My new novel CHASTITY FLAME is available as part of the Breathless line. I wanted to share some of the words of praise she has already received.

The fabulous Dana Fredsti AKA Inara Levay gave me a stellar blurb for my forthcoming erotic thriller, Chastity Flame. Dana’s the author of Murder for Hire: The Peruvian Pigeon and (as Inara) Ripping the Bodice. Her work is filled with her singular sense of humour and lots of lively action. She writes:

"Step aside, 007, and make room for Chastity Flame. Ms. Flame outwits, out-spies and definitely out-sexes James Bond in this rollicking, witty and exceptionally well-written erotic spy thriller. If you’re a fan of British media, look for the in-jokes. If you’re not,
there’s more than enough humor, action and hot sex to satisfy any lover of romantic suspense!"

It helps a new writer to get pull quotes from better-known authors. I have been lucky to get a terrific one right off the bat for my thriller novel.  From the lethally charming Phil:

“Chastity Flame is my kind of woman — smart, savvy and always ready for a romp with the guy of her choice. I wish I’d created this character, but in C. Margery Kempe’s capable hands you won’t be disappointed. Erotic and witty, this is a page-turner.”

– Philip Nutman
multiple award-nominated author of WET WORK

Thanks Dana & Phil!

Tags: breathless | publication | writing | inspiration | Chastity Flame

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I love to read in that field, for both personal enjoyment and for inspiration. But I've discovered that *listening* to the right people talk about their true sexual experiences also provides a huge amount of both pleasure and motivation. I've been happily addicted to several erotic podcasts. One of them may soon be broadcasting some of my unpublished work; I'll let you know when that happens.

As partial payback for the inspiration I've received, I am pleased to endorse the following podcasts:

Sex Is Fun

Swingercast

Open Source Sex

Happy listening! But be warned: your ears - and mind - will soon be hooked!

Tags: erotica | nonfiction | podcasts | inspiration

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Tags: Modesty Blaise | spies | suspense | inspiration

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“Write every day.” That’s something many writers tell others who want to write. “It doesn’t matter if what you put down sucks,” they say, “put it down anyway. It’s the only way to become a writer! Write. Write. Write!” That’s good advice. So is this: “Don’t write.”

I quit my day job to become a full time writer in 1994. Jumping into the full time writing fray was thrilling, liberating, and scary. Writing full time continues to be thrilling, liberating, and scary.

All this time later I’m still writing full time. Erotica. Horror. Historicals. Most days I spend hours upon hour at the computer, creating fictional adventures. Some steamy and graphically sexual. Some scary. Some set in the past. Some set in contemporary times.
Good fun, hard work. I write – a lot. I want to. I have to.

“Yep,” other writers might say, “That’s what she has to do. That’s what she’s gotta do. Don’t let a day go by. Write something everyday!”

But you know what I’ve discovered in all this time? Sometimes that old well runs low. And you have to fill it back up or you start scraping the bottom. What you come up with is thick mud and worm poop. You have to turn off the computer or lay aside the pen.

I took a vacation a couple weeks ago. Went to the beach with Mitch for five days. Stayed in an inexpensive motel on the oceanfront, one that was all the more inexpensive because it was off season. Ninth floor. Nonsmoking room. Balcony overlooking a pier and the great gray sea. I didn’t take a laptop. I didn’t take a legal pad, though I was going to. I was tempted, Lord don’cha know it. Instead, I just sucked up the vacation. I stood on the balcony to breathe in the frosty, salt-laced February air. I watched the people below on the boardwalk, pier, and sand, braving the chill in their coats and gloves, throwing sticks to dogs who leapt into the foamy waves to retrieve them. At daybreak I watched the orange slice of sun on the horizon, followed by several old men on the sand, waving their “treasure hunters” back and forth, looking for quarters and other valuable finds. One afternoon I watched a group of retarded people on a day’s trip with their counselor, sitting on boardwalk benches in matching wool caps, dutifully eating the sandwiches that had been brought in a wheeled cooler. I saw lovers buried deep against each other and against the wind, wandering past, unaware of the beauty around them, absorbed in the beauty that was their intimate connection. I observed the waves at high tide. The waves at low tide. The “Sand-Boni” leveling the sand soon after sunrise. Laughing gulls diving for leftovers. Herring gulls looking pissed and bored. Little sand pipers running around and just being cute. Pelicans in the sky. Dolphins embroidering the surface of the water.

Mitch and I also did our share of wandering. I took off my shoes and socks and rolled up my jeans to test the winter waves. We meandered through the closed-for-the-season amusement park, studying the graffiti, the old newspapers blown against wire fences, the boarded up concession stands. I stared up in horrified fascination (I have a major fear of heights)) at the “Skyscraper,” a 165-feet high, 65-mile an hour Ferris Wheel-type thing that seemed content to be left alone for the time being. Bought cool, kitchy souvenirs made of shells and glue at one of the few gift shops open. Then, I challenged one of my fears and climbed the wrought-iron spiral staircase to the top of the 200-year-old Old Cape Henry Lighthouse. For five days I watched, I touched, I smelled (yeah, okay, shut up), I tasted, and I listened. I took it all in. And I didn’t write a damned thing.

