TL: DR, I'm shamelessly asking you to
review my latest book and giving you my free open marriage erotica story below as my way of saying thanks. Read on if you want to find out why I'm asking.
I am shifting a lot of things in my life, and over the past few years, have downsized the number of anthologies I edit per year. I'd rather put out one or two that are amazing and as brilliant as I can possibly make them (which, of course, is not entirely or even largely my doing, but the doing of the authors who are willing to submit their work to me) than the six to eight I used to a few years ago, which meant that I barely had time to focus on one before I was moving on to the next.
In the case of what I consider my editorial crowning achievement,
Best Women's Erotica of the Year, Volume 1, I also feel I can best devote myself to getting the word out, on
Instagram,
Twitter,
Facebook and
Tumblr and wherever else I happen to be, online or off, if I take the time to truly focus on what I'm doing promotion-wise, whether that means visiting every bookstore I can get to that I know has the book, Tweeting about the others, or securing an audiobook deal with my favorite narrator.
Will it be "enough?" Will it sell as many copies as I'd like it to? Will I feel like all this was worth it? Time shall tell. For now, I am keeping my fingers crossed and, while also going about my regular writing gigs, really trying to reach as many potential readers as I can. No matter what the total tally is, I want to know that I gave it my heart and soul, because this book in particular deserves that.
One way to help reach those readers who will never read my blog because they've never heard of me is through Amazon reviews (yes, I know Amazon isn't the only bookselling game in town, but they are a major one). Why are they important? I'll let
Tall Poppy Writers explain in visual form (although I personally think that "I liked it" or "I didn't like it" without giving a reason why really doesn't make for a good review, even if it "counts" according to this, but I will share more on that later):
Amazon's algorithms are notoriously secret, so I don't know if every detail here is correct. But I can tell you that my books with the most Amazon reviews,
The Big Book of Orgasms and
Gotta Have It, have been among the ones that sold the best. I don't know for sure, but I don't think it's a coincidence.
Right now I don't have any contracts for more anthologies beyond the ones already slated to come out, including
Best Women's Erotica of the Year, Volume 2, which I'm reading very sexy stories for this month. My dream would be to get to keep on editing the series for a good long time, maybe a decade, long enough to publish hundreds of authors in it (I'm publishing new authors in each volume). No clue if that is even remotely in the realm of possibility, but that's my dream (dream part two: the series does phenomenally well so I can afford to bump up author payment from $100 to $200).
Whether it comes true or not largely comes down to how this first one does. Reviews don't guarantee sales, but they certainly help get the book in front of readers might like, say, some of the authors in the book, like
Tiffany Reisz and
L. Marie Adeline, and might think,
This looks like something I'm willing to take a chance on. So if you want to do me a short favor to help me further that dream, I'd love it if you'd take a minute (okay, it might take two or three minutes but doesn't require more than that) to
leave a review on Amazon. You can share which stories is your favorite. You can share what you liked or didn't like about the book. (You can read lots of free excerpts linked at
bweoftheyear.com). My goal is to get to 50 reviews, and as of this posting, I'm 9 away.
Whether you post a review or not, I thank you for reading. As a little reward for getting through my musings, I'm giving you the entirety of my story in the book, "Flying Solo," about a couple in an open marriage where a woman is encouraged to seduce another person on a solo trip, to read. If you like it, don't comment here: let
Amazon and
Goodreads know.
Flying Solo
by Rachel Kramer Bussel from
Best Women's Erotica of the Year, Volume 1
I’ve made sure my camera has plenty of battery left for this trip, because you’re not here to watch me. I wish you were, but life sometimes keeps us apart. You didn’t ask me to, but I want to send you photos of me naked, turned on, wet for you. Even though you’re not talking up a storm as you usually are when we travel, I feel you with me as I pass through security, and especially as I head to the gate and start casually, quietly, discreetly looking around, the way we did on our honeymoon. Has it really been four years? They’ve flown by.
I’ll never forget sitting with you and hearing you whisper, “Find someone to take back to our hotel room with us.” You didn’t specify if it should be a man or a woman, and although I’d never considered it before, the idea of being pressed between you and another man made me so excited I almost spilled the medium coffee I’d just purchased. You took it from my hand and blew through the small opening in the plastic top for me, raising your eyebrows. I giggled, then started looking. I reached for your hand for support; you squeezed it but then let me go. I fiddled with my wedding ring, twisting around the new gold band over and over, afraid I looked like a kid in a candy store.
You’d whispered to me again. “I’m just so madly in love with you, and I think this should be a new tradition; when we travel, we find someone to join us. Just for fun, no strings attached.” I’d spent the entire time before we boarded perusing every adult sitting around us, mentally undressing them, wondering who had piercings or tattoos, who was kinky, who was the best kisser. I pictured the tall man in a suit, speaking rapidly in Spanish on the phone, with his cock in your mouth. I pictured the short, curvy redhead with her head buried between my legs while you entered her from behind.
