Resurrection

How small is my world?

Long Suffering Traveling Companion and I are "ride the bus with the locals, eat street food," level tourists. Gringo First Class requires way too much wardrobe, and my ideal vacation fits into a single carry-on luggage. We broke that rule when we were in New Orleans for the Saints and Sinners GBLT writer's conference though when we wandered into Irene's Cuisine.

We were miles from home, in a restaurant chosen at random, and eating at a level far beyond our usual fare. And who was our waiter? The brother of my best friend from high school.

I had no idea. I thought he still lived in Palm Springs.

After the initial shock and bouncy hugs, I was reminded of the one reason why I miss the South, the jaw-dropping hospitality. He hadn't seen me in years, but the third thing out of his mouth was "check out of that hotel room right this minute and come stay over at my place." He dug into his pocket for keys to hand us. I was tempted to introduce Long Suffering Traveling Companion as a serial waiter murderer just to remind K that it probably wasn't a safe thing to do-- trusting us like that. But I know how the manners game is played, so I thanked him profusely as I reminded him that our BnB wouldn't be able to rent out our room on that late notice, so it wasn't fair to the owners. I promised that for next year's SNS, I'd be the first to claim his couch though.

Watching the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, I might not be able to keep my promise. The French Quarter still stands, but it's going to be a long time before it recovers. The magnitude of the hurricane's damage is numbing. To make it real and keep a sharp edge to tweak my conscious, I have to pull down the scope to a personal level. To me, this is all about how K is getting along.

I know that he didn't evacuate. He had neither the means nor a place to run to. I know that he has no phone service. His sister keeps me up to date on the lack of news. The water is rising. That's the sum of what I know.

The unknowns drive me nuts, but I feel as if it's so trite for me to say that, because I'm sitting a thousand miles away. My entire world isn't under water. Except for K, I know where everyone I love or love by proxy is, and that they have food, shelter, and drinkable water. Many people on the gulf coast can't say that with certainty about themselves, their loved ones, or their acquaintances.

It's going to be a long, rough autumn this year.

I believe that K will ultimately be okay. He might be worse for wear, his possessions might be waterlogged, and his job may be in jeopardy, but he's got a few people pulling for him, and we won't ebb away with the flood waters. Now that we've reconnected, I'll be keeping him in my heart.

Besides, I have a free couch coming to me. I just hope that it's dried out by then.

If there's any city that can live to party another day, it has to be New Orleans. Let the good times tread water!



(And YES, I do take pictures of cemeteries everywhere I go, especially when I see stuff like this. How could I pass up Mardi Gras beads for the afterlife reveler?)

Voyeurism and Exhibitionists

I was tempted to title this post "Where the Dark Things Crawl."

My counter on this site tells me by server, not account, who visits my site. I like seeing that I get hits from Saudi Arabia and Iceland. Don't know why, but I do. I was a little less pleased that the Department of Justice stopped by for a look-see.

My first job out of college was with the government. If conspiracy theorists knew how much of a cluster fuck was going on behind the curtain, they'd sleep soundly. Since I've experienced it first hand, I have a hard time getting worked up enough to be paranoid. Still, seeing that DOJ server gave me a bit of a frission. Maybe because the link they followed was from a fellow erotica writer's blog.

Maybe I like being watched.

I wouldn't consider myself to be an exhibitionist, but I do write porn. I can't decide if that makes me a literary exhibitionist. In small ways, I sometimes catch my private lifestyle seeping into my public life. We can't help being who we are, after all. If I notice I'm giving myself away though, I wonder if people around me catch those clues before I sweep them out of sight. I really don't like feeling that my private life is showing, so I guess that makes me definitely not an exhibitionist.

My relationship to voyeurism is a little more complex.

Watching television or movies is an inherently voyeuristic activity. Through shows, we peer into people's lives. Even if the characters aren't real, or they're the pseudo-real cast of reality TV, we like to peel back the facade and see what's underneath. Most dramas are slow-motion train wrecks. The viewers can see it coming, but we don't look away, because the coming calamity thrills us.

Once, while stopped in traffic, I spied two grizzled day laborers eating lunch at a McDonalds in West Hollywood. Above the table: two guys eating burgers after a hard day of work. Under the table: a brief, but extremely erotic, squeeze of a muscular thigh by a dark, rough hand. That was probably the hottest thing I'd ever seen. I wanted to park. I wished I had binoculars to watch them. I wanted to see them kiss. I would have peeked through the curtains of their hotel room. Didn't wanting to make me a voyeur? The thrill I got out of seeing that surreptitious grope was definitely a voyeur's high.

Yet I watch very little porn.

It would be fashionable to say that porn doesn't do anything for me, but the real truth is that I rarely need it. When I do, it works for me. I don't use sex toys all that often either. I have no problem with anyone who uses visual or physical stimulants to get off though.

So I'm not all that comfortable with exhibitionism, but I am with voyeurism. They are opposite sides of the same coin. Hard to have one without the other.

I can't get over the uncomfortable feeling that DOJ flyby gave me, even though I have complete sympathy for their voyeuristic tendencies.

My blog is out there for anyone to read. Why do I care who reads it? Maybe it was a DOJ employee screwing off at work. In that case, I'm a tax payer too. Get back to work! But what if checking out my blog is his/her work? Thinking that makes me want to draw my virtual curtains. I won't though. After all, it's still a free country. Don't mind me. I'll be sitting here in the dark, working up a conspiracy theory.

Impatience

Patience is a necessary virtue for writers.

No one warned me about that.

I'm currently suffering from cabinfever-level impatience which has me flipping through websites, blogs, and Craig's List forums like an internet Flying Dutchman. It's my alternative to pacing. Why? Because I'm fretting over my submissions and can't do anything about them.

I have eight short stories out on submission. The -- how shall I put this-- most finely aged submission celebrated its first anniversary in the hands of one editor way back in June.

