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Lusty Lady

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Watch my first and favorite book trailer for Spanked: Red-Cheeked Erotica. Get Spanked in print and ebook

Sunday, December 31, 2006

Happy New Year and sweet dreams


waterfall
Originally uploaded by rkb1.
One of my favorite photos I took at Los Sueños in Costa Rica during this crazy wild busy year of book deals, hookups, babies, breakups, and general chaos.

I can't believe it's almost 2007. Hope everyone (anyone? post Google) who's still reading this has a fabulous New Year's Eve and wonderful start to the new year. After putting my credit card through a workout at Cynthia Rowley, I'm ready to party with the comics and ring in the new year and certainly say farewell to this one. Resolutions and some recaps TK.

Saturday, December 30, 2006

Equal parts Butthead and Peter Pan

I have a ways to go, I’ll be the first to admit, but I’m definitely ready to leave all the boy drama of 2006 in 2006. Bring on new drama or girl drama or something else. I want to make a pact with myself - no taxis, no alcohol, and no sex in 2007, but I’m sure I couldn’t stick to any of them, though if we added no diet coke in there, it would be a real fight between them which would be toughest to uphold. I am all about taking everything one day at a time even as I try to envision what I want as a way of actualizing it. Though I want to get better about doing rather than just talking.

So I will try to make this the last post that is all about him. I’m moving on even though it’s slow, and I get derailed, and sit on my day off and cry in the most ugly way possible. It felt good to get out today, to walk across the bridge, to run into friends, to cook, to be totally silly with my baby cousin and just delight in his presence. Too much time alone, inside, asleep, is too much time to think. My creativity seems to have vanished and I need to get it back, for me, for my deadlines. I have more to say, so much more, but maybe that magic time period has passed and it all feels old, past tense, as Stephanie Klein would put it. Writing about the former me, the former life, the former heartbreak. It’s a little bit funny now, all of the irony packed together so tightly. There’s a book I just bought that I will post about more when I’m done, but it didn’t escape my notice, as I hopped on Amazon and sent a copy to my dad, that I so wanted to send him a copy too. I didn’t see it then but I do now, but that would’ve been okay, but I think just realizing that he is not the kind of person I want to surround myself with, or certainly plan a future with. The coke, the hookers, the self-centeredness, the whole dynamic that seemed so right but was so utterly fucked up. I was thinking about the Shawn Colvin song “New Thing Now,” the one she wrote about Courtney Love that Mary Lou Lord used to sing at times, and how fitting it is for him. I always thought that song was so specifically about her, about a certain time period, and it is, and yet, maybe it’s like Jeannette Walls says about memoir, that it should be universal.

Sometimes I see the half and not the whole
Sometimes I see the face and not the soul
Sometimes I think this place has no part
For anyone who ever had a heart


I am not going to try to endlessly second guess myself. Maybe I should’ve heeded the red flags at the very start, stepped away before I could get hurt. Maybe I could’ve and should’ve done a lot of things, but I didn’t. I wanted him to be this person that I thought I saw, that I both wanted to see and wanted to be. It wasn’t the outer accomplishments, the Emmys or the apartment or even the killer body (though that was pretty nice), it was the heart, or what I perceived it as. I would hear certain things and not others, skip over those and yes, think I could change them. I’d hear taking care of his friend’s baby, but not not having time to call his sister on her birthday. I’d hear letting me use his calling card to call overseas, but not dragging me out to look at apartments I’d never live in. I thought I was being so cautious and careful and yet there were so many things I couldn’t and didn’t dare say. I thought there’d come a time, in the near future, when it would be okay to ask, okay to broach tender topics because I’d already know what those answers would be. “Mixing up those latest junkie-isms/With all the pretty terms of religion,” indeed. I thought “Jewish” was this code word for “good,” for “pure,” despite clearly knowing differently. All the guys who broke my heart in big and small ways this year were Jewish, and the one who didn’t, the one who on the surface would look like the least likely candidate for anything more than a fuck buddy, the one who was engaged, the one who is so much smarter than I think his peers could ever perceive, the one farthest away, is the one who has managed this year to make me laugh out loud, uproariously, to take me totally out of whatever I’m doing and into his world. Who’s managed to see inside me in ways I think are rare.

I thought that’s what S. and I had, I did, and it’s so strange now to look back, to think of the things I worried about, the things I did somehow manage to capture on paper. The whole thing baffles me, like it was a dream and yet real at the same time and I just look forward to more distance and to new adventures and people and getting back to figuring out who I am and who I want to be.

That day just coalesced in such a way that made it clear to me that I need to be proud of who I am and not try to save anyone else, dead or alive. The juxtaposition, even now, of sitting in a synagogue hearing words that felt so untrue being spoken, of wanting my funeral to be one where people come out and remember me as I truly was and hopefully for that person they mourn to be someone they were proud of, and wanting to share that with him and then finding out everything I did, is still stunning to me. It’ll work its way into the novel, I’m sure, but I am trying to take away lessons for myself and my values and morals, which clearly weren’t his. So it’s reading about the serenity prayer and trying to make amends for my huge failures this year as well as embracing all the wonderful people in my life and trying to live up, even a few days early, to my six word resolution I sent in to SMITH - “Show love by any means necessary.” And by that I meant, by any means necessary to me. I don’t want to just hope the people I love and care about and appreciate and value and learn from know that, I want to make sure they do. I want to spend much more time alone, with myself, but also when I’m with others, really be with them. I want to develop better people skills, better radar, without being totally cynical. I want to follow my heart but not let it control me. I have so much I want for myself in 2007 and I wonder sometimes if I can ever hope to live up to my own dreams, but I guess all I can do is try, every day, every minute, to be that person I want to see in front of the mirror, instead of looking for her in other people.

Friday, December 29, 2006

Bill Clinton's sex addiction

Slate on Bill Clinton and sex addiction - also a topic I want to explore in either my column or elsewhere (not Clinton necessarily but the topic of sex addiction), but one thing at a time.

"Command Performance" from Caught Looking



Here's an excerpt from "Command Performance" by Teresa Noelle Roberts, from Caught Looking: Erotic Tales of Voyeurs and Exhibitionists. It's a super-hot story, which those who attended the San Francisco reading got to hear read in its entirety by Carol Queen, about a kinky slave girl who shows off at a peep show at her master's command. Alison Tyler and I are working on the sequel to Caught Looking now and I can already tell you, it's gonna be HOT HOT HOT!

She glanced down dubiously at the dirty floor, remembering the blatant, nasty way that Master had ordered her to end the performance.

They weren’t here to see Michelle. They weren’t here to see the pretty, refined woman she could be under other circumstances. They were here to see a slut. To see Master’s slut.

Deep breath. She was going to do this—for her master, who had made her into this slut, turned on by displaying herself on his orders.

She sat down on the floor, then spread her legs wide, showing her dripping pussy to the audience. She ran two fingers down her slit, then raised them and made a V for Victory sign, showing to each window in turn the glistening strands of moisture between them.

The old man had his fly open, his cock hanging out. The boys weren’t so bold, but she could see from their eyes they wanted to do the same. She glanced toward her master, but he was smiling calmly behind the façade of control he never lost until he chose to.

With one hand, Michelle opened her pussy lips, exposing the wet, gaping hole to hungry eyes. She had never felt so open before, so vulnerable. On the one hand, she wanted to close her legs, slink away, hide herself in shame. On the other hand, her body ached. Master was what she needed, Master’s cock, Master’s whip, anything he would be willing to use to get her off.

What she had was Master’s order to get herself off in a very specific way.

And although she couldn’t have imagined doing such a thing before others on her own whim, it was his order, and because it was his order, she suspected she’d be able to come from it. That was the real thrill for her, not one particular act or another, but knowing that, even if she were touching herself, she was doing so under his command.

One by one, she put her fingers into her mouth, sucking and licking lasciviously, making a great show of it, maintaining eye contact first with the boys, then with the old man, who was beating off magnificently. Once her fingers were slicked, she held them up for the onlookers to see, then plunged all four at once into her pussy.

Just as Master had ordered.

Google porn update

More on Google from Webpronews.com

And Anne from Babeland updates in their comments:

Yup, it’s happily true that we have resurfaced in the google rankings on our two most popular terms. We are still coming up short on a host of other words, though, so I’m still not sure what’s going on. We did have the satisfaction of going to a google event though and calling them out on the sex stuff!

Site of the day part 2

And more in keeping what you expect of me, I'm sure.

Virginia Vitzthum's I Love You, Let's Meet site (also the name of her new book about online dating, and she is also part of Erotic Memoir Night at In The Flesh on January 17th) - the site's a great resource with tips and news and funny bits about online dating

Sites of the day part 1

Iraq Slogger

The War in Context

Thursday, December 28, 2006

Erotic Writing Competition: "One Foot on the Floor"

The Richard Hugo House
"One Foot on the Floor"
Erotica Writing Competition


Second of a new quarterly series of competitions on genre

Richard Hugo House invites writers age 18 and older to submit manuscripts of fewer than 5,000 words to its erotica writing competition. The theme is "One Foot on the Floor" and the deadline is February 1. The winner will receive a $250 prize, a $50 gift certificate from Babeland and the chance to read on the Hugo House cabaret stage with an established writer on February 13, 2007.

