The World and Writing of Rosie D. Ruthers from Erotica to Paranormal Romance to Pulp fiction and Essays on Writing and More.
I will follow you I didn’t want to at the start When you kept shining that spot light on me Blinking Blinding I didn’t like what you said What you were finding As you walked around Tut Tut Tutting Then muttering All That Muttering Nearly drove me mad But now I see it was me […]
via Pillaging Poetry — A Thousand Bits of Paper
Followers if you can’t tell this is one of my favorite blogs and truthfully favorite poets. This poem is…well, for me, it is just incredibly evocative.
The waves roll in,
drowning my feet,
When some lifting force makes me scream,
Up and over the waves,
Some how my poor toes are saved,
And he wraps me up in his arms,
He laughs at my alarm,
And down we fall into the icey waves,
But they don’t feel cold at all.
In text of zeroes and ones,
He professes desire to me,
Across a screen brighter,
Than the fires of hell,
He plots to tempt me,
Because he saw my face by chance,
After months of radio silence,
And his heart, for a second, skipped a beat,
Across a thousand wires and wavelengths,
Lust in the modern age,
Blossoms,
Like the fruits that burst red and juicy,
On Persephone’s tongue,
“Lure me” or perhaps she said,
“Lure me?” or perhaps she said,
“Lure me!” but we’ll never quite know.
Perhaps she doesn’t quite know,
But it Flows.
But it Follows.
But does it Grow?
Who knows?
But across some far off distance,
Or closer than I hoped,
I became an object of desire,
He plots, leaving the door open,
Lure me or lure me or lure me.
Across clicks and churns and,
Chuggings of hard drive,
By chance he saw me, and I?
Who knows?
Churning emotions bubble forth,
Too much silence in the noise,
Everything stark,
Colorful only because of yearning,
Pulses pounding turns to pressure building,
Thudding, laughing, with the beat of blood,
And the heat that pierces through much and mud,
Leaving him and I and us together,
Alone,
Then together,
Breaths speeding in unison,
Bright red, yellow like wheat, and black like ravens,
With that subtle sort of blue that highlights the dark,
As scream through our hearts,
As the crowd listens.
As the sweat stains sheets and clothes and sofas,
As they laugh.
As they die.
Everything stark in perfect clarity,
Super heightened superficiality,
Fuck it and enjoy it.
Means everything, but ignore it when
The Light Comes Up And
The city is full of empty noise,
But for a moment there is an excited silence between,
Lovers…between…enemies…between breaths.
The spaces between the pulses.
The spaces between the buildings.
The silence between the screams.
So What Is The Difference between Love and Hate?
This has been on my blog banner and book listing page forever and it must be baffling to you all if you’ve paid attention. Well It’s a series I began writing shortly before starting this blog. So I wanted to explain what that series was originally going to be and what it is now, as well as talk about how our story plans can mutate into completely different creatures.
The original idea behind The Marquess series came from a story titled Come At Night. The blurb:
After years apart, Marquess Angela, the dusken beauty of the old world, and Lord Rion, a handsome boon to the new world, are drawn together again due to Angela’s loss of her husband’s estate to his siblings. With both their spouses recently dead they choose to eschew the formality of propriety and take comfort in each other. However, years of bitterness and unhealed hearts have taken their toll. Old wounds don’t heal quickly…then again if the choice is freedom or regret Angela knows her choice. Will she truly be able to make it or is that, like Rion said, a self deception?
Now Here is the (current) novel blurb for Come At Night
If I asked you to do the unthinkable and uncertain to save yourself…would you?
After years apart, both their marriages end in tragedy, and life throws them into a net of old magic and politics Marquess Angela and Lord Rion find themselves tangled up in each other again. Is it fate that brings them together or the cruelty of the universe’s limited imagination? With few allies and an old love burning in her heart Angela makes a choice that will threaten her family, her reputation, her faith, and her life. Vows of love and devotion make for beautiful sentiments in her eyes, but she is no one’s fool. However, wisdom can only take her so far when all she craves is freedom, but perhaps that is just another cage. As for Rion, he has tried to mature and be more than family rebel, but as he wraps himself in a woman who reminds him of his rebellious youth he must choose between his beliefs, his heart, and his family. He made this happen, but is he truly ready for what true love will cost?
So what do we have here?
What we have is the hardest part of writing erotica…not turning it into a well rounded story all the time. However, it isn’t really a problem when you turn it to your favor. The original series would be pseudo-dramas around the Marquess and her sensual experiences as she and Rion fall further and further away from convention. It was mostly sex driven.
Now, it is a socio-political drama about how Angela and Rion struggle with falling further and further away from convetion and begin to question if there is such a thing or not. In novel Angela is the dark skinned descendent of the native peoples of their nation and Rion is not. she is borderline pagan, traditional, and seen as a remnant of a savage age and people. Not all dark people are viewed this way, but the general feeling is the invaders did a service by showing the natives “the right way of living” and slowly intermingling. The darker you are, the older your bloodline, but that carries no weight. Yet, Angela is very modern socially and is essentially a socialist, as was Rion. He drifted away from socialism and became more involved in his family obligations, but it never sat right with him. He feels that until Come At Night he spent his years acting foolishly, and is now trying to set things right. Unfortunately he is just as impulsive as he was…and Angela often gets swept up in that.
How the hell did I get that from a series of sex dramas?
Simple really. I made Rion and Angela characters and people. I defined the problem between them. The original idea began with the image of this long raven haired man standing in the doors of a balcony, a man with eyes that ached and burned. The sensual images of him and the woman he loved gave rise to the knowledge there was more to them then sex and lust. They were deeply complex figures with pasts together and who were driven apart. I wanted to know more, so I began exploring them in the hopes of making the sex more rich. Really I followed the path of The Demon’s Bargain by weaving sex and emotional intensity in with complex story lines. I realized the series may be closer to Outlander or Game of Thrones more than anything else, and I couldn’t stop. Angela and Rion do everything right and everything wrong. Their principals compromise in the worst places and they bring out the bad in each other that your heart breaks because you see the good they bring out. They are two people striving for what may be unobtainable, but they try.
