Cleis Press 40% off new year erotica sale

To kick off 2021, my publisher, Cleis Press, is having a big 40% off sale through January 8, 2021 on select print books (shipping to the U.S. only) if you use the code NEWYEARNEWBOOK. Below are the five books of mine that are on sale, though Erotic Teasers I think still needs an add to cart button. If you haven't read these or are looking to give them as a gift, check it out. See Cleis's Twitter feed for more sale books. Also, a reminder that the best way to keep up with what I'm doing on a day-to-day basis is to follow me on Twitter @raquelita, Instagram @rachelkramerbussel (and/or my new all jigsaw puzzle account @rachelpuzzles and Facebook @rachelkramerbusselauthor which I update in that order of frequency. If you want to follow the Best Women's Erotica of the Year series, where I post news, photos, giveaways and more, those handles are: Twitter @BWEoftheyear, Instagram @bestwomenserotica and Facebook @bweoftheyear.



Here are individual links to my Cleis Press 40% off erotica print books for U.S. shipping with the code NEWYEARNEWBOOK. They're all also available in ebook and audiobook. I've listed some of my favorite of my anthologies with all buy links on my website, and will be adding more soon and here's all my Cleis Press books, most available in print, ebook and audio, some are out of print. Also, whether a book says "Best Women's Erotica" or "for women" in the title, readers of any gender who like sexy stories are welcome to read them! I welcome all readers and feedback and reviews to help me guide future anthology selections.

Best Women's Erotica of the Year, Volume 2

Best Women's Erotica of the Year, Volume 2

Best Women's Erotica of the Year, Volume 4

Begging for It: Erotic Fantasies for Women

Erotic Teasers (add to cart button should be up soon if it's not currently)

If you haven't subscribed to my monthly newsletter yet, hop on it, because I do roundups and newsletter subscriber exclusive giveaways. Last year I was a bad newsletter sender and skipped a few months, including my big book release month of December, but as part of my 2021 goals I'll be sending them out monthly no matter what, starting today with January's.

Spanking is popular as proven by my first sex column of 2015

My January 1st sex column "A good spanking really turns me on" went online a day early, and managed to teach me an important lesson. Lately I've been bursting with ideas for fiction and nonfiction, but less confident about executing them. I get nervous and petrified, and choose to believe the rejections mean I am unfit to write, rather than simply that I need to polish my piece and get it back in circulation and keep on writing and submitting, writing and submitting, repeat every day.



So because I was in a bit of a slump from around my birthday November 10th through the end of the year, I've been doubting myself, especially when it comes to my own words and thoughts. Pieces where I rely on someone else's expertise I can totally handle because they aren't about me. So I cobbled together the spanking column and even though it wasn't "perfect" or what I had hoped it would be, I turned it in lest I turn in nothing and get fired from a magical job that I love.

Well, as tends to happen in my moments of deepest doubt, it turns out that spanking is actually pretty popular, no doubt aided by the stellar choice of a photo. I feel dumb for not knowing this until a few months ago, but I've been told by multiple social media experts that posts with photos do better than posts without them. So thank you, all you spanking lovers who've read and Tweeted and blogged the column, for giving my 2015 a much-needed boost and reminding me that imperfect is okay too. For me, the reality is that a weekly column is a blessing that sometimes feels like a curse. I plan several weeks ahead but sometimes get stuck by my own doubt. I want to cover every possible base and idea and possibility when with only 650 words to work with, you actually have to be very on point and focused and zooming in on your topic. I've got a lot of great pieces lined up, trying to probe many aspects of sexuality, and I'm prepping to start a whole new sex column aimed at a different audience for a publication I'm also honored to work with. Plus other non-sex pieces that I hope to get out there soon, because I always want to have one foot outside the sex world. I'm proud to be a sex columnist and erotica editor and author, but "sex writer" feels a bit too much like "writer who can only write about one topic" to me. So those are my thoughts on this second day of the new year, with the shining blasting through my window, me eavesdropping on the workers drilling outside my bedroom window, and eager to get my brain and words back on track. I wish you many words, spoken, written and read, in the new year.

Buy one get one free, and signed: special sex book offer, this week only!

Happy New Year! As a special 2012 offer, this week only, buy my new book Best Sex Writing 2012 and I'll send you any of my Cleis Press anthologies in print free, and signed! Offer good through Friday, January 6th, midnight EST, US only. You can preorder the ebook or purchase the print book from any store selling it, or directly from the publisher, Cleis Press (some helpful links are below); send proof of purchase to bestsexwriting2012 at gmail.com with "BOGO" in the subject and let me know which of my books you'd like, along with your mailing address and, if it's not you, who to make it out to (they're all listed at the bottom, but Crossdressing and Bottoms Up are temporarily out of print). I'll send you a signed copy by the end of January! If this sounds like a good deal to you, I'd love it if you'd let your fellow book readers/sex nerds know. Thanks!



Purchase 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

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

Happy New Year!

I have many, many posts I would like to make and thought I could squeeze in on the last day of the year, ones that have been percolating in my mind, like 10 amazing books I read this year and 10 sites I’m grateful for and 10 things I'm happiest I did this year and much more, but it’s an insanely hectic time so they are going to have to wait. I’m on self-imposed lockdown this weekend, save for a massage and a few errands, as I write and edit and journal and think and prepare for personal organizers to come remake my home and lots and lots of other work. For once, though, it doesn't feel like a giant burden, it feels like exactly what I'm supposed to be doing. This has been a big, crazy, wonderful, awful, busy, beautiful year, I can't even think how I could summarize it except to say I'm looking forward to the next year and to learning from both my mistakes and others around me.

So I will have more Shag details, In The Flesh postcards, Best Sex Writing 2010 event dates (right now, 2/21 in Eugene, Oregon, 2/22 in Portland, and we are working on Seattle that week) and much much more.

But I just wanted to say, to whoever is still reading this intentionally neglected blog, THANK YOU. It means a lot to me and I am doing my best to be a better person in 2010, one I, first and foremost, can be proud of, and hopefully other people can too. I’ve had so much amazing support, from friends and strangers alike, recently, and I am beyond grateful for it. I wish you all a wonderful 2010 and Happy New Year!

Here are two more of Anya Garrett's amazing photos from my Shag photo shoot. Shag is definitely worth checking out and I promise you the January 28th boob casting will be a one-of-a-kind very fun event.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year everyone! May 2008 be wonderful and cupcake-filled.

From Flickr user Bombass



From Flickr user abbietabbie