We are seeking excellent writing with an erotic charge rather than stories that rely on graphic language to carry the story. We encourage lyric outbursts and sensual language.

Lusty Lady column, "The Twat Thickens"

Sometimes, when whoever's in charge of titling things, can come up with a better title for my column, they do. That's what happened with "The Twat Thickens" (my original title: "All-Girl Passionate Partying"). For my next one, which will involve a hot little indie porn star, I have a title that I really think is a keeper. So here's my last column of the year, which is technically the first column of 2007 according to the issue date. It's about going to a recent Passion Party (sex toy party).

"The Twat Thickens"
When ladies dish about icy-hot clits and tingling tits

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Gothamist interview with Jennifer Shahade, author of Chess Bitch and former U.S. Women's World Chess Champion

Today I did my final Gothamist interview of 2006, with Jennifer Shahade, author of Chess Bitch and former U.S. Women's World Chess Champion.

I stopped playing chess long before Jennifer got really into it, but I'd read about her and found her very intriguing, and was lucky enough to meet her earlier this year at Tom Zoellner's book party for The Heartless Stone and was thrilled when she knew who I was too. Since then we've played Boggle several times and I'm always interested in what she's up to. There was more fracas this year over the use (or non-use) of the word "bitch" in the New York Times, and I wrote a letter to the editor on October 10th (below) that they didn't run.

And on a personal note in terms of what I want to work on in myself, not even starting in 2007, but now, I had this interview basically done for months and months and for some reason couldn't get it together to proof it, write the intro, and put it up. I will say that takes way more time than it may seem like it does, but I have to start getting over myself and just getting the work out there. That's been my stumbling block, oh, forever, and has killed much larger projects than this, where I get 90% of the way done and just totally freeze up and freak out and hate myself, and when I think about those books that could've/should've been, and the many things I've flaked on, I hate that person I see. I don't want to wake up hating or berating myself anymore. That is one of my goals for 2007, but that will only come by actually pulling back, not going out, and buckling in for the long haul. I don't want to be a talker and not a doer, so I will just say that I hope I have it in me to do everything I set out to and commit to in 2007. It's a tricky thing because only I know what those goals and commitments are and I am doing everything I can to say goodbye to old bad habits and embrace new, mature, adult ones.

To the Editors:

You insult the intelligence of your readers when you fail to include the title of a blog that you're quoting, as was the case in "That
Which Simmers Is Not to Be Dissed," about the Washington, D.C. subway ad disparaging romance novels. You quote from "a blog whose very name - not printable in most newspapers - refers to the genre as 'trashy.'" That blog is called Smart Bitches Who Love Trashy Novels (smartbitchestrashybooks.com). A search of your online archives on October 10th, 2006, shows 773 uses of the word "bitch" since 1981, most recently on October 8th, 5th, and 1st, 2006. The word may not be printable in "most" newspapers, but it certainly is in yours, but only selectively, which brings to mind your refusal to publish the title of Jennifer Shahade's book
Chess Bitch when she penned an Op-Ed piece in 2005. You need to make up your mind as to whether or not "bitch" belongs in your pages and stick to that decision across the board, rather than treated the word in such an arbitrary, haphazard fashion.

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Wednesday, December 27, 2006

Stranger and Stranger

I love The Stranger, and I especially love their blog, Slog, where every time I visit I learn something new and it almost makes me want to live in Seattle. They've got Dan Savage and Mistress Matisse and all sorts of fascinating writers giving really insightful, funny, spot-on commentary on news local and national.

But...in their year-end mistaken mistakes redux, they printed this:

Charles Mudede, an associate editor at The Stranger, regrets his Slog post on the subject of sex with pregnant women. It was not worth the trouble or the insults he received from pregnant women who believe, despite the ugliness of their bodies, that men still want to fuck them.

Dude, give it up! You really were wrong. Not in not wanting to fuck pregnant ladies, that's totally your call, but in the absolutely sexist, misogynist, hateful and misguided way you went about writing about it, assuming that everyone shares your warped views. I will say this though...when I am preggers, and even when I'm not, I will not want to fuck you.

If you missed that debacle, just read this. (and my earlier take on it)

I will give some link love to two other Slog posts this week:

Dan Savage on two gay men who just got married in Vancouver and chose not to use their real names in a story for Seattle Magazine

Ari Spool calling The Seattle Post-Intelligencer to task for not mentioning Jews eating Chinese food on Christmas

His furriness

Jeff Newelt, aka Jahfurry, is interviewed over at LVHRD.

The man of infinite careers and talents has much to say, so I will be interviewing him for Gothamist in January. Jeff has introduced me to some of the most amazing people in the city. Good thing, too, otherwise I might have to hate him for the bad apple he introduced me to as well, but I feel like the end of the year is a good time for peacemaking and letting go. It's been one month exactly since that all-nighter from hell and, well, I'm not exactly over it, far from it, but I feel like I'm getting stronger and wiser and more at peace with myself every day. And the truth is, I wish him the same (you know, when I don't wish for something awful to befall him). I really do, and yet I know that the only person I can control and work on his myself. But that is another post for another time.

Add me to the list of Google disappearances

While I would hesitate to truly call this a "sex blog" (yes, I know there are sometimes naked or topless photos and the bulk of what I write about is sex, still, it's not, technically a "sex blog"), but that's neither here nor there because if you search Google for "lusty lady" + bussel, you do not get this site in the first page of results. Why?

We don't fully know yet but this is a hot topic being covered at blogs like Tony Comstock's, Violet Blue's Tiny Nibbles, and Boing Boing.

What's (sortof) funny is that I had read about this earlier at Viviane's site and thought "hmm, that's messed up" but didn't realize it was affecting me even when I saw my traffic down to as low as 3 or 5 in the last hour (it's never that low, ever, thanks to Google).

What to do? Well, I don't know. I will leave that to the geeks because I am mired in dirty words right now. You know, the ones probably getting me demoted by Google - cock, pussy, butt cheeks, ass worship, spank, come, spurt, blowjob, titty-fuck, blah blah blah. Actually, my personal erotica has taken a kindof dark and melancholy turn lately but I'm trying to turn the heat up a notch but when all else fails, I just think about cupcakes and mac and cheese. Yes, I'm a food whore despite my recent exercise kick. So if you're reading this, I'll just assume you didn't search for "cupcake bukkake."

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Looking for Elissa Wald

I'm trying to get in touch with author Elissa Wald (of Holding Fire and Meeting the Master fame) to invite her to read at In The Flesh. Anyone know how to reach her? Thanks! rachelkramerbussel at gmail.com

Site of the day: Stacipop.com

Sometimes I love to just get lost in photographs, especially when they make me realize that a picture really is worth at least 1,000 words. Seeing photos that awe me makes me realize how I wish I could be as concise and time stopping with my words, but also how sometimes words just do not do it, cannot do it, in the same way.

I was looking at The Village Voice's Year in Pictures and found a link to photo editor Staci Schwartz's site Stacipop.com - go check out her stunning photos for yourself. Celebs and night clubs and bar mitzvahs, it's all there. She also did a set of the Dyker Heights Christmas lights for the Voice.

Hearting Philadelphia City Paper

I don't read it all that often, just because I barely have time to read my umpteen local papers, but I've gotten hand it to Philadelphia City Paper. Their year in review makes me wish I'd been reading all along, and Ashlea Halpern's Paper Doll column is totally awesome.

Here she is on her olive fetish: (yes, it's over a month old, I'm catching up now)

s a food editor and sex columnist, I can't tell if my fruity obsession is motivated more by gastronomic hedonism or some bizarre fetishism. The desire to get fucked in a tub full of olives does not strike me as strange; then again, I've been known to give coffee-sugar handjobs and incorporate yellow mustard and Tabasco sauce into my lovemaking. More recently, my boyfriend lay naked on the kitchen floor while I stood over him pelting eggs and pitching handfuls of flour. (We never did get that security deposit back.)

LOVE IT!

Tis the season...


Rachel0045
Originally uploaded by rkb1.
For xmas light bondage. I mean, when isn't it the season for it? An oldie but hopefully goodie.

I am looking forward to my first 2007 photo shoot! Don't know when or where that will be but I will plan something fun. The last one, well, the last one was the start of a very tumultuous few months that I am slowly recovering from. I don't want a repeat of that, but those photos serve to remind me of where I was on that day, October 15th - so hopefully and happy and full of possibility. I want to get back to that headspace and I am, slowly but surely. In the mean time, work work work. I am enjoying the solitude, the quiet, the walking and thinking and reading and words pouring out. It's a bit tougher lately, tougher to pull myself back from the brink when my thoughts veer too far in the wrong direction, but the recovery time is shorter. I am trying to remember to be grateful, to take things one second at a time if I need to.

