Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Prick-Tease Muse

I think my muse might be a prick-tease. All of Saturday before me and she's off shopping/drinking/tormenting poor misguided souls. Come Sunday and just before I'm due to head off to cricket practise she's back with fiery inspiration.

Write this story now, now, now!

I know her lies. If I cry off practise, she'll be gone again within an hour and it'll be another afternoon lost to the great time-suck that is Civilization. I'm better off getting out in the sunshine and giving the little (cancerous malignant creators of filth) grey cells a good airing.

Looming deadlines are always odd for me. Sometimes they spur me on, other times I grind right down to a halt. Time for a project switch methinks to get the juices going again.

A prick-tease muse, hmm. Given the kind of stories I write, I really shouldn't be that surprised . . . :)

Friday, June 24, 2011

Harry Potter and the Future of Publishing

There have been rumblings about JK Rowling’s new online venture, Pottermore. This week those questions were answered. While Harry Potter fans will understandably be delighted by the new collaborative web site thingymajiggum, it’s the eBook side of things that’s of interest to those of us with a toe (nail) in publishing.

The Harry Potter series is one of the most lucrative franchises in the history of publishing. And JK Rowling holds the electronic rights…

Can you say million dollar diamond mine.

The publishing world has been thrown into a lot of turmoil with the rise of eBooks. Age-old ways of doing things are being ripped up. Authors are going it alone and grabbing a bigger slice of their own pie. The interesting question was always going to be how one of the most successful authors ever would bring their much-loved series to the digital market.

Well the answer is out and I suspect various high-level Amazon and B & N execs were choking on their coffee this morning. The Harry Potter books will come out online, but exclusively from the Pottermore site.

Ouch.

That’s really taking control of your work. Rowling didn’t cut out her publishers entirely, they’re still playing a role, but it sounds like she thinks she’s big enough to manage just fine without the services of the biggest bookseller in the world.

Interesting times indeed…

Monday, June 20, 2011

Plans and Schemes

The "Locked in with a Succubus" mini-serial is over, so now it's time to move onto pastures new. Here's my current todo list.
  • Write story for Literotica's Nude Day contest. This may involve weres. It may actually appear in this year's contest. Bearing in mind I originally intended Locked in with a Succubus as a Valentine's contest entrant it's probably safer to assume it'll appear next year.
  • Write story for an eXcessica anthology due out middle of next year. This has a hard deadline of July 17th. Time to start sweating...
  • Clean up Succubus Summoning 1o1 and get it ready for publication. My first novel, yay! I'll be adding a lot of extra scenes to develop Phil's character a bit.
  • Gather enough stories from my stockpile to put a 4th collection together in time to go out first half of 2012. A little hampered in that the current stockpile is a bit lacking in stock.
  • Complete Succubus Summoning 201. I suspect the only item in the list some of you care about. I kind of feel all GRRM about it as it's been clattered all over my schedule because I'm always behind with other things. Thankfully, I have most of the plot planned out in my head and it will be everything you hoped it would be :D.
  • Anthology collection #5 for Halloween 2012. (yeah, right. Dream on snail-pace writing boy!)
Of course, most of this won't actually appear until 2012, which is kind of in the way-too-far in the future category. What about the right here and right fucking now. Here's the 2011 run down.
  • There's the Literotica Nude Day contest story (assuming I finish it in time). You can also expect to see me mount equally fruitless challenges against the unstoppable juggernaut of HEA romance (with or without vampires) in:
  • Literotica Halloween contest. Because all my stories qualify.
  • Literotica Christmas contest. Because it's already written (naughty, naughty elves!).
  • A Summer Dance with a Succubus is in one of eXcessica's forthcoming anthologies. Oh dear, some readers are going to be in for a shock if they go on from that to my other stories. Oh well, everyone has to get a little Unretrofied now and again ;)
  • A Succubus for Halloween. Collection #3. Yum. Lots of new goodies including a brand new Nicole story. Be warned, it fits Halloween well. Horror-head is awfully hard to rein in for that time of the year. Halloween NĂ¿te is in there and it isn't even the most fucked-up, nastiest story.
I enjoyed writing the Locked in mini-serial, so I can see myself doing something similar around Halloween to promote the book. Not sure on what yet. Giving away stuff is fun, but I've got to keep some things back otherwise my writing career will be extremely short-lived ;)

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Locked in with a Succubus: The Inside View

Okay, so it looks like I need to run through an explanation after all. :)

Whether people got it or not depended on whether they'd already read my earler story: Delivery Special Soap. That's a fail on my part as I always intended the recurring characters and cheeky little references to enhance the stories for the readers who were familiar with my other works, but not be essential to the understanding of the story for the first time reader.