Novelist chuckle. A year! A mere year and she's losing it?

Yeah, well, the short story market is a little different from the novel market.


Editors may have just cause to grumble about clueless writers. Somehow the concepts of being an artist and acting professionally can't co-exist in the brains of many writers. The horror stories I hear while talking to editors are funny to me because I don't have to deal with it.

The guilt by association isn't fair though. Some of us read submission guidelines and even follow them. We restrict our artsy-fartsy side to writing stories. If I ever submit something in violet, cursive type on scented paper, it's going to be to an editor I know very, very well and who will appreciate the joke. I also won't expect that story to be accepted.

Editors aren't the only ones who are subjected to iffy manners. Writers have some reasons to get grumpy too.

Even though he rejected my story, Sean Meriwether from Velvet Mafia is my ideal editor. I wish everyone I submitted to was as good at communication as he is. He sent an e-mail acknowledging my submission. He sent another e-mail telling me when he expected to make his decision. He sent a kind rejection.

It doesn't sound like much, but I really appreciated it. I e-mailed a note thanking him for that. (Not for the rejection. I'm not a literary masochist. I thanked him for keeping me informed.)

Unfortunately, since then, I haven't had a story that I felt met his needs. Sure, I have a hot vampire story waiting for the right publisher, but Sean actually flinched when I told him about it. Oh, it was a small cringe, a tiny twitch of his eyelid, but I saw it. Won't be submitting that tale to him any time soon! When I do have a story that's right, he'll be the first person to see it though, because he's the god of good manners.


I won't name names on the other end of the spectrum. The anti-Seans. I won't trash a reputation simply because I felt the need to pull a story. What if it was simply a personality clash? Or maybe I was being the difficult one. (No. That couldn't be it. I'm a frickin' saint.) Whatever the reason, my bad experience might be your wonderful one, and there's nothing to be gained by catty sniping.

To be fair, most editors I deal with are very professional. However, I choose my submissions carefully. If an editor writes, I've read their work. If they've edited an anthology, chances are I've read it, and that I know a writer with a story in it. I ask. I do my homework. I'd rather not submit than deal with an unprofessional amateur.

As for my impatience, I have, twice in the past, sent polite e-mails inquiring about submissions that I assumed the editor had in hand. Assumed because there was no communication acknowledging the submission. In both cases, I waited six months after the deadline for submissions to inquire about the status. In both cases, my story was eventually rejected. As a writer, it's very irritating to have a story tied up that long and have nothing to show for it. So even though it would nice if the editor would drop me a line telling me how things are going, I'm not going to ask about the submission that's been out for 14 months-- just in case past results are any indication of future outcomes.

In the meantime, I suppose I could read something. If only Mike Kimera's new book would get in the bookstores. I waiting to review it. Impatiently, of course.

Black Swan Events

In its day, this was the epitome of mathematics and engineering. It was more than a rich man's toy though. It was a study tool. Meticulous mathematics was applied to the gear ratios and the movements so that the model mimicked, as best it could given the scale, the observed workings of the cosmos. This was applied technology. The cutting edge of science.

Beyond that, look at the artistic detail the craftsmen put into their work. The marriage of Art and Science. Absolutely beautiful.

And a huge, murky load of codswollop.

How could I help loving something so exquisitely wrong? So tragically failed? It is pathos, schadenfreude.

Of course it's easy for us to look back and snigger. Circular orbits. What were they thinking? But those people weren't idiots. They observed, they pondered, they crunched their numbers with amazing accuracy without computers or calculators. Their only mistake was that they didn't question every little assumption that they used as their basis for their higher theories.

Then Copernicus dropped a black swan event on them. I'm sure that their brains were blown away.

A black swan event is an outlier - something so far out of imaginable circumstances that you fail to work the possibility that it might happen into your theories. And why would you? It's SO far outside the realm of the imaginable that you can't imagine it. That's the point.

For those mathematicians and astronomers, elliptical orbits were a black swan event. For us, it's built into our expectations. We think we can afford to look smug. But think about this. When did you learn about dinosaurs? In the 1970s? Guess what. Half or more of what you learned has since been completely refuted. Dinosaurs were warm blooded. Some raised their offspring. There's no such thing as a Brontosaurus...

So what does this have to do with writing, you ask?

Plot.

If you're looking for a story to tell, how about placing your character in their equivalent of a pre-Copernican universe. Everything moves in order. Everything is predictable. They may not be happy, but they understand their world and they've carved out a place in it. Then throw in a black swan event. Shake up that world like a snowglobe and set expectations on ear. Make your character have to face every given in life and question how valid it is.

Examples: Gone with the Wind. Alice in Wonderland. The Color Purple. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Interview With the Vampire. Topping From Below.

It works in every genre. Almost every murder mystery involves a black swan event. Who really thinks that they're going to die? I mean now? That person isn't going to pull the trigger. That one little lump of lead can't be enough to kill me. This isn't really happening, is it?

Many BDSM novels follow this path. I can't believe I'm doing what that person told me to. Am I really going to obey that order? Am I getting turned on by this?

One note of caution though. Like Copernicus, you better be able to back up your tale with some believable patter. We're as invested in our version of reality as those astronomers were. If you're going to destroy our comfort zone, you have to replace it with something equally real. Not only does your protangonist have to finally accept or endure topsy-turvy, your readers have to willingly follow you. Make things as dire, dark, or absurd as you wish, just make sure we have a reason to buy into it. Black swans we might be willing to accept, but purple crocoducks?

The Next Big Thing

Forget vampires. Forget shapeshifters. Forget wizards.

I've had a vision, and it tells me that the next big public obsession will be sun signs.