Your post-holiday gift to yourself

Now that you've survived (or thrived or gorged yourselves) the holidays, you deserve a treat, and what better one than comedian Bob Powers's new book Happy Cruelty Day! Daily Celebrations of Quiet Desperation? I suggest carrying it around with you and looking up whoever you encounter's birthday and seeing what terrible fate befalls them. Will it be "Your High School Girlfriend Is Now An Ass Model Day?" or "Just Because You Can't Remember Anything About Last Night, It Doesn't Necessarily Mean That You're An Alcoholic Day" or "Date a Wizard Day" Or "Hot Date With a Conspiracy Theorist Day" or simply "Your Commemorative 9/11 Bong Is In Poor Taste And You Should Be Ashamed Of Yourself Day?" Find your own at happycrueltyday.com but really do yourself a favor and check out the book. I had to finally put it away cause it was hurting me from laughing too much. See also: Susie Felber's interview with Bob at CC Insider.

I also plan to interview Bob because I simply must get the scoop on his Publishers Weekly review. Also: Book party Thursday, January 25th at 7:30 pm at Mo Pitkins, 34 Avenue A.

If you liked Naughty Spanking Stories from A to Z 2...


_DSC7110
Originally uploaded by brianvan.
Please let Amazon know! Really, if you like any book, why not leave a little comment on Amazon? But especially for mine. It seems to have seen a post-Christmas spike in sales at 6,884, but we can do better than that, right? I'm picturing people getting pretty paddles and crops and very hard spankings for the holidays and reading each other some of these stories. Or maybe that's just wishful thinking on my part. I will have to work on locating the perfect spanker, but that's another story for another time.

Here's a photo from my birthday party last month of L. Elise Bland spanking me - she kept wanting to do more of it, but we will have to save that for private time. She spanked me back in 2001, I believe, and my ass was super sore for days (in a good way). She knows whereof she writes, certainly, which may be why her story "Every Good Boy Deserves Favors" made it into Best American Erotica 2006.

Below I've included a short excerpt from her Naughty Spanking Stories 2 tale, "X-Rated Exes," which she read at In The Flesh last week.

You can also WIN a copy of Naughty Spanking Stories from A to Z 2 over at Saskia Walker's blog!



From L. Elise Bland's "X-Rated Exes" in Naughty Spanking Stories from A to Z 2

I exchanged looks with Erin. My pussy was still throbbing from the crazy orgasm, and the adrenaline in my veins was churning so hard, it had even drowned out the pounding music. I was up for anything. I whispered into Erin's ear and then pulled Desiree across me on the sofa so that her feet were in Erin's lap.

"What are you doing?" Desiree asked, as if she didn't know. I had never given her a real spanking before and wasn't sure how it would go over. Desiree always tipped me on stage and I returned the favor with a public slap, but never a private one.

"You said you liked to be spanked, didn't you?" My hand quivered with nervousness as it ran across her round cheeks. The first time spanking someone is always scary for me, especially someone like Desiree. I wanted to slap her hard enough to satisfy my own sadistic streak, but I wanted her to like it enough to come back for more.

"You know I have to punish you for spying on us earlier!" I scolded playfully.

"I'm sorry," she said, pretending to pout. "I just got, well, you know, kind of lonely."

"You're such a bad girl," I told her. "But that's why I like you so much."
I laid one hand on her cheek and gave her a pat so delicate, my palm didn't even sting afterwards. When Desiree sighed and jumped, I knew I had her number. She wanted more. She said she was a lightweight, but it turned out she could take a decent round. I slapped every inch of her ass—longer-lasting strokes in the center of her cheeks, light circles around the outsides, and sharp stingy pecks on the most tender parts. Spanking Desiree was completely different from spanking our customer on stage earlier. This time it was real.
Between spanks, I ran my fingers up and down the back of her thong, which was hot and wet from the burn of exhibitionism. Desiree writhed against me so that the metal of her garter straps dug into my bare thighs. Once she was completely worked up, I let loose. My hand started moving so fast and feathery, it looked like a bumblebee's wing. Desiree raised her derriere into the air as if she didn't know whether to come closer or escape.

All the while, Erin was watching. "Hey, don't hog her," she called out. "I want to get to know your friend Desiree, too."

Read the rest (plus 29 other HOT stories) in Naughty Spanking Stories from A to Z 2

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Glamour Girls hotness



Bliss for Women praises my anthology Glamour Girls: Femme/Femme Erotica and it's listed right above the Hitachi Magic Wand!

This was one that didn't turn out as spectacularly as I'd hoped, starting with the stories and ending with the cover. I'm happy with it but sometimes you set out with a vision for an anthology and then are pretty much at the mercy of the slush pile. Sometimes you like out and get an abundance of super hot stories and you have to reject some and you're just so damn excited because you know it's gonna be a killer book. And sometimes you have to go begging, ask for reprints, try to find stories that fit your theme without being too forced. It's a really tricky balancing act, especially along with writing my own erotica in between, and I realized with this one I had to do the best I could. I am happy with it and think it's doing okay and the advance was small so I think I may even see royalties (which I've yet to do on any of my books though I think will be doing so from now on).

Working on this book was definitely one of my lessons in erotica editing, and I was very late with it in part because of these issues and in part because of the big breakup of 2004, but all in all, I'm pleased and it seems to be getting a good reception. It has the infamous "Cup Cake" bakery erotica story that I read at the Cupcake Reading Series way back in the day and some other favorites of mine, including the luscious sorority girl story and the mermaid story, both written by friends.

It was also the first anthology I conceived of and edited all by myself. A lot of the early ones someone came to me with the idea, or I had to co-edit, and as I proof He's on Top and She's on Top, both of which I'm very excited about, I realize that for me there is a special thrill in coming up with an idea and seeing in executed. I have a few things in the works that I hope pan out and three projects I'm currently doing and it's definitely a different level of excitement when it's my idea.

I try to keep up with what's going on in the world of erotica without getting jaded or bored by it, which is easy to do. I have to read so much of it and push myself to write a lot of it that when it comes to leisure reading, I choose almost anything else, but the stories that can make me forget about all that, that catapult me out of complacency and make me go "WOW," like the one I'm publishing by Marie Lyn Bernard, make it all worthwhile. As do the learning experiences. I think now I have a much bigger roster of writers I can tap into (and harass on occasion, especially if I know how good their writing is) to send me stories. I forget sometimes that it's not just about coming up with an idea, but that editing an anthology is a hell of a lot of work, both editorial-wise and administratively and then keeping up with the publicity and all. Worth it, hopefully, but a lot of work. I am looking forward to 2007 and seeing what happens with these new books as well as working on the longer fiction for myself while still making time for the occasional dirty story.

It seems like the idea behind Glamour Girls should have been done already; after all, there's already an anthology of butch/butch erotica, and femme sexuality is certainly a strong presence in lesbian erotic fiction. Its fantastical, sanitised marketed-to-men counterpart has become so mainstream in the media that it can be hard to remember that the femme is not just an archetype who exists only in fantasies. The writers in this anthology turn mainstream ideas about the femme and her sexuality on their head prove that the femme lives, and does so entirely on her own terms. The characters are in control of their lives and their sexuality, and are gloriously, unapologetically femme, and reject the very idea of their sexuality being solely about pleasing other people.

The stories are intelligent, witty, and above all, completely, unrelentingly hot.

Tuesday, December 26, 2006

Mmmmm....cleavage


DSC_9928
Originally uploaded by brianvan.
She made me do it! No, just kidding, I will happily grope and nuzzle Ms. Bland's cleavage any time. She also brought this incredibly bear-shaped paddle that maybe sometime in '07 I'll be lucky enough to get spanked with. Just when I start thinking I will be all pure and good and hiding away at home, someone like her comes along and reminds me that I really can't get enough of cleavage and over-the-knee spankings. Maybe that can be my reward for finishing my novel?

Cleavage is for candy canes


DSC_9923
Originally uploaded by brianvan.
As L. Elise Bland, author of such HOT stories as "X-Rated Eves" and "Every Good Boy Deserves Favors," demonstrates last week at In The Flesh, with some assistance by Nichelle.

The fabulous Brian Van has now put up all of his wonderful photos from the reading.

2006 Sex Blog Awards



Actually, this is not really a sex blog (thank goodness or it would be very boring!) but if you want to nominate me for Sexiest Sex Blogger, be my guest. I would recommend surfing on over to Viviane's Sex Carnival for most of my favorite sex bloggers both on there and linked in her blogroll.

Need erotic romance writers for In The Flesh and looking for crossdressnig erotica

I'm still looking for a few more readers for the February 21st and March 21st lineups of In The Flesh. I'd really love to include some romantica and/or erotic romance authors, so if that's you (published authors only) and you can read in NYC on one of those nights, please contact me at rachelkramerbussel at gmail.com with your bio, contact info, and 10-minute writing sample (that would take you 10 minutes and no more to read), and which date(s) you're available. In March, Suzanne Portnoy, is coming all the way from England to read at In The Flesh!

April 18th is our second annual True Sex Confessions night and that one I will probably have too many readers - so far I've got Chelseagirl, Valerie Frankel, Dan Goldman, Peter Hyman, Logan Levkoff, Courtney McLean, plus two more readers TBD, and it's again going to be AWESOME.

