Email: rachelkramerbussel at gmail.com



 

Lusty Lady

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

Saturday, December 31, 2011

So long, 2011

I'm immersed in words, excited about a big day/month at Cupcakes Take the Cake, and looking forward to 2012. This year has come full circle (cue the Suzanne Vega), and I'm grateful to be in an infinitely better space than I was a year ago. I never want to repeat the lowest moments of this year, yet I have to grapple with and learn from them so I'm not doomed to repeat them. 2011 grew me up in some vital ways, and I'm truly grateful for that. I had to think long and hard about what I want, what I don't, what (and who) I covet and why, about failure and success, both of which I experienced, about love and loss and faith and courage and ambition. I have an endless amount left to learn, but I am doing the daily work of making the best choices, of treating others as I'd wish to be treated, of living by the Serenity Prayer, though I'm still stubborn as hell about the things I can't change. So be it. HAPPY NEW YEAR, everyone!

A friend's awesome holiday card (it says "cause we're having a blast!" on the other side, along with adorable photos)



Me looking at the bright side:



As seen in the window of Pas de Deux:



And the last two cupcakes I ate in 2011; click here for my review!



Friday, December 30, 2011

Yay! My super professional Best Sex Writing 2012 book trailer is here

Please keep your fingers crossed that this Best Sex Writing 2012 it passes the approval of Amazon; it's been a huge goal of mine to get one of my book trailers embedded there and I'm 99% sure that will help with sales, but time and luck will tell. I'm so grateful for the chance to have had this shot in a professional studio for free. Bigtime grateful. Enjoy!





Order Best Sex Writing 2012:

Amazon

Kindle (out January 10th - pre-order now)

BN.com

Nook (out January 17th - pre-order now)

Powell's

Books-a-Million

IndieBound (find your local independent bookstore

Cleis Press

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I'm on Goodreads

fyi, having trouble with their widget but you can add me on Goodreads here.

Thursday, December 29, 2011

"Is Casual Sex Good for You?"

That's the question I ask and somewhat answer in my latest SexIs Magazine column. And yes, I've gotten lots of feedback on the photo Dave Naz took of me below. I am not that photo's biggest fan, not because of Dave's photography, because of my own self-consciousness. Hoping to take a sexy photo from the front soon so I can switch it out.

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Slightly haunted


title inspired by the wonderful Lynn Miles, whose new album Fall for Beauty I highly recommend

I had a dream the other night, and what I can tell you is that the least surreal part of it was that in the dream I was having a conversation with a dead man (he wasn't dead in the dream). When he was alive, I cannot think of any possible scenario where I'd be sitting in with a friend interviewing him in a living room, but that's what happened in the dream. Then I had an ethical dilemma, did the right thing, and faced an even more wrenching emotional dilemma. I held my phone tightly in my hand and was so immersed in that decision that when I woke up because my neighbor was storming into their apartment, for a few seconds, I was still in that foggy dreamlike state. I thought I still had to make that decision: to call or not to call? I know that sounds vague, but that's the best I can do. I can tell you that the dream was a giant reminder of a lot of things that have been haunting me this year, my subconscious' way of saying: Don't let go, don't let go, don't let go. Oh, subconscious, if you only knew how little I've let go, you wouldn't need to send me such an insane, easily decipherable reminder, like a child's jigsaw puzzle of, say, 24 pieces, when I'm more of a 1,000-word piece puzzle type.

This is a weird time for me, both the wrapping up of a year that I'm in some ways very ready to leave behind, but also am clutching to, trying to rectify mistakes, make amends, catch up on work and all the goals I had for this year that I have to admit are not going to be done before January 1st. I'm excited about so many new possibilities next year offers, starting with just the idea of a clean slate. But a clean slate is not the same as a blank slate. I'm entering it with everything I've been and done, but I am trying, by any means necessary, really, to use that history to help me navigate the present and future, rather than keep me stuck in that past.

I don't always want to be the girl who is so immersed in one way of thinking, especially to the point that I can't step back, outside myself, and try to see life from someone else's point of view. That has been a huge challenge this year, but I am working on it. Charlotte Kasl writes in If The Buddha Got Stuck, in a chapter called "Notice the Stories You Tell Yourself:"

You can also notice how your stories can stop you from feeling joy or happiness. Many people get scared at the fullness and expansiveness of joy and try to push it away by jumping out of the experience and into a story. Instead of feeling awe at a glorious sunset, they distance themselves with a torrent of words or, even more removed, they bring up some problem they are having, or suddenly say, "Time to go now." Any form of strong energy, be it joy or sorrow, has the potential to shake loose parts of us that are hiding. It's like a big wind blowing through us. To get unstuck is to invite the wind in.


I haven't been the best about recognizing that a lot of the things I told myself this year, last year, maybe my whole life, were not necessarily true. They felt true, so I thought they were. Sometimes I wanted them to be true, wanted them so badly I was willing to ignore any evidence to the contrary. I catastrophize and I also do the opposite (is there a word for way too positive thinking?) and have trouble recognizing reality. When I do, especially the last week or two, I've been shocked at how when someone asks me how I'm doing I can actually say, "Good." And it has nothing to do with things or money or, for the most part, other people. Sometimes it's literally just the sun making its way through my mostly bare windows, or splashing down the street as I walk from my deli to my coffeeshop (I'm pretty sure that since I go to each almost every day and almost all the staff know me by sight, I can claim possession of them). Sometimes it's geeking out when I get to meet a little kid who melts my heart in approximately .01 seconds. Sometimes it's just sheer fucking gratitude, for not having to haul myself through the MTA every day. I always thought I was so grateful to live in New York for its public transportation, and while I am, this is the first time in ages that I haven't been utterly dependent on the subway, haven't had to race the clock, have been able to find my own rhythms, which sometimes means making awesome discoveries late at night.

Last week I got this Modern Love rejection and my first thought was not "That sucks" but "Ooooh, I am really proud of that essay, let me send it out to another editor." I was almost excited. It was surprising and awesome. Am I still impatient? Of course. I want to know right this second whether that editor likes it, or if I should send it elsewhere. I'm rarely that into something I write; usually I'm mentally on to the next thing, even while in the middle of one thing. It's part of what I'm trying to work through; if you can afford it, I recommend Vyvanse for cutting through that overthinking, but I don't have that luxury right now. My point was, though, that that rejection didn't send me into the "you suck" mindset it normally would.

Life is up and down; I'm up and down. I can't get too complacent, because the moment I do, I'm in trouble. So, yes, I may find myself when, reading Holly Cupala's excellent YA novel Don't Breathe a Word, immersed in the story, and then not. I see "Capitol Hill" and I'm in Capitol Hill, on my last trip there, so fully that I have to stop reading for a moment to process that. I don't know even what to wish for: to be someone who keeps reading? Who doesn't remember? Who smiles and nods, or medicates herself into a state of complete equilibrium so nothing can get past it?

I'm not gonna lie: I'm getting out of town for a little while next month partly because winter is not my ideal time of year. I'm already cold, and yes, I am going to Milwaukee in February (9th-12th, more on that soon), but it's a strategically planned trip to the beach, a little escape that I have high hopes for (but not opposite-of-catastrophizing-my-life-will-change-completely hopes). I got this vision in my head of me on a beach in my purple bathing suit, no phone, no distractions, just time and warmth. It sounded flighty and fantastical and then I realized I could make it happen and no matter how much transforming I do or don't do, I'm proud that I was able to make it happen. It's both an escape and an escapade. But you can't live your life in search of permanent escape. Okay, you totally can, and plenty of people do, but I don't want to be one of them. Instead of fixating on the transformation of escapism, I'm trying to be as present as I can possibly be, in the haunting moments, the mundane ones, and the blissful ones.

Monday, December 26, 2011

Food, wine, haiku and single ladies on January 5th!

Join me, along with Falling for Me author Anna David and Haiku for the Single Girl author Beth Griffenhagen next Thursday, January 5th at WORD, 126 Franklin Street, Greenpoint, Brooklyn (one of my favorite bookstores!).

My review of Unwasted: My Lush Sobriety by Sacha Z. Scoblic

One of my favorite books I read in 2011 was Unwasted: My Lush Sobriety! Also one of the first I purchased for my Nook. I read it in pieces, and finally finished it last night. I cried. In a good/moving way.



My review:

It would be almost impossible to tell her story of the first year without alcohol without sharing what alcohol meant in her life, and Scoblic manages to weave the two together beautifully in this moving, sometimes funny, sometimes sobering (pun intended) memoir. She writes about how she relied on alcohol in multiple ways, and that when she took that crutch away, she was left with a lot of assumptions, about 12-step programs, about faith, about relapsing, that she had to reexamine. One of the most crucial parts, one that I related to, was the idea that faith and prayer are not just for believers. She writes about praying even though she doesn’t actual believe, or isn’t sure that she does, and that is a concept that was utterly new for me. From Unwasted: “I have found moments of prayer, as I snuggle into my white bed in my deep blue bedroom—like a woman floating on her own moon—when I get grateful about the man next to me, my little pooch, my groovy neighborhood, and our good health and lives, in which I can rediscover a sense of adventure about life and I can touch a small and wonder-filled current inside of me.” This concept permeates the book.