Brace yourself now for the cheesy bar pick-up lines you know are coming. Oh, they'll probably be updated with a hint of Japanese culture, like a wasabi stinger, but underneath, they'll be the same pathetic attempts at conversation. Repeat after me in your best unctuous swinger's voice: "Hey baby, I'm a Libra, Type A. What's your sign and blood type?"

Back when people were very into the zodiac and the Age of Aquarius, I read the book House of Scorpio. I don't remember much about the story other than it was a mystery, and in that world, everyone typified their sign. I thought it was so cool. I'd love to read it now and see just how trashy it really was. (Apparently I'm not the only person who remembers this novel and would like to reread it. I found a discussion forum, believe it or not.)

I think zodiacs and horoscopes will catch on again and be the next really big thing, so dust off your charts, align Uranus with a pert Moon, get laid at the House of the Rising Sun, and pound out a novel about Leos ascending and Virgos in flagrante delicto.

Trust me on this one, darlings. Would a Capricorn lie to you? Only if there was a profit to be made.

A Smut Writer's Bookshelf

So what does a smut writer keep close as she writes?
Books.
That's what you were thinking, right?
Right.




Reading off the spines straight across the top shelf near my computer:

Roget's Thesaurus. Open to 41.1 REDNESS. I was looking for a word for red that also had a musical connotation. Didn't find one. I frequently work layers of meaning into stories by choosing words that can pull double duty. Sometimes it's refreshing to have red simply mean red though. The thesaurus rests on top of the other books because I got tired of pulling it off the shelf. Now it's at the perfect height to stand in front of as I flip through pages.

Great World Atlas. Maps fascinate me. I pour over this when I'm doing research. Geography influences culture.

Merriam Webster Dictionary. Sanity check for spellchecker.

Outbursts - A.D. Peterkin. So I can teach my spellchecker dirty words.

The Art of Seduction - Robert Greene. While you can't watch Casanova at work, at least you can get a good overview of his technique. When you write short stories, you can get away with physical attraction as the driver for the plot. Once you get into a novel length work though, you need to show seduction. Learn from the masters.

Leatherman's Handbook - Larry Townsend. This is aimed at a queer audience, but he's so at ease with the subject, knowledgeable, and very readable. Can't beat that combination. Even though he probably doesn't mean to present a history lesson, he shares interesting insights into the changes in queer culture over the past thirty years or so.

Slang and Euphemism - Richard Spears - When I want to make sure my improper English is proper. No better or worse than any other slang dictionary. Not essential.

Dr. Tatiana's Sex Advice To All Creation - Olivia Judson. If you write speculative fiction, and you want to create truly alien beings, this is the source. Transexual fish, multi-sex fungi, cannibalism, genital mutilation, you name it. Your backyard never looked so scary. This book is a font of inspiration for your imagination. If biology had been presented like this in school, I would have been a science major.

The Browsers Dictionary of Foreign Words and Phrases - Mary Varchaver and Frank Ledlie Moore. A great way to find out you've been using some French word the wrong way for years. I use this a lot.

Moist - the last issue printed. I hope Liam is able to get it going again.

Auden's Collected Poems - WH Auden. You probably know his poem Funeral Blues, which was read in the movie Four Weddings and a Funeral. I like Lullaby too. I'm not into poetry. I think I once told someone it was like masturbation -- do it if you have the itch but don't make me watch. My opinion since has completely reversed. Go ahead and show me what you've got. Just don't make me read your poetry.

Black Tulip - Dumas. Combines Dumas, one of my favorite writers, with my passion for stock market history and Tulip Mania. (Okay, you have your hobbies, I have mine. I'm also hooked on Victorian age machinery, clocks, varacolici, steampunk, Baroque models of the universe, and the before mentioned maps. Get your Freudian out and interpret that list.)

Zen philosophy, Zen Practice - Thich Thien-An. I swear I'm going to read this some day.

Be Here Now - Ram Dass. A spiritual picture book. Acid poured down like rain in monsoon season while he created this text (not a guess. He admits it), and I think maybe recreational drugs are required to slog through it on the, "Wow dude! That's, like, wow," level. A Buddhist friend suggested this book to me. I think he's still smirking, the little rat. Or should I say the tall, thin Bob-like rat? You know who you are, Bob. You'll never achieve Samsara like this. Buddhavista, my ass.

The World of Zen - Nancy Wilson Ross. I always find something in this. The section on Zen esthetics in visual art makes me think about the use of silence and space in writing. Hemingway could do that. Read his short story The Hills Like White Elephants. I'll bet you never thought of Hemingway as Zen before.

The Wisdom of Insecurity - Alan Watts. Deceptively approachable. Has it's massive bullshit moments, but there exist those occasional passages that are like a whiff of spiritual smelling salts. Just so you don't get any ideas - I'd make a lousy Buddhist. But damn, I love that philosophy.

Elements of style - Strunk and White. A different belief system. Am I the only one who suspects that the Strunk wore polka-dot bow ties?

Self-Editing For Fiction Writers - Renni Browne and Dave King if I had to pick only one book to keep, this would be it. When I hear that someone wants to write, I buy this for them. I read it at least twice a year, and always find something to cringe about in my work.

Elements of Arousal - Lars Eighner. This is second only to Self-editing for fiction Writers. Written for writers of gay smut, this is universally applicable.

Eats, Shoots, and Leaves - Lynne Truss. This won't simply be reshelved; it's going in the giant plastic bin of exile in my garage. I hate her tone.

latest issues of Mental Floss magazine and Other magazine.

My composition books. I take notes at writer's workshops. Many notes. Mainlining caffeine through an IV drip helps.

Green Man - William Anderson. I keep meaning to write a greenman story. I love a myth that hasn't been castrated.

World Mythology - William Doty. Honesty, I'm not happy with this book. It isn't bad, but I always feel as if the mickey was knocked out of these stories to make them acceptable to Baptist spinsters. I want the hot, natsy originals. If anyone knows a source of unbowdlerized mythology, please share.