Also, I'm editing 3 anthologies and proofing He's on Top: Erotic Stories of Male Dominance and Female Submission and She's on Top: Erotic Stories of Female Dominance and Male Submission, in addition to everything else, so my mind's spinning a bit. I need good crossdressing erotica stories, so if you have one or want more information, email me at rachelkramerbussel at gmail.com - for an anthology I'm editing. Unpublished stories highly preferred, but will consider reprints, and "crossdressing" can be any gender, any sexual orientation (because really, what is "straight" when it comes to crossdressing?) as long as the person is dressing against their usual gender presentation. Double spaced word documents ONLY with your full contact info and bio and any prior publication details.

Thanks for your help! I will be launching a big online push for He's on Top and She's on Top but should have more info on that in the new year.

Inane MySpace email of the day I will not be responding to

im just curious....how can you be jewish and at the same time you write an article about your love for sucking cock? Im not saying that you are a slut or anything or that your bad....just curious as to how you work that out...


thanks...

chris

Link of the day

I can't promise to do a "link of the day" every day, especially since I'm all about one day at a time lately and not overwhelming myself. For today, I can tell you that if you care about sex, you should bookmark Cory Silverberg's Sexuality blog at About.com ASAP. It's consistently newsworthy, insightful and interesting. And I promise I'm not just saying that cause he listed this blog as one of his top 10. Any blog that tells me things about sex I haven't seen elsewhere yet is tops in my book.

Check out his top sex questions of 2006 and then send in your own.

Cory is also the co-author of The Ultimate Guide to Sex and Disability and co-owner of the Canadian sex toy store Come As You Are.

Saturday, December 23, 2006

Weekend links

Some very old and overdue, sorry:

Polly Frost's Erotica, Uncorked (Check her out as she goes on tour)

Is this what a rejection letter should look like?

Rachel Resnick's Writers on Fire in Hawaii retreat, which I would SO attend if I had found out about it a little sooner. She apparently has them throughout the year so maybe that'll be a good way to complete the novel, or later on, once it's done, more likely. I think for me it just might be another way of running away and hiding but still, Hawaii sounds so tempting so maybe that'll be a reward of some sort.

I am loving Barbara Rushkoff's A Girl Grows in Brooklyn blog at Babble:

I am a believer in sharing information. As a matter of fact, when my doctor told me that I couldn’t have kids because my eggs were rotten, I went around telling people I was infertile. I started using that word because when we decided to adopt, I’d always, and I mean always, be met with people saying “but you can have one of your own too.” After glaring hard at them for that insensitive remark, I’d just reply “No, I am infertile.” I have stopped at least 2 dinner parties with that remark.

But now I don’t say that. Now when I get asked I just say that I got pregnant by FUCKING. And when their jaws drop (because it’s usually strangers who ask me this) I continue on and say “Yes, fucking. Fucking two times a day. Penis. In. Vagina. No condom. You know, with the squirting.”

After that, they kinda walk away.


And her Dooce-like 2nd birthday letter to her daughter made me melt.

Tristan Taormino's latest Pucker Up column, "Urban Buttgirl Meets Rural Right," just might be my favorite one ever. And was I was telling someone after the KGB reading on Thursday, hers is probably the only column I've read every single time, as they go up, since it started. I think we all struggle, to some extent, with truth and how much of it to tell. I've read so many memoirs and personal blogs this year and through my own writing have realized that there is no singular "whole truth." There never is, even from ourselves. There's always some part that's private or just hidden, some things about ourselves that some people may know, but not all. I struggle with that all the time, where and how to let the words take over versus how much of myself I need to hold onto to feel okay when I look in the mirror. Often I have to write it out, it's the only way that makes sense, and other times, it's unclear.

The simplest questions ("What do you do for work?" or "Are you married?") plunge me into a state of anxiety. I can't say I'm a writer, because the next question is always, "What do you write?" Should I make something up, or should I offer up a few tips on fucking, sucking, and swatting? When people see me with my partner but sans wedding ring, they inevitably want to know when the question will be popped. Do I say I'm in solidarity with Angelina and Brad and won't get married until everyone can? I feel conflicted about being out in our tiny town—out as a sex educator, a pornographer, a queer, and the partner of a transgender person. It's not like I was out to all my neighbors in Brooklyn, but enough of them had read the Voice or seen me on Ricki Lake to get the general picture.

Fun photos with cotton candy by Anya Garrett

Friday, December 22, 2006

Gratitude therapy

Grateful people are not necessarily ones whom the world has showered with gifts; people of modest financial means or who have suffered personal tragedies nevertheless may report themselves as grateful, while the well-to-do and good-looking may exhibit little gratitude.

"To say we feel grateful is not to say that everything in our lives is necessarily great," Emmons says. "It just means we are aware of our blessings. If you only think about your disappointments and unsatisfied wants, you may be prone to unhappiness. If you're fully aware of your disappointments but at the same time thankful for the good that has happened and for your chance to live, you may show higher indices of well-being."



I turned 31 this year and yet so often I feel like I'm 31 going on 13. It's not just the number but the way I handle things. I want to truly be 31, to live up to what still sounds old to my ears. I don't want to be a baby and yet sometimes, okay, a lot of the time, my initial impulse is to go to the darkest places, the most disturbed and distraught, the ones that tell me how awful and worthless I am. The ones that make it seem like there is no way out, even though if I look around objectively, there are ups and downs but I'm in a place I never could've imagined. I have been meaning to write a gratitude list and yet it's hard when I go to those places, when all I see are the to dos, the should've dones, the failures, the flaws. I feel like I don't know my own body or my mind and it's confusing to just be at such an utter loss. Not all the time, but enough of the time that I don't know where to go with it. I've spent the last 3 weeks running around as much as I could, saying yes to everything because I didn't want to go home, didn't want to face the really hard parts, the ones that even now make me feel there is and always will be something wrong with me.

I've been grateful in fits and spurts, grateful at things, at moments, at triumphs, but not the kind that Beliefnet is talking about, not the kind that requires you to feel it even when you don't, to see beyond the darker moments to the future, to accept that it will get better...and it will get worse. That I have a lot of power within that, but not all of it. It's not necessarily that I want it to be easy; I think I'd feel antsy if everything always fell into place. But I don't want my life to be a giant struggle either. I want to remember to be grateful, always, and not just when I need to to drag myself out of the mental pit. I want to work on myself so I can be the person I want to be, the person I wanted to see in S., the person who isn't perfect, and doesn't try to be, but does learn from her mistakes. I am not there, far, far from it, but I can see a little bit of where I want to go and know my task is to start moving there, baby step by baby step. I'm so tempted to edit what I wrote below, edit and prettify and clarify and order, as opposed to just letting it be, but, for once, I will resist temptation.

I'm grateful for my family, especially Bess and Adam, who make sure I know they are always here for me.
I'm grateful for the fabulous vacations I got to take this year.
I'm grateful to Lori and Eric for including me in their wedding weekend, and to Aaron for encouraging me to go.
I'm grateful to Shirley for recommending Clara to me for the haircut.
I'm grateful that my dad found someone who, while his opposite in so many ways, is also a wonderful match, and am grateful I got to be part of their wedding.
I'm grateful to be able to help my grandfather with his memoir, and to have grown closer to him by bonding over being writers.
I'm grateful to have met my agent, Lori, and her immense belief in me, and all that that has set in motion. I'm grateful to the editors who believed in my book, even when there was no book, who pushed me to conceive of it and made me believe I could do it.
I'm grateful to cupcakes for being so adorable and sweet and introducing me to a whole world of people.
I'm grateful for going to BEA and being utterly overwhelmed by books for the 5th year in a row, and especially for getting to meet Brooke Warner, my psychic twin, who made me feel like I have something to offer and whose respect I completely treasure.
I'm grateful to Mikki for asking me to be on the SXSW panel.
I'm grateful to all the crazy relationships this year brought my way, the good and the bad and the ones that were both at once. I'm grateful that after all the drama and crying and cursing and ridiculousness, for the friendships they've left me with.
I'm grateful to the new crowd, especially Brett and Emily and Courtney, who are so real and present and funny and creative and energetic and who make me smile.
I'm grateful to all the babies I've gotten to meet and drool over photos of and send gifts to, and all the mamas like Elise who let me be a total dork over their kids.
I'm grateful to all the people who made In The Flesh such a success this year. Special kudos for going the extra mile and giving such memorable performances that nobody who was there will ever forget to Jessica Cutler and Todd Levin.
I'm grateful that K. is back in my life, that we can talk about Jenny Schechter and TDL and the past and the present. I'm grateful she can make me spit out my tea and kiss me on the sidewalk. I'm grateful that we can still walk into any room and own it. I'm grateful that she's learned and shown me that we always have the ability to change, to grow, to become better people inside and out and do not have to submit to our worst instincts.
I'm grateful for my health, which I take utterly and entirely for granted.
I'm grateful for the opportunities that have fallen into my lap this year, for the chance to write blurbs, which still feels strange and surreal, for the interest people have shown in my writing that has in turn impacted what I think I can do.
I'm grateful to S. not just for introducing me to some amazing New Yorkers, and not for breaking my heart so spectacularly, and not even for those six crazy wild weeks. I'm grateful, as much as I'm also a lot of other things, because the past three weeks have kicked my ass in so many ways and finding the good buried underneath there, finding ways to turn anger into action, finding my own form of forgiveness, finding that I can be the better person, all I know will guide me through.
I'm grateful for some of the dialogues that opened up this year, even the ones that felt awful while they were happening. I'm grateful for the chance and the venue to say what I want. I'm grateful for my column, especially this year, and every time I get to write it, for having that space and voice.
I'm grateful for being able to listen and learn. Something happened for me while I was interviewing Dawn Eden and Wendy Shalit and I felt like maybe this is maturity, being able to go from viewing certain people in one way that, well, wasn't complimentary in the least, to being able to both agree to disagree and to finding the common ground. I'm grateful that I can do that, that I want to do that, that I don't feel like I'm "done" in any way with learning or thinking or growing.
I'm grateful to my grandmother, who at 83 is a role model of heart and joy and courage and love. I'm grateful I could be there for her in her time of need, to hold her hand and comfort her.
I am grateful for a 3 day weekend with very few plans except to see some beloved friends, read some of the books I've been hoarding, and see what New York has in store for me.
I'm grateful for anyone reading this, even as a part of me wants to turn off this blog sometimes. It's hard to not want to clarify every statement, every thought, to try to put forth "the real me," but I'm grateful that the people who get me, get me. It doesn't take long, and I know and I think they know right away. So I'm grateful that I still feel a reason to write here, even as I try to find new ways to express myself, new ways to work things out, new ways to purge. I'm grateful that I can see that the benefits outweigh the negatives.