Here's a little peek from the other side to clear up any confusion:

Demons (and possibly other mythological beings) exist in that world, but they're rare and largely unknown. George doesn't know they exist. Inari, the mysterious woman he does some odd jobs for, does and she has a problem.

Virgins are extremely tasty delicacies to a succubus, especially the nice ones and even more so the older ones. As Nicole points out, George is quite the hot commodity in the succubus world. Inari knows it's only a matter of time before one of the nastier demons (Like Orchrhys in Delivery Special Soap) catches his scent and makes a snack out of his soul.

George hints at Inari's earlier attempts in Part 6, although he doesn't recognise them for what they are.

The problem is he's now too old and a little too tasty. (Hinted at twice. At the very beginning Nicole isn't going to let him into her house. He also mentions about the masseuse, Arisa, making an excuse and leaving. They're worried they're going to eat the poor guy!)

The wine is important as most of you probably guessed.

Mysterious label. No recognisable branding. Yeah, that's not wine. It's how George is able to have a lot of sex with Nicole and not meet the usual fate of most of my protagonists when they have a lot of sex with a succubus. It keeps his energy levels high enough so he doesn't die. (Hinted at again. Nicole recognises what it is. As soon as George shows her the bottle she changes her mind and lets him in)

Nicole picks up on George's slightly submissive tendencies, but gets it wrong with the first room - a classic dominatrix dungeon - she picks.

The second room is right and Nicole reveals her succubus nature. Because of the wine she can also be a little more sexually aggressive than normal.

Except it goes wrong and she loses control. Her behaviour should (I hope!) seem a lot different in Part 9 compared to other chapters.

George passes out and then wakes back up. What happened in the meantime? Another oblique hint. George notices smudges on her cheeks. Succubi can cry and Nicole was extremely upset a few moments before. She thought she'd killed him.

Of course, I'm not going to tell you this. Why spoil the fun when there's another three chapters of will-she-won't-she-kill-him to play with! :)

It's all from George's PoV, so he doesn't realise. Nicole, ever the sublime consort, slips straight back into her role as the teasing demoness. At this point George is in no danger. Nicole has already taken his virginity and gorged on his energy. The final pieces to explaining her behaviour drop into place in Part 12 when she tells George she knows what his secret fantasies are.

The explanation for it all is in the epilogue when Nicole tells Inari her "stink is all over him".

Yeah, if you haven't read Delivery Special Soap, you've got no chance with that one. In the world Nicole inhabits, it makes sense for demons not to tangle with each other over a single human when there are so many others to prey upon. Nicole has fulfilled Inari's request. She's taken George's virginity (so he's no longer a beacon of tasty snackness to other sex demons) and claimed him as 'her kill'. Which was Inari's aim right from the start. Whether the other demons hold up to that, well that's another story...

That's a bit of a booboo on my part. Oblique references to link the story with Arisa from the earlier story are one thing. It's an Easter Egg for the people that spot the reference. Making it vital to understanding the denouement . . . that's the kind of clever-cleverness that falls straight into stupid.

Oh well. That's the good part about putting stories up for free. It's easier to make the right corrections before they find their way into anthologies. :)

I hope that clears things up anyway.

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Locked in with a Succubus, part 13

Part 1. Part 2. Part 3. Part 4. Part 5. Part 6. Part 7. Part 8. Part 9. Part 10. Part 11. Part 12.

Epilogue


The demoness with horns, wings, tail and empty black eyes lounged on the great big black waterbed. She picked up a phone from the shelf behind her and dialled a number.

“It’s done,” she said.

She stretched in contentment.

“Yes, he was extremely enjoyable.”

Her face darkened.

“There was a . . . moment. It passed.”