“Well?” you’d asked, as they started to board the plane.
“I can’t decide. And I certainly can’t go up to any of these people. What am I going to say? ‘I just got married and my husband wants to have a threesome?’” Yet even saying those unspeakable words made me wet, made my mind and heart race. I’d told you that I was bisexual after our third date, wanting to make sure you wouldn’t have that awful, frat-boy, “That’s hot!” reaction that even most seemingly sophisticated men busted out once I revealed I went both ways. You just nodded and let me tell you all about Simone, the gorgeous woman with the smoky voice and beautiful, curvy body I’d most recently bedded.
I’d fallen in love with you in part because you let me tell you anything, and in turn revealed some of your fantasies. We’d tried out many of them—bondage, strap-ons, hot wax. We’d talked about threesomes and orgies but in a fantasy way, until that trip. For whatever reason, you’d never mentioned wanting to be with another man, but I liked learning new things about you just when I thought I knew it all. “Let’s wait until we’re on the plane,” I’d said, and lucky me: my dream girl, the one whose face I kept returning to, was sitting next to me on the plane. You’d pretended to sleep while I made small talk with her, all the while working up the courage to say what I most wanted to. As it turned out, she’d been the one to whisper in my ear, “I wish I could be alone with you for an hour. I want to kiss you all over.”
I’d stared right back at her, barely hearing the screaming infant behind us, or the blaring music from the woman’s headphones in front of us. I just saw her, Katia, her ripe, naturally pink lips, her jet-black hair, the tiny diamond glinting from her lightly freckled nose. When I reached up and traced her lips, you’d stirred, gently knocking my knee with yours. “You can. Well, not alone, exactly. I’m with him,” I’d whispered, getting close enough to make sure my lips grazed her earlobe. “It’s our honeymoon, but he wants me to bring someone home for us to share.”
“I’m good at sharing,” she’d whispered back, and she’d proven exactly how good once we were settled into our suite. Fresh from a hot shower we’d shared, our kisses making me tingle all over, Katia had gotten you and me on our backs and eased her mouth from one to the other until I was absolutely dripping wet, desperate for more. “You get on top of him,” she’d instructed, in the sweetest, silkiest voice possible. It was an order, but a gentle one. If I’d had a better plan I’m sure she’d have gone along with it, but there was nothing I wanted more than your cock inside me, my body primed from her hot, hungry tongue. She eased you inside me and just as I moaned and thought I might come right then and there, her tongue was back, lapping between the cheeks she held open with those soft, delicate hands. Her tongue pressed against my rosebud, making me groan.
“She’s licking me,” I’d whispered frantically before burying my face in your neck. She worked me into a frenzy, one that your hard, driving cock only made more frantic. When Katia’s fingers reached around me to circle my clit, I came, trembling against both of you, then biting your neck when her fingers didn’t stop dancing against my hard bud. She raised her head, only to nip at the soft flesh of my ass while she coaxed another climax from me. But it wasn’t until she lifted me off of you, pressed three fingers deep inside me, then eased them out and put them in your mouth that I really lost it. The look of sheer ecstasy on your face had me slamming down on top of you, fucking you harder than I ever had. You looked right at me while you sucked her fingers, and I came for the third time, something I’d also never done.
“Can I taste him?” she’d asked, and no sooner were the words out of her mouth than I was climbing off of you, wrapping my hand around the base of your cock, and feeding it to her. She didn’t swallow the whole thing greedily like I would have. Instead, Katia was like a cat with a bowl of milk, her tongue slowly licking up the cream at the tip, one long stroke at a time. I’d never seen a woman give a blow job up close like that, and I didn’t even think about what I did next, I just leaned forward and joined her, my tongue on one side of the ridged crown, hers on the other. Soon we were taking turns putting the head in our mouths, but I let her do the honors when you started to buck your hips up and down. I was too blissed out to give you the proper care and devotion you deserved, but Katia certainly wasn’t. I saw her saliva glinting off the length of your shaft as she rose all the way up, opened those beautiful brown eyes to stare at me, then, keeping her gaze locked on mine, moved all the way down. When I reached out to stroke her hair, you grabbed my hand and we both put just a little pressure on her head, enough to make her moan. Soon you were fucking her face—there’s no other way to describe it. She was grunting like an animal and you were lost in the feel of her mouth.