I keep wanting to add things here in the "I hope" or "I want" or "I wish" categories. It's like running into a brick wall. Starting with "I'm grateful" doesn't really leave room for hoping, wanting, or wishing, which I seem to spend so much of my time doing. It's a challenge and not necessarily a fun one, but I am starting to see that the real work of being an adult is getting through the things that aren't easy. I think on some very basic level I see a lot of myself in S. No, not in the details, but, as horrified as I am to admit this even to myself, it's a lot like the ways I see myself in my dad. It's those worst traits, magnified and reflected back ten times larger, but just because my version may be a fraction of theirs doesn't mean it's okay. It's not. I don't want to be the girl that runs away, the girl that fucks up, the girl that self sabotages, the girl that seeks comfort in trouble and darkness, the girl that goes there because she can't figure out where else to go. That is not who I want to be, and yet it's a part of me and always will be. I have that in me, like a gene, and I can't just ignore it but I can work with it, face it head on, find a way to weave it in and then ease it out, to make a new me that doesn't resemble them. But I don't think I can do that without acknowledging where we intersect, where it's all, at some very base level, the same. I can't pretend to be above all that, at least, not to myself, if I ever want to really be the person I hope to be. And I'm grateful that I can see that. The easy thing, the thing I've been doing, is just blaming and ranting and gnawing at it, going there when anything else goes awry, instead of facing how I can change, what I can do, not for anyone else's sake, but for my own.

Thursday, December 21, 2006

Bye bye bye

from Daily Om

We often hold on to things, feelings, and relationships out of habit or, many times, out of fear of being without. For so much of learning to let go is about learning to trust. We have to be able to trust that, indeed, new branches will grow, that there is a new skin under the old one. And yet, to the degree that we are willing to let go, we are able to receive. When we stop holding on and clinging to anything, we realize we have everything.


I have trouble letting go. Of things, people, emotions. My nature is to cling, save, hoard, capture. I want them there, all of them, whatever them it is, to prove to myself that I am worthy. One is hardly ever enough, and when it is, it seems that to let go is to give away a part of myself, or a part of how I want to be reflected. I’m stubborn, and I know I have trouble seeing what’s right in front of me, often in black and white, words that should be easy to decipher but become riddles the more I look at them. “I don’t want you” becomes “Maybe I would want you if only you did X, Y, Z and then started the alphabet all over again.” That belligerent, gotta-have-it instinct kicks in for me that makes me forget all the reasons I should walk away, why I truly need to let go, and makes it seem all backwards. There are so many “but”s and all of it makes me cry. I see in the quote above what K. was trying to tell me, about Neitsche, about trust, about living in the present. I am almost there, at least most of the time. Everything doesn’t have to remind me of him, though he is there, on CNN, in my inbox, in my Spanish word of the day. In ways I don’t even realize. Time does make it easier, or at least dulls the pain. I go home and curl up amidst the blankets and computer and books and light, trying to stay warm, leaving the pajamas I got in LA, the ones that will always remind me of his bed, on the floor. I want to wear them again, because they are soft and silky and pretty. They remind me of that ridiculous day at the Beverly Center, when he made my stomach do somersaults via telephone. I am finally trying to move on, to figure out what it is I’m meant to be doing that is not being with him. I can almost look back and see where I let my heart leap a little too far, talked myself into feelings that seemed right and reasonable.

Courtney sends these gratitude lists and I am working on mine. I have so much to be grateful for and I keep going back to whether I’d do it all over again, whether I got something good out of all this. And of course, on one level I did, for sure. All these people who are now in my life, who are just there, who don’t at all feel like they are “his” in any way.

But the whole “there are no accidents,” well, I don’t know. That doesn’t compute for me. I don’t know why I would fall so hard and so fast to have things fall apart so spectacularly. I don’t know why it would make it so I want to compare everyone else I meet to him, or why I would want to see all the things in him I wanted to see, the things I want to be and want whoever I’m with to be as well. I can’t regret anything I did and yet I miss the time and the energy and most of all, I miss my judgment. I know, there was no way to know and yet I feel like I should have seen it coming, should have been more cynical or suspicious or any of those things I so rarely am. I generally consider it a strength, and I do tend to wear my heart on my sleeve and I know I was in such a good place before him. I was ready to tackle everything and now I am barely sure if I can make it through a day.

Even at my most sparkling, new haircut, new clothes, new lipstick, the biggest smile I can summon, no matter how much I try to fake it I don’t quite seem to make it. Maybe no one else can tell, and last night, I did laugh, for real and out loud. How could I not when sneaking off for a madcap topless photo shoot, then hearing some of my favorite readers, then getting to fish a candy cane out of a friend’s cleavage? Of course it was fun and yet I couldn’t help but compare it to last month. I was standing in the doorway while he said he couldn’t make it talking to a very cute someone and I could kick myself now but I am trying to be a bigger person than I was in 2004, to not let myself get dragged down by the weight of the worst feelings at a time when I need to see ahead, not behind. I know I have to accept that there is not going to be some big meeting of the minds, any real closure, any real anything. It doesn’t matter what I might have gotten him for Hannukah or what Adam would’ve made of him or any of the things I thought before the fittingly funereal day. I am looking forward to 2007, to starting over, but I also know that the date is so arbitrary. It’s not about starting over, but working with what I’ve got, no matter how much I may hate who that is and want to erase her. I can’t and instead of trying have to just start from this second, no matter how much I want to fast forward to somewhere better. I think the ultimate letting go will be when there is nothing to “let go” of, where it’s not anger or even indifference but a blank slate, an empty space filled with something new.

meme me

from Julian Sanchez

1. I was born prematurely at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital in NYC at 26 weeks and weighed just under 2 pounds. I would've been a Pisces had I been born February 21, 1976, instead of my Scorpio self, birthday November 10, 1975.

2. I sleep with my baby blanket, that is now mostly torn to shreds, but I adore it anyway, and a huge Hello Kitty pillow.

3. I was afraid to pluck my eyebrows until age 29.

4. I once registered as a Republican, in college, so that I could vote for one of my political science professors, who was running for a state office.

5. In college, I was totally anti-pornography and my name even appears as a supporter on the late Andrea Dworkin's website. Who knew that only a few years later I would pose nude for On Our Backs magazine?

Will tag people later.

January 17th is Erotic Memoir Night at In The Flesh

IN THE FLESH EROTIC READING SERIES
EROTIC MEMOIR NIGHT
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 17 at 8 PM
AT HAPPY ENDING LOUNGE, 302 BROOME STREET, NYC
(B/D to Grand, J/M/Z to Bowery, F to Delancey, http://www.happyendinglounge.com)
Admission: Free
Happy Ending Lounge: 212-334-9676
http://inthefleshreadingseries.blogspot.com


In The Flesh ushers in 2007 with true stories from erotic memoirists, who dish about everything from being a sex columnist to online dating, indulging in fine food and fine sex, BDSM relationships, loving a transgendered partner, dating as a single mom, and more. With Marty Beckerman (Generation S.L.U.T.), Helen Boyd (My Husband Betty, She’s Not the Man I Married), Ron Geraci (The Bachelor Chronicles), Gael Greene (Insatiable), Rachel Sarah (Single Mom Seeking), Susan Shapiro (Secrets of a Fix-Up Fanatic, Lighting Up, Five Men Who Broke My Heart), Grant Stoddard (Working Stiff), Virginia Vitzthum (I Love You, Let’s Meet), and Lauren Wissot (Under My Master’s Wings), along with host Rachel Kramer Bussel. Authors’ books will be available for sale from Mobile Libris. Free candy and mini cupcakes will be served.