Once you give characters that much depth you’re pretty much boned in keeping it a short story. How can you when you know the characters so well and you find their journeys of love and loss so damn compelling? You just can’t. It feels like a crime and an intimate crime at that. On one hand it is a good thing because Romance novels sell better than erotica. On the other hand wow now I have to write more…but I was going to write a series now everything is just longer and that gives you more time to fall in love with these characters as I have.
Have you ever had a story or blog or article exceed your expectations or original intentions? Is it a boon or a burden?
In the depths of the old wood, where the trees dripped tears over the toppled stones from the mountain, Mal sat beneath the willows, clutching the totem in her hand. It’s word ivory etchings still held the shape of a Field Spring dog. Her father said it held the power of the old ancestors, but she sensed no faint hum through her skin nor the pull upon her spirit. All that reached out to her was the winter frost through the long arms of the trees. When did everything turn so cold? It seemed as though she’d been walking along the southern shore the day before. Asan, with his rugged good looks, swept her up and into the water as though they were children and not soldiers. The war seemed so long ago, but it’d been merely a year. If everything felt like it’d just happened did that mean Mal was getting old? She sighed and hoped not. Grey did not go with her sun blessed complexion. Grandma might have gone silver, which flattered her ebony skin, but Mal took after her father’s people. “Least of my worries.”she muttered, as a large wet drop splashed across her head, making her cringe.
A short time ago she’d been the source of much strife in the life of her lover, Asan. He defended her like a noble knight defending a fair maiden, though Mal had never been fair and Asan had helped her cease being a maiden long ago. Yet what plagued her was his defenses of her character and person. They were flattering and yet they seemed to inflame parts of her just as much as her attackers, her detractors. Asan’s spirit had been right until they revealed the truth. It ached and cut in such a silent way. In bandaging he just cut deeper, and how could she say why? Would it even be clear?
“I thought I’d find you here.” Asan’s voice, deep like the ocean and just as soothing, came from behind her, and she sighed.
“I needed to think.” She turned her head to see him trudging up the hill wrapped in thick a thick wolf pelt and carrying a dense green blanket. She must have been gone longer than she realized. She looked upward and the sun had just moved past the mountain peek. It’d been hours. Asan came and sat beside her on the stone and wrapped the blanket around her shoulders. A slow smile crossed her face and she remembered all the reasons she loved him. For his parent’s and sibling’s sakes she wished she did not. “How are things at the house?”
Asan’s shoulders tensed ever so slightly before falling, and then with all the irritation and disappointment a son could have when his parents disapproved he sighed.
“My mother calmed father and Bretlynn down. Rynhold is…civil, but displeased.”
“I got that from the yelling.” She managed a small smile, but it felt more painful than humorous. Judging by how he rubbed his knees and he hung his head in shame it looked as painful too.
“I’m sorry you had to deal with their horrid behavior. I had told them of you, but…I didn’t expect-”
“They assumed it’d be less part of me, but my magic is as part of me as my hair, my eyes, or my voice. But I think…I think they expected to talk you out of…of us.” The words hurt as she spoke them, and part of her felt foolish for it. She’d been a mage her whole life. Sequestered, belittled, threatened with things that no person should have to suffer. The rejection by Asan’s family wasn’t even the worst of her life’s horrors. Ha. They should have taken lessons, but their scornful eyes spoke of beliefs more seated than prejudice. Those eyes ,so like Asan’s in their almost golden beauty, told her their beliefs were faith. They’d never see it for what it was. They’d never admit their irrational consternation for her daring to exist. People like them never did.
“And I love every part of you!” He misunderstood. She never doubted that for a second though she had plenty of reason to. He was vigilante of those who could move energies beyond their world, but he’d long outgrown their fear. However, did that truly make enough of a difference? Did he truly ever understand? They’d come here to announce their engagement and he had never expect his family’s ire.
“I believe you…but could they?” she said. He looked taken aback, as though he didn’t expect her to be so blunt. She felt so tired, but what else could she do but make him see things as they truly were. “You were raised by those who fear magic and who see me as cursed-”
“I don’t care that you’re a mage.”
“And that’s the problem!” She jumped to her feet, nearly slipping on the rocks. He started forward, grabbing her arm so she would not bash her head in on a rock. She stepped down to the ground and turned to him. “You love me, but do you see me?”
“Of course, how can you doubt that?” Asan sounded so hurt and it stung her to hear it, but she had to be honest.
“I ask because they can’t and perhaps you couldn’t, or wouldn’t, see them.” Mal began rubbing the back of her hand nervously. Her heart thudded against a cage of anxiety that began to creep up her throat, and squeeze in on her vocal cords. “How could you not know they’d act this way?”
“I-I…thought they’d be better.”
“Better how?”
“That they’d see you, as I do once they got to know you.” His fingers slid down to her hand, squeezing gently. Mal almost pitied him for his naivety, but that feeling only heralded a wave of slow burning irritation. She rubbed the bridge of her nose and took a slow breath to steady her nerves.
“I am a mage. A witch. An arcane warrior.” Her eyes fell upon his face, and all part of her yearned to do was study his olive skin and run her fingers and lips across his stubble. Not for lust or love, but to pretend the world didn’t matter and none of this mattered. But it did. It made all the difference to their future. “Do you not see that?”
“Of course I do,” he said.
“A-and you love me in spite of it?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said. Asan looked so confused and Mal could tell he knew she had a point.