A smile returned to her face. She looked at the human lying still on the bed. Her devil’s tail lifted up off the mattress and she used the tip to tickle the man’s nose.

“My stink is most definitely all over him. Your little virgin has been comprehensibly despoiled. That should keep the others away.”

She grinned as George’s nose twitched and he murmured. Still in his sleep, his arms flailed ineffectually at her teasing tail. He snorted and rolled over on the bed.

“Mmm, you don’t need him back right away, do you? I was thinking of keeping him for a little longer. One day, that’s all.”

Nicole heard the reply. Her smile widened, revealing the delicate points of two fangs.

“Oh good. Send over another bottle of that wine.”


THE END



Now, hopefully, if I’ve done my job correctly, that ending should make sense and, if you go back and read again from the start, you should find a lot of Nicole’s actions and words take on a whole extra meaning. If there are still questions, I’ll put up an explanation filling in the gaps from Nicole’s side next week sometime. (As a hint—this previous story might help).

I hope you enjoyed this little serial. If you liked it, please support my writing by buying my books. A brand new story featuring Nicole is in my third collection,
A Succubus for Halloween, coming out—appropriately enough—Halloween this year. I’ll put up more details nearer the time and maybe even find another little serial to run to promote it.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Non-Human Morality

When it comes to non-human characters I like them to be . . . well, not human. This means they probably have a set of attitudes, thought processes and values which are completely alien to us. Not everything, some stuff’s going to be the same, but enough for some of their actions and responses to surprise every now and again.

The Doctor from the BBC’s series Doctor Who is a classic example. Alien. Looks human. Big big heart(s). Saves the world multiple times. But every so often is a bit . . . weird. The current actor playing him, Matt Smith, has got that whole a-bit-too-weird-to-really-pass-for-human thing down perfectly. Tom Baker was also brilliant (although I suspect he might actually be an alien marooned down here on earth . . .)

That little spice of alienness is really important to me. I hate reading urban fiction with vampire or werewolf protagonists where the characters display a completely human array of emotions and reactions. If the author hadn’t told me the character had fangs, super-strength, was centuries old, whatever, I doubt I’d realise they weren’t human at all. Feels like a waste (Although I can’t argue with the success of that genre. Maybe my wrong is everybody else’s right! :) ).

I think this is why I might be so reluctant to write anything from one of my succubus’s point of view. It’s hard to avoid humanising a character and takes away a lot of their mystique.

Tuesday, June 07, 2011

Locked in with a Succubus, part 12

Part 1. Part 2. Part 3. Part 4. Part 5. Part 6. Part 7. Part 8. Part 9. Part 10. Part 11.

A day later than planned, but never mind.



“I lied,” she said.

George stared at her.

Nicole smiled. She traced a circle around his nipple with a coquettish nail. “I’m a demon, what did you expect?”

George deflated inside. She was never going to let him go.

“Aww, such a hurt look,” Nicole teased.

“It’s not fair,” he said.

Nicole laughed. “Oh come on. You’re thirty-four. You must know by now the world isn’t a fair place.”

She reached over and retrieved the bottle of wine from the shelf.

“It’s a pity,” she said. “If there were a few more like you, maybe it would be better.”

“Then I suppose you’re doing your job,” George said. “Servant of Satan and all that.”

He felt so stupid. He’d thrown everything into that last bout of sex. He felt so drained he didn’t even have the energy to lift his head from the mattress. He’d played right into her claws, again. She was a demon; of course she wasn’t going to keep her word. He was such an idiot.

Nicole looked at the wine bottle. Her eyes became a little distant. She smiled.

“Yes, I suppose I am,” she said.

She brought the bottle to George’s lips and he greedily gulped it down. It was so delicious. The wine settled in his stomach and emitted a warm glow. All of a sudden he didn’t feel quite so exhausted. What was in it—crack? His mouth even followed the bottle as she took it away. Don’t, she’d only make him beg for it next time.

If there was a next time.

Nicole shook the bottle with a frown on her face. There was barely a swallow left in the bottle.

“Oh well,” Nicole said. “All good things must come to an end.”

She poured the last dribbles between George’s parched lips and tossed the now empty bottle over the side of the bed.

“Mmm, I was saving this for last,” Nicole said.