She includes extended fantasies about alternate worlds, from aliens to celebrities, where she might be “required” to drink, and these relapse fantasies, while fantastical, lend an important reality to the book. Scoblic did not simply hop, skip and jump into sobriety. She does not make it sound simple or easy, and doesn’t gloss over the challenges of being at a heavy-drinking company retreat or at a party where her old ways can no longer guide her. Toward the end of the book, Scoblic writes, “Until sobriety, the idea that I was someone worthwhile and unique a priori had not occurred to me. And, as I looked toward the blank sober slate before me in the mirror, a thousand discarded personas on the floor, I began to sense that this one last transformation—that is, become myself, which is what everyone tells you to be from the start—was going to be an awful lot of fun. I was going to reinvent myself as me.” By the actual end, as she writes about training for a marathon, a lifelong goal, I will admit that I cried. Scoblic does not pretend to have all the answers, but her vision of community, of strength and support, for running and sobriety, is an antidote to the loneliness she explores in the rest of the book, the loneliness and fear that alcohol momentarily removed from her. Her journey in exploring those dark spaces and discovering how to fill the gaps left by alcohol is touching, and should help give insight into alcoholism from a very poignant, personal perspective.

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Sexy excerpts from my first 2012 anthology, Irresistible: Erotic Romance for Couples

Irresistible is my first anthology of 2012; isn't the cover HOT? Guess what? The inside is hot too, and if you click here you can read excerpts from all 16 stores.



If you like these free short story excerpts from Irresistible: Erotic Romance for Couples (click on the title to read the full introduction), please click "like" on Amazon and check out the entire book! Thank you.

As you can read, it's got everything from outdoor sex to BDSM to strip clubs to the military and more. If you’d like to review it on Amazon by February 28th (books go out mid-January), email irresistibleantho at gmail.com with “Amazon” in the subject line and your name, US mailing address and “Amazon” in the subject line. Fans of meatier stories will especially appreciate this book (I will not be reaching out to Mr. "there's no married couple erotica" cause I don't deal with haters, but he should totally read this book for lots and lots of married couples fucking). I usually opt for more stories at fewer pages but with this book I have 16 longer-than-usual stories, so for those who prefer more depth to their short stories, this book offers that, along with more depth to the emotional relationships. All the stories, as befitting the title, involve couples.

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Words to (try to) live by

People have asked me a lot since getting laid off, "What do you want to do?" The truth is, I love all the varied parts of my work, the fun and community of cupcake blogging, the learning from interviews, the enforced deadline and honor of getting to write a sex column, the introspection and politics from personal essays, the creativity of writing short stories and, back to community, the thrill of getting to publish and pay other people and put together books that are greater than the sum of their parts. I do enjoy the mania of book promotion, the having someone design postcards and mailing giant packages of them, the posting excerpts, the making videos, though plenty of times that feels like useless awful busywork, fake work, even, like something that "real" writers don't do, but I'm trying to train myself out of that way of thinking. I'm also learning that when you hate it is the time to quit, and the best thing I did last year was end In The Flesh when it became clear that I was in way over my head. I know that's an option if things reach that point with anything else I do, but I feel that my job now is to find the time, creativity and energy to make sure I meet my goals and commitments, and keep pushing myself to actually take the next step, as petrifying as that may be.

I love getting to edit sex diaries every week and all the worlds that have opened to me since I shucked the poor fit of law school and stepped into a career, or rather, leapt without knowing a damn thing, that fits much better. At the same time, I don't romanticize brokeness. I have major debt I'm trying to dig my way out of. I want to move past the status quo and reach higher. I'm most proud of pitching and striving to break into new venues this year. I love traveling and won't always have frequent flyer miles. I said last year I wouldn't do any more readings and because I'm desperate for all the hard work that went into Best Sex Writing 2012 to pay off, literally and figuratively, I'm trying to swing as many readings in as many stores as I'm blessed enough to host me.

So...who knows where 2012 will lead? Certainly not me. But I want to approach it with a healthier attitude, not one of lamenting all I haven't done or feeling utterly overwhelmed, but welcoming each day's blank slate and blank pages, ready to be filled. I know I'm extremely lucky, and I cannot afford to waste my time here on earth, however long I'm lucky to get. So this is, as always, a very selfish post to remind me to keep on keeping on, and to love my days at Gimme Coffee as much as my days in far-away places.

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Sunday, December 25, 2011

Cupcakes cupcakes cupcakes!

Head over to Cupcakes Take the Cake for lots and lots of holiday cupcakes! I'm so excited that 2012 will be the year of our amazing Cupcake Cruise (tickets are on sale now, and we'll have more details soon) and hopefully lots of amazing cupcakes.

Lesbian French fry flirting and rock star female dominance in my two new stories

I've got stories in two hot off the press Cleis Press anthologies: "French Fried," my Parisian lesbian French fry flirtation story (Fuck Yeah French Fries indeed!!!) in Best Lesbian Romance 2012, edited by Radclyffe, and "Rock Star Rewards," about a rockstar and her groupie plaything in One Night Only: Erotic Encounters, edited by Violet Blue. Check them out!





A big excerpt (also at PGW, woo-hoo!): Rock Star Rewards
by Rachel Kramer Bussel

Anyone who tells you that fame is the biggest perk of being a rock star is lying; sure, the high of being onstage, the rush of hearing your song on the radio, the fact that I never have to commute on a subway train at eight in the morning again. There’s the fact that I can dye my naturally red hair an even more fiery shade of red/orange/badass and get applauded, not sent to HR. There’s meeting celebrities, even going to the White House once, and travel galore, and knowing that every day I get to see my art not boxed up or hanging on a wall, but alive, being hummed or sung or danced to. I love entertaining people, love being able to take my thoughts and feelings and turn them into a rock song that goes beyond words. But best of all, I love the boys who love me back.

Okay, “love” is overstating the case. I hunger for the boys who lust after me; they’re men, really, but I like to call them boys, even to their faces, and they like it too. They, my groupies, are the biggest perks of the job, by far. The kind of fan a six-foot-one Amazonian tattooed screaming redhead lead singer (of my band Fiery) gets aren’t exactly the type who’ll object to anything. I once had a boy come backstage and told him I wanted my own personal tattooer to put my name on his ass. No sooner had I said it than this sweet young thing dropped his pants! Even I don’t have an on-call tattooer, and I wouldn’t have gone through with it anyway; I just wanted to see what he would do.

We tour about ten months of the year; I’ve chosen bandmates who like the itinerant lifestyle as much as I do. Two of them, Steffy and Craig, are actually in committed relationships, while Benny is like me, the kind of guy who just goes with the flow. We’re in a city one night, maybe two, and we don’t form attachments, except to each other. We’re not lovers, though we have been known to take a tumble on the rare night when there just aren’t any groupies to our liking or we want a warm body to curl up next to far from home. Usually, though, what happens is something like what happened tonight. Our gigs usually end around midnight, and then the real show starts. Sometimes while I’m onstage, I’ll roam my eyes over the audience, try to pick out a boy who just looks like he’d be the perfect fuck. You might think that I’m not discriminating, but that’s far from true. I have standards, especially because this guy’s only gonna get one shot to perform. You don’t want someone so insecure or uncertain that he shoots too soon or can’t get it up. I want a guy who’s turned on by my power, but not so turned on that he can’t access his own, if fucking is on my agenda.

If I do spot a candidate, I’ll have our roadie, Genius (his nickname for himself, but one that, with his voluminous store of random knowledge, we’ve had to concede is pretty accurate), go pull the guy aside, give him a backstage pass. Does that sound sleazy? Well, so be it. Nobody’s complaining. I look for boys who I can toss around my hotel room, who I can pick up, throw across the bed, maybe take over my lap and spank. You work up a lot of adrenaline, not to mention aggression, when you’re onstage, and even playing the shit out of my beloved electric guitar isn’t always enough to get it all out of me. Besides, the guitar won’t fuck me back. These boys will.

Sometimes I think I should’ve been born a guy; I’m told I talk like one, cuss like one, and even fuck like one, but I don’t wish I were a guy. I like being a loudmouthed, smartass wild girl. I like being unpredictable, and I love having a new specimen of manhood to play with every night.

There is a magic to getting to start over, to have a human body at your fingertips, waiting to be explored. Tonight, it was Jacob. He was twenty-five, but looked a few years younger. He had black stubble set against his pale skin, and was wearing a slightly worse for wear t-shirt of ours from five years go, along with black jeans that had seen better days, and black and silver sneakers. I cared more about the look on his face than the look of his clothes, and what I saw when Jacob stood before me was pure adoration, like he was ready to worship me in every way. He already was, in a sense, as I flung myself all over the stage, flitting my eyes back to him on occasion. He clearly hadn’t brought a girl to the show, and his eyes seemed to bore into me.

If I were looking for a soul mate, I, like other women, might have a whole checklist of things I wanted to know: job, pedigree, hobbies. But since all I wanted was some fun for the one night I was in town, a way to let off steam, to keep on seeing that worshipful face after I’d gotten off the stage, I didn’t care about all that. What I cared about was how looking at Jacob made me feel: sexy, hot, invincible. During sex, I like to feel the way I do onstage, like the ruler of my own mini-universe. When I winked at Jacob, I saw the small gesture make its way through him; he knew what it meant, he knew what I wanted. After so long in this business, I can spot my special submissives easily.

There was no band t-shirt that said, “I want to be ordered around and made to lick a powerful woman’s pussy.” There was no hairstyle that could convey, “My dick gets hard when a hot woman growls at me.” It wasn’t a fashion statement, for me or for them, but somehow, we found each other. Powered by the adrenaline rush of knowing I’d have a boy to test out the new red suede flogger I’d picked up at a sex shop that afternoon, I blazed my way through the set list and even added two songs to the encore.

“Hot damn!” Genius greeted us as we left the stage. “Someone’s got a fan.” He was onto me; he was always onto me, and not just because I’d pointed out Jacob earlier. Genius could spot these guys a mile away, too, and sometimes I was kind enough to let him play with the ones I didn’t want, if they swung that way. He knew, though, that my music was powered by sexual desire, and that I was hungry to continue that flow of energy.