“But here is the trouble I need you to love me , not in spite of, but in part because my magic is what makes me…me.” Mal slipped her hand from his grasp, and with it she felt herself slip further away from him. They were boats out at see and the ropes that bound them together were slipping, the knots couldn’t hold, and soon? If they were not careful they’d vanish in the fog and hold nothing but parts of a rope of old bittersweet memories. She didn’t want that. She didn’t want to lose him, but she’d be damned if she did her and him and his family a disservice by ignoring it. Perhaps selfishly, she’d rather break his heart than pretend that this didn’t bother her or did not matter. “You must love me fully or not at all in this case. You need not love magic, but you must love the magic that is in me, what I can do with it, and appreciate the joy I take in it. There are things couples can look past, but somethings must be loved to and not in spite of. If I loved you in-spite of your faith in the All-Father and could not find any respect or beauty for it, what would you say?”
“I..I do not know. I would have to think on everything.” Asan spoke softly and slowly. In his eyes wheels turned, as the thoughts and words connected to find meaning. He wasn’t a slow man by any means. She’d seen him put fools in their place with perfect words, so sharp they might as well have been a sword. But he had this habit of ignoring that which hurt to acknowledge, or bounding around the issues to avoid confronting what life demanded. If only she could be the same. But then again she would not be herself.
“and for you to understand what my magic means and to see what my magic means you must see me as a person, a woman, and a mage. You can’t section off the parts of me you like all the time. Everyone does it. We ignore our lover’s favorite books, or distaste for foods we love. But there are parts of us so important to our lives and who we are we must take a stand.”
“But what does it matter? How do you know the difference?”
“The difference is your family greeting me as your temporary lay versus your future wife.” Cold. Curt. and made them sound so unfavorable. She didn’t like to be that way usually, but it felt somewhat good.
“That’s unfair!” he said.
“But is it wrong?” To that she received only a heavy silence, pregnant with fears he didn’t want her to speak and words she feared she’d have to say.
“No.” His eyes fell to her feet. “Shit.”
“I say all this because for you to bring me here, to be hurt, by them…for you to be so ignorant of their prejudice-” he voice began tremble, and her throat grew tighter, hotter. She felt the threat of tears as images of the evenings arguments blurred in her head. They wished them the worst. They called her everything but a monster. Oh they thought her nice, but her magic damned her more than rudeness ever could. “How could you not think about that, or at least warn me of it, unless you were pretending not to see?”
And to that Asan had no answer. To that his mouth hung open as he tried to bring forth excuses, justifications, and rationales. Yet Asan could not lie through logic, through truths presented by someone he so dearly loved, and his spirit crumpled. Many would call her over sensitive, would say it shouldn’t matter, would say she made a mountain out of a mole hill. Asan had always acted better than that. He did not disappoint. If he did maybe it would have been easier.
“But what does your magic matter? What does that have to do with you as a person, as a woman, as my wife?”
Mal let out a dry chuckle, and folded her arms in front of her chest with a roll of her eyes. He still did not want to get it.
“Magic informs who I am. I am a woman mage. I like being able to cast spells, I research magical artifacts, I grew up cloistered in a mage sanctuary. Magic is and always will be a part of my life and a part of my life that defines part of my core identity. If we have children they could be mages. Their mother will be a mage.”
“I know that! Don’t think I’m a fool,” Asan said.
Mal sighed, letting her arms fall to her side. She wanted to just run off to some warm quiet corner, and sleep.
“No child should be told in ways big or small that “Your mother is very lovely except…” “Your father is wonderful but only….” I will not have it be so. I’d sooner raise children on my own than have that be so. ” Now, the tears began to fall down her cheeks. A sob racked her chest and the suddenness of it shocked her. She turned away, wiping her tears so he could not see. Crying in front of people wasn’t something she did. From the corner of her eye she saw his shadow move and he stepped behind her. He let her cry as he wrapped his arms around her, and maybe he had begun to understand. Maybe he had begun to see her pain. “It was minor to you. My magic was to be ignored, but I don’t want it ignored or even loved. I want it accepted.”
“I would never tell our children that,” he said, and she believed him.
“You don’t have to say “I hate something” to make it clear. Most people never use the words love or hate, but their words and actions otherwise do enough.” She sniffled, and swallowed, trying to collect herself once more. Another beleaguered silence weighed in, only broken by her sniffling. After what felt like an eternity of melancholy he pulled her tighter.
“I failed you because I didn’t want to believe they’d not understand. I wanted to believe they’d come to the same conclusions I did, but maybe even my own conclusions were short sighted.”
“You’ve never been with someone like me. It is to be expected, but… can it change?”
“I can’t change my family, but… I can try to talk to them and I can try to better accept you. Mal, you deserve everything in the world I can give. It isn’t much, but I’d rather be and do better than live a lesser life without you.”
A warmth slowly ran through her, causing the cage around her chest and throat to retreat. It’d take time until she felt free again, but the release brought relief enough for now. She trusted him, but now he knew her line in the sand. He had to see if he could change and she’d watch carefully.
“I’m going to talk to my father, and he shall either accept us or he shall be a lesser part of our lives…I’ll be sorry for it, but they need to know I won’t let it stand.”
“Don’t destroy your relationship with them, but…don’t expect me to let them walk over me again and discuss me like I’m five seconds from burning down the whole village.”
“Five seconds? I thought it was less than that.”
She let out a little laugh, watching the river flow on as a stray leaf landed on its surface. It bobbed along, twisting and turning with every flow and ebb.
“Oh yes, three seconds from massive destruction is more accurate. Especially on a day like today.”
It’d have to do for now when better people took a lot of work. No one changed in a day. Asan didn’t and she couldn’t expect that of others. Still she couldn’t be expected to let their lesser natures belittle her own. She was a good woman and an even better mage. They could either learn that or they could not. But for now she had Asan and for now she’d try to be happy and push through the bad for some good.
