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.