“Should I go get him for you?” The others just looked at us and rolled their eyes. They didn’t quite share our groupie-spotting vision.

“Nah, make him wait a little while. Give him these to play with,” I said, reaching under my short skirt to take off my sweaty

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21 bondage erotica excerpts from Best Bondage Erotica 2012

Best Bondage Erotica 2012 makes a great gift for the kinky person in your life! This book also features bondage expert Midori's foreword! For that matter, so does Best Bondage Erotica 2011. Here's excerpts from all 21 stories in the book; maybe I'll read "The Weight" to you if I get a chance. One of my 2012 goals is to finally put the voice recorder I bought last year into action. If you like these excerpts, please pass on this link and click "like" on Amazon and spread the word. Thank you!



Order Best Bondage Erotica 2012 from:

Amazon

Kindle

Amazon UK print

Amazon UK Kindle

Barnes & Noble

Nook

Books-a-Million



Powell's

IndieBound (find your local independent bookstore)

iBooks

Google Play

Cleis Press

Melting Ice Shoshanna Evers

Taking the bowl containing the single ice cube into the living room, she sat on the couch and watched the ice. It hadn’t even begun to melt. How long would it take? Just the idea that it would be a while turned her on.

Because tonight, she was going to be handcuffed, unable to free herself, until the cube with the key in it melted. Her pussy clenched in anticipation.

While she waited for the handcuff key to freeze in the tray, she took the second key upstairs with the cuffs to practice.

She was so turned on that just walking made her clit rub against the seam in her pants, and she had to stop and take a deep, shaky breath.
Save it for later, she told herself.

A Night at the Opera Elizabeth Coldwell

“Remember I said I’d make sure you couldn’t misbehave tonight?” I asked. “Well, these beautiful gloves are designed to help me do just that. Hands behind your back.”

“I don’t want to,” Jonathan murmured, in a tone indicating the exact opposite.

“Now!” I snapped, the word perfectly in time with a dramatic burst from the brass section. Jonathan pulled his hands away from his cock, so rigid and enticing it took all my willpower not to forget the game and simply order him to fuck me.

The lack of resistance as I guided first one arm, then the other, into the gloves told me how much Jonathan was enjoying being placed in this bizarre predicament. Some submissives fight against the process of being tied up every step of the way, their pleading and struggles all part of the game. Others complain their bonds are too tight, too loose, too inexpertly tied, whining and goading until the only response is to gag them and silence their irritating attempts to top from below. The easiest to deal with are those who embrace their restraint wholeheartedly, permitting themselves to give up all responsibility and handing the administration of their pleasure to their partner. Jonathan falls into that latter camp, letting me mold and twist him into whatever position I desire without complaint.


Darlene’s Dilemma Andrea Dale

Darlene had surreptitiously squirmed her way through breakfast, trying to no avail to find a comfortable position on the chair. She was stubborn enough to not want to admit there was no comfortable way of sitting in public when there was a butt plug buried in your ass.

Of course, the wriggling around made it worse, made her more aware of the silicone toy inside her. It wasn’t terribly big⎯she wasn’t into harming delicate tissue⎯but it was
there, and it brought a flush to her face anytime Jaden or Sienna lubed it up and told her to bend over.

They allowed her to wear panties to breakfast, because they had a respect for the hotel’s antique chairs and didn’t want her staining the cushion.

Sienna was wearing a plug, too, but somehow she managed to look completely unconcerned and entirely comfortable. She didn’t find it as deliciously humiliating as Darlene did.


Snow White A. R. Shannon

“Snow white, just the way I like it,” he said, caressing my bare buttocks. “Like a blank slate.”

I didn’t understand.

If he liked it blank and white as snow, what was I doing tied to this chair?

“I like the first mark best,” he said. “I like to make that first mark, and then I like to watch as you change colors under my hand.”

I could feel him reach down and pick up the leather glove he’d brought with him. He held it dangling by the hem and let the empty fingers drag over my flesh, tickling me. I squirmed a little over the back of the chair and he chuckled.


Trophy Boyfriend Lucy Felthouse

Finally, the penny dropped. Understanding the new game at last, Ethan dropped his arrogant behavior and removed the rest of his clothes speedily. As the last garment landed on his pile of discarded clothinges, I spoke again.

“Get the chair. Put it in the middle of the floor, facing me. Then sit on it.”

This time Ethan didn’t need telling twice. I had no idea what he thought about this new dominant persona of mine, but it was clearly turning him on. His cock jutted proudly out of his pubic hair, pre-come already beading at its tip.

He sat on the chair and looked at me expectantly, awaiting my next move. I walked to where I’d placed my overnight bag and began rummaging inside. When I pulled my hand out with a pair of handcuffs dangling from my fingertip, Ethan grinned from ear to ear. Walking over to him, I made short work of cuffing him to the chair. I smiled as he pointlessly rattled his restraints. He wasn’t going anywhere. Not without the chair, anyway.


The Spider and the Fly Salome Wilde

He made his way into the private club, paid for a one-night membership and found his way to a little table in the back of the darkened main room with little fuss and eyes kept mostly to himself. Only when he was sipping a complimentary Coke (it was BYOB and he’d not remembered that, and he definitely could have used a stiff shot) did he begin to peek out at the crowd. There was a whole herd’s worth of leather, he noted, from jackets and miniskirts to chaps and bustiers. There were corsets and schoolgirl outfits and Lycra and more spike-heeled shoes and boots than he’d ever seen in one place. The men were far less decorative, on the whole, most going for leather and T-shirts or prim black suits with narrow ties. The majority paraded their submissive girlfriends or wives behind them or on ostentatious leashes. He could pick out the very few gay and lesbian couples easily enough, though there wasn’t a lot of difference in presentation. Both gender and role were on proud display. The few submissive men with their dominant women interested him most.

He stared at one young-looking guy in nothing but a cock cage, head down, sitting at his mistress’s feet. She was heavily made up, trussed into a corset and long black skirt, and was stroking his shaggy head with long, red nails. A “hetfemdom” poster couple, Nick concluded. Mostly, he found himself wishing he were at home with Paolina, naked and exposed to her desires and demands. Too much here was for show, and that wasn’t what kink was about for him. How much did Paolina really get into this, he wondered, and would it prove too great a wedge between them?


Tied Down Elise Hepner

“It’s over, Lexie,” Marley purrs.

It doesn’t matter that it’s the most expensive restaurant in town. Marley’s got a scowl on her puss that could piss off a mime. Those gorgeous cheekbones could cut me if I get too close and her light blue eyes burn with an intensity that makes me squint. But her model looks won’t detract from the problem, a slight bump in our road that has my stomach twisted in panic, even as my pussy gets wet and eager from her taunt.

There’s a pile of her “relationship notes” sitting in between us and, where her water spilled, purple ink stains the white tablecloth. All the reasons we shouldn’t be together, just there⎯as if we’re sitting at a business meeting. Maybe I can still work this exchange to my advantage. She’s always had a sticky sweet soft spot for my kind of lovin’, even from the beginning.

But it’s okay⎯she’s biting her lower lip. That means there’s hope. Even if it isn’t laid out on the pros and cons list next to my lobster that I ordered to be spiteful⎯across from the water Marley just spilled in her nervousness. Her nervousness is beautiful; it’s an emotion that rarely pushes through to the surface of her domineering and perfectionist tendencies. It’s a tiny chink in her armor, but I’ll take it. This is the most serious I’ve ever seen her. My chest tightens reflexively as I nibble on the inside of my cheek. Underneath her hard exterior there’s something gentle in her gaze as she considers me across the table. Could those three rapid blinks mean this is another sexy game?


The Cupboard Under the Stairs Kay Jaybee

The moment she heard the sharp click of the key turning in the padlock, her pulse drummed faster and her mouth dried.

Kristi slowly lowered the book she’d been reading to her lap. Mark was standing right behind her. She continued to look the other way as she spoke. “I didn’t hear you come in.” The minutes before it started were precious. Kristi took silent deep breaths, aware that her pussy was already twitching and her chest was swelling beneath her black satin bra. Perspiration dotted her palms.

As her long russet hair was gathered into a sleek ponytail by strong male hands, Kristi closed her eyes, and goose pimples covered the flesh beneath her shirt, as her husband’s fingers traced the length of her hairline. Her husband tugged her hair sharply, craning her neck backwards, making Kristi’s throat constrict with longing.

Speaking calmly, as if he was simply offering to take her to the movies, Mark said, “I know how much you’ve missed our special sessions while I’ve been working away, so I’ve arranged a surprise.” Without relaxing his grip, he began to knead Kristi’s left breast with his free hand, squeezing it roughly through her top. “I see you’re more than ready for the challenge that lies ahead, my dear.”


Suffer for Me Teresa Noelle Roberts

Martin said, “I want to suffer for you.”

I smiled. I tried to make it an aloof, catlike one, but my heart ached with a combination of tenderness and lust and I’m sure it showed on my face. “You’re such a good boy,” I said, continuing to stroke his long, brown hair. “And so beautiful. Why would I want to make you suffer?”

He was sitting at my feet, his head in my lap. He looked up at me, his eyes huge and lost, almost tragic. “Please...I want to be worthy of you, Mma’am. I want to suffer for you.” Martin was younger than me and new to revealing his own submissive nature. The admission had released a streak of dark romanticism, abetted by much erotica read with too little grounding in reality. I could chuckle about it, remembering my own early, fantasy-fueled explorations ten years ago, and yet his leather- and hemp- scented romantic fancies, his yearning devotion, had swept me off my feet just as much as my firm but sensual control had swept him off his. Now we were trying to figure out where to go from here. I was the experienced one, and I had definite ideas where I wanted things to go with my beautiful, biddable Martin, but a responsible Ddomme finds a balance between her own needs and those of her sub. This was especially important at Martin’s delicate exploratory stage, where a wrong move could sour his fascination not just with me, but with kink.