In the Flesh is a monthly reading series hosted at the appropriately named Happy Ending Lounge, and features the city's best erotic writers sharing stories to get you hot and bothered, hosted and curated by Village Voice sex columnist and acclaimed erotic writer and editor Rachel Kramer Bussel. From erotic poetry to down and dirty smut, these authors get naked on the page and will make you lust after them and their words. Since its debut in October 2005, In the Flesh has featured such authors as Andy Horwitz, Lily Burana, Jessica Cutler, Polly Frost, Maxim Jakubowski, Emily Scarlet Kramer of CAKE, Edith Layton, M.J. Rose, Lauren Sanders, Danyel Smith, Cecilia Tan, Carol Taylor, and many others. The series has gotten press attention from Escape (Hong Kong), The L Magazine, New York Magazine, Philadelphia City Paper, Gothamist, Nerve.com and Wonkette. This is not Amanda Stern’s Happy Ending Reading Series.

Marty Beckerman is the 23-year-old Alaskan author of Generation S.L.U.T. (MTV Books) and America's Sexxxiest Young Journalist. He has written for Playboy and New York Press, and interviewed Hunter S. Thompson for Ain't It Cool News. Beckerman flirted with the Republican Party after a feminist broke his heart in college, but concluded that Puritanical fascism is incompatible with his status as a Luscious Sex Lord and Generational Voice of Freedom. He lives in Washington, D.C.
www.martybeckerman.com

Helen Boyd is the author of My Husband Betty, which was a finalist for a Lambda Literary Award. Her next book, She's Not the Man I Married, will be published by Seal Press in March. Her writes about gender and trans issue for her blog (en)gender which can be found online at www.myhusbandbetty.com. She lives with her partner Betty, in Brooklyn, New York.

Rachel Kramer Bussel is Senior Editor at Penthouse Variations, writes the Lusty Lady column for The Village Voice, and conducts interviews for Gothamist.com and Mediabistro.com. Her erotic stories have been published in over 80 anthologies, including Best American Erotica 2004 and 2006, and she’s edited or co-edited 13 erotica anthologies, most recently Caught Looking: Erotic Tales of Voyeurs and Exhibitionists and Naughty Spanking Stories from A to Z 2. Rachel has also written for AVN, Bust, Cosmo UK, Metro, New York Post, Punk Planet, Time Out New York and Velvetpark.
www.rachelkramerbussel.com

Ron Geraci is a writer living in New York. The Bachelor Chronicles is his first book. He writes on relationship topics for several magazines and conducts regular seminars on online dating.
www.rongeraci.com

Gael Greene was New York magazine's Insatiable Critic for 32 years and continues to write a weekly restaurant column. She is the author of seven books⎯her two erotic novels, Blue Skies, No Candy and Dr. Love were both NY Times best sellers. Delicious Sex was a guide for Women and Men Who Want to Love Them Better. Her memoir Insatiable: Tales from a Life of Delicious Excess tells how America fell in love with food, what she ate at the revolution and what she did between meals. With the great food guru James Beard, Greene co-founded Citymeals-on-Wheels to bring weekend and holiday meals to the city's homebound elderly. On its 25th birthday this Christmas, Citymeals delivered its 32nd millionth meal.

Rachel Sarah’s Single Mom Seeking: Play Dates, Blind Dates, and Other Dispatches from the Dating World, was published in November 2006. She is the romance columnist for San Francisco's j the Jewish news weekly of Northern California and her column "Single Mom Seeking," appears on Literary Mama. Rachel's writing has also appeared in Family Circle, Parenting, Tango, Ms., BabyCenter and Christian Science Monitor.
www.singlemomseeking.com

Susan Shapiro's work has appeared in the New York Times Magazine, Los Angeles Times and Washington Post. She's the co-editor of Food for the Soul and author of Secrets of a Fix-Up Fanatic, Lighting Up and Five Men Who Broke My Heart, optioned for a movie by Paramount Pictures. Her book Only As Good As Your Word will be published in late 2007. She lives with her husband in Greenwich Village and has taught writing at N.Y.U., the New School and Mediabistro.
www.susanshapiro.net

At twenty-one, perennial virgin Grant Stoddard came to the United States in pursuit of true love. After eighteen months of couch-surfing and heartbreak, he stumbled into a job as New York's most intrepid sex columnist, despite having little experience in either sex or writing. His first book, Working Stiff: The Misadventures of an Accidental Sexpert, will be published in January 2007 and was optioned for film by Paramount Vantage. He lives in New York City.
www.grantstoddard.com

Virginia Vitzthum has written for salon.com, The Village Voice, Ms., Elle, and other publications. She has also written a play and a screenplay. Her first book, I Love You, Let's Meet: Adventures in Online Dating, will be published in February 2007.
http://virginiavitzthum.com

Lauren Wissot describes herself as an undercover agent in the mainstream world, a gay boy born into female form. She is a filmmaker, film journalist, screenwriter, and music and film critic living in Manhattan. Her sex memoir Under My Master’s Wings (Nexus Books) details her time spent as the personal slave to a gay-for-pay stripper.

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Wednesday, December 20, 2006

In The Flesh press

A sampling:

Take these sexy tales home and let your imaginations loose during your own read-along for two while you and your partner share your wildest sexual fantasies. This is one event that will literally knock your socks off.” ⎯ Dr. Ruth

“Writers picked by Village Voice sex columnist Rachel Kramer Bussel keep the audience hot and bothered via fetish fantasias, true confessions, and erotic memoirs.” ⎯ New York magazine

“In The Flesh lures its audience with the promise of free cupcakes and tantalizing wordage. Comedians, sex columnists, lesbian erotica editors, adult stars and more confess their raunchiest, raciest, most rocking-est bedroom escapades.” ⎯ Philadelphia City Paper

“We're sure Bussel will only be satisfied if you come again and again.” ⎯ Flavorpill

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And now I'm gonna cry from the cuteness

Mr. Hugo Holland, adorable baby boy, son of Susie Felber and Ed Holland, as seen in the New York Observer

And check out Elisabeth Eaves's "Baby Frankenstein" article at Forbes (I'm assuming she's the same Elisabeth Eaves who wrote Bare: The Naked Truth About Stripping, but am not 100% sure)

(Sorry to anyone coming here from Fleshbot looking for smut - you've gotta dig around a bit for that these days, though I'll try to post something semi-fleshy or just come out to In The Flesh tonight to hear the dirty words live)

My new favorite blog: Girl's Gone Child

This luxurious and rare three-day weekend I plan to read the entirety of my new favorite blog, Girl's Gone Child. That woman can WRITE. I mean, she blows me away and has brought tears to my eyes and made me realize the kind of writing I truly want to do. Honest, open, heartfelt. Maybe not on this blog and who knows for what venue, but it reminded me again why I love writing. And that I want to be a mom, not that I needed reminding, but it's good for me to see that it is possible, even for someone like me. Sometimes I just feel like I've boxed myself into a corner writingwise, and while I still have lots of plans with erotica and Sexual Freedom for All, I never want that to be all I can do or all that I think I'm capable of. I guess I'm greedy and I want it all, and these kick-ass mommy and daddy bloggers show me a way out, a way to be real and honest and true and sexy and still be a good parent. I know I have a ways to go but I feel like I am trying to move beyond the little niche I've somehow created that too often feels like a noose. I love it, don't get me wrong, I just don't want to ever settle whether it's relationships or writing. I feel like I found this blog just when I needed to be reminded about authenticity and emotion and everything I love about writing.

This post, "On Past and Present Futures," really wowed me:

I said I love you to everyone who needed to be loved but did I love them? Of course not. I loved saying so. I loved that my love was enough to make a difference, at least until morning. I loved that my words could be an easy fix, could numb the pain. Fix a moment. Fix an hour. Fix a life. I loved that I could be the strong one, even though I was falling apart. I felt like I was worth something. I was alive.

Rebecca also now writes Babble's "Straight From the Bottle" column.

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Tuesday, December 19, 2006

dazzling


IMG_2924
Originally uploaded by honeyrider.
and I don't think it's just the hair color. It's the energy. Last Thursday at Whole Foods, before we invaded the comics panel and the reggae party. Taken by Julie Staub

Dr. Ruth!

Ummm...Dr. Ruth is recommending In The Flesh! WOW WOW WOW.

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We want your original cupcake recipes!



We are working on a Cupcakes Take the Cake book proposal, and could use your help! We want to include some fabulous recipes to spice up our other cupcake material. If you have a super duper original recipe that we could reprint in our book (with credit given to you), please get in touch with us at cupcakestakethecake at yahoo.com with full recipe, notes, name/credit, and any other relevant information, by December 31st. If you have any questions, you can contact us at that address; we will let you know as we progress if we plan to include your recipe in our proposal. (At this time, we do not plan to renumerate recipe providers, but we will be able to provide you with a free copy of the book when it comes out, but right now this is all in the planning stages, though we think it'll be a fabulous book!) Thank you and Happy Holidays!