Rip-Off, A Writer's Guide to Crimes of Deception - Fay Faron.
Deadly Doses, A Writer's guide to poisons - Serita Deborah Stevens
The Casebook of Forensic Detection - Colin Evans. I lump these together. You might notice a trend. I love mysteries, but I can't seem to write them. Whole different set of talents. So I never use these books, but I can't get past the idea that I just might some day.

A Story is a Promise - Bill Johnson. This is about screenplays, but most is applicable to novels. If you want to chart out your plot, this is a great source.

Cowboy Bebop - volume II. How embarrassing! How did this get there? (I want to be Faye Valentine in another life. Or Spike. Do you think Jet is doing them both?)

Living Wicca - Scott Cunningham. I hang with a lot of wiccans. It's always good to know what kind of wine to bring for Samhain celebrations, or proper guest etiquette for jumping the broom.

latest issue of Asimov's science fiction

Masks of the Gods - Joseph Campbell. Well, if he inspired Lucas to such scintillating dialog and heavy-handed plotting, he must be great. Okay, admission time. I try to read this. Really. I do. Any night I can't get to sleep, I whip this baby out and Zzzzzz.


So, what do you reach for while you're writing smut?

Lisabet Sarai's Fire

Lisabet Sarai is one of my favorite erotica writers. From the anthology Sacred Exchanges to Raw Silk , her stories have that dream quality that makes the rest of the world go away. As I read, I become aware of my body. Aware of my breathing. Arousing stuff.

Although Lisabet often bemoans that her characters feel too similar to her, as a reader, I found a wide range of voices in her newest collection: Fire.

I'll ignore the easy puns about the title story, Fire. The hardest thing to convey in a fetish story is the sexual connection, but Lisabet brings you inside the mind of a man with a fire fetish and lets you feel the attraction. Creepy? Yeah. Enjoy the chills.

Butterfly is one of those stories where you ache for the character. He denies himself happiness because he can't get past the one flaw of his seemingly perfect lover. While the end was realistic, I wanted to shake him.

Perception is a great domination and submission story that doesn't rely on any of the trope usually associated with power play. Hot, fun, and refreshing.

Thieve's Honor is about a pickpocket who gets caught in the act by a mysterious man with a proposition. Never mind all that. This is one where you just have to go along for the ride. The train sex had me squirming in my seat. Lots of sassy bravado from the main character, and more hot sex.

I could go on about many of the stories in this collection. Wednesday Night at Rocky's Ace Hardware Store is what you wish your Wednesday nights were like. Vows is spiritually steamy. Detente - well- let's say that those domestic arrangements would suit me just fine, if I were David. So pick up a copy and enjoy. When Lisabet takes you along, you simply have to trust that you're in the hands of a master.

Stories that Die

Since I read the call for submissions back in April, I struggled to create a story for the Garden of the Perverse anthology.

The story had to be like a fairy tale with some kind of moral. I immediately thought of a good moral. I tried to work back from it to fill in the story. And tried. And tried.

I had characters, setting, moral, but couldn't make those elements align like cherries across the screen of a slot machine. No pay-off. Sigh.

By mid-May, since nothing else worked, I told myself that I couldn't work on it for three weeks. Usually when I self-impose a writing ban, by the time it elapses, I'm more than ready to get back to it. I may say that I'm not working on a story, but that doesn't stop me from thinking about it. Besides, in Mid-May, I went to Saints and Sinners writer's conference and expected to come back to my computer energized and ready to write. (If you're a GBLT writer, go next year. I had an incredible time.)

End of May-- no story.

I write every day. Meaning physically typing. I put in at least two hours a day, seven days a week in front of my computer, and usually more on the weekends. So I was writing, but editing my novel, not on the submission for Garden of the Perverse.

End of June-- no story.

I tried. It simply wouldn't come to me.

I finally had to admit that the story would not work. Damn. I loved that moral. I loved the characters. But the more I forced it, the worse the crap that I wrote. I finally had to face the horrible truth. I had to let it go.

Death of a story. Copious weeping and gnashing of teeth. Ashes and sackcloth.

Mid-July -- every day, I go to Wikipedia and pull up about ten random pages. As I'm flipping through, the subject on a page catches my eye as a great title. I read the article. By the time I'm at the end of the entry, I have my story. (Different moral, different characters, different setting.)

Some stories have to be sacrificed. They have to be set aside, shunned, ignored, and allowed to die. It isn't easy. I still have hopes that one day at least my characters will be revived. I was very fond of them. I invested a lot of imagination in that tale, but it was DOA, and letting go was the right decision, even though it wasn't easy.

RIP

Micromanaging Your Characters

I was in the National Gallery in Washington D.C. a couple years ago. As I walked into a large, open gallery, I looked at the nearest painting. I saw smears of muted browns and thought, "What an ungodly mess."

I moved on to look at the other paintings. For a time, I sat on the benches in the center of the room and refreshed my eyes by staring at the stark white of the walls. Then I walked around the gallery again. Across the room, I looked back at the "ungodly mess," saw Monet's Waterloo Bridge at Sunset, and was smitten.

Feeling like an idiot, I moved closer. I stood directly in front of the painting, at arm's length as Monet must have while he painted, and the subtle brushstroke by brushstroke changes in color were even more awesome, because the artist didn't have the luxury of painting his canvas from across a gallery where the distinctions were clear. He had to be right up against the "ungodly mess" and make sense of it.

In a way, writers need to be able to do the same thing. Many of us "see" our stories like movies in our minds, and we try to translate that visual into words. The problem comes in the translation. Many beginning writers (I will not except myself from this. I am guilty, or was.) feel the need to take the reader by the hand and show every small detail of the scene.

What they deliver is the engineer's blueprint for Waterloo Bridge. Technically detailed, but souless.

