My fellow authors and editors, let's have a likefest!

I'm on a quest to get to 100 likes on Amazon for my new book Twice the Pleasure: Bisexual Women's Erotica and I'm sure many of you could use a boost on Amazon too. You don't have to be an author or editor, of course, but if you are, please leave your Amazon URL in the comments and I promise to like your book too (likely even download it since I'm in a book devouring mood lately). I'm fully aware that maybe this is the dumbest idea in the history of book promotion, but I hate sitting by feeling helpless, like if I don't do that little extra bit, I'm doing a disservice to my books, so I feel like anything I have the ability to do is worth trying. Postcards and bookmarks are coming soon too. Sorry if this seems tedious and stupid. I teeter on the border of tedious and stupid and inspired and excited quite often, trust me. But Serving Him and Twice the Pleasure are books I think have a bit broader appeal than some of my other ones, and I'm hoping someone out there who's been all, "I wonder where I should start when it comes to erotica" will pick them up, but they can only do that if they know where to find them, hence, my maniacal quest for 100 likes. I also only get updates on sales 4 times a year in the form of royalty checks, but Amazon likes I can check any time I want, so it feels a teensy bit more within my control, unlike just about everything else when it comes to putting books out into the world. Just wanted to let you know, I know it's crazy, but I'm crazy. I would never deny that, and maybe, just maybe, my madness will help sell books. A girl can dream. Here's a sneak peek at my story.

From "A Little Fun" by Rachel Kramer Bussel

“Can I buy you a drink?”

He can’t be serious, Dee thinks, willing herself not to roll her eyes. Yes, she’d entered a straight bar, wanting a beer or three and some quiet, to watch the game, maybe, to be alone, but in public. Did she look like the kind of woman who wanted a man to buy her a drink? Her fashion sense since she’d turned fifteen had been all about not looking that way. She didn’t want to be the kind of girl who men thought they owned, simply because she existed. That wasn’t why she was gay, but it was at least part of why she was butch, along with the fact that it felt natural, right, the way all the ads in Hannah’s magazines and on TV always said a “real woman” should feel. Well, damn it, Dee was a real woman, she just wasn’t a girlie one.

Fuck. She was here to think about anything but Hannah, who had lit out of New York the week before, insisting she needed to go to L.A. to pursue her acting dreams. Dee said she would make plans to move out there with her if that’s what Hannah truly needed to be her best self, but Hannah had pressed her delicate, hot pink-painted fingernail against her lips and looked deep into her girlfriend of five years’ eyes, and Dee knew. They were over, whether Dee liked it or not. She’d had to hold back her tears, determined not to let Hannah know how much she ached. That was also part of her butchness; she wasn’t sure why, exactly, that’s just how it was and had always been for her. The femmes cried on her shoulder; if Dee had to cry, it happened in private. That had been six weeks ago, and she was sick of crying. “Sure. A Guinness. Or whatever,” she said, trying not to sound quite so morose. As the guy leaned over the counter, she looked at him. He didn’t look gay—of course, as a good queer, she knew you could never really know for sure until you asked, and sometimes not even then, but everyone has tells, even the militantly straight men who secretly wanted to suck cock. There was usually something. This guy just seemed, well, friendly. He had on worn jeans, cowboy boots, a red, orange and white faded flannel shirt over a white T-shirt.

“Here you go,” he said, and then he grinned.

“Are you trying to flirt with me?” The words burst out of Dee’s mouth before she realized quite how harsh they sounded. They weren’t a girl/woman’s words; there was no uptick at the end of the question, no accompanying flirtatious smile or toss of long, glossy hair—Dee didn’t have any of the latter, but if she did, it would be worn down her back in one long braid, like she had in junior high, when her mother insisted she keep it well past her shoulders.

“So what if I am?” he asked, raising an eyebrow. He wasn’t laughing at her—he was challenging her. Dee’s face flushed—she had her tells, as well—and she was annoyed that she was, somewhere, somehow, getting just a little turned on. Had a male stranger who wasn’t overtly gay ever flirted with her like this? She’d have to ponder that one later. She was so used to being the one to make the first move, flirting with women, mostly femmes, the occasional androgynous type, a few trans guys who always made Dee feel old. She looked every bit of her forty years, and she didn’t mind; her body was strong and she’d packed a lot into her life so far.

“Look, I really appreciate this”—Dee held up the cold, frosty glass—“but I’m gay. Into girls. Women. Queer. In case you couldn’t tell.” She gestured down at her outfit and willed herself not to blush when she saw that her nipples were hard beneath her white tank top and T-shirt. It was summer, and she hated wearing a bra and tried to avoid it whenever she could.

Show your support for Twice the Pleasure: Bisexual Women's Erotica by liking it on Amazon and a reminder, if you pre-order it in February, you get a free ebook or autographed paperback.