Smut by (and in) the Sea

I read from one of my stories on Saturday evening. Out loud. To actual, real people, right there in the same room as me. And it was fun. People even sniggered in the right places. I’d do it again (something I’ll probably regret saying at some point in the future). It was probably a good job, though, that my story was one of my milder offerings. 

I was at Smut by the Sea in sunny Scarborough, the first event of its kind that I’ve attended and I read from my story in SbtS volume 2. Fortunately, I work in a politically incorrect environment which makes me perfectly happy to utter four-letter words out loud without embarrassment.

A fair few people know that I write smut. Very few know about it in any more detail. A colleague who I asked to do a wee proofread of my mini short story collection, Miranda’s Tempest (blatant plug alert), for me is probably still recovering from the experience. So it was fabulous to be in an environment in which people could talk about their work openly and with pride. It was good to actually meet people I’ve chatted to on Facebook or Twitter. I even eventually won something on the tombola.

And in honour of the theme of the event, and of my story in the anthology, Tabitha Rayne and I did take a dip in the sea, although she looked far more glamorous than me in her itsy bitsy polka dot bikini. I felt more like one of those stoutly built ladies who swim the channel clad in granny cossies and smeared in grease. The lifeguards stood watch, with a somewhat incredulous look on their faces, after telling us it would be freezing. ‘It’s not that cold,’ I said as we emerged from the waves like Bond babes.

‘That’s because you’ve gone numb,’ one replied. And he was right. But it didn’t stop me joining a local group of sea swimmers the next morning. The hardy folk at Sea Swim go out every Saturday and Sunday from May to September for a good long swim. With them, I got a different view of Scarborough and the neighbouring coastline, literally from sea level. They were even literary and artistic – reading poetry and viewing Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus before the dip and penning their own poems or snippets about a Yorkshire Venus afterwards. To be honest, by then my numb hands were shaking a bit too much for legible handwriting. But there’s got to be a smutty story out there about The Venus of Scarborough.

The mock pirate ship that took holidaymakers up and down the bay also made me think of Odysseus’ travels by sea, particularly the brave hero lashed to the mast so he can hear the song of the Sirens without being lured to his death on the rocks. I wrote about his wife Penelope and her 108 annoying suitors in the final story in Miranda’s Tempest (blatant plug alert), but maybe it’s time to turn my attention to her husband...

A big thank you to Victoria and Kev Blisse for all their hard work in organising the event and to all those who helped on the day.

Review: Thrill Seeker by Kristina Lloyd

Sometimes, it’s nice to read a bit of light, escapist fantasy in your erotica. Thrill Seeker is not it; it’s dark and difficult and has no respect for the reader’s safeword. I have to admit that, sometimes, I even enjoy some pretty badly written BDSM on a bypass-the-brain, physical kind of level; stuff that has people do stupid things in the name of kink but glosses over the risk. Then I’ll read something that makes me remember just how bloody brilliant it is when a writer comes along and combines the hot-as-fuck kink with a well-crafted plot, characters you identify with and care about and a head-on intelligent treatment of the difficult issues. And that’s what Thrill Seeker is.

Natalie is looking for someone who can fulfil her kinky fantasies. She’s determined not to repress her desires but to live them. So she goes online, openly discussing what she wants, and finds a man who will kidnap her. Added to the mix are Liam, her fuck buddy who is a lovely, likeable character but vanilla, and Baxter, the ex she still thinks about constantly who did cater to her submissive tendencies but turned out to be still living with the wife he claimed to be separated from.

Here’s Natalie’s philosophy: “Basically, I could live or die; or at least, live a life not fully realised. Giving up on certain aspects of yourself, the parts others might find distasteful or threatening, is the easiest thing in the world. It’s the safest route, the path of least resistance. But I was starting to feel if I followed that track of inertia, my lost and abandoned fragments would return to haunt me.”

She’s completely aware of the risks she’s taking in sharing her kidnap fantasies online with a man she hasn’t even met, whose face she has never seen. But she does it anyway, letting him play out the fantasy without safewords or prior negotiation. The thing is, the encounter leaves Natalie dissatisfied; there’s no emotional connection. And so the quest goes on, eventually culminating in a dramatic denouement which eventually makes everything right with the world.