Cupcakes by my fellow cupcakes blogger Allison

Monday, December 18, 2006

Got a Minute? anthology in March

Okay, I am a little excited (and motivated to finish the umpteen overdue erotica stories I have somewhere in my files) about this anthology that the fabulous Alison Tyler has edited:



My stories "Hired Hunk" and "The Perfect Season" will be in this book. And now I will be proofing He's on Top and She's on Top, both of which I really am excited about and can't wait to see them on the bookstore shelves.

Stephanie Klein's Moose: A Memoir of Fat Camp on Amazon and no Kevin Keck at ITF



Surprised I haven't seen more about this upcoming Regan book - Stephanie Klein's second memoir, Moose: A Memoir of Fat Camp, which Amazon is listing with a June 1st release date.

She also just gave birth to twin preemies, Abigail and Lucas. I was a preemie, just slightly tinier than her little ones, and I remember looking through the baby book and being horrified. I don't look like a human yet, and I always wanted to know how they could love me like that, all skinny and scrawny and see-though. Now, I get it, completely.

Speaking of which, I wish I had a child that prevented me from doing stupid readings. Not that my reading is stupid, but honestly, part of me is so over all of this stuff. It just seems so pointless sometimes, even though I love them when they're over and that day-of panic kindof fuels me. I just cannot act like I really care about it when my life feels like it's just drifting along into nothingness. I am getting antsy to get far away from New York and start over. I can't, not yet, not till that check comes in, and probably I'd wither and die somewhere else, but maybe, for once, running away and starting afresh would be the answer. In the meantime I have to find a way to make it through, to hide away from the incessant social madness that I'm just not equipped to handle right now. I miss the solidity of writing, thinking, working. I hate the way my brain's been total mush and I've talked myself out of every query, every attempt, every word before I even get it down.

All this to say, I hope you will still come to In The Flesh on Wednesday even though no, Kevin Keck cannot make it, because he's on daddy duty. (Check out his awesome essay about being a dad to twin girls, as well as Lisa Carver's meditation on watching Bring It On! with her 4-year-old, both at Babble.com.) At this moment, I wish I could trade places, could be the one bowing out of truly meaningless events because I have something more important to do. I'm trying to figure out a way to make writing feel meaningful again. I often feel like I've boxed myself into a corner and I envy the anonymity and freedom everyone else seems to have. I feel doomed to fail because I've been too open, too honest, too whatever it is that had led me here. I know, in all honesty, that I cannot be anyone but myself, but sometimes I hate that so much. I hate who I've become or let myself become, hate that I cannot be better, purer, stronger. I can only try and do my best, and lately, I've been doing my worst. I know it and it all came to a head this weekend when I almost, for a second, tossed the contract in the trash. I think I started to feel like if S. rejected me, then that was all I was worth. That no matter how hard I tried or could try in the future, I would still be a failure, so why even bother? Why take money I don't deserve, why try when I'm probably doomed to fail? I know that I'm incredibly lucky, and that's part of the problem. If I knew it was for real, if I knew I was meant to be on this path, I'd believe in it a lot more. Doing Urban Erotika helped restore my faith quite a bit; that crowd was so with us onstage, so in the story, and the performers. WOW. It was one of the best readings I've ever attended or performed at.

Finally, yesterday, I started to get a glimmer of that urge to write. Started some submissions for Zane's anthologies that part of me thinks won't ever make it in, and part of me wants to at least try, needs the push, the challenge. I get scared when too many people are interested, are looking, expect things of me. I don't really want to be the girl with sex furniture adding clutter to her apartment. I don't often want to be any of the things that I am, but I can't turn back the clock and I don't want to go back to being a typist. It's not that I don't love working with words, I just don't love all the baggage that seems to come with it, the judgments and stereotypes, including my own. I hate having to apologize for what I do, for feeling so less than, for still wanting to be a "real writer." I am starting a new journal with my goals of '07, which are largely the same as the ones I've had for what feels like forever. But I will use it to record some of the process so I don't forget the triumphs too, even if they're just as rare as getting a few good sentences down. Trying to turn this movie-like surreality into fiction is probably one of the greatest challenges I've ever faced, especially because I'm not really a fiction writer. But I have to learn sometime, and I'm finally ready to dig it, and welcome the chance to be someone else for a little while. I am also probably getting a new laptop, a Mac this time, as my Dell is dying and I don't feel like fixing it and don't know how. That'll have to by my baby for now, until until until I get to join the big kids.

In The Flesh on Wednesday!

We've had some lineup changes but it's still going to be fabulous, candy-cane- and cupcake-filled, and totally dirty this Wednesday. Styleaholics.com will be filming the readers for an upcoming show and you have a chance to win a copy of Dr. Sketchy's Rainy Day Colouring Book by the luscious, surely sexily-clad Molly Crabapple. I think it should be listed in this week's New Yorker too but I will have to double check.

I'm also looking for readers for the March 21st In The Flesh - published authors only, please send me a short bio, URL if you have one, and a short (10 minutes' worth) excerpt you'd want to read. I will get back to you by January 15th. I'm especially looking for fiction that has erotic elements/sex scenes (speaking of which, I plan to read my galley of Dana Vachon's Mergers and Acquisitions over the holidays - I'm told there's a whole chapter full of sex!). Send an email with "In The Flesh" in the subject line to rachelkb at gmail.com - Thank you!

IN THE FLESH EROTIC READING SERIES
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 20 at 8 PM
AT HAPPY ENDING LOUNGE, 302 BROOME STREET (AT FORSYTH), NYC
(B/D to Grand, J/M/Z to Bowery, F to Delancey or F/V to 2nd Avenue, http://www.happyendinglounge.com)
Admission: Free
Happy Ending Lounge: 212-334-9676
http://inthefleshreadingseries.blogspot.com


Ring your jingle bells and get warm and cozy at December’s In The Flesh, featuring holiday erotica and much more. With Abiola Abrams (BET’s The Best Shorts), L. Elise Bland (Best American Erotica 2006 contributor), Scott Bowen (The Midnight Fish), Stan Kent (Shoe Leather series, Hustler Hollywood), Lisa Beth Kovetz (The Tuesday Erotica Club), Karen Moulding (Unbox, The Untrainable Heart), Jean Roberta (Best Lesbian Erotica contributor), and host Rachel Kramer Bussel. Candy canes and cupcakes will be served, and erotic books, including The Merry XXXMas Book of Erotica, will be given away as door prizes.

In the Flesh is a monthly reading series hosted at the appropriately named Happy Ending Lounge, and features the city's best erotic writers sharing stories to get you hot and bothered, hosted and curated by Village Voice sex columnist and acclaimed erotic writer and editor Rachel Kramer Bussel. From erotic poetry to down and dirty smut, these authors get naked on the page and will make you lust after them and their words. Future themed nights include Erotic Memoirs (January 2007) and True Sex Confessions (April 2007). Since its debut in October 2005, In the Flesh has featured such authors as Andy Horwitz, Jessica Cutler, Polly Frost, Maxim Jakubowski, Josh Kilmer-Purcell, Emily Scarlet Kramer of CAKE, Edith Layton, Tsaurah Litzky, M.J. Rose, Lauren Sanders, Danyel Smith, Cecilia Tan, Carol Taylor, and many others. The series has gotten press attention from Escape (Hong Kong), The L Magazine, New York magazine, Philadelphia City Paper, Gothamist, Nerve.com and Wonkette. This is NOT Amanda Stern’s Happy Ending Reading Series.

For more information, please contact In The Flesh host and curator Rachel Kramer Bussel at rachelkramerbussel at gmail.com

Rachel Kramer Bussel is a New York City-based author and editor. She is Senior Editor at Penthouse Variations, writes the Lusty Lady column for The Village Voice, and conducts interviews for Gothamist.com and Mediabistro.com. Her erotic stories have appeared in over 80 anthologies, including Best American Erotica 2004 and 2006, and she’s edited her own collections, including Naughty Spanking Stories from A to Z 1 and 2, Up All Night, First-Timers, Glamour Girls, Ultimate Undies, Sexiest Soles, Secret Slaves: Erotic Stories of Bondage, and Caught Looking: Erotic Tales of Voyeurs and Exhibitionists. Rachel has also written for AVN, Bust, Cosmo UK, Metro, New York Post, Punk Planet, Time Out New York and Velvetpark.
www.rachelkramerbussel.com

Writer-director Abiola Abrams uses movies and motivation to empower women emotionally, politically and sexually under an initiative called The Goddess Factory. She is the host of BET’s independent film series The Best Shorts and her fiction writings will be featured in activist-playwright Eve Ensler’s 2006 anthology entitled Until the Violence Stops. Her first novel will be published by Simon & Schuster in 2007. Abrams is also the creator of the recent Until the Violence Stops: NYC Women’s Film Festival in association with Eve Ensler’s V-Day. In addition, Abrams is currently creating a line of urban feminist erotic films produced by Candida Royalle.
www.thegoddessfactory.com

L. Elise Bland has worked as a stripper, a dominatrix, a fetish model, an erotic actress, and finally, a sex educator. Along the way, she started writing erotica inspired by her kinky adventures. Her most recent publications include Naughty Spanking Stories from A to Z 2 (Pretty Things Press), Best American Erotica 2006 (Fireside/Touchstone), and First-Timers: True Stories of Lesbian Awakening (Alyson). In her free time, Elise indulges in decadent gourmet cuisine and practices the fine art of Middle Eastern dance.
www.lelisebland.com

Scott Bowen works as a book editor and freelance journalist. His short story collection, The Midnight Fish, was published in 2001. After living in Brooklyn for ten years, he currently writes and lives in Connecticut.