Now I’m home. My mind’s well is full again. I’m ready to get back to work. Not writing for those five days was inspiring and enjoyable. And I’ll attack my writing once again with inspiration and enjoyment.

If you are a writer or aspire to be one, write, write, write! But also, don’t forget to shut down the computer some times. Spend a day in a park or an afternoon in a bookstore. Do some gardening, go wandering, sit in a coffee shop and experience the world beyond the screen. Don’t tell yourself, “Okay, I’m here to get inspired for a story, a novel and I better come back with some ideas.” Remove yourself from urgency. Just be there. Just suck it in. Relax. Don’t fear a little time to let the well refill, for it will. And when it does, drink deeply. (But spit out any residual worm poop.)

Love,

Morgan

Tags: writing | relaxing | erotica | historical fiction | horror | vacation | advice | inspiration | rejuvenation

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I just finished a novel (a sexy espionage thriller) and experienced once more the incredible relief and joy that typing the very last words of a book brings.  There's such satisfaction in finally reaching that point after the long haul of chapters.  This was a relatively short process, about two months (some novels have taken me years), so the beginning was still fresh enough in my mind to feel a genuine sense of wonder that I had reached the end.

It's satisfying to have created something out of nothing.  That's the magic of writing.  

I find it especially gratifying when it's on the scale of a novel.  You're conscious of juggling narrative threads, characters and locations with manic energy throughout, so when you can finally set them all down neatly in a row, the sense of accomplishment is worth savouring—and celebrating.

But then comes the inevitable sadness; with luck, you get to enjoy the happiness for a while before you realise that the people with whom you've spent so much time have gone away.  You miss them.  They've been talking in your head for so long and now the voices are silent.  Fortunately, I will in all likelihood be seeing many of these characters again.

However, the only real solution is to find yourself typing those other words that have as much thrill as "The End"—those words, of course, are "Chapter One" or any other start up phrases. Think of the thrill inherent in the phrase "Once upon a time".

Begin again—writing is an endless cycle.  Stories only end so new ones can begin.  The magic is always waiting to be reborn.

 Make some magic today.

Tags: inspiration | composing | writing | magic | suspense | characters

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Tags: laughter | Peter Cook | humour | comedy | inspiration

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Tags: love | inspiration | medieval | Middle Ages | courtly romance

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It's a weary truism that it remains taboo for women to talk publicly about what turns them on. Another of the contributors, Joan Smith, says she has been fielding scandalised callers demanding to know why a feminist such as herself would even countenance writing erotica. For all the jocular gloss, the media's imperative to identify Lette's writers carries an unpleasant undercurrent of the scarlet letter.

“So many cultures have quite strict codes governing female sexuality,” she said. “If that sexuality is relatively passive, then why so many rules to control it? Why is it so frightening?” There was the implication, in her words, that she might never illuminate her subject because she could not even see it, that the data she and her colleagues collect might be deceptive, might represent only the creations of culture, and that her interpretations might be leading away from underlying truth. There was the intimation that, at its core, women’s sexuality might not be passive at all. There was the chance that the long history of fear might have buried the nature of women’s lust too deeply to unearth, to view.

Tags: desire | writing | inspiration | erotica | sexuality

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What if?  I used to dread those words.  I used to work with Jerry, an executive producer at a small (okay, minuscule) production company and those of us who did any writing for him knew that no good would come of any of this man's ideas, especially those prefaced with 'What if....' Of course, most of his 'what ifs' were along the lines of "What if...the galactic warriors have to pretend to be strippers on this alien planet?"  Or "What if...these women end up in a bar in the middle of a wet t-shirt contest and have to pretend to be contestants?" or "What if the only way these vampires can be killed is by a werewolf with a magic sword? and the werewolf is a stripper?"  Jerry was obsessed with strippers, big boobs (the kind that stood at attention even when their owner lay down), and bizarre plot devices that had no place in a movie not destined for straight-to-video release and a good shot at winning a Golden Turkey Award.  You learned to pick your battles and include at least one scene shot in a strip club, even if it was the medieval equivalent of a titty bar.  It was the way of things.  

But oh, did I learn to hate those two words.  'What if?'  

Then, a few months ago I had to come up with a story for Ravenous Rendezvous.  I’d been working on a novel based on a famous succubus and, while this particular plot line didn't lend itself to erotica, I found myself thinking those dreaded words:  What if...? What if a woman who has succubus in her family tree (sort of like a recessive gene) and can't have sex without draining her men dry (pun sort of intended) of life essence meets a man with incubus in HIS gene pool, with much the same problem?  And if they had sex...who would feed off of whom?  And what if the part-succubus worked in a STRIP club?  