There are a few instances where there’s a twist in the tale, but you see it coming. But I think in this story, it works because it adds to the discomfiting tone of much of the narrative. There’s no big effort to conceal what’s going to happen, even if Natalie is unaware of it. The ‘reveal’ of the twist is not the point; the point is that jarring between Natalie’s perspective and the reader’s. You’re left viewing the book through the gaps between your fingers as you put your hands over your face and think, “Oh God, I know what’s happening here...”

It's a shame publishers don't invest more in erotica cover designs though. Not once did I think of Natalie as the sort of woman who would spend much time worrying about her manicure and nail varnish, nor did I think of the men as smart business types. 

I bought Thrill Seeker at Amazon UK. Published by Black Lace.

Oh I do like to be beside the seaside...

It's nearly time for Smut by the Sea, which takes place in Scarborough, UK, this Saturday.

There's an amazing line-up of erotica authors who'll be reading from their work, including.... Janine Ashbless, KD Grace, Lucy Felthouse, Victoria Blisse, Liv Honeywell, Lexie Bay, Slave Nano, Ruby Kiddell, Ashley Lister, Tabitha Rayne, Gemma Parkes, Rachel Kincaid and Jennifer Denys, a special show to launch Slave Nano's book Adventures in Fetishland and a Q&A on how to write erotica and get it published. There's also an erotic marketplace where you can buy books, sex toys and cake, amongst other things (I can't decide which is my top priority. Decisions, decisions.)

Entry during the day is free. Yes, you read that right. Free. 

In the evening there's the launch party for Smut by the Sea Volume 2, with readings, a Q&A, a burlesque show with Moorita and a goodie bag full of, well... goodies. Tickets and all the info you need at the Smut by the Sea website.

I fully intend to have a swim in the North Sea while I'm there. I've been googling and I gather that South Bay is the place to be. I'm actually in the picture above, a little black dot in the Irish Sea. Here's an excerpt from my Smut by the Sea Vol 2 story, in which Gareth and Claire are larking about off the north-west tip of Wales...

Gareth aimed another splash at me, but the foamy water missed. Instead, he stumbled on the stones. He fell like he was playing some kind of extreme Twister, trying to put down hands and feet to keep his clothes out of the water. It didn’t work. He went in, arse first.

“Shit and bollocks,” he said with a sigh.

I laughed. That proved a mistake. In a provoking-him kind of way. He jumped up, water streaming, and lunged for me like a rugby player. I did that crazy kind of run where you try to lift your feet out of the water to go faster without splashing yourself up to the eyeballs. It didn’t work. He grabbed my waist and flung me into the deeper water. I thought his “shit and bollocks” something of an understatement. The cold took my breath away. Literally. My lungs emptied in one great gasp of shock. The Irish Sea in May. It’s not warm.

“I. Cannot. Believe. You. Just. Did. That,” I stuttered, teeth chattering.

“Oh stop being a wimp,” he grinned, splashing me some more just to make sure. There was probably a tiny spot of my left eyebrow that still wasn’t wet. 

Writing what you know

We’ve all heard this one: ‘Write what you know.’ And, as erotica writers, possibly worried about the assumptions people might make about us based on our subject matter. Just me? No, I didn’t think so. And no matter how many times you repeat the mantra that Agatha Christie wasn’t a serial killer, it's unlikely you'd write about kinky sex if you had no interest in it whatsoever.

But, and it’s a big but (no pun intended), writing what you know doesn’t mean that every story you produce is autobiographical. That would mean there would be no such thing as fiction. And you’d run out of stories pretty quick (speaking for myself; perhaps your life is one big sexual adventure!). 

I think writing what you know is more about the detail than the grand plots. We all have a unique set of experiences and knowledge to draw on and combine in our work. That’s why there’s always room for another decent writer in what might seem like a saturated marketplace. No-one else can write quite like you, or me. I might be able to describe what it’s like to break up heavy soil with a spade because I have an allotment. You might be able to describe something I know nothing about, like reading computer code or the smell of a ferret. I recently read Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea and was struck by the depth of the description that can only have come from an intimate knowledge of the sea and its wildlife. It doesn’t mean Hemingway ever battled an 18ft marlin like the old man does in the book. But it does mean he used his skills as a writer to bring that to life realistically for someone who doesn't have the same knowledge or experience of the sea.