I tangled my fingers in his hair, tugging cruelly. “If you weren’t worthy of me, you wouldn’t be here,” I said, dropping my voice to a low, ominous register. “Do you question my judgment, or my taste?”


Dry Rub Giselle Renarde

The chair jerked twice, and she realized Terry was trying to raise his hands to grab her before remembering they were tied to the sides of the chair. She still had a grip on his hair, and his face looked so pitiful in her hands that she almost wanted to laugh. He was desperate, poor boy, and she wouldn’t give in. Tonight he was a tool of her pleasure, nothing more. She stroked her pussy harder against his cock as he struggled to free himself from the pretty peach napkins. Her mother had bought them as a gift for special occasions. They’d never used them until now.

Today had been its own sort of foreplay. Shaving her pussy and squeezing into this school uniform had made her pussy pulse hot beneath her skirt. Now, with the pressure of Terry’s dick and the smooth heat of the leather, her clit was throbbing like it had its own heartbeat. It wouldn’t take long to come. In fact, she could feel her orgasm sitting like a trembling itch at the base of her pelvis. She knew just what would get her there.

Releasing her grasp on Terry’s hair, she quickly unbuttoned her top. As she shoved her tits against his face, his mouth moved like a magnet to the nearest nipple. When he sucked it into his hot mouth, she felt that velvet sensation of tongue on flesh all the way down to her clit. Bolts of energy passed through her, setting off sparks in her cunt as she writhed against his cock. She felt hazy now, like her body was something separate from herself.


Worth Redemption Craig J. Sorensen

“I’ve forgiven you, William; you’ve forgiven me. You have to forgive yourself.” You touched my chin to lift it. My eyes remained fixed downcast. My resistance was cracking. So tempting, but so strange. So similar, but so far from our usual. You must have known I was giving in. Silently, swiftly, you took me by the hand and led me home. You stripped so suddenly, so certainly. Strange how meek and small you looked, which is not you, not even in submission, Dana. You took the cross from your neck and suspended it from the center headboard finial. You pulled the covers from the bed like a matador and fell in the middle of the nude bottom sheet. Your body opened wide like grand double doors to a temple.

You seemed so supple as I put your left hand in the first steel bracelet. Your right hand balled into a fist, your arm twitched. A fish nibbles at bait, the pole slightly bends; resisting, but hooked, just a small fish. The fist relaxed into the second bracelet and I closed it. You scissored your legs after I cuffed the left foot, and it took a hearty tug to spread the right, but I know how strong your dancer’s legs are. I felt you relax your grip. I paused. You didn’t say a word. It was the point of no return. I pulled my hands away. The foot stayed in the cuff. I locked it. You gave a tiny nod.

We’d done this sort of thing so many times before, I knew all your boundaries. This was different. I lifted two meticulously folded silk scarves you had placed on the nightstand, and wadded the first.

You opened your mouth. I stood motionless.


Laced Elizabeth Silver

The pull on my arms eases just enough so I can straighten, and I gulp for breath, even though I have nowhere to put the air. Stefan keeps my wrists pinned in one of his hands, holding me close, petting my stomach with his other as he kisses my neck, kisses my collar.

He doesn’t ask me if I’m good, but I really am when he stops petting me and starts wrapping my wrists in the tail ends of the corset laces.
Jesus fuck, I think, and flex my fingers as he binds me to my clothing, my arms behind my back. Now there’s no getting out of this without him, no quick release of the corset unless Stefan decides it’s time. I am completely at his mercy.

It should scare the hell out of me, and it does, but at the same time, it feels so goddamn good to let go of it all. Every last responsibility is his now, and all I have to do is just fucking enjoy it. And I really am; my body feels like it’s been plugged into a live current, and if I had enough room in my lungs, I’d say I feel like singing. I want to tell Stefan all this, but how do you say that you feel the most free you’ve ever felt in your life by being tied up, and please, please, don’t fucking stop?

Instead, I twist in both his and the corset’s grips, and offer him my mouth. He kisses me back, a warm and wet invasion that takes what little breath I have away, and we’re both panting when he pulls away and yanks on my arms, forcing me to face front again. He’s just as flushed as I am, grinning as he rubs his cock against my ass; I’m pretty sure he got my message loud and clear.


Pawns Billey Thorunn

He went to give her their usual hug but froze when he saw what she was wearing. Or rather, wasn’t. He glanced at her bare collarbones, eyes moving down her cleavage before skipping shyly to the floor. Instead of relief, there they found shiny red heels. A dancer turned yoga teacher, Kate was calm as she watched Chris’s eyes move up her sculpted legs. When they reached the midthigh hem of her apron they jumped back to the floor.

“It’s okay, man, look all you want. We went over this—that’s what the day’s all about.” Gabriel came up and clapped Chris on the shoulder. “Come out to the balcony, I’ve got the chessboard set up.”

Chris gave a small laugh and relaxed a little. “You’re crazy, Gabe.” He looked at Kate, who had returned to the kitchen and was pulling glasses down from a shelf. The apron didn’t reach around her back and her teddy barely covered the curve of her buttocks.

“You’re both crazy.”


Cumaná Helen Sedgwick

First he lifted my left hand. I felt rope tighten against my skin. He pulled my arm up to the top corner of the bed, securing it somehow. I held out my other hand obediently, and he guided it towards the other corner, fastening more of the rope around my wrist. I lay there, waiting, tensing against the knots that secured my hands above my head. One by one he took my ankles and pointed my feet to the corners of the bed, spreading my legs wide open. Moving slowly, deliberately, he tied them down. I strained against the rope, but it was tight. He made no sounds, no more movements. My heart was racing. I could still hear the music from outside and voices chattering; I was glad I wasn’t down there. Something in me shifted; my eyes stopped straining to see through the satin, my limbs relaxed, my skin stopped shivering, my breathing slowed. I felt my mind slide to a place it didn’t usually go, and I started holding my breath. He turned on the air- conditioning, and I felt a cold rush of air over my skin. My nipples hardened instantly, a shiver moving up and down my body.

“Don’t move,” he said.

His fingers stroked my skin from my elbows to my armpits, the sensation making me conscious of the soft exposed underside of my arms.


Good British Steel Lana Fox

At the window, the curtain was only half closed and the moonlight spilled across the Roman statue, a bust of a boy in an ivy crown with vacant eyes. I burned as I remembered Rupe’s sword slicing through the darkness, and I dreamed of the steel pressed onto my sex as I rubbed against it, wet.

At last the door opened again, and Rupe walked toward me, after closing the door behind him. “How’s my little captive?”

I shivered with longing. Then came the swish and glint of metal as he unsheathed the weapon with a flourish. Wielding it in front of him with the tip pointing upward, he took a step toward me. “Spread your knees.”

Slowly, I did as he said.

He moved closer, the sword still held between us, close enough that I could smell his scent. With a glare, he told me, “Lick it.”


Parting Ways Tenille Brown

Maggie stood there, stunned and mesmerized all at the same time, watching through a crack in the door, her feet seemingly glued to their spot.

Derek was sitting in a chair, naked. There was wide gray tape over his mouth and binding his wrists as well as his ankles to the chair.

Almost as tall as Derek, the woman stood over him, smiling deviously. And she was naked, too, except for the black patent leather stiletto heels and bangle bracelets.

Glancing just behind her, Maggie saw the woman hadn’t always been naked. She had shown up in a red shirt and gray slacks; a long white lab coat thrown over the sofa bore the name FELICE.

In the chair, Derek was hard, hard in that tantalizingly solid way that drove Maggie wild. His cock rose up, bounced forward and back.

Maggie struggled to identify the emotion that coursed through her body as she watched the scene that was unfolding before her eyes.


Knot Alone Kathleen Tudor

I keep a full-length mirror in my walk-in closet. It’s a freestanding antique, made of dark, polished wood that seems to catch the shine of the lights as I dress in front of it every day. Today is special.

I carry the heavy mirror out of my closet and set it up in my bedroom where it shows off my body in the best possible light. Today isn’t about hiding in closets or being secretive; today is about celebrating me.

I’ve met a few so-called Doms in the scene. They’re punks and jackasses or dirty old men. I’m sure there are exceptions out there, but the good ones, the kind of men I dream about, they’ve already got their girls, and they don’t seem to bother with the dirty little bondage clubs downtown.

What I dream of is a man who can drop me to my knees with a glance or turn my cunt liquid with one steamy gaze. I want a man who earns his control over me—a man who can make me beg him to control me. He’ll be nothing like those boys at the clubs who try to order me around and hope I’m in the mood to obey. No, he’ll expect me to listen, and he’ll command me with no doubt or hesitation in his voice, and when he does…


The Insurrection Valerie Alexander

Our gazes locked. Then I looked around for the rope that had to be there. Different lengths of what looked like six-millimeter hemp were coiled under the coffee table.

I held one up. “Try me.”

He smirked and held out his wrists like a prisoner. “Okay, cowgirl.”

That was the wrong thing to say. I pushed him facedown on the sofa, bringing his arms behind his back. “You’re not that fast,” he said, turning his face to the side so he could talk. Jackson always talked during sex, could never stop lecturing and pontificating and educating. “I could still get away at this point.”

“I’ll keep that in mind for my next abduction.” I skipped all the fancy knot work and went straight for incapacitation. I toyed briefly with the idea of hog-tying him, but decided it would limit his uses too much.

