I was very happy to read that Xcite Books are now able to offer free shipping worldwide for any of their print titles - so when The Business of Pleasure releases in September, there will be none of the irksome hanging around for non-existent worldwide release that dogged On Demand.
This offer is available on books purchased through Xcite's own website - if you don't want to wait until September, have a gander and see if there's anything you fancy from the variety on offer now. There's a mysterious portal into the erotic world of Xcite at the bottom of the sidebar. You'll find that the vast majority of tastes are catered for!
Completing a trio of erotic romance sales is my story in the forthcoming Mammoth Book of Hot Romance, edited by Maxim Jakubowski and due for publication in Spring 2011.
Coming Home is one of those stories you indulge yourself with - like a mug of hot chocolate with whipped cream in front of a log fire on a winter's night, it gave me a warm, rich sensation inside while I was writing it. I hope it will find favour with readers too - and if it doesn't, they have a treasure box of alternative stories to choose from.
While we're on the subject of erotic romance, I'm thrilled to announce that I will have a story in the brilliant Rachel Kramer Bussel's forthcoming anthology Passion: Erotic Romance for Women.
The book releases in November, and features a stunning line-up of writers - some established in erotic romance and others, like me, exploring the genre for the first time.
My story, Lingua Franca, features broken glass and all-night kissing. I hope it will strike a chord.
After my father died in January, I needed a writing outlet that was less ferocious than the full-on erotica I was pouring into The Business of Pleasure. I needed something with a little more give and flexibility - sex would still be involved, but perhaps not in every other scene. What came out on to the page at that time fell into the category of Erotic Romance (insofar as things really have categories - I do try to avoid them if I can).
Back in the days of writing for friends and internet amusement, most of my output was erotic romance in that it always featured a primary partnership and always ended happily. Much as I often want to write a downbeat ending, I find myself incapable of doing so, perhaps because I see so many around me in the real world. So erotic romance was comforting to write and took me back into a warm and nostalgic place - which was where I needed to be.
I didn't know how good any of it was, but I sent some away anyway, just to see if anyone would like it. And I am delighted and relieved to report that anyone did. Not just Anyone, in fact, but the wonderful editors at Total E-Bound, who accepted my short novella, Competitive Nature, for publication in November.
I've had such an overwhelmingly positive experience with them already that I'm hoping to work as much as I can with the lovely peeps over there. And I'm going to join the yahoo group as soon as I figure out how to change my embarrassing old yahoo identity! Yeah!
I could be wrong, but I think the late Falco's strange homage to Mozart constitutes the only UK number one record to be sung in German - which is a pity, because it's a damn fine language (except when you're trying to speak it under oral examination conditions, that is).
So I was mighty pleased to get a copy of a German translation of Black Lace's final anthology, The Affair, in the post. My story, Das Interwiew, looks really quite cool in German! And, inspired by Saskia Walker, who is celebrating her book Rampant's translation into Italian, I decided to have a bit of fun with online translation software.
Here, then, is how the opening paragraphs of my story are rendered from the excellent German translation back into English by babelfish:
'" If it is too late, I do not even become it into consideration. I radiated delay in my working life with enough; I also reject to face, in my Privatleben." My man is remarks is jähzornig comes prematurely, it is still only five minutes before three. Our candidate to be would know cuts of things a little well, but it is time enough, over parking lots A and crosses the gravel way up to the entry door before expiration of the term. I take my last chance, application threw a critical view on the photographies, although perhaps came with that, to ' critical' is not the mot juste. The man, the competition has himself struck to process to reach this last stage of the selective procedure is breath-taking to be regarded. A shot of its face in the half profile, do not catch the exact diagonal of its cheek bones, outlines of its rather wonderful nose and lightning Teufelei in its eyes reveal the anything to fuller lips disappoint except few that could be. But then, who wants perfection? My man, I assume, but it is its own animal at all.'
You'll have to trust me when I tell you that my own writing is slightly more polished than this. Or, if you need proof, the book is available on amazon ;).
As if evidence of good German taste were in any doubt, I should also tell you that they have picked up the wonderful Charlotte Stein's collection, The Things That Make Me Give In, for distribution in the Buchhandlungen of the country. Ja!
Looks like the Curse of Elyot struck again then. Not content with having the last ever Black Lace publication, it looks as if I'm in the last issue of Scarlet Magazine too. And that's not the half of it either.
Sad face.
But there will be happy faces too. I have returned from various travels to lots and lots of news. In fact, too much news for one post. So I'll endeavour to shake off my blog-slackness and post every day until I run out of self-promotional things to say. And after that, you never know, I might say something interesting.
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