***So definitely inspired by the video game Dragon Age: Inquisition, and the relationship between Commander Cullen and a mage Inquisitor.***
At this point in my career I have been building an audience for my novels and blog, and I am so lucky and thankful that all of you bother to read my work. But one thing you’ll know if you’ve been a reader since the start is that I never pretend my passion isn’t also a business. I love to write. I love naughty bits. So I write about people’s naughty bits meeting and doing naughty things. It seemed rather sensible since I’ve written erotica from the time I understood the sex act. Erotica is a genre that can be lucrative and disappointing without any rhyme or reason. You can find hundreds of articles and books on writing ebooks in the genre with conflicting and contrasting experiences. The variables of success are endless, but for 2017(wow that feels weird) we can prepare ourselves for the best approaches to consistently publish erotica and make some money from erotica. So let me help you by discussing my observations and experiences thus far.
Most people who get into writing in any genre make it a black and white issue as to whether you’re in it for business or in it for passion. Well, why not both? Money ins’t the end all be all and passion doesn’t put food on the table. In my view a healthy about of pragmatic thinking is the difference between well known authors and authors with regular sales versus unknown authors and authors with low sales. I missed the big erotica booms of 2012 and 2013, but I will say you can make sales if you’re crafty, smart, and figure out your strength.
Now first let me cover a few things you need to know before thinking about writing erotica…
One of the biggest complaints from people is that so many authors pop up and out after two months. People read these insane articles about authors who quit their jobs and made 20k and more in a few months off one or two books, so they assume it is easy work to make even a fraction of that. They hear the bare bones and decide to become an erotica author to make some cash because it doesn’t seem hard. Partially this is because they assume erotica isn’t “real writing”. But all writing is writing. I personally find article and essay writing (with research included) to be so much easier than erotica. I’ve done both for money and it is night and day with how easy article writing is in comparison to figuring out what is and is not a sexy description. This isn’t an easy or simple field to jump into anymore, if it ever really was. Free sites are your competition, name brand authors are your competition, and putting out consistent stories is what keeps you afloat financially.
Further hundreds of other people probably read those same articles at the exact same time , and got the same idea. The market is fucking flooded and it really is a shame because your books might get buried beneath a thousand stories. Buried beneath a thousand throbbing rods with not escape, so to speak. From my research and conversations, roughly 70% of users tapered off after a month and a half of low sales on the erotica forums. This is constant. A bunch of people come. A bunch of people don’t see that it is work, and they bury those that do, but then vanish. Writing erotica becomes a funny story for buzzfeed or slate, or coffee after dinner. When books don’t sell all those forums, facebook groups, and reddits end up full of inactive users. Amazon, smashwords, nook, and others end up flooded with generally sub-par stories. Meanwhile the authors have tossed up their hands because they didn’t make a thousand dollars in the first month. These are the writers who don’t enjoy the genre, but even those of us who love it can get bruised.
I nearly became one of those fly-by-night authors because I burnt myself out, got discouraged, and then sat on my stories for a few weeks. I expected to make $10 in the first two weeks. It took two months. The sales have no pattern other than they sell about the same rate. So how did I get back into it if I was selling so slowly and so little? I realized the stories you hear about are the exceptional ones, and that if I kept going I could make some nice pocket change for myself. The only people who really fail are the ones who got in over their head and assumed they could bulldoze through the erotica market. The people who stick with it, and built an audience of bother fellow writers and readers are the ones who have long term success. Whether they sell a few hundred books or several thousand they kept writing, kept improving their writing, and they acknowledge writing sexual material takes a ton of hard work. Even those who have failed have said to me “This shit is harder than I thought” once they realized they didn’t enjoy it after page one. You can’t do this half assed. You can’t do this for quick cash. Writing is one of the most difficult professions to be in because it is harder than it looks and it is hard because you can’t just write and be assured success. It ain’t easy.
However, if you reorient your approach and intent writing in this genre becomes easier. You have to approach this as a business and all business takes an extraordinary amount of work. That doesn’t mean it can’t be fun, but even someone who works in a sex shop has to take inventory, be familiar with most of the product, and be able to get people what they need when they come to the store. If you acknowledge this when you begin planning you stories, your persona, and your specialty then you will have a much easier go of it when things are rough.
You have to work at what you’re writing even if it is sex. Chuck Tingle isn’t famous on just laziness. Tingle’s works are parody built on word play, innuendo, and absurdity. Not to mention he is as famous as he is because he was shocking and caught the right attention, but even with that his writing takes work. Crafting the story, building the characters, and molding them in ways that make people turn to the next page (Especially if your book is available on Kindle Unlimited) is key.
You will run out of words. You will run out of desire. You will want to take a break especially if you make this a full time job. I can turn out four short stories with basic editing in two weeks. If I push myself I could probably do six or eight stories, but that would require 8 hours of writing a day. Writing would not just be a career, but a job of taxing emotional and mental work. Marketing would be another eight hour job of more emotionally and mentally taxing work. I could do it, but the notion that you can easily do it without any stress, and then be guaranteed to make money is sorta flawed. I will tell you what a writer told me when I first got started, “Most authors I know don’t make consistent money until they have upwards of 30 books and stories on amazon”.
That’s a shit ton of writing for months or years on end. Some people really can turn out a dozen books in six months and a dozen short stories to boot. They are a lucky bunch. But you have to have a plan if you burn out. I took a break and focused on romantic stories instead alongside shorter more scene based works like Suffer Too Good and Dirty Honey.
Why? These stories are fun for me, but I’ll get back to this in a second.
I don’t expect to rent my first apartment with the money I make from my sales, but I do expect my sales to supplement my income enough where I do have an extra $30+ in my account. Not because I’m aiming low, but because I’m just starting out and while I have a ton of novels started I don’t have an editor and have to take time to edit myself. Further I’m just a realist. Some weeks I get sale after sale, my blog facilitates that. Some weeks that other authors say are hot look like chicken turds on my amazon report. Overall you have to realize that you may not be the next big thing, but you may have nice money to pocket regardless. I don’t know about you, but any money is good money.
