations, anxieties, and rites of passage surrounding sex, it’s a strong contender for the most literary of topics. It certainly beats out taxes, though not necessarily death…

…and it may tie with travel. Discovering new places, or leaving the old ones behind; a hunger for different sights or sounds or tastes; short transactions or deeper exchanges with strangers you might never see again. And then there’s the logistics: carrying your baggage or finding somewhere to put it or forgetting it entirely, hoping your transportation doesn’t come to a halting crash, considering the sense of relief you might feel it it does–there’s a lot going on and going into your average case of Wanderlust.

I’m very excited to be part of this anthology for my first publication of 2017.

Read an excerpt from my story, “Soft, Rough,” under the cut

Continue reading

Hello world!

I’m happy to say my new author’s website is up! New look for the new year! And hopefully better than ever!

Please pardon my dust as I update this website with content and links to stories. In the meantime, here’s a full list, with excerpts, of my work published in 2016.

Year in Review 2016

I mean, yeah, the less said about this year the better. That was even reflected on the writing front–I completed and placed fewer stories than I wanted to. However, I was also thrilled to be included in the following publications (and to have participated in my first Femslash February, with results posted on AO3)!

“For Myself” on the Bright Desire website

I enter my bedroom, where southern sunlight filters through the white and blue striped curtains like a haze. Ignoring the light switch, I leave the space dim and cool as a cave. Currents of air conditioning lick my skin as I undress. Whisper over goose bumps and sweat-slickness. Exposed, I feel like my naked body gleams in the twilight, but I’m not sure it really does.

I’m not like the covers of the books that flank my top shelf, books I often turn to when I’m in a state like this, books which I love like old friends-with-benefits—books advertised by people who are faceless, voluptuously thin, with innie belly buttons and skin the shade of honey-and-cream. Well, in the end I’d prefer to have a face. I’m not as hairless as they are, either, and though I feel smooth and even sleek under my hands, that’s only from familiarity. Familiarity is enough; at times like this it gets me going even more than those well-thumbed pages.

“A Last Touch of Grace” published by Forbidden Fiction

“Maybe I am wrong,” Iphigenia said. “And if so, I’m sorry to trouble you. I don’t think I’m wrong, but I truly don’t want to—to make things worse for you. If I’m opening a wound that’s healed, tell me. If it’s not still raw and bleeding, then I know I ought to let it be.” A deep breath from her, while everything else around him was still silence. “Say it hurts you less than it hurts me, and I’ll go, Mattie.”

Behind his eyelids, wetness stung. He laughed at it. “Nobody’s called me by that name in a long time.”

“Breakfast Time” in Bust Magazine’s 100th issue

“Oh, that’s good,” she growls from deep in her throat, clutching his thighs, his hips. Keeping track of her hands is hard this close to orgasm. But when she can control her touch, she can control him. She spreads his cheeks enough to tease his hole, satisfied to leave him open and unfulfilled. She doesn’t need to penetrate him to fuck him.

“Before the Fast” with Circlet Halloween Microfiction

She came closer, and he didn’t retreat. Her nostrils flared. Her breath fell on his cheek, then her lips, skimming over his skin in something not quite a kiss.

He swallowed hard, and then turned his face in an attempt to catch her mouth. She gasped, pulling back. He caught the flare in her dark eyes as she seemed to change her mind. Her gloved hand grasped the back of his neck, holding him in place as she closed her lips over his. He moaned as she added her tongue. Then her teeth.

“The Bitterness of Flesh” in Ever Dream of Me 

An arm went around her waist—Rob’s, lithe and warm, an eager embrace she couldn’t help melting into. He reached for her hand and brought it to his lips for a kiss.

Only then did he follow Jillian’s gaze to the dresses from the back of the closet. He went still against her. From the corner of her eye, she saw his cheeks blush to match the russet highlights of his hair.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Her clothes were supposed to be cleared out.”

Her body still sang with silk and scent.

“I don’t mind,” Jillian said. 

“Phone Call, 3 AM” in Best Women’s Erotica of the Year, Vol 2

You take on a posture sometimes that I can only think of as “ripe.” An erotic thought. I’m thinking it now, thinking you look ripe, even as I watch you shake your hair from your shoulders and sigh.