I don't need to read:

"He unlocked the door to his hotel room and opened it. The blue door swung into the room. She swept past him into the room. He followed her into the room, closed the door behind him, locked it, and bolted it. With his left hand, he flicked on the switch for the small brass lamp that sat on the small cherry desk with the graceful cabriolet legs. They kissed, at first lightly, and then with more passion. His left hand pressed at the small of her back, pulling her tight against him as his right hand tangled into her long blonde mane of curls. She (I'm so tempted to write "whilst, and at the same time" since I'm writing bad on purpose.) gazed deep into his sapphire blue eyes that dominated her and kicked off her shoes, using her toes to pull down the heelstraps. He took glasses from the sink in the bathroom to the small honor bar. He opened the black refrigerator. Inside, he found an airplane sized bottle of his favorite scotch-- a brand that showed he was a man of wealth and taste. Twisting the cap off using his right hand, he poured the amber fire (I'm having too much fun here) into the glasses. He carried the glasses in one hand as he crossed the room to her with a predatory prowl. He handed her one glass with his left hand. She took it with her right. Her pink tongue snaked over the rim of the glass, tasting the liqueur that burned in her mouth. She set her empty glass down on the dresser between a pile of loose change and his hotel room key, where he'd tossed it. They moved onto the bed. He pulled down the covers with both hands as she threw the pillows into the narrow space between the Cal-King sized bed and the wall to the bathroom with an impertinent toss of her head."

Still with me? Do you even care what they do after this mind-numbing entrance?

Damn, I forget to mention her blazing emerald eyes and 36DDs.


Characters who are micromanaged through every move soon have readers scanning. Honestly, did you suffer through my entire paragraph? Or did your brain shut down? Detail clutters the picture and obscures the meaning of the scene. Details pull the reader out of the story, because the exact measures you put in don't fit the reader's imagination. Besides - they're dull.

What we should aim for is an impression of the scene. Highlight the important aspects such as emotion, arousal, etc., and cut away everything else. Think nuanced brushstrokes, not technical diagrams. Sure, anchor the reader in the scene by giving them some details of setting, but don't explain the carpet color or every step of every move. If you're resorting to right or left hand descriptions, you're micromanaging. Prime the pump of your reader's imagination and then trust them to fill in the details. Their hotel room won't look like yours, but if it doesn't change the plot, who cares?

Think of it this way- if a reader invests their imagination in your story, they're much more willing to stay with it because they've internalized it. They are part of the story. They participate in the fantasy. If you give them everything, they won't appreciate it.

So set down your pen, or keyboard, and step back from your work. Get some distance. Maybe refresh your brain before looking at your work again. Then try to see with a reader's eyes. You might be amazed to see what develops.

The Writer's Cat

Cats are seemingly the "must have" accessory for a writer. Most every writer I know has one, or three.

Why?

I have cats. More accurately, they have me. Not once have these animals helped me in my writing. They distract me by being cute, they demand to be pet, and they walk over my keyboard and delete things. Accident? Hah!

They are remorseless critics.

Aptly named Loki thinks that my computer is his playground. He only climbs on it while I'm working.

Skitters likes my computer chair. (Excuse me, HER computer chair) Every time I leave to pick up the newspapers Loki and Skitters knock onto the floor, Skitters moves in.

(Hmmm. Do you think they conspired to get me out of the chair?)

Look at that face. Would you evict a cat who is so clearly thinking, "If you make me move, I'm going to come into your bedroom at night and suck the breath right out of you!"

(We titled this picture "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die!")

So what is it about writers and cats?

Are other writers mind-linked to their feline familiars? Do those cats inspire? Is there something about them that helps with the writing process?

Maybe my cats are defective.

Of course, Loki and Skitters probably believe that there's something defective about me. "We've been trying to mind-link to her about tuna for years, and she simply doesn't understand!"

A Writing Exercise

The question arose on ERWA writer's list about how
much detail is enough, or too much, because a writer
was criticized for not sketching his
characters fully enough for that reader.

In erotica, we're building fantasies, but the reader
has to bring something to the table - their
imagination. Words are simply words until the reader
invests something of themselves into the story. It's the
reader that makes a story hot. So does the reader need
to have the vital stats on the characters? You know - hair,
lips, eyes, height, weight, cup size....

Some readers seem to need that hand holding, but I hate writing
like that. I don't think that hair color tells anything about
the character. I'd rather flesh out the picture in other ways.

That got me thinking about an exercise in writing. I
wondered if I could paint a picture in a reader's mind
without resorting to the vitals.

What if I were to describe the character by his/her
body language? As a starting place, I was thinking
back (way, way back) to high school and my Mom when
she came into my bedroom and saw that I'd painted
large rainbows on my walls.

(And no, this isn't erotica. Ew. It's my Mom, fer chrissakes.)

The raw (read: no rewrite) version:

My bedroom door bounced against the wall as Mom shoved it
open. Every feature of her face pulled in tight, from her
incredible disappearing lips to the skin around her
hard eyes. Underneath the pads of her suit jacket, her
shoulders were back and her arms were folded over her
starched white blouse. The toe of her black pump
tapped beside the can of red paint. Both eyebrows rose and
then settled like a dark cloud on the horizon.

My question is: can you see her? Can you see her well
enough that hair color is irrelevant?

Would it help if I quoted the first words out of her
mouth?

"This better not cost me money to fix."

Do you have a better picture now?

(Yeah, Mom is quite the cuddly type.)

Does it add anything to slip in the information that
at the time she was being a blonde, her eyes are
hazel, she's 5' 5'', and is medium build? Or are you
willing to go with the picture your imagination threw
together - which may resemble your Mother when she was
pissed off.

Let me know.

Where Stories Come From

The origin of stories is a topic that comes up a lot in writer's groups.