So how do you get reasonable expectations?
Figure out what your books are worth. People, especially the fly by nighters, think if they just push a bunch of .99 cent stories of $2.99 stories they have guaranteed sales. Here’s the bloody truth, most people will think you’re writing is poop unless you’re doing short stories. What do you think of a book available for .99 cents without any special considerations? It isn’t a promotional event or presented like a freebie out of a larger collection of works. It just is .99 cents because it is. Most people want their money’s worth and a lot of erotica buyers are regular buyers, so while they want a good deal they want signs of quality. Look at the best sellers in your sub-genre and list the three most common prices for short stories, novellas, and novels. If you’re a new writer I’d suggest setting those common prices for a week or two then dropping price by a few cents or a dollar. That way you’re works are technically “on sale” which usually gets attention on distribute sites. I never sell anything over 5k words for below $3 because I put my heart and joy into my pieces no matter what genre they are.
You tell the world what you are worth, and you do it realistically. Don’t be arrogant and don’t try to be Walmart by underselling everyone else because then two things will happen: Other writers will get pissed off and you will have fewer allies(writers also read btw) and you will look bad to consumers. When you price accordingly you can form realistic expectations about how much you’ll make. I have several pen names for different genres of writing and I know exactly what I want to make with every book that is under every pen name.
Do you want to know what the base income I want is? $30 for every two books. Two times seven is 14. 14 books times $30 is $420 dollars. That is an extra $420 a year that I wouldn’t otherwise have. Now, I have high hopes, but let me bring back what my author friend said about authors needing 30 books to break the bank because it matters here. Chances are you have less than 10 buys per book, unless someone randomly picks it up and loves it enough to recommend. Unfortunately even if your book is good the saturated market may bury it. So your book is set at $4.30 with 70% royalty on Amazon which means you get $3.01 from every sale. You have to convince 10 people to buy your books every month. The biggest asset to getting those people is having reviews. Most people will not leave reviews on amazon. Some books do have 1k reviews, but I have searched through 89 pages of erotica and only found a handful. Of course, the more taboo you get the more likely you are to sell but the smaller your chance of reviews gets. It sounds easy but out of thousands of books it is hard. Some of your books won’t find an audience. Some won’t be to go on Amazon or may get taken down for being too “taboo”(because they arbitrarily decide what is, hence why people say the weekend team is a bunch of prudes). You have to have a game plan. A marketing strat. and a strength within that. I blog because I like it and because I realized all the BS about SEO and social media only works now if you have an audience previously. It’s true.
Two things change the game for every writer and chime in via the comments if you have opinions on this:
Before I say another word let me preface by saying a lot of people assume erotica authors have the same kinks as their characters or experiences….Stop. That’s just not the case. Plenty of “female authors” are men or gender queer people who know female names sell more. Plenty of vanilla women write the kinkiest of bdsm erotica about things they’d never try or talk about in real life except if it is about their books.
I told you I’d get back to this eventually, didn’t I? Here is a brutal truth…you have to have a positive understanding of your writing. I spoke on this previously and have a longer post about this in the works, but here’s the shorter version: Most people don’t make money on their erotica and burn out because they don’t have any positive feeling or understanding about what the hell they’re writing. They start writing about masochism, but can’t comprehend why their character likes it. They start writing about the sensuality of demonic lovers, but find the concept laughable. They make their lead fall for a billionaire, but find the whole idea contemptuous. While you don’t have to love everything you write, you are best served by trying to grasp it. If you don’t there is a very high likelihood the sort of fun or emotional nuisance your story’s sexuality will require will be non-existent.
The second one sounds like two no brainers, right? Most authors are readers and if you read more you get better. Common sense says seek out other authors. But let me tell you that so many people write, but then admit they never read. I’m not talking about the college students who temporarily lose a taste due to having to always read or people who take a bit of a break. These are people who will say to your face that “I’m a good writer, but I hate reading”. They want to master a craft without seeing anyone else work with it. They’re swordsmen who never watch people use a sword. They think they’re excellent writers and don’t need to read, but don’t see how they are missing a valuable resource into what readers like, potential inspiration, and what sells.
Not to mention they go onto those facebook pages, post a bunch of ads, and then think they’re going to get something from people.The only people that visit those pages are other authors selling shit, so the best you can do is also buy books. If you are an author or a blogger who doesn’t interact with other authors or bloggers then you’re not using your resources to the best of your abilities. Other authors will review, beta-read, edit, and promote other authors they’ve established a relationship with. If you never interact with people then you’ve limited you resources and your audience. Seek out writing communities, make a point to be active daily, make a point to offer to help out other writers, and don’t just ask for things in return. Give a little bit and you just might be surprised.
Being involved in communities is part of marketing and writing. Most people don’t do it meaningfully unless something is wrong. I like the website scribophile(thus far) because it requires you to interact by critiquing and reading others works. It forces me to so something I may not otherwise do outside of physical workshops. It exposes me to a wider range of individuals, or writers and books. If you seek out other people you broaden the people who may become your audience. In essence you can give yourself value and learn the value of others, which is all platform building is.
Hundreds of authors will sit there and tell you a thousand seemingly detailed, but ultimately vague notions about how they make a ton of money on selling erotic ebooks and how it is the easiest low involvement job in the world. But I’d rather be brutally honest and detailed so you get solid information and experience from someone who has done the research and is doing her damnedest to sell even when she’s terrible at marketing. Everything you heard about this being easy is wrong. Every story about an author breaking banks with their cash is an anomaly.