When you write about sex, I don’t think it means you have to have been promiscuous, or to have done absolutely everything that you write about. Otherwise we could never write from the point of view of someone not our own gender or orientation. This doesn’t mean you don’t have to do your research and get your facts right, but just like researching how to write a murder wouldn’t mean carrying one out, researching sex and kink doesn’t mean you need to be having one-night stands every weekend or own a fully equipped dungeon full of gear.

That’s what your imagination is for; a little knowledge goes a long way in the imagination of a writer. Writing what you know is more about observing the world through a writer's eyes and storing away quirky little things you see and hear for future reference, then applying those unique little details to the fantasy world of your stories to make them really come to life.

Flash Fiction: Under My Heels

The few friends I discuss my writing with occasionally say, 'Why don't you write the next Fifty Shades and make your fortune?' and I have to explain that I don't write like that (so many reasons it's beyond this blog post to explain). But since there is so much excitement over billionaires in swanky offices and so many books in which the heroine seems to literally stumble into the presence of these hunky chunks of Alpha male, I thought I'd give it a go. So, in a mere 500 words, here's my romance between an uber-rich industrialist and a lowly freelance designer:

Under My Heels

I shifted my booted heels on Samuel’s back. He gulped back the groan that built in his throat, beneath the black leather collar I had given him. He had the obedience on his hands and knees of a man who had spent many thousands on the most discreet dominatrixes New York could offer. I was surprised he’d never crossed my path before.

We started off like some kind of corny romance. I fell at his feet. Literally. I’d landed a meeting to discuss freelance opportunities at his firm in my day job as a graphic designer. I stumbled on a loose corner of carpet in front of his desk. Okay, so it wasn’t so much like a corny romance; his swanky offices were sorely in need of a refurb. Anyway, he rushed round to help, dropping to his knees facing me. I got up without his aid, but he stayed there, developing a glazed look as he eyed my shiny, spike-heeled boots. I mostly dress conservatively for my day job, but I can’t give up the footwear.

I knew that glassy look. Here was a man who fantasised about being on his knees at the feet of a cruel and beautiful mistress. Fortunately for him I was both.

‘Enjoying yourself down there, Mr Monton?’ I asked, shifting my toe to beneath his open mouth.

‘Um, I was admiring your boots. Sorry, Ms Anderson. You are Ms Anderson, I presume?’

His uncertainty was amusing. The billionaire founder of Monton Industries, stammering over the pointed black leather of a woman’s shoe.

‘Yes, I am Ms Anderson.’ I offered a hand and encouraged him to rise. ‘And I’m here about the design work.’

I got the contract. And an invitation to dinner. Normally I kept business and pleasure, or should I say business and my other business, separate. But Samuel Monton fascinated me. His need to submit bubbled so close to the surface it took only a woman’s stumble to have him grovelling on his worn, grubby carpet. The right woman, of course. But he could pay for the best so why was his desire unsatisfied?

I ordered the most expensive fillet steak, rare, and a bottle of vintage Barolo. He ate a very restrained Caesar salad and sipped water as though we had already entered into an arrangement of mistress and slave. He seemed to have forgotten his need for utmost secrecy, to keep his deviance out of the newspapers.

‘There’s something about you mistress,’ he said. ‘Something sensual and powerful that I’ve never experienced before.’

He wanted me to give up my other clients and work only for him as his Domme, set up in my own penthouse apartment. I refused. I refused to give up clients who relied on me and who allowed me to express myself in a way I find particularly satisfying. But I also refused his money, his apartment, gifts of clothes and diamonds. That’s how I knew. I was falling in love with this slave.

© Tilly Hunter

Read Your Smut However You Want! by Lucy Felthouse

Lucy Felthouse is visiting today with some great news about Smut by the Sea Volume 2. Over to you, Lucy...

Firstly, I want to say a huge thank you to Tilly for letting me loose on her site today. Thanks, Tilly!