Some people call inspiration a muse. Not to knock them, but I think I've seen too many plays where a velvet and fringe draped diva in a turban emotes about her muse to take that seriously. But stories come from somewhere. Even though I've written many, I'll admit that it's still a bit of mystery to me.

I live in LA and spend a lot of time in my car. Not all of the work of writing is in the typing, so I can sit in traffic and still be writing. If I'm actively working on a novel or a story, that's my time to puzzle through plot points or develop characters. If I don't have a story, or if I need distance from a current one, I let my mind wander.

Since I write erotica, one of my favorite questions to pose is, "What's hot?" Almost always the scene that pops in my mind is, as Kate Dominic puts it in her great collection of short stories, "Any 2 People Kissing." Or three. Or more. I also like people holding hands, especially same sex couples, because I'm awed by fearless love.

Other sights that make my pulse race: The brush of a hand across a lover's shoulder. That special, knowing laugh between a couple. Glimpses into their private world that show tenderness. Not overt sex, but sexuality. If I can capture that in a story, I know it will be hot.

Sometimes I get flashes of an idea that are so sketchy that they can't stand alone. I mentally file those away. Many times, I see my characters in terms of colors or seasons. It's the impressions that matter with those quick flashes.

I think, "What am I seeing?"
The end of an affair? Blue and purple. Winter trees. Grass that crunches underfoot.
The beginning? Green and yellow. Summer skirts. Camellias. Water.
My personal favorite- rekindled attraction. Red. Cozy blankets. An Autumn snap in the air. The scent of bushels of winesap apples in a wood shed.

Later, while reading a call for submissions or just by accident, these flashes will fall back into my thoughts and expand. Maybe they won't be the way I initially saw them, but those will be the feelings that anchor the story.

But where does it come from? My imagination, I suppose. And from life around me. Or maybe there is a muse whispering in my ear. If she'd only make herself visible, I could drive in the carpool lane.

On Erotica and Porn

Erotica. Porn. Smut. My personal favorite: wank fiction.

There is a never-ending debate about the differences between these labels.

One person's smut is another person's porn.
Porn is in the groin of the beholder.
I read erotica, you read porn.
Women read erotica, men look at porn.

I HATE this conversation, which, of course, means I have an opinion, the short answer, and the long "soliloquy at a party" answer.

The short of it:

The word EROTICA has more letters in it.


The pretentious writer's witty comment at a party answer:

Using the word EROTICA is like putting pantaloons over the limbs of the furniture in your front parlor so as not to incite the unnatural lusts of your gentlemen callers. But no matter how many frills you throw over it, it doesn't change what lies beneath.

The word PORN is like a buttercream rose on a birthday cake. You know it's no good for you. You know that you shouldn't indulge. You feel wicked for even wanting it in your mouth. But, oh, doesn't it feel good on the tongue? Say it with me. Porn.


You may make distinctions between the two, but beware, some people don't. In their minds, all smut is bad, and you are evil for even wanting it. To save your soul, they want to deny your right to wank. These are the same people who thought that they were doing a witch a favor when they tied her to a stake and lit the kindling.


So if you like your mildly titillating romantic erotica, you need to cut some slack for the guy in the grungy raincoat buying his porn. Because if we do not hang together, we will surely hang separately.

Support the separation of Church and State.
Support free speech.
Power isn't taken. It's ceded.

Suicidal Trout

This is one I wish I had a picture for.

Better yet, I wish I had a video clip.

No one believes me when I tell this story, but I swear it's true. Even if it is a fish story.

I was camping up in the redwoods with my long suffering traveling companion and his friends. Long suffering traveling companion's idea of roughing it is going without high speed internet connection, so you can imagine how well sleeping in a tent went over. But he gamely bid his laptop goodbye and helped pack the car. (Besides, it was his friends we went with, so technically I was the good sport that went along on this one, but bringing that up seems to be an ISSUE with him, so we'll only mention it as a whispered aside. Shh! He's coming. Say nothing. Act casual.)

Anyway... His friends are nice, funny, intelligent, and great in measured doses. About half way through the second day, I decided I needed a break from Nice, Funny, Great, and especially Intelligent, so I grabbed a fishing pole and told them that I was going to fish. No one stumbled out of his lawn chair to come with, thank god, so I didn't have to make any excuses to get away.

(Note to self- losing Nice, Funny, Great, or specifically Intelligent in the woods is an option I must explore.)

(Second note to self - be sure to swipe their mobiles, GPS devices, and cookie crumbs before leading them into the woods.)

I hiked about twenty minutes away from camp through saplings and tiny redwoods. It was a hot day. Dust motes swarmed through shafts of sunlight coming through the trees. The air smelled like dust and pine sap, and I could hear the gurgle of water from a nearby stream. There was a decently wide pool in the stream, created by fallen logs. I waded in shallow part of the water to A) cool off, and, more importantly B) to let the fish know I was there, scare the bejeezus out of them, and insure that they would not bite.

I found a shady spot on a log, dropped a hook without bait into the water, and opened my book.

You might notice something here. I was actively trying to NOT CATCH A FISH.

Several reasons for that. First off, I'm not a fan of trout. I like salmon, but I've never really liked trout. Having grown up in Colorado, I've had my share of fresh trout pan fry, thanks.

Second - there were so many people back at camp that I'd have to catch eight fish to make dinner out of them. I wasn't allowed that many on my fishing license.

Third - I was on vacation. I didn't want to gut and scale eight fish. We were planning to hop in the cars and go out to the nearest log cabin bar for beer, dancing, and vittles that evening. Why would I screw up a perfectly sound plan like that by catching a fish?

So I settled in for an hour of solid peace. I listened to the wind in the trees. I listened to the water. I slapped at the vortex of small winged things that kept swarming into my hair. I breathed deeply and thought, "Ah, nature. Nice place to visit, wouldn't want to live here."