My word of warning is that if you think you will be able to pop up with a pen name throw together a story and then forget then you are sorely mistaken. Further don’t bother. I’m sorry to be cruel, and I admit this is even a touch self-serving, but there are a thousand dedicated authors who legitimately should be making more than they are who are buried because some rando thought they ‘d make hundreds in a month without having to do anything but put words on a page and press “publish”. If you are really serious about making a profit then you have to put in the work. If you want to get out a story a month, set a word length goal and write when you can. Have your partner watch the kids, stop playing your favorite video game every day after work, make a meal that lasts a few days for easy leftovers, and make time to write. This isn’t some get rich quick scheme and it is frustrating to see people act like my pursuit isn’t “real writing”, to see awesome authors vanish beneath a tidal wave of one time authors because a bunch of people read Suzy B. Buttholes account of making 30k at the end of 2016.
BUT you can bring in a relatively stable auxiliary income that can be the difference in the long term. If you write with an open mind to kinks you may not share, write with an open mind to the genre at large, recognize that all writing is hard, recognize that it will be difficult, and accept that it will demand a lot of you creativity then you are ready to start making extra income. It will take months or possibly even years, but it can happen.
Do this because you want to do it and your willing to figure out how this works. Don’t expect everyone to just go and buy it because you post ads. Don’t expect it to be easy. Don’t expect to make more than a few bucks a month until you have a catalog. Be sincere. Be honest. Be smart. Be friendly. Make money. The trick to making your erotica sell is knowing your strengths and playing to them alongside being willing to connect with people as more than a sales person. If you keep all this in mind as you pursue this weird world of words and sex then you’ll not only do fine, but you’ll do excellent. Just give it time.
Cliches aren’t an inherent problem. Shocker. I know. You’d never expect Rosie to say something like that, but it is true. Cliches are not an inherent problem in writing or life. The problem with cliches is twofold sincerity and whether or not they’re boring. A cliche fails when it feels insincere. Let’s put it another way your partner can say “You look great”, but you’ll usually be able to tell when they are really serious or just spouting platitudes. Why? Because there is a difference in tone. Whether your reading a book or a blog you can tell the difference between someone writing passionately and with more than a passing interest to get a concept out.
I say this because I think there are a lot of writers who like the idea of writing and the concept of telling a story, but who don’t want to dig into what they’re writing enough to make it feel authentic. You pick up a book or read someone’s story page and your met with an obvious love of the concept of a character or a relationship, but the writer hasn’t made the story worth your while. They love the idea of this handsome young lad sweeping this girl off her feet…but there is actually no relationship between them except for the writer telling you so. They never have serious conversations or bond beyond steamy scenes, and even if your’re left with a bit of enjoyment you can’t quite believe in their relationship.
Plenty of blogs and stories that I started have not been finished for that very reason. They’re concepts with no depth, and that’s how you fall into the cliche. You don’t sound sincere even if you sincerely want to tell your story. D.D Griggs and I talked about this the other day. Whether you are writing non-fiction or fiction there are cliches and themes. She writes self-help books, and 70% of them are similar or have similar themes that are cliches we can all spout to a certain degree. Writers like her put those cliches into a context and a way of living that is incredibly important, but we’re all familiar with self-help stereotypes of conferences, yogis, and hippies. Most people can tell you one common philosophy in self-help, but neither of those things are inherently bad. What makes a self-help book succeed or fail is a matter of someone liking the author’s style, but more so it is a matter of whether that author is speaking from a place of sincerity and belief. That’s what keeps those cliches from being a problem.
When cliches become a problem is when they’re boring and don’t feel genuine. A blogger talking about “the power of positivism” and working out won’t grab your interest if they are just issuing copy-pasted ideas to their audience. If they don’t let you in to who they are you don’t feel like you can trust them because all you see is surface cliches. The same thing happens in fiction. If you have a book about a werewolf romance that is just paint by numbers it may make money…but it won’t make you an audience for the next book. It won’t get you the sort of repeat readers you want because the readers can tell you aren’t in it and you’re not giving them anything interesting. By that same token, someone else can write the exact same plot (and people do this and do it well) but they make the characters more sincere and write with more passion. They try to keep the story interesting and their readers see that. In blogging and ebook writing I see a lot of people just regurgitating what they think will get them blog follows or downloads, and then I go to forums of people upset and complaining about not getting sales. Well, you aren’t giving a unique product. You give something that is pain by numbers…and so have hundreds of thousands of others, which has hurt the market in many ways all on its own. These writers just don’t see how the cliches aren’t what hurts or helps a story or blog or what have you. It is a matter of how something is written and the tone that allows readers to connect.
Cliches can be powerful tools not only when you subvert them, but when you embrace them with the intention of making them interesting and bringing somethign new to the table with all the sincerity you can muster. This not only applies to the page or screen, but to how you talk to people as well. I hope you keep that in mind when writing holiday cards this season or are getting ready for New Years.
Until next time…
The first time I wrote a story with a sex scene I was 14. It was a Full Metal Alchemist fan fiction. The first time I wrote an original piece worth a damn was at age 15. The story concerned a young unnamed woman who encounters a shape shifting wolf(original I know). The wolf isn’t some bad boy though. He’s a teenager like her, but full of cheer and hope for a better world. One moonlit night the unnamed girl kissed him and shy fumbling led to more. Now as I begin my journey as an erotica writer I’ve been forced to ask a question: is it wrong or uncomfortable for my readers if I revisit those ideas and give them a more evolved form? Is it wrong to plumb my brain for dirty fantasies I drooled over as a minor? Is it wrong to take old stories from my books and USBs and rewrite them as something new? It may seem like a stupid question, but as young people gain access to more technology and we engage in discussions over technology, sex, consent, and inevitably morality we have to begin figuring out these often arbitrary lines of legality and morality.