So, Smut by the Sea Volume 2 has been out for a little while now, so I apologise for being so slow in getting this guest post out, but things have been incredibly busy – but I’m not complaining. I’d rather be busy than bored!

Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that you can now read your Smut by the Sea Volume 2 however you want to—i.e. eBook or print. Yes, I said print! :D Most of the eBook sites now have the anthology available, but what’s even more exciting is that if you want a delicious print copy  in your hand (I’ve got ten here ready for Smut by the Sea the event on 22nd June—they’re gorgeous), you can bag one, or two, or fifty... we really don’t mind. Just head on over to Amazon UK or Amazon US (links here: http://lucyfelthouse.co.uk/published-works/smut-by-the-sea-volume-2/) and grab your copy for an absolute bargain price.

And don’t forget to let us know what you think—us authors and editors thrive on feedback, you know...

Happy Reading!

Lucy x

*****

Excerpt from On the Big Wheel by Lucy Felthouse

Brigit loved the seaside. She always had, probably because visiting it was a rarity. Living in the centre of England meant that even the nearest seaside town was over an hour and a half away—and the nice resorts even further.

Which was why her boyfriend, Allen, proposed a long weekend in Brighton. He knew how fond she was of the seaside. Unsurprisingly, she agreed delightedly.

“It’s a long way,” she said. “But it doesn’t matter. We’d never go anywhere if we lamented the length of the journey.”

As it happened, the travelling wasn’t too bad. Miraculously the M1 was clear all the way down to the M25—and even that notorious motorway wasn’t experiencing its usual havoc. A straight shot south on the M23, then the A23 took them towards Brighton, and they navigated the one-way systems and lack of road signs and—eventually—found their hotel.

“Wow,” Brigit said, stretching luxuriously after getting out of the car, “that didn’t take as long as I thought. Shall we check in, dump our bags and go and explore?”

“Sounds like a plan to me,” Allen replied with a grin.

They slammed their respective car doors, grabbed the bags from the boot and headed into the hotel. Fifteen minutes later, after using the toilet and freshening up, they were back outside.

“Nice choice of hotel, babe. I like it.” Brigit said.

“I’m glad. I researched it well,” Allen replied.

“The bed looks nice and comfy.”

“Well, I’m sure we’ll be able to give it a decent road test later.” He winked at her, and got a slap on the arm for his trouble.

“You’ve got a one-track mind, you have.”

“Well, what do you expect when I’ve got a girlfriend that looks like you?”

She giggled. “Charmer.”

“That’s me. Okay, now I’m back in good books,” Allen said, “what do you want to do? Now, I mean. Not at bedtime.” He waggled his eyebrows.

Brigit stuck her tongue out at him before replying. “I dunno. Just look around I guess. Get our bearings. See what there is to do around here.”

They walked hand-in-hand towards the seafront, then along it in the direction of the pier. They passed the burnt out shell of the West Pier, and Brigit wondered aloud whether it would ever be rebuilt or demolished. Or would the blackened skeleton be left there forevermore, a reminder of what once was.

Soon, they drew close to Brighton Pier. Brigit turned to Allen with a grin.

“What?” he said, then followed her almost manic gaze down the length of the pier, towards a building with fake turret-type things and some very real flags. He sighed. He couldn’t be sure from here, but he thought it was bound to be the amusement arcade. “Oh, you want to go in there, do you? I wonder why?” His voice was laden with sarcasm in his last sentence.

“You know damn well why. Come on!” Brigit tugged him along the last few metres of the pavement and onto the wooden slats of the pier. “Ooh, we can have fish and chips when we come out, if you want.”

*****

Light hearted, sexy fun by the sea is the theme of this erotic anthology, edited by Victoria Blisse and Lucy Felthouse.

From the sun soaked beaches of Brazil to the altogether cooler coastal towns of England, Smut by the Sea Volume 2 has it all. Whatever your interpretation of naughty seaside fun, there’s something nestling between the covers for you. Amusement arcades, beach houses, mermaids, honeymooners, shipwrecks, sex toys and more abound in this exciting collection of stories from erotica’s finest authors.