The sun was drowsy warm. I was reading some good smut by Greg Wharton, and pretending to fish. All was right in my little world.

Ahhh.

And then world's only suicidal trout decided that was a good day to die. Stupid fucker swallowed my hook. Remember, I didn't put bait on the thing. I was using the hook more as a weight than anything serious. I didn't jiggle it or in any other way try to make it look enticing. But that damn trout had other ideas.

Cursing, I set aside my book. (I was to the pay off, the come shot, you masochistic little fish. You couldn't have waited another page?) I reeled in Mr. Rainbow. Eleven inches, uncut. For a fish, that wasn't bad.

It took forever to get the hook out of him, because I seriously didn't want to hurt him. The trout wasn't flopping much, which was good, because by then I had fish slime hands.

Now the part people can't believe.

I bent over to gently return him to the water, and he jumped suddenly over my head and into a pine tree. I grabbed for him, and he twisted and jumped again higher in the tree. Every time I tried to catch the fish, he climbed up a branch until I couldn't reach him anymore. Then he made a spectacular leap onto the trail beside the stream. Picture me running, stooped over, after a demented, suicidal trout as he twitched, flipped, and squiggled his way up the trail. Every time I bent down to grab him, he took off again. He finally boinked his head against a rock.

We both panted. I grabbed him to take him back to the water. Little fucker fought me every step of the way. His fins sliced my hands. Great - fish slime, stream water (read: nature's urinal) dirt, and an open cut. Can you say tetanus booster shot?

I finally got him back in the water. I rinsed fish stink off my hands, grabbed my book, and headed back for camp and the antibacterial ointment therein.

What would Hamlet have said? "Get thee to a city." Where the fish are sane and the living is easy.

Amen.

Random Weirdness

BLANG!
Blang?
Is this a word?

Notice the subtle finger gesture. Those nutty college kids....

At least we know the vandals weren't English majors. They surely would have altered BLANG too.



Funky balloon hats: $8.50. Your dignity: worthless.




The new fast dry cement they use takes all the fun out of sidewalk art. There's only enough time to flop out the package, trace it, scratch in your initials, and the damn stuff is set.

Note to self: learn to draw to scale. No one cares about the nine inches if the circumference is five millimeters.

P.S. What's up with frankenhead?

P.P.S. Effective advertising would have inlcuded a phone number.

Oh Them Shoes

It's late afternoon. It's Friday. And it's payday.

The triple witching hour for prostitutes.

A few of the more industrious party girls are out working the boulevard as I drive home. Okay - I assume that they're prostitutes. In fairness, they might simply be scantily-clad young ladies in six inch come-fuck-me gold spiked heels who know the whip-thin weasel in the blue Trans-Am, and bend down through the passenger window for a quick negotiation - er, chat with him - before climbing in.

I'm wedged in traffic between a used-to-be-blue gardener's truck and a white convertible BMW who seems to think if he can narrow the distance between our bumpers to a micron, all will be right in his little world.

My window is down, a double edged sword. I can smell L.A. Citrusy eucalyptus. The Sees Candy factory. Hillside chaparral. A pungent cloud of spices wafting from Los Camerones... I can hear the city too. Spanish radio - spoken mas rapido. Rap trapped inside a Honda pounds against the windows trying to escape. Somewhere, blocks away, a siren.

It's all too much for Mr. BMW. He leans out of his car, tries to see around traffic, slumps back behind his wheel, and presses his horn with both hands.

Oh yeah - that helps. Now that you've worked your magic, traffic will miraculously clear.

Go back to the Westside where you belong, moron.

We're not moving anytime soon, so I check out the storefronts. That's when I see her. She's already past me, so I can't see her face, but oh god, her back has to be her best side. She's tall and she moves with athletic grace. Skin teddy-bear brown. Hair clipped short to her skull.

Oh honey, if I had an ass like that, I'd wear gold lame boyshorts that show off the under-cleavage of my perfect, tight, track star butt too. Each step she takes forward, I can see her ass cheek, the smooth skin of her thighs, the sway of her hips. I am enchanted, struck dumb by the sheer joy of watching her walk - for free! "Sweetheart," I want to yell out, "you could sell just that strut. Bottle it and let me drink it down! Let me snort the line of your legs."

But, seeing as I'm such a girl, the next thing I notice is that she's wearing the most perfect, killer, pair of patent leather boots on the face of the earth, and I want them! The heels aren't too high, just enough to force her to walk with the magnificent ass of hers thrust out to counter-balance. The patent leather is so glossy that pure white light halos gleam on the curve of her calves.

I'm so jealous that I start hoping she's a CD. For some reason, if it's a guy, it makes it okay that he has better shoes than I do. I inch forward along with traffic, hoping to get far enough ahead to get a package check in front, and maybe ask where she found the boots. I almost cut into another lane to get closer, but Mr. BMW jerks forward into the spot. Cursing, I check for my streetwalker. She's almost to the corner.

And the weirdest thing - there's another party girl coming from the opposite direction and she has on the same boots! What are the odds? Will it cause a fashion singularity if they see the other one? What is prostitute etiquette? Does one of them have to go home and change shoes if they work the same corner? Do they stalk in opposite direcitons in a huff? Do they duke it out?

Ooh - girl fight!

I burn to know, but the light changes. I drive away before they come together. Now I'll never know.

Damn BMW driver. Next time, stay off the fucking horn.

Rebel Love

I'm so not an artist.

Reflecting on events in Spain and Canada this past week legalizing gay marriage, I've decided that I'm jealous of....

Their kindness?
Their grown-up behavior?
Their belief that everyone deserves to be loved?
All of the above.

Do you remember that one girl in your third grade class who ran to the teacher tattling on everyone simply because she couldn't stand the idea that you were having fun, and GETTING AWAY WITH IT? We've turned into a nation of that joyless, mean-spirited, spiteful, self-righteous bitch.