My natural instinct with creative works is that they are fictional and though they do impact our society we can’t and should not treat thoughts as crimes. So long as no one is hurt then regardless of our disgust no one should be penalized legally for fictional content creation…though they can be penalized socially. My litmus test has always been “Is anyone being hurt by this?” and I mean that both directly and indirectly. And take notes here because that question is going to become particularly important as we advance virtual reality and robotic technology (we often talk about robots used for sex, but a debate will be around animal like or childlike robots made for that purpose. This will soon be our reality.). Access to stories, platforms like amazon, and access to the materials necessary to create stories/comics/games/movies/etc. are already complicating our reality. Back in 2014 I remember reading a story about a man returning from Japan who was arrested on child pornography charges because of comics specifically manga as well as this. The characters were written as being the age of majority, but they said it didn’t matter because they saw what they saw on the page/screen. And I get why people reacted this way because they saw what they saw. I have no doubts that some characters are written younger despite their given ages which can be gross and uncomfortable to say the least. I have no clue what sort of manga or comics that the people prosecuted had, and I don’t know how young or realistic the characters drawn were, so it may have really been a case of “I know it when I see it” and even though that’d make me more comfortable part of me hesitates because it’d still be fiction. But I’d still be more comfortable.
But the weird part is basically the choice to prosecute these individuals penalizes artists for their style but more than that it brings up a whole lot of questions. To me this asserts if a person has a young face, or more dramatically has a youthful body and you date them you could be subject to being called a pedo. A lot of people say it is a matter of using common sense to decide what is and is not ok, but it isn’t. I wish it was that simple to separate the wheat from the grosso chaff but it isn’t.
Despite all the fan service I loved the animes pictured above…now let me tell you a secret. They are both animated versions of The Dirty Pair. One is the original show from the 1980s and the one on the right is from the fan service laden ugly 1990s reboot. The exact same characters are depicted, but the artists had very different interpretations, styles, and quite frankly most people probably wouldn’t think they were the same characters or the same ages(mid twenties). The reboot had them less mature and more cartoonish in personality, so is that enough to penalize it? I’d guess not, but still it might be. Whether right or wrong it can lead to sticky situations. But plenty of people risk arrest for creating characters who are drawn or written in a certain style. It’s arbitrary decision making based on some random person(s) comfort level, and in the case of fiction…depending on the style of the artist the only difference between a child and an adult is height and eye size…and that’s not always the case.
I point out the difficulty of this scenario because it is something we’re dealing with now that affects creators both in business and in figuring out how people see their work. The comics/manga examples are far more clean cut than me revisiting stories from my teenage years, and yet they are fraught with ethical, moral, and social questions. Do we assume that any character in a particular style is a child. In the picture about Hiei, the short black haired guy on the left, is the oldest of the core four characters if I remember correctly. He’s just short. Do we assume any character written a specific way is meant to be a kid? I think there’s a reasonable argument for that, but even then I have to admit it becomes “I’ll know it when I see it”. All of these issues of morality, technology, and creation come to the forefront of your mind as a writer, especially when you begin engaging with pieces, thoughts, and characters that have experiences with sexuality. As I said, I wrote sex as 14 year old, and though it wasn’t good…it was there depicting characters who were young and on adventures. And while their or my age was never fetishized…I cannot stop someone from sexualizing it. I can’t thought police people to not find it arousing that I was a young pervert even if I find it gross, but can people be penalized for reading those revamped old stories, fantasies, and thoughts?
But that’s complicated…and this next part is often something we don’t like to discuss but it is true.
Quite frankly, we can’t 100% know what exactly excites someone or what role they are taking in their fantasies. Research finds time and again that some fantasy aren’t of the one traditionally considered the victimizer. Not every sexual thought is going to be safe, sane, consensual, or even possible but people have them…and there is no way to stop people from sharing them. Further why shouldn’t people profit off of fiction so long as it doesn’t give people a step by step guide to illegality? There are arguments to be made, but even still we don’t know what other people think. It isn’t my place to assume your darkest taboo fantasies place you in the role of the victimizer/power-holder/etc. because there is literally no way to know that unless you told me, and even if I did know what does that have to do with you in the real world? If its just a fantasy, a fun story to read, a fun story to write…than who is anyone to decide that makes me immortal?
Yet I can’t ignore that a large part of society disagrees. What I consider “Playing thought police” is what others call setting standards, and while I disagree with many of those standards I can’t say it is wholesale wrong. Now, this isn’t a matter of people being able to critique and turn their noses up in disgust. It is a matter of wondering what is inappropriate, not in risk of being seen as illegal, and generally pragmatic. So long as a piece isn’t harming anyone then it is generally seen as fine. The problem is deciding when something “promotes” something negative. Hundreds of thousands of people would see my BDSM erotica ,like Suffer too Good or my latest Dirty Honey, and decide I’m promoting anything from insanity to sexism. And I was once told by a room fool of people that sexual submission is an extension of sexism, so this isn’t me over reacting to nothing. Take that and add to the fact that I do have stories I wrote years ago that I find hot, erotic, and would love to rewrite, and we have some difficult questions. I’m pulling stuff from myself, but from my teenage self. Is it wrong because I should ignore who I was or ignore young people having sexuality and only write new stuff? I was a teen, a kid, and I had some of the dirtiest fucking thoughts you can imagine (pun intended), so I wrote some intensely erotic smut that would work for my business now. To some people that can be a problem.
Do young people have a right to write erotica or smut? Is there an inherent problem with anyone, especially adults, reading and enjoying it? Is there something wrong with me writing old sex stories from my teenage years into something else? These seemingly ridiculous questions have to be asked at some point and people don’t because they think the answer is obvious or the subjects make them uncomfortable. But we have to be braver. We have to be honest.
Every writer I know has at least one story or article that they’re written and put aside. I have thousands of notebooks filled with unfinished stories with some great ideas, but they were written at a point in time when I could not do them justice or give them the time they needed. Full disclosure…The Original Story that Dirty Honey was based on was a story I began at some point between the ages of 16-19. Does that make you uncomfortable? If yes…why? Because now you know I had very aggressive sexual fantasies at a younger age? If I liked the story then and I liked the story now, so what does it matter? Does the story take on added dimension with that revelation? Perhaps yes, but does that make the story disgusting in some way? So far as I can see no. The fact is I am a sexual and romantic being. I’ve always been fascinated by sex, romance, and falling in love. What is the difference between me coming up with the story now or then? Nothing practical or logical justifies a reaction.