She lay down on George and then rolled them both until she was lying on her back in the centre of the large, circular waterbed with him on top of her. The classic missionary position, although George didn’t feel like he had any control.

His erection didn’t get a chance to go down from his last bout of ejaculations either. The moist lips of Nicole’s vagina wrapped around the head and sucked his whole length down inside her. The soft walls of her sex pulsed and undulated around him. He was back to full hardness and trembling in a matter of moments.

Nicole’s legs wrapped around him. Her arms went around his neck. Her great black wings unfurled and then folded around his back like a latex cloak.

“This is nice,” Nicole said. “Relaxing.”

George felt weak, like a kitten, but pleasantly so. He slumped on top of Nicole, his chest resting on the soft pillows of her breasts. There was a pleasant tingling sensation wherever Nicole’s smooth skin came into contact with his. It had a strange draining effect that left him relaxed to the point of immobility. Every breath he took was filled with the sensual perfume of her body.

“You don’t have to do anything at all,” she sighed, her breath whispering through the hairs on the back of his neck.

The walls of her vagina bunched up around his shaft and then rolled down, giving him a pleasant little tug. Her soft lips brushed against his tender throat. Her thighs squeezed his sides. Her membranous wings stretched across his back, hugging him closer.

“You’re mine,” Nicole whispered in his ear. “There’s no escape. I’m going to drag you down into deep, delectable darkness.”

She’d wrapped him all up in her body. There was no way George could get free. He sighed as her pussy contracted around his cock and gave him a teasing little suck.

He wasn’t even sure he wanted to get free.

“How does it feel to have your favourite fantasy made flesh?”

Her vagina squeezed again. The moist walls, soft like sumptuous cushions, rubbed against his glans.

What fantasy?

“Haven’t you always wanted to be enthralled by a creature of the night?” Nicole whispered in his ear. “You like to watch the horror movies with the sexy vampiresses. They arouse you.”

George had told no one about those fantasies. Reeves as Harker in the castle of Dracula. “How’d—”

Nicole cut off his question with a luscious kiss.

“A guess,” she said. “But an easy one. A good succubus is adept at sensing the desires of her prey. I heard your heart quicken when you saw my fangs and wings, and you haven’t exactly put up much of a fight.”

George sagged. Was it true? He knew he found her incredibly sexy, but surely he didn’t want this—his death?

“Now it’s real,” Nicole said, her soft breath tickling against his ear. “Here you are, drawn into the embrace of a dark beauty. Mesmerised, seduced and helpless as she folds her wings around you and puts her fangs in your neck.”

Oh god, it was true. Her words sent a thrill of pleasure through him. His manhood swelled and twitched inside her snug sheath.

Nicole chuckled. Her hot lips brushed his throat.

“I can bite you,” she whispered, soft and barely audible. “I have fangs. Would you like me to sink them into your throat?”

George felt two sharp pinpricks. He panicked and started to squirm.

The pinpricks went away. Nicole laughed.

“The bite doesn’t interest you,” she said. “It’s the feeling of being seduced and overwhelmed by a dark temptress. That’s the turn-on.”

She hugged him tighter and writhed beneath him, rubbing her breasts against his chest.

“A good thing,” she said. “Biting’s messy. Blood goes everywhere. Not very sexy.”

Nicole crossed her ankles behind his buttocks and squeezed, pulling him down deeper into her velvet depths. The fleshy walls of her sex throbbed and pulsed against his twitching erection.

“A succubus drains her victim in a much more pleasurable manner.”

Her luscious vagina squeezed around his cock. She stimulated the head with rhythmic tugs of her flesh. George tensed up right away. Pleasure and anticipation thrummed along nerves as taut as piano wires.

“Can you hold on?” Nicole teased.

George groaned. He felt like he was vibrating like a struck tuning fork. Her fleshy tunnel squeezed and sucked on his cock, enveloping his member with hot, wet kisses. Her moist walls slid over his pulsing hard-on like the finest silk.

“I don’t think so,” she said.

George’s balls felt like they were boiling. He trembled as he tried to deny the instincts of his body.

“Oh yes, you’re close. My vagina’s going to slurp you all up.”