If someone had told me I’d spend the first night of my honeymoon watching another woman giving my husband head—and liking it—a few years before, or even a few weeks before, I’d have thought they were crazy. But in the moment, it was the hottest thing ever. There was no separation between us; we were all connected by our desire, our yearning to give and get pleasure all at the same time. When you came, I could tell instantly, even though Katia expertly sucked down every drop. “I think you should let Katia sit on your face,” you told me.
Oh my goodness. Of course. I lay back and soon she was on top of me, not writhing wildly, but slowly pressing herself against my mouth, enveloping my senses with her perfume. You got between my legs and ate me while I ate her, and even though your tongue distracted me from what I was doing, nobody minded. Eventually her languid movements weren’t enough for me, and I pulled her tight against me, loving how wet she was getting, loving it even more when she came. She repeated her clit stroking as you kept your mouth on me, so I got to experience a fourth orgasm that knocked me out. Katia was gone by the time I woke up, but what she left us with was an insatiable sense of sexual adventure.
Since then we’ve bedded men, women and couples—only while traveling, never back home. Today will be a first, though, and I not only don’t want to let you down, I’m curious what it’ll be like. Though I’ve had more partners than most of my married friends, when I’m with you, it always feels like married sex, no matter how many people are in the room. This time, it’s just me, and I have to imagine you watching, you whispering to me, you encouraging me. I still get nervous, as you well know, but I’ve loved every single one of our encounters, both in the moment, and how they spur us on later when we’re alone.
I text you a quick hello along with a photo of me, and just as I’m finished sending it, I see a man watching me. His head is shaved, and he towers over my five-two frame. I can tell he’s muscular from how his suit doesn’t quite fit him, even though he looks amazing. He’s taller and wider and probably stronger than you, but again, I know that if you were here you wouldn’t be threatened. Remember that pro football player we picked up, the one who not only bent me over and, with my head buried in the sheets, fucked me so well I squirted, but also fucked you? I think about that when I’m alone sometimes. It was one of the hottest things we’ve ever done. I wonder if Mr. Muscles would ever want to be with a man like you. Instantly, I blush; I can never hide that.
You’ve told me that’s one of the things you love about me—how easily I blush, how readily you can tell when I’m thinking something dirty. The muscle guy walks over. “Hi,” he says, his voice deep yet somehow boyish. “You busy?”
“Just waiting for my plane. Going on a business trip,” I say.
“Me too. Meetings, but not till three tomorrow.” Our flight’s at seven and is only an hour and a half, which means we both have a whole night free. “Look, I don’t want to bother you if you aren’t interested”—he nods at my wedding ring, which I only take off when I shower—“but I couldn’t help noticing you.”
“I’m interested,” I say quietly. I’ve had this conversation dozens of times, but it’s never easy to tell a stranger you’re in an open marriage, and it’s even more challenging without you by my side to help ease things along. “I’m…available. Tonight, anyway,” I say with a laugh.
“Tonight works for me,” he says. I motion to the seat next to me and we sit in companionable silence. I have an urge to lean my head on his shoulder, so I do. He strokes my hair, a seemingly gentle touch, but one that sends shivers running through my body. I picture you on my other side, and me snug between two men, one who sets me on edge and one who makes me feel safe—and sexy too. That’s what you do, if you didn’t know; I feel like I could take on the world in every way, knowing you’re there for me.
I don’t say any of this, though; it’s too intimate to share with a stranger. It’s just for you. I give the stranger a look after a few minutes, one of pure desire, conveyed through my lowered lashes. I don’t need to talk dirty just yet; in fact, the silence makes our gaze all the more powerful. He puts his hand on my cheek, cupping my face toward him, but instead of kissing me, he runs his thumb along my lower lip, folding it back against my chin before pinching it. Tears rush to my eyes and I’m utterly lost in his touch. I still feel your silent, unspoken presence near me, but it’s starting to recede just slightly—forgive me—as this man works his magic on me.
“I only need one night,” he says, then pinches my lip even harder before moving it aside, reaching into his bag and pulling out a notepad and pen. “Write down how you’re going to suck my cock,” he whispers, his voice as prim and proper as his words are not.
If his command is meant to shock me, it fails completely. Instead, it thrills me. I picture you watching me as I write, you who know so well exactly how I suck your cock—and how I love it. I write down what I think I will do, what makes me most excited about this most intimate act, but I also know that sex is the most unpredictable act ever invented. Just when you think you know what to expect, someone or something or some emotion comes along to make you feel as giddy as a virgin again. It’s like that with you, anyway, and I’ve given you at least a thousand blow jobs, by my estimate. My cheeks do grow hot, which means they burn red, as I write down my oral plans, passing the note to him and then looking away.
“Your husband is a lucky man,” the stranger whispers in my ear as we board the plane. My nipples get so hard it’s almost painful.