The aversion some may feel comes from this belief that young people shouldn’t be sexual even though we know they are, and that feeling isn’t logical…but conditioned and arbitrary. I debated over using old material,but ultimately I realized it’d be more criminal to not do so and pretend something drastic happened at 18 and I realized I had girl parts that could be fun and imagine these filthy things. But no one took the adult filter off my brain like all of a sudden the kids have left home and the adult channels no longer need an adult filter. Nah. I’ve been sexual for a long time and there is no reason I should act ashamed of that or not use valuable material because someone might be uncomfortable with realizing I’ve always been me. Life is too short and I am too poor to not look to the things I like and use them in profitable ways. Bottom line: that’s their hang up not mine.
Fanfiction.net, live journal, Gaiaonline, myspace, Xenga, IMVU, and ,hell, even Neopets were spaces where I found sexual young people who were writing flat out smut if not erotic romances. Anyone of any age could read them. Once upon a time I was one of those teens, and writing was so much happier than my reality. Writing those sexy, romantic, and angst filled stories helped me develop as a person. Getting feedback helped me develop as a writer. Some people would look at those places and see corruption. I have no doubt there are predators on those sites because there are predators everywhere, but that isn’t what this article is about. This article is about navigating artistic boundaries, and what I’m asking is does age negate the right to certain types of art, to profit from that art, and/or affect those creating it?
There’s a difference between sexualization and writing sex, which I believe in. However I acknowledge that it is difficult to navigate. I know a woman who published her first book at 17 to rave reviews, she sold the rights while maintaining royalties, and generally could stand to make millions from that still popular book. As I began writing Dirty Honey, I found myself thinking what if that author had written a sex scene in her book? What if there is a book written by a brilliant 16 year old who is able to write with the sort of maturity and care that most adults can’t even do, but they’re story has been hurt by sex?
While plenty of YA books contain elements of groping or “fades to black” or references to candles burning all night…what happens when 15 year old Rosie D. writes sex that is inherently different from 20 something year old Rosie D. ? Content wise I’m a better writer and I write better stories. There is no moral imperative here. Nothing changes, and yet so often we use age to determine what is appropriate not because it works, but because why not. We have to do something to protect those who aren’t mentally matured enough for the sexual world, but even the more tangible aspects of sex and age and consent still have muddied waters. A number of gay kids have been charged with statutory rape because they turned 18 and their current or former girlfriend or boyfriend was a pinch younger with parents who blamed the now-18 year old for “making their kid” gay and forcing them to acknowledge their kids as sexual/romantic beings. It is an unfortunate reality that the laws just can’t cope with, and I don’t know if they ever will be. So how do authors especially young authors navigate this moral mind field?
If a 15 year old was revealed to be a top selling erotica author how would the world react? Probably with calling the kid’s parents perverts, suggestions of child protective services, investigations of abuse, laughter, derision, suddenly rave reviews are redone to point out “childish” aspects of the writing they once praised. It has a sense, but it isn’t logical or reasonable. Yet people would feel dirty, but if that 15 year old held back that book and then published it five years later? Their reputation would be un-compromised and the readers would feel less upset and bothered. That 15 year old might be harassed as well, and perhaps sexually harassed by not only old perverts but classmates and others. But I don’t know how we would handle that. I don’t know how we would make peace with the fact that a 15 year old wrote a mature, sensual, erotic, and emotional sex scene that excited adults, teens, and anyone who got their hands on a copy. I do believe we’d struggle. So often we pretend young people are sexual or capable of sexual thought with any weight to them.
But if that kid waited five years…what would we do? Praise them, share their works, whisper about them in coffee shops, and then see them on Oprah’s Book Club. And then what would happen if that now-20 writer went on TV said “I wrote the story when I was 15. I fully edited it by the time I was 16, but didn’t get the courage to send it out until I was 19”? Once again people wouldn’t know what to think. They wouldn’t know what to say, or how to feel about reading sex by the author’s younger self, but I’d imagine they might excuse in five seconds if the author was charismatic enough. I hope that’s what will happen with my writing.
For me…I have lived a life as a teenage wasteland of sex, and now as a young adult obsessed with sex and candy and whips and things I find the best policy is to look at the piece as what it is before doing anything else before moving to where the piece came from and who wrote it. In erotica the best way to examine our works and to enjoy them is to just accept them and the creativity that birthed them then we can evaluate what they are, how they work, and if they really do promote dangerous ideas for someone to follow through on to hurt people/creatures.
Writing in the winter is always such a moody thing to do. It sounds odd, but for a moment imagine sitting by a window, and beyond the glass there is a bright grey overcast and a beautiful cold stillness. Every ounce in a while the wind blows reminding you the world isn’t a painting. Something happens in the winter. Something that makes a person connect to something from long ago. For some reason you can imagine someone in 1803 sitting with parchment and quill, and feeling the same as you. There is something timeless about the cold winter that inspires quiet reflection whether on your health journey or your emotional journey. Perhaps it is the knowledge that things are slowly dying, waiting to be reborn anew. Maybe it is a natural reaction to the cold, as we physically draw inward for warmth. I do not know, but I welcome it. Some people find it strange that I adore the winter, but there’s something wonderfully romantic about the cold dry air. Somehow it always inspires me to write and write in different new ways. In a way I am most at peace with my being an introvert during the snowy heart of winter. The stillness that radiates from house to house and tree to tree inspires me in a way that I am only now beginning to understand. The outside world sort of pulls out my inner struggles and thoughts over the past year and forces me to reevaluate. That is how I come to appreciate myself and my growth.
As the winter unfolds in my part of the world I wonder if you have any interesting feelings about winter? Do you think the seasons affect you as a person, blogger, and/or writer?
Bound By Rosie 