Announcing The Six Swans

I've previously blogged about the Coming Together series, an excellent charity series of erotica with the delicious tagline "Doing Good While Being Bad."

They're being kind enough to publish my story "The Six Swans" in their new erotic novella series, Coming Together: Neat. I'm not sure exactly when the book will be out, but you can see the cover if you follow the link.

The Six Swans is an erotic retelling of the fairy tale by the same name.

The young King Evan struggles to become a man and ruler amid the choking influence of his mother’s spies and machinations. When he meets a silent, beautiful woman in the woods, he can’t resist the pure, honest sensuality of her touch. Bringing her to the castle as his wife and queen is Evan’s declaration of independence. The king’s hard-won happiness falls apart, however, when his mother accuses his new wife of murdering their first-born child. Evan believes that the private, physical language he shares with his queen tells him everything he needs to know, but as tragedy strikes again and again, his love and faith are tested to the breaking point.

The original story is told from the perspective of a princess who must take a vow of silence to save her brothers from a curse. I’ve always been interested in the king who falls in love with her despite her seeming insanity, and so I wrote The Six Swans from his perspective. I wanted to tell the story of his passion and loyalty, and of the sexual connection that’s strong enough to overcome the isolating power of the princess’s vow.

The result is a story that's dark, sexy, and deeply romantic.

Now that I've told you about the story, let me talk a little about the cause. Sales from Coming Together: Neat go into Coming Together's account on Kiva, a website that allows users to give small loans to entrepreneurs around the world. For years, I've loved the idea of microloans. I like how empowering they are for both the giver and the recipient, and I love the statistics on how often they're paid back and how effective they seem to be in changing people's lives.

Please consider checking out "The Six Swans" and supporting the other titles in the Coming Together: Neat line. I'll post more information here as it becomes available.

The Edible Interface

I've got several pieces of news to report, but I'll start by mentioning another story I've got up on the Oysters and Chocolate site. It's called "Edible Interface," and it's another lesbian erotica piece with a bunch of geekiness thrown in. Think DIY sex toys and mediated human-human interaction.

As an author's note, I have to say that I wasn't the first to come up with the idea of an edible interface. This story was inspired by a real artist's project, which won the 2006 Yahoo! Out of the Box award. That interface was a racing game controlled by licks on a lollipop. Though I do not believe it was intended to be dirty, you should Google for the video and check it out--it's definitely something to see.

However, I can't blame the video or the project for the smut. The moment I heard the phrase "edible interface," I envisioned a device such as Alesha builds in the story.

Enjoy!

What's Not to Come

I'm late announcing that the excellent Oysters and Chocolate has published my story "What's Not to Come." They were also kind enough to feature the story in their March newsletter.

"What's Not to Come" is a sweet story about a married couple exploring sexual possibilities.

I'm a regular reader of Oysters and Chocolate, and it's always an honor to appear on their site.

Girl Crush

I have a story coming out in the Girl Crush anthology, which will be released in May 2010 by Cleis Press. Editor R. Gay just released the lineup for the anthology, along with the very sexy cover art--you can view both at the link above.

I'm excited to read this anthology because R. Gay's made an effort to include stories that cover a wide variety of girl crush scenarios. Some of the stories will be sweet and romantic, and others will portray a darker side.

My story, "Running Away and Running Home Again," is on that darker side. I've been exhilarated by the experience of reading and writing erotica because I'm finally saying things I never felt I had permission to say. I'm encouraged to do so by the brave writing of others (see links to the side of the page).

Check out the site, and I'll post more about the anthology when I've got more information.

Coming Together: As One

My story, "The Hunt," will come out this April in the Coming Together: As One anthology. This is part of a very cool series of erotic anthologies published for charity. This one will benefit ONE, the campaign to end global poverty.

The stories and poems in this anthology all have a menage theme. Mine is set in ancient Greece.

I'm incredibly honored to have been selected for this anthology--I'm in great company among these writers. I also love this subversive way of raising money for a good cause. I'll post more as the release data approaches.

Hello World

Thanks for visiting the site. I'm a writer of erotica, and I've started to get enough stories out in the world that I wanted a central place to gather links and post news. Look for more to come, and in the meantime, check out a couple of my stories.