He jerked experimentally against the rope. “Not bad.”

Neither of us said anything, and he forced a laugh. “You going to leave me like this, compadre?”

“You sound nervous.” I ran a fingernail down his long brown back. “Afraid I’m going to violate your maidenhood right here on the sofa?”

“Impossible. I’m inviolable.”


The Tipping Point Lolita Lopez

Mia shivered as Cal brushed the looped end of the braided rope against her collarbone. The silky rope followed the curve of her naked breast, teasing the stiff peak begging for attention, before sliding even lower along the sloped plane of her bare belly. Cal playfully swatted the tender lips of her sex with the looped braid. Mia hissed at the sting and pressed back against the stone wall. The shock of the cold masonry on her hot skin forced her ramrod straight.

Cal’s fingers tangled in her black hair. He claimed her mouth with a possessive kiss, his tongue darting between her lips and swiping her own. A hint of peppermint licked at her taste buds. She gave a little mewling sigh and shoved her aching breasts against his chest. The pearlescent buttons lining the front of his crisp cotton shirt lightly scratched her flesh. Cal abandoned her lips and nipped the edge of her jaw. His teasing bites moved ever lower, sliding along her throat to the swell of her breasts. He sucked on one nipple and then the other. With his tongue and teeth, he teased her erect nipples until they were glistening and ruddy.

Mia breathed heavily as arousal blossomed in her chest. Her pussy ached with need and seeped its slick juices. Already she could feel the sticky wetness pooling between her thighs. She squeezed her knees together in a desperate attempt to calm the overwhelming urge to open wide and beg Cal for his cock. A deliciously dirty image filled her mind: Cal taking her up against the wall as she clutched at his shoulders and sucked on his earlobe. She bit her lower lip at the phantom sensations of Cal pounding into her.

The looped end of the rope caressed her cheek. Cal fixed her with a searching gaze. She swallowed hard and gave a little nod.


As Long As You Don’t Wake Me Neil Gavriel

She climbed on my face and ordered me to use my tongue. “And use it well, or there will be consequences.”

She’d never been this imperious with me before, and I found that I was slowly sliding into a deeply submissive version of myself that I barely recognizedknew. I had a sudden sense of myself when I was young, and I’d first been exposed to bondage, playing “Han Solo frozen in carbonite” by wrapping myself tightly in an afghan and lying on themy couch, not moving for hours at a time. It was almost meditative, my current predicament, and I had only the sensations of my tongue inside her wet, slick pussy, and my cock vibrating slightly from the rubber ring around it.

It snapped me out of my reverie when she came again, this time even harder, and she ground her face against my mouth and nose until I was gasping for breath. I felt used; I was merely a tool to provide her orgasms. I was always, I felt, a selfless lover, but at that moment I felt barely necessary or regarded, and it was an immense turn-on for me. “How’s this little thing doing?” she asked, flicking my cock.

I didn’t answer, for fear of reprisals. She slapped me.

“I asked a question, cock,” she said.


The Weight Rachel Kramer Bussel

I settle into my favorite position: naked, facedown on the bed, arms by my sides, legs slightly spread. I’m not moving, but inside I’m twitching with excitement. I wait, like this, for Damian. He’s in the kitchen but he knows I’m in our bed, eager, hungry. He knows he is the only one who can give me what I need. Now he does, anyway. I’m pretty sure when we first got together all those years ago, he thought it was just my kink or fetish: get on top of me, hold me down, provide that rote set of actions that get me off.

I didn’t know how to tell him for a long time it wasn’t that at all; it was him. He was my fetish, he was my everything, which made it easy to give so much of myself right back to him. It didn’t even feel like a choice. Better for him to think I was just a kinky girl, rather than kinky for him. He already held so much power over me after that first time, another bit of it might set me permanently in the cage he’d placed me in, the one whose invisible bars I met everywhere I turned, with every thought that passed through my mind. He’d invaded me inside and out, to the point where he didn’t need to do or say anything to keep me in place. He had me, every inch of me. I was only twenty-two, but I knew exactly what I wanted and, once he sank his claws into me, what I needed.

“No,” I told him, looking up at him and blushing as I felt the tears rushing to give me away. “Just you. All of you.” He’d looked at me for a long time. I could sense the smile along his lips even though he didn’t dare show it to me. He likes to look stern even though I can read him just as well as he can read me and I know that while it’s not an act, there is a heart as tender as mine beating beneath the layers of menace he slips into when we are together. He manages to make the transitions seamless, though, so I never know which Damian I will get, how rough he will be, how deliciously far he will push me. That first night was a lot like tonight, but no matter how many times I prepare myself for Damian, I’m never truly prepared. I couldn’t be, even if I could peer into the future with some kind of kinky crystal ball. Some things you have to live through moment by agonizing, dazzling moment. He steamrolls over my anticipation, crushing it like he crushes me, until I am a blank slate. Oh, he likes my dirty mind well enough, the fantasies I cook up and spin for him, but he wants me to know they’ll never come true, not exactly, not the way I conceive of them, anyway. His fantasies will, and do, and he will make them mine whether I like it or not, even though I always wind up liking it, even when I’m literally kicking and screaming.

Sometimes my fantasies morph into his, or maybe it’s that they merge. Maybe it’s that what I think I want is never actually what I really do, or that when the fantasy comes alive, like now, it’s more intense, more scary and far more arousing than I ever could have predicted. Damian takes away my predictability the same way he takes away my mobility, my breath, my agency; they’re there, and in a flash, they’re gone. I could protest, but he knows me too well for that. I like offering those elemental facets of my being to him, only him. I like the way he looks when he knows I’ve stripped away even the flimsiest of barriers between us. Too many of my exes thought stripping was about the skin, about getting naked, and that was all it took to see all of me, to capture me. How little did they know. I’m the queen of the invisible cover-up, but Damian can induce fear and lust and a scarily possessive passion all with a look, even with my clothes on. So now, when I’m bare in every sense of the word, is when the real magic happens, when I truly come alive, and so does he. I can almost see the power shift animate him, light him up like a rocket about to shoot into space, only it’s my space he’s about to barrel through; the spaces inside me, the ones I’m not even aware I’m clinging to, he’s about to invade.

There’s nothing showy about this. If you were watching us, you’d see a large white man lying on top of a smaller white woman, if you could see her at all save for her brown hair splayed across the sheets. There are no pillows beneath me; he is pillow enough for both of us, even above me, his heavy softness cushioning, momentarily, what he is about to do. I’m aware we could be on the floor, we could even be on the sidewalk; he could get me to do that, I’m pretty sure, my cheek pressed to the filthy concrete, drool leaking out of my mouth. So any lack of amenities simply makes me more conscious of what I do have in this moment: him, his body, every last ounce. I don’t know how many there are, ounces or pounds, but I know there are a lot. I know he can easily scoop me up into his arms. I know the guards size him up when we get on a plane. I know he is not just big, but huge, so when he is on top of me, I am small, able to be crushed, flattened, compressed.


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Sinfully awesome tights!

I love these tights! They're my friend Denise's tights (and legs!) and she got them on Etsy.

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Email reminders

I rarely print out emails. It seems redundant and wasteful. I can access them at the press of a button, because I never delete them. But once in a rare while I do print out an email. It's something that I don't just want to read on the screen; its words look different in stark black on crisp white, rather than the glow of a computer screen. I had printed one such email, copying and pasting the words from gmail into Word, then printing the 8.5 by 11 page and folding it in half. I tucked it into one of several books I used this year as a wallet. I didn't forget that email—that would be impossible—but its precise details had eluded me.

I woke up this morning and needed a piece of scrap paper; I keep daily lists in my phone but often crave the feel and look of my pen on actual paper, the liquid imprecision of the ink oozing onto the page, making letters fatter or thinner, perfectly imprecise, personal, mine. And I saw this one email I'd printed. For the first ten to fifteen minutes that I'm awake, my mind is foggy. I usually first fumble for the light, unless I first pause and assess what day it is, what time it is, what was the last thing I did or thought before I went to sleep. So it took a sentence to realize that this was the prequel to the other email I found on a folded-in-half piece of paper in my living room the other day.

I should know them by heart. They are twin bookcases to something that started and ended so fast yet seems to have lasted forever. A smarter girl might burn them, or, okay, a very smart girl might recycle them, but I don't. I put each back where I found it and resist tracing my fingers over those words, thinking them might akin to my tattoo, slightly raised, somehow alive. Reading them in succession, no matter the order, is not something I do easily, because they are stark reminders of the best and worst of my 2011.

Right before I found this one I was reading the new book The Moment, a collection of "wild, poignant, life-changing stories." Perhaps it's audacious to call the moment after I first read that first email "life-changing," but it was for me. It was a moment when I saw something in myself that I hadn't seen before. I let this space inside me shift, crack open, make room. I let it reveal itself to new possibilities, a new way of remaking a relationship that was dying, and taking me with it. That space was one I knew required a gigantic leap of faith but I took it, right then. It wasn't even a question, really, a weighing of what would happen if I jumped right in, or if it was, my heart had already jumped for me and I was simply catching up.

That space inside me was one I had to make for myself; certainly nobody was going to make it for me. Certainly it's not one our culture readily embraces and no matter how much you push yourself to live outside that culture, if you live in it's part of you, embedded, so even stepping outside of it means walking through it to get to that outer circle, and for me it's like always having some small part of me touching it, getting shocked by it but unable to fully separate.