Gngh-no, George thought. Her pussy gripped the base of his cock and pulled him deeper into her. Fleshy walls sucked on him like a mouth.

It was her mouth.


Nicole hugged him closer, enfolding him in the heat and scent of her body. Her pussy sucked on him with rhythmic pulses. Too much. He was welling up.

“Mmm, time to drink.”

A gasp of air escaped George’s mouth. The molten flesh of her pussy stimulated him beyond the limits of his resistance. He came.

It was like no ejaculation he’d experienced before. It was like a river of mud—slow and constant—running from his cock with slow, deep throbs. Each throb was a spike of purest ecstasy, each almost a separate orgasm in themselves, all running together as one.

“Ooh,” Nicole sighed. She ground her hips against him, stimulating the flow to continue.

Her vagina pulsed around him with slow, steady contractions, pumping the semen from his body. Pumping his fluids—his life—while he was kept helpless and overwhelmed with sensations of purest bliss.

“It won’t hurt,” Nicole said, her voice soft. “You’ll fall right asleep.”

George slumped on top of her. His energy was ebbing away. She pumped it from his body and into the ravenous pit of her sex along with his seed.

“You’re like most shy guys. You want the wanton temptress to give you the sexual release you’re too nervous to ask for, but you’re so insecure, the fantasy only works if you make her the femme fatale—interested only in your blood.”

Nicole let his head fall over her shoulder, into the black silk sheets of the bed. She placed a hand on the back of his head, and let her smooth cheek brush against his.

“So silly. You’re far more of a man than the shallow peacocks you envy.”

Nicole sighed. Hot sticky fluids bubbled up around his spurting penis.

“And far far tastier,” Nicole purred. “The nice gentlemen always taste the best.”

Her vagina continued to pulse around him with long, slow throbs—like a great velvet heart. He felt the beats flow through him, a pleasure which washed away all other sensation. His ejaculations were long slow waves rolling through his body. He was pouring, emptying, into her and—god help him—he couldn’t bear for it to end. His eyelids drooped shut. He felt tired now—drained and sleepy. There was no fear or panic. His only thoughts were a constant series of sighs and moans—the soundtrack to a hundred porn films all overlaid on top of each other.

“This brings back memories . . .” Nicole said, “. . . of times past, when the world was larger and existence was simpler. A chapter long closed. As it should be.”

George felt like he was sinking. Like the bed was growing softer and softer and, wrapped in Nicole’s embrace, he was sinking into its depths. Pleasure enveloped and surrounded him in a second skin. It saturated all his tissues.

“Mmm, I do so enjoy playing the wicked sensual predator.”

Nicole hugged him tight and dragged him down into deep, delectable darkness. George closed his eyes and the darkness welcomed him into its embrace.


Oh Nicole. To be concluded . . .

Thursday, June 02, 2011

Crowd Funded Publishing

This is an interesting idea I read about recently. Unbound.co.uk are looking to apply the Crowd Funding model to book publishing. It’s a simple enough concept. An author pitches an idea for a book. If enough people pledge enough money then the book becomes reality. Supporters can also get additional benefits depending on how much they pledge.

It’s interesting because it takes away some of the guesswork in judging whether a book will be successful or not. The creative industries tend to be a little conservative and risk averse, preferring to go for a slightly tepid ‘sure’ thing rather than gambling on something unusual.

This model mitigates a lot of the risk. Have a niche idea? Not sure there’s a big enough audience? Well, you can see right away. The project either generates enough interest and funding to get off the ground or it doesn’t.

I don’t think Unbound have it quite right just yet. The initial writers they have on board are already famous (Terry Jones, Amy Jenkins). While it’s good for them to see whether an idea is viable or not, it would be nice to see it used to uncover some unknowns.

I think the minimum £10 pledge is too high as well. There are the other benefits, but £10 for an ebook is a little steep, even with the extras. I wonder if they’re missing out by not having a £1 or similar mini-pledge option. £1 is closer to an impulse amount and might generate a lot of money from people that otherwise wouldn’t be interested in pledging the full tenner.

I think this model might be more interesting if applied to manuscripts from unknown writers. Here’s the first three chapters and a synopsis. If we get X thousand pledges, the book will become reality.

It’s got to be better than the sodding slush pile . . .