Of course, America hung into slavery as long as possible, so I'm not surprised that we're on the back end of the morality curve this time. Maybe the next generation will look at two men holding hands on the street and think... nothing. Absolutely nothing. It will be so commonplace that it doesn't even register in their minds. I can only hope.

People who are ultra-right wing must not trust God very much. They don't believe that matters will get handled on a spiritual plain. That must be why they feel they have to take judgment into their own hands. Maybe they don't really believe in God. Maybe they never advanced from third grade.

Since my life's work seems to be tweaking that tattletale girl every chance I get, I've come up with a radical idea. It's the 4th of July, we Americans are supposed to be celebrating freedom, so I was inspired.

Legalizing gay marriage is going to come down to a duke-fest between Federal and State's rights. People of my generation equate State's rights with the ugly side of Civil Rights, so we tend to support a strong Federal Government. But when the Federal government is in the hands of people who think the freedom of religion boils down to picking between being Baptist and being Methodist, we have to turn to our states to protect us from them. State governments are more receptive to real live humans anyway.

(In an aside, a moment of silence for my California State Assemblyman, Mike Gordon, who passed away from a brain tumor this week. Mike was for legalizing gay marriage. That stance and many others made him the first politician I ever voted for, instead of simply voting against his opposition.)

Traditionally, the symbol of the struggle for State's rights over Federal enforcement has been the rebel flag. I suggest co-opting the rebel flag and making it over as a symbol of the state-by-state struggle for legalized gay marriage. And for those of us who are a little bent, note that the Confederate symbol is a Saint Andrew's cross! What could be more fitting?

So proclaim your Rebel Love loud and proud.

I can't wait to see Johnny Reb's face when his symbol of Southern Manhood is the centerpiece of a Gay Pride parade.

Happy 4th to all you Canadians and Spaniards who get to celebrate true liberty.

URBAN SHRINES

I'm fascinated by religion. I'm fascinated by train wrecks too, but I don't really want to get involved in either one. I'm more than willing to stand on the sidelines and gawk at the mass destruction though.

Do-It-Yourself religion appeals to me more than the corporate variety, so I'm always on the lookout for impromptu shrines: Small white crosses in the red dirt beside an Arizona highway; Smooth gray river stones stacked under green ferns in the Smokey Mountains; Sneakers hanging from telephone wires; Play-On Mary, AKA advantage Mary, protecting a small fenced schoolyard....
(This isn't Play-On Mary. This is her friend, Fatima of the Dixie Cup)

My favorite find so far has to be Our Lady of the Vespas.

Maybe we were on Via del Polacchi or Via Paganacia. Someone who knows Rome can (and will) correct me. Somehow, I misplaced Villa Borghese. Not an easy feat. That's like losing Central Park in New York. But is was gone, misfolded in my map, leaving us to wander the deserted, sun-baked streets of Rome in mid-summer.

Process of elimination. We were not Englishmen. Therefore, we were mad dogs.

Whatever direction we were headed, it felt wrong, so we ducked into the first narrow, shady street we passed. In the shop windows were huge baroque candlesticks and heavy goblets like something out of the last Indiana Jones movie. All the stuff a person would need to start up a church was there for the buying.

Like heatstroke, a revelation hit me. Religion is a business.

Hardly a groundbreaking philosophy there, but it seemed like an epiphany. It was wonderful and awful at the same time, seeing the backside of the facade like that. So blantently commercial.

Why do we let them get away with it? What other business in the world could get away with selling something that they've never been able to prove that they deliver - Enternal Life. Not only do they fail to prove their claims, but they use the worst fear tactics on the most vulnerable members of society to sell their snake oil. (Would you like to drop your life savings into our collection plate, or would you rather SUFFER IN HELL FOR ALL ETERNITY?) And they're ruthless competitiors. Don't you think Pepsi would love to be able to burn Coke's executives at the stake, and then tell all Coke drinkers that unless they switch, it'll happen to them too?


We were supposed to be looking for the Temple of Minerva, but there was enough wisdom to go around in front of that plate glass window. I stared greedily at a very cool bishop's chapeau and wondered aloud how much it would set me back. Talk about the ultimate souvenir! A bishop's miter was way more inspired than the Pope bobble-head doll that, up until that moment, had been my Holy Grail tchochke.

My long suffering traveling companion tried to pull me away from the window.

I could feign complete innocence when the need arose - daily - so I batted my eyelashes and said, sweet as you please, "I bet they have those embroidery machines just like Disneyland. I'll get my name on it in gold thread!"

He grabbed my elbow and steered my to an alleyway for one of those stern talks. "Please," he begged. "Just - please!"

What I heard was, "I double dog dare ya!"

Anticipating a problem in translation from weary traveler to toublemakerese, my traveling companion kept a firm hold on my arm. He knew from past (read:bad) experience that the impish gleam in my eye meant that as soon as he let go, I'd make a dash for the shop door. He tried to keep hold of me, but we were sweating and my sunscreen was a slick layer over my skin.

"Okay, I'll go in and ask how much it costs, if you promise to STAY. And be ready to run in case they're offended."

What a guy!

I would have yanked his chain a bit longer, but the picture of the Madonna gazing serenely down at the Vespas at the end of the alleyway caught my eye. I realized that I had stumbled into a rare cathedral of spontaneous occult worship. Urban Shrines were mystical places that could only be seen by the fully aware mind, or one that was woozy from too much heat, strong sun, and lots of Italian table wine.

Intrepid, much put upon, traveling companion went to the door of the store, offered a muttered prayer to the azure sky, and yanked the knob. The door rattled but didn't open.

"Hah! They're closed!" He crowed.

Hallelujah! Another miracle - courtesy of Our Lady of the Vespas.