And that's where I was in that moment, not quite fully shocked by what I'm supposed to want, and not quite all the way into what I did want, but somewhere in between. I've spent a lot of time, probably more than is healthy, since pondering that space, its beauty and its imperfections. As precarious as that space was, it was somewhere I felt at home, at peace.

Recently, I thought about making a list like a friend of mine did of everything she wanted in a partner, down to the most minute detail, and before that idea got way too overwhelming one of the first things I came up with was someone who would accept me for me and not judge me. I felt so comfortable in that space that feels dreamlike looking back because there wasn't that judgment that I feel so much of the time, or at least, I didn't sense it. It's a rare thing, to be nonjudgmental, to be open, to take people where they are rather than where you want them to be. I struggle with that every single day. Maybe it's a very human impulse to want to see others in what we think is the best light possible, so human that we forget that "best light" is subjective.

So anyway, these five months later, I saw those words and I didn't rip them up or burn them or try to erase them. I could, and I might sometime, but that's the thing about words—they never truly go away, especially once you write them down. Maybe you add to them, or disagree with them, disavow them, but there they are, still being reckoned with, still powerful.

I have so many things I want to do differently in 2012, which I'm trying to think of in a positive way rather than, "Look at all the things I fucked up in 2011," cause that's way too depressing, and much as the moments after that moment were dark, shall we say, which is a grand understatement, one of the things I most want for 2012, what I managed to squeeze into five letters on my arm, four on my back, is not to reject those moments when something shifts inside me, when a space opens and leads me to a new way of being myself. It would be incredibly easy to override those impulses, train myself out of being the kind of person who has them, to brace myself inside and out when anything or anyone threatens to get that close, dares to wade past all my armor and even foresee a space like that existing in someone like me. But like one of my muses this year, the character Musa, who I saw sitting in the innermost circle of seats during Musa and Sheri in the Free World this year, I don't want easy, at least, not at the expense of...I don't even know how to end that sentence, actually. Sorry. I'm not saying I want its opposite either, I want to be clear about that (hi, universe), but easy simply for the sake of ease, no. I want everything that email that's tucked back inside its bookish home promised, as crazy and audacious and ridiculous as that might be, as much as my realistic side knows I might never get that. I don’t want to be someone who stops wanting.

Friday, December 23, 2011

Erotica audiobooks: Listen to me now at Audible!

Cleis Press and Audible.com have paired up to bring you audio erotica! Several of my anthologies, as well as some anthologies featuring my stories, are now available for your listening pleasure. Below are links to Amazon, and you can also buy directly from Audible. I haven't heard them yet but think this is a very cool new way of getting erotica out there. If there are more, I'll link to them.

He's on Top: Erotic Stories of Male Dominance and Female Submission

She's on Top: Erotic Stories of Female Dominance and Male Submission

Orgasmic: Erotica for Women

Passion: Erotic Romance for Women

Hide and Seek: Erotic Tales of Voyeurs and Exhibitionists

Best Sex Writing 2010

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"Do you like dick or vag?" and other negging pickup lines I heard in Vegas

Haven't had a chance to catch up on everything here, but my latest pieces (other places I post my links at Google+ and my Facebook fan page), for whatever reason posting everywhere else but Lusty Lady has been easiest for me) but here's a piece I wrote for The Frisky, "Let's Talk About Negging", about a guy I met in Vegas (of course it was in Vegas!) who told me my dress was ugly, my name was fake, and asked "Do you like dick or vag?" Really.

Instead, he asked me my name three times, each time demanding to know if it was my real name. I’m no expert on fake name etiquette but I’ll go out on a limb and say that if a girl’s going to make up a name, it’s not gonna be as generic as “Rachel.” The more he asked if my name is real, the more accusatory he sounded, and if he thought I was making up my name, surely anything else I said would probably sound just as ridiculous.

I didn’t need to worry, though, since he wasn’t big on small talk, and every question I asked him he managed to evade. “What do you do?” I asked, not in the New York one-upmanship kind of way, but out of genuine curiosity, considering I knew absolutely nothing about him. “You don’t need to know,” he told me, like I’d just asked him for a trade secret. True, but it seemed like a pretty basic question a guy trying to pick up girls might expect.

Instead, he pounced on the idea that he’d somehow managed to interrupt an incipient lesbian tryst with my friend simply with the power of possessing a cock. He asked me over and over, any time there was a lull in the meager conversation, whether I was “with” her, as in, on a date. I told him repeatedly that she was just a friend (if she was my date, why would I suddenly ditch her?), but he didn’t believe me. Then he busted out with “Do you like dick or vag?” At first, I wasn’t sure what he said, since no one has ever asked me whether I’m bi in quite that gross a way before. When it sunk in, I told him, truthfully, “Both.” He acted like this was a more offensive answer than either of the others I’d come up with, including my “fake” name. Up unil then he had his arm around me, but he moved as far apart from me as he could while still be seated in the chair next to me.


Read the whole thing

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Saturday, December 17, 2011

Shame, Sex Addiction, Sleep and Food Porn

Haven't had a chance to update here lately (for that, read my Tumblr and @raquelita on Twitter) but here are some recent writings:


"Shame, Sex-Positivity and the Sensationalizing of Sex Addiction"


"30 Hours of Sleep, or, The Fantasy of Escape" (realized later could equally accurately be "and The Fantasy of Escape" but hey, whatevs, I write at Open Salon for the community and the sense of completion, both things I don't have much of these days)

"Why Nigella Lawson's Caramel-Covered Photo Shoot Was Food Porn"

Monday, December 12, 2011

Kinky BDSM spanking sex diary this week!

I imagine this week's sex diary "The Kinky Blogger Who Gets 'Maintenance Spankings'" will be of interest to many of you (I'm the editor). Here's a snippet:

He pulls the "demerits" list off the fridge. I have accrued twenty demerits this week, each one punishable by a spanking, for offenses like being messy and teasing him. I bend over the bed, arching my bottom up in the air. He spanks my bare butt through open-bottomed fishnet panties.

Read the whole sex diary

If you're interested in writing a sex diary, make sure to read a few diaries then email me at sexdiaries at nymag.com and tell me why you'd make a good diarist. And if you know someone who'd be interested, do feel free to pass that info on. Thanks!

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Blast from the erotic past: Dirty Girls: Erotica for Women

Dirty Girls: Erotica for Women from Seal Press is my bestselling anthology. Crazy but true. Click here to read the introduction, which you know is ancient (okay, 3 years) because the first sentence references my MySpace page, an account whose password I no longer remember. I say "crazy" because it has no particular theme other than "dirty girls" and the nipple on the cover is pretty hidden and, well, I wasn't expecting that, but I love it. My friend Twanna Hines wrote about it over at Funky Brown Chick in "Who Wants to be a 'Dirty Girl:?'"

“I don’t think my sexual interests make me any less of a well-rounded, kind-hearted intelligent person,” writes my lusty friend Rachel in her anthology Dirty Girls: Erotica for Women. “I’m as likely to kiss a lover’s forehead tenderly and offer to tuck them into bed as I am to throw them down on the floor and strip them naked.” Yeah, Rachel’s a dirty girl. But, here’s the question: Is that necessarily a bad thing? “I’m realizing that everyone (or almost everyone) has a dirty and a sweet side,” she cops. “All too often we denigrate the dirty girls — the ones who dare to publicly show their naughty sides — as incorrigible sluts, rather than realizing just how exciting it is to tap into our lustiest selves. Once you crack the surface of those who are seemingly prim and proper [...] you’ll very likely find that the simplicity of the word ‘dirty’ doesn’t go anywhere near far enough to describe the kinks that lurk within them.”

Saturday, December 10, 2011

Coming in January: Irresistible: Erotic Romance for Couples

This is going to be a very HOT Valentine's Day read! A heads up. Yes, postcards are coming; I determine whether to spring for postcards or not based on how hot the book cover is. I'll be in Milwaukee doing an event at The Tool Shed on February 9th (details coming soon) so will have postcards with me, and am looking forward to my first Milwaukee visit and signing this hot-off-the-press book. I'm excited about the entire book, of course, but especially getting to publish new-to-my-books authors Tiffany Reisz and Kris Adams and Alyssa Turner and Delilah Night and Karenna Colcroft and (I think) Kate Pearce. There's a lot of new territory for my books, both plot and location-wise, and I think this pushes the envelope a bit. And there's some familiar themes; it shouldn't surprise you that after my story "Our Own Private Champagne Room" in Kristina Wright's Best Erotic Romance, my story here, "Exposing Calvin," starts off: "'Let’s go to a strip club,' I say, my eyes lit up." If this book sounds good to you, I'd love it if you'd click "like" on Amazon to show your support - thank you!

Coming in January: Irresistible: Erotic Romance for Couples, edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel, published by Cleis Press. If you are interested in reviewing Irresistible for a publication or blog, email Brenda Knight at bknight at cleispress.com with your mailing address and publication's URL.

This Irresistible read features loving couples turning their deepest fantasies into reality, resulting in uninhibited, imaginative sex they can only enjoy together. You’ll delight in discovering all the exciting erotic possibilities, from serving tea naked to a very intimate massage to a reminder that sometimes best friends make the best lovers. Engage in a little sexting in A.M. Hartnett’s sizzling “Safe for Work” office tryst, and follow a kinky candidate for public office—and his lusty wife—in "Hypocrites." Cole Riley’s moving “Same As It Ever Was” shows that makeup sex can be worth fighting for. Dirty talk leads to lustful surprises and inspiration for the neighbors in “The Mitzvah” by Tiffany Reisz. As editor Rachel Kramer Bussel notes, the lovers in this daringly romantic anthology are “able to open up in the ways they do is precisely because they have another person to rely on, coax them, challenge them, tease them and seduce them into traveling down a new sexual path. Whether that means outdoor sex, kink, a trip to a strip club or a very sensual massage, we get to see how the layers of trust that have been built up get used to stoke the fire that burns between them.”