Damn you, Jerry.  See what you did to me?  

So I wrote Succubusted and was pleased as anything when it ended up as the story of the day on December 1st, Ravenous's official launch date.  It stayed in the Top 10 for a while too, which made me very happy indeed.  So thank you to everyone who read it!   I got my first official review from the Romance Bureau of Investigation (if you haven't been to their site, check them out – their premise and review style is a hoot and I absolutely love them) and it was positive!  

Lesson learned?  The words 'what if' are not necessary bad unto themselves.  They can used for good instead of evil.  But if they're uttered by a semi-insane executive producer with a fixation for women with faux boobs and a predilection for pole dancing, not to mention character hooks like "What if...one of the characters is obsessed with vitamins?"

Run away.  Very quickly.  

Tags: succubus | succubusted | bad movies | inspiration | romance bureau of investigation

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It's Virginia Woolf's birthday today.  You may tend to think of the resigned suicide portrayed in The Hours, but she was an innovative writer with a good sense of humour and an ambition to write the kind of stories that fired her imagination.

While troubled and struggling for much of her life, Woolf survived longer than she might have done because she had a community of other writers and creators who gave her inspiration and support.  Without that safety net, Woolf probably would have given in to despair even sooner.  She was able to complete a number of fascinating and ground-breaking works before she took that final walk to the river.

Woolf wrote, "Some people go to priests; others to poetry; I to my friends."

Woolf reminds me of the importance of community for writers.  Our work is solitary.  It requires a lot of hours simply putting pen to paper or fingers to keyboard.  While you can do that anywhere—in your office or out in a coffee shop—the process is one that requires spending much of your day inside your own head where the movies unfurl and you try to capture every nuance (or where you kick the projector to get it running again).

That's why you need that community—people who understand that need for solitude, the difficulty of the process and the hunger to fill your head.  One of the best things about Ravenous Romance is that it has brought together a whole new community of writers.  There's a broad range here, from old hands who've been writing erotica for years, to people new to the genre and even folks who are publishing for the first time (yay you!).

Without fail, the other writers here have been supportive, cheerleading and generous with their knowledge and experience.  Just look at the blog entries here, where folks offer advice, tips and insight into the writing process.  Experienced writers model the way to promote their works without being overbearing, while new writers get to share their excitement and pleasure to a wider audience. I have new friends here, on Facebook, on Twitter and the ripples widen.

In other situations, I have seen writers overwhelmed by envy and so competitive as to grudge the least bit of success to others. There's none of that here.  We all know that the success of Ravenous Romance is a tide that raises all boats.  We spread the word not just to promote our own projects, but all our friends here, too.  We're an eclectic bunch and we have a publisher who celebrates it. How great is that?

Tags: community | classics | Virginia Woolf | inspiration | writing

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Tags: music | inspiration | writing | Etta James | Tori Amos | Lucinda Williams

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Tags: writing | inspiration | Anaïs Nin | erotic classics

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Where do I find my ideas? Everywhere!

I jump off on tangents, one after the other.

Just there, up above, I accidentally typed "w-e-r-e" instead of "w-h-e-r-e" in everywhere. (Of course I went back and fixed it.)

But my first thought wasn't were, as in was, past tense, we were, I was, but were, as in were-wolf, were-bear.

Pronounced "where". I guess that's why I typed it originally.

You might be wondering what this has to do with finding ideas.

So, the tangent hopping had me visualizing hopping from log, to log, to log.

Where might such a thing happen? Where are there logs? Who would be hopping from log to log? (Besides a frog...)

Perhaps a contest for the strongest, most agile, muscular man in a female dominated society.... Where women rule and men are just physical labor....

But what if a ruler in this land falls in love with a man, a were-man, who is really something else when he isn't with her?

What could he be?

What if she values his counsel, and actually heeded his advice, but she would be publicly hanged if found out?

But she cannot possibly give up his touch. His caresses. His tongue lashings.

Who would have such a tongue?

Perhaps a snake; a pronged tongue to lick her most sensitive places. And who wouldn't listen to counsel when being lavished this way?

Perhaps he is a spy to win back man's place in society.... To put women back in bondage... What if she is the lynch-pin to the undoing of all woman-kind?

This is starting to sound like an erotic version of the Garden of Eden. I just need an apple. Loads of stories used apples, even Snow White...

All that from a typo. And I don't even think there's much there...

yet....

Hmmmm. Typo.

Type O. I'm type O. I wonder if that would be the Cristal among vampires?

Excuse me, I have some tangents to follow....

Please join me in my virtual imagination by leaving a comment, question, or thought.

Tags: ravenous romance | writing | inspiration | erotic romance | sex | writers | vampires | blood | ideas | apples | typo | virtual

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Tags: writing | inspiration | time management

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