Archives: podcast

Episode 3 of Smutty Storytelling: Reading the Good, The Bad, and The Sexy

Is this the most awful sex writing 2017 can offer? Erotica writers and editors Betina and T.C. do a close reading of excerpts from The Literary Review’s “Bad Sex in Fiction Award”, featuring: bizarre word choice! Awful details! Strained metaphors! Painful dialogue! “Erotic” scenes that beg for psychoanalysis! 
And, most shocking of all…several pieces of sex writing that we really, really liked! 
But why don’t you listen and judge for yourself?

You can listen to the podcast on Soundcloud and iTunes.

If you want to read along with the excerpts, here are the articles we read from for the Bad Sex in Fiction Awards 2016 and the Bad Sex in Fiction Awards 2017 shortlist.

Tragically, The Toast’s page of Male Novelist jokes seems to be down, but happily someone on Tumblr has quoted the particular joke I reference in this podcast:

Q: How many male novelists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: He lit a cigarette. His glass of whiskey lit a cigarette too.

This was a REALLY FUN podcast to do–in fact, reading sexy writing aloud (even if it’s not what you’d call sexy sexy writing) was unexpectedly enjoyable. And I mean what I say about wanting to check several of these titles out.

Episode 2 of Smutty Storytelling: Sex Languages

Sex Languages: Romance vs. Porn vs. Erotica in the Quest for Sexual Connection

As recent events have made all too clear, our society is deprived of ways to communicate honestly about sex, desire, and consent. One potential source of language comes from the words that turn us on. In this episode, T.C. and Betina discuss a range of sex languages: the bestselling romance novel, purely sexual pornography, and literary erotica, which offers a balance between the emotions, the mind, and the senses.

It’s exciting to get back in the swing of things with the Smutty Storytelling podcast! In this episode, Betina and I discuss a topic that’s interested us for a long time–the different “modes” of erotic storytelling (Betina calls them “Sex Languages”, which I love) and what experiences they offer readers. Let’s go beyond “I know it when I see it”! We offer recommendations and share our frustrations and our joys with each language. We also acknowledge some of the ways erotic writing can offer an opportunity to express desires and needs we’re not otherwise able to express, along with some of the risks of sex languages that don’t reflect real intimacy (in all its strengths and flaws) or offer a skewed perspective of human sexuality.

You can listen to the podcast here, or check us out on Soundcloud and iTunes.

One of my New Year’s resolutions is to start typing transcripts for each episode, too, so keep an eye out for those in the coming weeks.

First Episode of “Smutty Storytelling”!

I’m excited to share the first episode of the Smutty Storytelling podcast, where my fellow erotica writer and editor Betina Cipher and I discuss the craft of sexy wordsmithing. In this first episode, we talk about how to use Point of View and tense, with examples from our stories in Getting It (though you don’t have to have read the stories to follow along!).

You can follow us on SoundCloud and we’ll soon be on iTunes as well. We’re recording the second episode next week–is there a topic related to erotica writing + editing you’d like to hear about? Let us know!