Pre-order Irresistible: Erotic Romance for Couples:

Amazon

Kindle (coming soon)

BN.com

Nook (coming soon)

Powell's

Books-a-Million

IndieBound (find your local independent bookstore

Cleis Press

Introduction (see below)

Twice Shy Heidi Champa

Safe for Work A. M. Hartnett

Repaint the Night Janine Ashbless

Same As It Ever Was Cole Riley

Out of Control Karenna Colcroft

Warrior Kate Pearce

Hypocrites Alyssa Turner

The Pact Elizabeth Coldwell

Exposing Calvin Rachel Kramer Bussel

Six Eyes, Two Ears Kris Adams

Renewal Delilah Night

The Netherlands Justine Elyot

Predatory Tree Craig J. Sorensen

The Mitzvah Tiffany Reisz

After The Massage Kay Jaybee

Pink Satin Purse Donna George Storey

Introduction

A lot of the erotica that comes across my desk focuses on the spark of attraction when strangers meet, the cataclysmic sensation of falling, hard, for someone new and exciting. That makes sense, because there’s built-in drama and erotic tension when two people discover there’s intense chemistry between them. With this anthology, though, I wanted to explore what happens after that, once those people have been together a while (even a short while). I wanted to see what sparks fictional couples could produce on the page, and the results are, well, scorching.

The couples in this book explore all sorts of exciting sexual possibilities, and one of the main reasons they’re able to open up in the ways they do is precisely because they have another person to rely on, coax them, challenge them, tease them and seduce them into traveling down a new sexual path. Whether that means outdoor sex, kink, a trip to a strip club or a very sensual massage, we get to see the ways the layers of trust that have been built up get used to stoke the fire that burns between them.

In addition to enjoying naughty, wild adventures, the couples here also work out differences between one another and handle issues like infidelity in ways that ultimately strengthen, rather than destroy, their relationships' longevity. In Cole Riley’s “Same As It Ever Was,” Joanne suspects her husband of cheating, but with a little help from her best friend, manages to recapture the sensual spirit and passion that’s been missing as both husband and wife make amends and move on, knowing what it was they almost lost. Rekindling a romance that’s threatened to go stale is also the theme of “Renewal” by Delilah Night, where she writes, “That touch sent a long-missing ripple through my body. I hesitated, hoping he’d remember what I love.”

In “The Pact” by Elizabeth Coldwell, a woman rediscovers a man she’d once passed over, only to find that the years they’ve spent apart have made him someone she’s sorry she overlooked. How a couple deals with a death in the family, as well as religious tradition, is the subject of “The Mitzvah” by Tiffany Reisz, as Grace and Zachary find that embracing desire can be healing. Kris Adams takes us into an African village and some complicated relationship dynamics, along with a lot of voyeurism, in “Six Eyes, Two Ears.” Kay Jaybee takes a common fantasy, that of a man watching two women make love, and breathes new life into it by showing both halves of a couple as they live out this dream.

Individual characters work through their own issues with the help of their partners, getting support, love and, of course, very hot sex. “Repaint the Night,” by Janine Ashbless, is about public sex, but, even more, a woman who is conquering a fear of the dark after being mugged ten years before. The erotic power of that story is heightened by Leah’s awe at being able to enjoy what she and Callum are sharing, as she recovers a part of herself she lost and deepens the level of trust between them.

For those who likes things a bit spicier, there’s "The Netherlands” by Justine Elyot, in which a nude Loveday serves guests tea and takes orders, while fulfilling a longtime fantasy of being “used,” with her true love there to watch.

Make no mistake: though these are stories about couples, they are not light or fluffy. They are full of joy, lust and kink, as well as realistic elements of mistrust, uncertainty and confusion, which the couples work through in ways that don’t gloss over or ignore their differences.

These couples, however long they’ve been a team, push the envelope by pushing themselves to try something new, even when they’re not sure where it will lead them. They go to those exotic, erotic places, to those recurring fantasies, because they know they have someone who will travel there with them. I hope this book will inspire nighttime reading--out loud--and erotic adventures, as well as conversations that have been bubbling under the surface, waiting to be exposed, just like the fantasies in the tales you’re about to read.

Rachel Kramer Bussel

New York City

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Seeing art in Chelsea reminds me why I live in New York

Lately when I visit or think about another place that I know is cheaper, quieter, less full of memories, I find myself thinking, Maybe I should move there. Of course in real life I couldn't afford to move, and it would take months to toss everything I'd need to toss, but it's a fantasy. But here's some things I saw recently, all in Chelsea save for the top photo, which I saw in the C/E subway station at 51st (?) and 8th. My friend Rachel Hills was in town from London and had Time Out New York with her and we started at the Matthew Marks Gallery for the excellent Nan Goldin exhibit. I realized that while being unemployed sucks bigtime, there is so much free art a subway stop away, and that is pretty awesome. All photos by me; more on Flickr.




A quick snapshot that in no way does justice to the art, but just to give you a sense of what she's doing; there was another piece all about hair, and a four-photo homage to the infamous L'Origine du monde by Gustave Courbet (the gallery has amazing light, and it was a sunny, beautiful day). From the Nan Goldin exhibit Scopophilia at Matthew Marks Gallery. She took photos at the Louvre (by special permission) and juxtaposed them alongside some of her 1970's photos. Amazing. Through December 23rd. Read more about it in The New York Times.








Both of the above images from the Sydney Chastain-Chapman exhibit, on through January 7th, at Kravets|Wehby.




I'd never been to Printed Matter before. I highly recommend it. So much to see and soak up. I got the Bread & Puppet calendar for my dad.

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So fucking true, so hard to live by

"You don’t discover courage right away…You discover a tender, shaky vulnerability. It takes courage to be vulnerable. But when you live with a genuine heart, unarmored, you can trust the basic goodness of yourself and humanity."

Pema Chödrön, quoted in Learning to Breathe: My Yearlong Quest to Bring Calm to My Life by Priscilla Warner. I actually responded to someone on OkCupid because they listed Pema Chödrön as one of their favorite writers, but the more I get in touch with what I'm supposed to be doing right now, who I'm supposed to be, the time I'm supposed to take to sit and focus and feel and explore, the more I realize that looking for external validation like that is always, always the direct road to self-hatred. Giving over any part of myself for someone else to judge and find wanting, when I do the very same thing every day? Not helping. Never has, never will, and yet, I'm weak too, sometimes. I want things I can't have. I fail hard at the Serenity Prayer almost every day. I can only pick myself up from those failures and keep trying. I can't undo the book that's not on the shelves, the essay that never was, bounced checks, whatever. I can only not doom myself further by assuming that once a failure, always a failure. I don't think (and certainly don't hope) life works like that. Every day is a chance to remake myself into someone I can be proud of, someone who can live up to being vulnerable in all its utter shakiness.

So instead I'm trying to find ways to live this unstable life as best I can, with all its stops and starts and ups and downs and recognize that sometimes the greatest moments, the biggest lessons, come when everything is on the verge of falling apart, or feels that way. Being financially, emotionally, physically vulnerable, fearing that I have no words, especially when I've made a promise that I will have words, have done the ultimate hubris and called myself a writer and staked something on that...well, it's fucking hard. Some days, impossible. But thankfully, there are more days. Like today.

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Thursday, December 08, 2011

Call for sex diarists!

I'm the editor of the sex diaries and here's a recent call for diarists posted at nymag.com - do read a few diaries to get a sense of whether you're game for this. All are true, anonymous sex diaries. Please give a little bit of info on why you'd be a good candidate (what makes your sex life stand out). I'll get back to you within 2-3 days. We are not looking for you to send a completed diary, but to send your vital stats to see if you'd make a good candidate. And feel free to pass it on!

We know that bisexual women in open relationships aren’t the only people having sex in New York City. You, the readers, are all having sex — or at least trying to, probably. And however successful you are, we want to hear about it. Especially if you’re not the “typical” sex diary author. Maybe you’re married with kids. Maybe you were born during the L.B.J. administration. Maybe you’re a gay fireman. Maybe you’re a gay, old, married fireman. Whoever you are, however much ass you get, we want you to share a week in your sex life. Our Sex Diaries editor, Rachel Kramer Bussel, is looking for new submissions. Get in touch with her at sexdiaries@nymag.com.

Why Best Sex Writing 2012 is my favorite of all my books, and the one I most want you to read

If you only ever read one book of mine, I'd lobby hard for this one. It's the book I've worked the hardest on in terms of hours and effort and the one that's closest to my heart and politics. I'm really proud of it and think that no matter what your background, you'll learn something from it. I'll have copies in my hands next week, and it'll be in bookstores and in stock online by the end of the month. I'm looking into readings in (fingers crossed) Portland, Seattle, the Bay Area and NYC (NYC will probably the toughest location, so if you have any bookstore contacts, let me know!). Below is my introduction, and if you like it, I'd really appreciate it if you'd pass this on. I hope it does well, not just so I can continue to edit the series, but because I think the ideas and the writing are important, and trust me, I rarely say something as audacious as that about my work, but look at this killer lineup and you'll see what I mean.

Thank you for your support! I have a limited number of copies avaialble for Amazon.com review. You must promise to review it by January 31st and get your request in by December 14th. Your signed by me copy will be mailed out next week via media mail. I will delete this one call the copies are taken. Email bestsexwriting2012 at gmail.com with "Amazon" in the subject line and your name, US mailing address and Amazon.com profile so I know you are eligible (or a link to a previous Amazon review).