Contains stories from Victoria Blisse, Tilly Hunter, Rachel Randall, Giselle Renarde, Tamsin Flowers, Lucy Felthouse, Kate Britton, Jillian Boyd, Bel Anderson, Cass Peterson, Delyth Angharad, T C Mill, Erzabet Bishop, Tenille Brown and Annabeth Leong.

Buy links: http://lucyfelthouse.co.uk/published-works/smut-by-the-sea-volume-2/

*****

Lucy Felthouse is a very busy woman! She writes erotica and erotic romance in a variety of subgenres and pairings, and has over seventy publications to her name, with many more in the pipeline. These include Best Bondage Erotica 2012 and 2013, and Best Women's Erotica 2013. Another string to her bow is editing, and she has edited and co-edited a number of anthologies. She owns Erotica For All, and is book editor for Cliterati. Find out more at http://www.lucyfelthouse.co.uk. Join her on Facebook and Twitter, and subscribe to her newsletter at: http://eepurl.com/gMQb9

Random WIP excerpts

I'm doing my usual thing of working on far too many stories at once and deciding to write for far too many calls for submissions that stop me getting anywhere on the longer works I have on the go. But the end is in sight... until I see some fresh calls that tickle my fancy. 

These are what I'm working on at the mo. The first two are set to be those longer works I keep harping on about. The four after that are all short stories with summer deadlines:

1. This one's a contemporary story exploring what it means to be a male Dom:

She goes up to her bedroom and reaches under the bed for her toys, which she keeps in an old wicker picnic hamper. It makes it look like she’s going to pull out some cucumber sandwiches and a slice of Victoria sponge. What she actually takes out are two lengths of 8mm white cotton rope. 

2. And this one's a story of a couple who build their own house with lots of kinky opportunities in the design. Told by the male sub:

“I’ve been wondering what possessed me to grow these new-fangled round courgettes,” she says, showing me one that looks to me to be the size of a tennis ball, although my mind is probably exaggerating as it runs through the possible things she could do with it. I swallow and put down my hammer. I’ve already had trouble concentrating while I imagined what its handle would feel like inside me. We like to improvise.

3. And here's one in which a couple are separated for several months while he's on secondment so they start having webcam sex. She's just told him to gag himself:

He puts the black ball between his teeth and fiddles with the fastening. I see him cinch it so tight that the straps cut into the corners of his mouth. I’ve grown to love gagging him myself. I think it’s the moment when he opens his mouth and lets me slide it in. It’s another way of penetrating him, filling him all up... But seeing him do it to himself. That’s new. That’s something I’ll be doing again when he gets home too. 

4. And here's a fem sub to even things up a bit, although she's on her own in a 'special' kind of spa in this bit ahead of a date that evening:

My breath seems loud. Perhaps because it’s the only thing I can hear. No rainforest sounds CD, thank God. I’m starting to feel warm and my skin is tingling as my sweat activates the mud minerals. It is a spa treatment, after all. Just one that provides a little extra. If I survive today without dying of embarrassment, I might sign up for one of their shibari experience days. Sounds like something you’d get coupons in the paper for – try paragliding, try scuba diving, try rope suspension…

5. Here's one about sharing fantasies:

That night. It was a few weeks ago. Cabernet sauvignon had been on buy-one-get-one-free, so of course we drank both bottles. Then we started talking dirty. “Go on, there must be some fantasy you haven’t let on about,” I dared him. His turned out to be the relatively mundane one of wanting to watch me with another woman. My confession put a bit of a dampener on the evening. He sobered up pretty quick when I said, “I’d really love to fuck your ass with a strap-on.”

6. And here's a historic m/m one - a Victorian lord and his gardener. The 'fgfgfg' denotes some research still to be done (yellow rose variety around in the 19th century anyone?) And of course, in Tilly World, it's not going to be the gardener who ends up on his knees later...

He comes out onto the front steps to see them off. The parasites that have fed from his table and slept in his feather beds for nigh on a month. I don’t understand how he can be so polite to them all, rigorously observing all social niceties. I know he’s seen me here, kneeling in the rose bed weeding; he made one slight glance to where I’m working beneath the yellow fgfgfg before he turned back to his guests, smiling and shaking hands, lifting the ladies’ gloved fingers to his lips.