Stan Kent is a chameleon hair colored former nightclub owning rocket scientist author of erotic novels. Stan has penned nine original, unique and very naughty works including the Shoe Leather series. Selections from his books have been featured in the Best of Erotic Writing Blue Moon collections. Stan has hosted an erotic talk show night at Hustler Hollywood for the last five years. The Los Angeles Times described his monthly performances as “combination moderator and lion tamer.” To see samples of his works and his latest hair colors, visit Stan at www.StanKent.com.

Lisa Beth Kovetz is an award winning writer and producer. Her first novel The Tuesday Erotica Club was published by Sourcebooks, Inc. in April ’06 and translated into 14 languages. Film rights have been optioned by James Middleton and Steven Gary Banks. With her company Flying South Productions, Kovetz created the Jazz Baby line of audio CDs presenting 36 classic nursery rhymes set to jazz. Her play “David’s Balls” appeared at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, has been translated into Romanian for the Pearl of the Carpethians Theater.
www.lisabethkovetz.com

Karen Moulding is a born-again virgin with no impure thoughts of any kind, but she has agreed to read at this series because she thinks Rachel is a really nice person. Karen has written several novels, including The Naked Shopper, Unbox, and The Untrainable Heart. Her poetry and fiction have appeared in the anthology Woman in the Window, The Piedmont Review, and Spectrum, and she has been a Fellow several times at the Virginia Center for Creative Arts. She has both an M.F.A. in Fiction and a J.D. from Columbia, and is author of the biannually-updated legal treatise, Sexual Orientation and the Law, even though she no longer practices law, and does not believe in sexual orientation.

Jean Roberta teaches English at a Canadian prairie university, and writes in several genres. Her\non-fiction has appeared in Girlfriends magazine and Harrington Lesbian Literary Quarterly. Her erotic stories have been published in approximately fifty print anthologies on both sides of the Atlantic, including Best Women's Erotica (2000, 2003, 2005, 2006), Best New Erotica 6, Trans Figures: Transgender Erotica, Sexiest Soles: Erotic Stories About Feet and Shoes, and Best Fantastic Erotica.

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Friday, December 15, 2006

Um, wow

From Publishers Marketplace:

HarperCollins announced at 7 this evening, "HARPERCOLLINS TERMINATES JUDITH REGAN."

The brief statement says that "Jane Friedman, President and CEO of HarperCollins Worldwide, today announced that Judith Regan's employment with HarperCollins has been terminated effective immediately. The REGAN publishing program and staff will continue as part of the HarperCollins General Books Group."


Gotta say, Regan has my initial vote on Best Book Title of 2007:

Are You There Vodka? It's Me, Chelsea by Chelsea Handler

Gift guiding

I've barely event started sending out cards, having fallen behind on that along with everything else, and haven't quite caught up on my shopping either but here are a few recommendations that I have either given or received or watched this year. More TK as I shop/remember.

For the sugar fiend in your life:



Waffle Cone body wash - need I say more?

For the dangly earring lover:



From Satya Jewelry, which now has an online store, and fabulous selection of yoga-inspired jewelry (whether you do yoga or not)

For the smart TV fan, Weeds Season 1:



For the riot grrrl in all of us, Willie Mae Rock Camp for Girls calendar: (they also have magnets, greeting cards, mugs, journals, and mousepads)



For the new mom or soon-to-be mom:

The First 1000 Days Baby Journal by Nikki McClure



For the babies:



These blocks by Rich Frog come in green, yellow, blue, and pink and are big, soft, and have a rattle inside. I have given out a bunch of them this past year and have heard many good reports from parents. I recommend Silly Goose Toys as a good place to shop for them.



Also, these big block books by Karen Katz are fabulously large, brightly-colored, and chewable.

For your hippie dad, The Quotable Sixties:

Tuesday 12/19 Is A Night of Big Boobs!


A Night of Big Boobs!
Originally uploaded by rkb1.
Click here for more details


For Immediate Release
Lux Killmore: Big Busted!
email: luxkillmore at gmail.com

Lux-Killmore Entertainment presents Big Busted!, an evening of chicks and flicks on December 19th @ 8pm at Galapagos Art Space.
Hooters, melons, fun bags, jugs or boobies. No matter what you call 'em, we love 'em and the bigger the better! This is sure to be a sold out night where all big bust enthusiasts can come together to celebrate the exaggerated female form. This bodacious evening not only features three great films that put the bosom front and center, but live performances by NYC's finest burlesque stars.
Lux Killmore presents
Big Busted
Tuesday, December 19th @ 8:00pm | Galapagos Art Space
Galapagos Art Space 70 N 6th Street, Williamsburg, Brooklyn |Admission: $10 | Full Bar
Three Films: Val Killmore's "Buxotic Beauty Murders"; (RT 30mins),World Famous *Bob*'s "You'd Be Prettier if you Smiled": (RT 3mins) and "Pervert"; (2005, RT 81 mins)
Live Burlesque Performances by: World Famous *Bob*, Velocity Chyaldd, Dottie Lux, Lady Rigel and Dirty Martini.

Christmas Breastacular tonight!


rockettes email bigger
Originally uploaded by rkb1.
Or, part 1 of "Breasts! Breasts! Breasts!"

There will be free holiday punch and Ho Hos!
There might even be elves. Maybe.

Starring
Adira Amram
Katherine Bryant
Shayna Ferm
Kimmy Gatewood
Becky Yamamoto

The Pit is located at
154 W 29th St (btwn 6th and 7th)
2nd Floor

New Lusty Lady column on sexy knitting

Full report this weekend on the comics panel last night and the most glorious and sunny day I've had in a while, but for now, my latest Village Voice column on sexy knitting, "Kinky Knitknacks," is up. It looks at the trend, along with three new books, Nikol Lohr's Naughty Needles, Jennifer Stafford's DomiKNITrix and Ashley Paige's Sexy Little Knits. They got 3 photos in there too, which is fabulous, but I highly recommend all the photos in Naughty Needles. I swooned over the full-color finished version - fishnets, schoolgirls, cavegirls in bikinis, a girl with an eye patch and a knife in her mouth! Totally hot, whether you're a knitter or not!

And proving that great minds think alike, Violet Blue also writes about sexy knitting and interviews Nikol Lohr for her San Francisco Chronicle Open Source Sex column!

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Thursday, December 14, 2006

SXSW, baby!

It's official! I'm speaking at SXSW on a panel about blogging and dating. Details TK.

Great Caught Looking review at Cleansheets

William Dean reviews Caught Looking: Erotic Tales of Voyeurs and Exhibitionists at Cleansheets:

At least in theory, if not actual practice, we all house a little voyeurism and a bit of exhibitionism. Also, at least in theory, everybody is a star, and, considering the prevalence of skin and desire on the World Wide Web, it often turns out we're wanna-be porn stars at that.

Some do it with style, some with crudity, but the fact is, we all do it, from the pseudo-shy to the blatant "look at me!" types. Now, for our erotic reading pleasure, editors Alison Tyler and Rachel Kramer Bussel collect an anthology dedicated to the proposition that we all like to look at naked people and, seemingly as often, we like to be the naked people others look at.

Caught Looking, by Cleis Press, presents twenty tales of the tawdry, torrid, and tantalizing adventures of voyeurs and exhibitionists.

...If you're looking for some heady sensuality and hot contemporary erotica, get
Caught Looking. Leave it out on your coffee table, on the floor by your bedside, somewhere prominent and easily peeked at. Who knows? It might just lead to a fantasy come true.

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

Spanking letters to the Voice

Village Voice Letters to the Editor



It's in their jeans

Re Rachel Kramer Bussel's "Spanker's Delight" [November 22–28]: Those who have been in the scene for most of their adult life have a true understanding that it is a part of their very being. They are born with the BDSM gene and can never purge it from their system. It defines who they really are, and for most it is their secret world, as they search out others who understand what they must live with. Pleasure-pain is a craving and an addiction, in all its many forms. It's not a game for a weekend party. For serious individuals, they immerse totally into the head space of their calling. It's like breathing; they can't do without it, whether they are "out" or not.

Dominick Epock

Manhattan

Thanks for printing the article on spanking, a subject close to my heart. I do not know exactly how many people are into this, but I have a feeling it's more than we know.

Tim Crenshaw

Waldport, Oregon