The book has original pieces and reprints from everywhere from Ms. ("Sex, Lies and Hush Money") to Reason ("You Can Have Sex With Them; Just Don’t Photograph Them" to Playboy ("The Dynamics of Sexual Acceleration") to The Village Voice ("Guys Who Like Fat Chicks") to Salon ("The Worship of Female Pleasure" and "Dating With an STD") to The Rumpus ("The Careless Language of Sexual Violence") to Guernica ("An Unfortunate Discharge Early in My Naval Career") to SexIs Magazine ("Latina Glitter" and "Penis Gagging, BDSM, and Rape Fantasy: The Truth about Kinky Sexting"), plus literary fiction stars and some preeminent commentators on sexuality, and many more offerings from a range of ages, backgrounds, locations, topics, etc. I'm especially proud of the media criticism, which is intense, unrelenting, powerful, political and vital; I speak of Roxane Gay's "The Careless Language of Sexual Violence," which takes The New York Times to task over its coverage of an underage rape victim, and Thomas S. Roche's "Men Who 'Buy Sex' Commit More Crimes: Newsweek, Trafficking, and the Lie of Fabricated Sex Studies," which challenges the newsweekly's coverage of the issue of sex trafficking nad utterly unqualified fawning over Melissa Farley. The book touches on atheism, SlutWalk, sex work from a first-person perspective, sex scandals, sex after a lover dies, male sexual education, obscenity law, teen sex and the law, and much more.

If you do plan to buy it, as with all books, pre-ordering them has a dual impact on the book's sales, meaning your sale counts not just for one book, but means that the bookseller your purchasing from will stock extra copies. All sales are great, but pre-orders are extra special, a heads up as a way to support your favorite authors.

Best Sex Writing 2012: The State of Today’s Sexual Culture is a nonfiction anthology edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel, with Susie Bright as guest judge, to be published by Cleis Press in January 2012. It is available for pre-order at Amazon (other links below). Email bestsexwriting2012 at gmail.com if you have any questions; to request a review copy, email Brenda Knight at bknight at cleispress.com.

Pre-order Best Sex Writing 2012:

Amazon

Kindle (coming soon)

BN.com

Nook (coming soon)

Powell’s

Books-a-Million

IndieBound (find your local independent bookstore

Cleis Press

Table of contents:

When the Sex Guru Met the Sex Panic Susie Bright

Beyond the Headlines: Real Sex Secrets Rachel Kramer Bussel (see below)

Sluts, Walking Amanda Marcotte

Criminalizing Circumcision: Self-Hatred as Public Policy Marty Klein

The Worship of Female Pleasure Tracy Clark-Flory

Sex, Lies, and Hush Money Katherine Spillar

The Dynamics of Sexual Acceleration Chris Sweeney

Atheists Do It Better: Why Leaving Religion Leads to Better Sex Greta Christina

To All the Butches I Loved between 1995 and 2005: An Open Letter about Selling Sex, Selling Out, and Soldiering On Amber Dawn

I Want You to Want Me Hugo Schwyzer

Grief, Resilience, and My 66th Birthday Gift Joan Price

Latina Glitter Rachel Rabbit White

Dating with an STD Lynn Harris

You Can Have Sex With Them; Just Don’t Photograph Them Radley Balko

An Unfortunate Discharge Early in My Naval Career Tim Elhajj

Guys Who Like Fat Chicks Camille Dodero

The Careless Language of Sexual Violence. Roxane Gay

Men Who “Buy Sex” Commit More Crimes: Newsweek, Trafficking, and the Lie of Fabricated Sex Studies Thomas Roche

Taking Liberties Tracy Quan

Why Lying about Monogamy Matters Susie Bright

Losing the Meatpacking District: A Queer History of Leather Culture Abby Tallmer

Penis Gagging, BDSM, and Rape Fantasy: The Truth about Kinky Sexting Rachel Kramer Bussel

Adrian’s Penis: Care and Handling Adrian Colesberry

The Continuing Criminalization of Teen Sex Ellen Friedrichs

Love Grenade Lidia Yuknavitch

Pottymouth Kevin Sampsell

Beyond the Headlines: Real Sex Secrets
Rachel Kramer Bussel

I think about sex a lot—every day, in fact. I don’t mean that in an “I want to get it on” way, but in a “What are other people up to?” way. I’m a voyeur, first and foremost, and this extends to my writing. I’m naturally curious about what other people think about sex, from their intimate lives to how their sexuality translates to the larger world.

With the Best Sex Writing series, I get to merge my voyeuristic self with my journalism leanings, and peek into the lives, public and private, of those around me. This volume in the series doesn’t pull any punches; the authors have strong opinions, whether it’s Marty Klein sticking up for circumcision in the face of an effort in California to criminalize it, Roxane Gay taking the New York Times to task for its treatment of an 11-year-old rape victim, Thomas Roche calling out Newsweek for its shoddy reporting about prostitution, or Radley Balko examining a child pornography charge.

There are also more personal takes on sex here that go beyond facile headlines or easy answers, that aren’t about making a point so much as exploring what real-life sex is like in all its beauty, drama, and messiness. Whether it’s Amber Dawn and Tracy Quan sharing the truth about their lives as sex workers, or Hugo Schwyzer explaining the damage our culture does to men with its mythology about their innate sexual prowess, or Tim Elhajj’s first-person account of pre–don’t ask, don’t tell military life, these authors show you a side of sex that you rarely see.

What you are about to read are stories, all true, some reported on the streets and some recorded from lived experience, from the front lines of sexuality. They deal with topics you read about in the headlines, and some topics you may never have considered. They are but a small sampling of the many kinds of sexual stories I received in the submission process.

Part of why I think sex never goes out of style, as a topic or activity, is that it is so very complex. There is no one way to do it, nor two, nor three. Sex can be mundane or mind-blowing, and for those who are trying to get from the former to the latter, there is a plethora of resources but also a host of misinformation purveyed by snake oil salesmen.

In Best Sex Writing 2012, you will read about subjects as diverse as “Guys Who Like Fat Chicks,” the care an handling of a man’s penis, and the glamour and glitter of the Latina drag world. Abby Tallmer, telling a story set in a very specific time and place—the gay leather clubs of New York’s Meatpacking District in the 1990s—manages to capture why sexual community is so vital, and why, I’d venture, those who lack such a community wind up mired in sex scandals. Tallmer writes, “These clubs gave us a place to feel that we were no longer outsiders—or rather, they made us feel that it was better to be outsiders, together, than to force ourselves to be just like everybody else.”

I’m especially pleased to present stories about the kinds of sexuality and sexual issues that don’t always make the headlines, from Lynn Harris’s investigation of dating with an STD to Hugo Schwyzer’s moving look at men’s need to be sexually desired and what happens when boys and men are told that that wanting to be desired is wrong. Joan Price gives some insight into elder sexuality, as well as into what it’s like to purchase the services of a sexual healer. The topic of elder sex is often treated with horror or disgust, or the focus is placed on concern over STDs—which is a worthy topic this series has explored before. But Price, author of two books on elder sexuality (her piece here is excerpted from Naked At Our Age), obliges the reader to see the humanity behind her age. She writes, “My birthday erotic massage from a gentle stranger changed something in me. It showed me that I was still a responsive, fully sexual woman, getting ready to emerge from the cocoon of mourning into reexperiencing life. I realized that one big reason I ended up on Sunyata’s massage table was so that I could get ready to reenter the world.”

Not all, or even most, of the reading here is “easy.” Much of it is challenging and heartbreaking. Roxane Gay’s media criticism centers on a New York Times story about a Texas gang rape and why “The Careless Language of Sexual Violence” distorts our understanding about rape. You may think such a piece doesn’t belong in an anthology with this title, but until we rid our world of sexual violence so that everyone can freely express themselves sexually, we need to hear searing indictments of media or those in power who ignore injustice.

As an editor, I’m not only looking for pieces that I agree with, or identify with, but for work that illuminates something new about a topic that’s been around forever. The authors here dig deep, challenging both mainstream ideas about sex and a few sex-positive sacred cows. Ellen Friedrichs sticks up for the right of teenagers to be sexual without throwing parents, school boards, and other adults into a sex panic. Amanda Marcotte explores the fast-moving SlutWalk protest phenomenon, which has garnered criticisms from various sides, from being futile to only appealing to white women.

I will quote Abby Tallmer again, because I don’t hear the words “sexual liberation” often enough these days. What moves me most about her piece is that you don’t have to be a New Yorker, queer, leather, or kinky to understand what she’s talking about. I’m 100 percent with her when she writes, “Back then, many of us believed that gay liberation was rooted in sexual liberation, and we believed that liberation was rooted in the right—no, the need—to claim ownership of our bodies, to experience and celebrate sexuality in as many forms as possible, limited only by our time and imagination.” I hope this applies in 2012 just as much as it did in the 1970s, 80s, or 90s.

The truth is, I could have filled a book twice this size. Every day, stories are breaking, and being told, about sex—some wondrous, some heartbreaking. This is not a one-handed read, but it is a book that will stimulate your largest sex organ: your brain. Whether you live and breathe sex, you are curious about sex, or somewhere in between, I hope Best Sex Writing 2012 informs, incites, and inspires you. I hope it inspires you to write and tell your own sexual story, because I believe the more we talk about the many ways sex moves us, the more we work toward a world where sexual shame, ignorance, homophobia, and violence are diminished.

I’d love to hear your thoughts about this book and what you think are the hot topics around sex. Feel free to email me at rachel at bestsexwriting.com with your comments and suggestions for next year’s anthology.

Rachel Kramer Bussel
New York
November 2011

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