As luck would have it, our seats are next to each other. Once we're seated, I look out the window—toward you, my version of you. I wish you were here, not because I need you to be, but because I want you to be. I want you to smile with pride when I take him in my mouth, to tell him naughty facts about me while I swallow him whole.
I manage to make it through landing, though my panties are drenched by the end. I don’t tell the man because he has to know by now. I’ve been tightening and releasing, taking deep breaths, alternating between thinking about him and you. “Ready?” he asks as the flight attendant tells us we are free to go.
Am I? Not exactly, but I’m ready as I’ll ever be. I touch my phone in my purse and think about texting you, giving you a heads-up, letting you follow my actions vicariously. But I don’t. I’m not sure why, except that maybe I’d rather tell you later and try to be in the moment. Instead, I nod and then impulsively take out the camera I’d so carefully loaded, and give it to my new lover. “Show him how lucky he is,” I say with a wink. My exaggerated flirting is silly, but he rolls with it.
We’re in the baggage claim area now, waiting for our luggage. I pose suggestively for the camera—for you, but also for this man, who, when the conveyer belt starts to rumble, pulls me close and gives me a deep, sensual kiss. I can feel other passengers’ eyes on me, but I don’t care. I like that they have no idea what we really are to each other, no idea that my lips are right here, my body now curving toward this man, but part of me is with you. We break apart and I am hot all over. Thankfully our bags arrive shortly. I was going to take the subway, but he pulls me toward the taxi stand.
He beckons me toward him in the backseat as we’re whisked toward Manhattan. He asks where I want to go and I say his hotel; my room is just for me—and you, of course. I unbutton my coat and toss my long red hair all around, grateful it’s still sleek and straight after the plane ride. He takes photo after photo, which makes me want to share more of myself. I flash him my breasts in their lacy, hot-pink bra, laughing as I throw my head back.
Soon we’ve arrived, and I people-watch while he checks in, smiling as I ogle a six-foot-tall woman I know you’d love to bend over for. She notices me watching her, and I smile. If you were here, maybe I’d do more than that. Instead, I follow the man upstairs, aware of how hard my nipples are. He slips the key card in the door and once it’s shut, says, “You’ve had my dick hard the whole flight. I almost jerked off in the bathroom, but I wanted to save it for you. Show me those gorgeous breasts again.” I drop my coat right on the carpet and unbutton my blouse until it hangs wide open. I peel down the cups of my bra and show him my breasts. This time, the camera stays in his bag while he moves toward me, hunger on his face.
He pulls me close and sucks my nipples one at a time, using not just teeth, tongue or lips, but a combination of all three. It goes on and on and on until I want to buckle under him. When I reach for his cock, he holds me back, though. “Call him,” he says, whipping out his phone. “I want him to hear you come.” I freeze. This might be too much for you; it borders on being more intimate than you’d like me to be without you. Yet am I really without you if you’re listening, maybe even touching yourself?
Hesitantly, I dial you. “Hey, baby,” you say as I adjust the setting to speakerphone. “What’s up? Where are you?”
“In a hotel room,” I say. I turn around for a modicum of privacy, but I can still hear him taking off his pants. “I’m with someone I met on the plane. A man.”
“Are you?” you say teasingly.
“Yes. He wanted me to call you.” I pause until the silence is more unbearable than my next words. “He wants you to hear me come.”
“Oh my goodness, Sunny,” he says. Now the man knows my name, but I don’t care because I can hear how aroused you are. “Let me talk to him.”
I hand him the phone, but he adjusts the settings so I can’t hear anything except “Got it,” and “Will do.” He puts the phone back down, and you say to me, “Be a good girl for him, baby. I’m listening.”
Instead of pressure, though, all I hear is permission—to be myself, my best self, with you by proxy. He picks me up and throws me onto the bed, and in a few quick moves has my clothes off and my wrists tied above my head with my bra. I squirm, turned on in the way only bondage can make me. He fishes out the camera and snaps a photo, then says, “Spread those pretty legs for me, Sunny.” I blush at his use of my name, and at exposing myself so blatantly, but I do it. “And open your eyes,” he adds.
I stare back at him until he finally gets his fix then kneels next to me to show me his cock. “Your husband wants me to fuck you nice and hard, said that’s what you like, so that’s what I’m going to do.” He gets a condom out of his bag and rolls it on while I wait for him. Normally I’d touch my clit before penetration, but I can’t at the moment. He rubs the head of his cock against my clit for me, then the wetness along my slit, but when I start to thrust and urge him inside, he pulls back. “I was warned that you can be greedy,” he says, pinching my clit instead. “Roll over. Now you have to wait for my cock.”
No sooner have I managed to roll over, arms still bound with my bra, than he lifts me up and positions me across his lap. He spanks me hard, way harder than would normally happen the first time I’m with a new partner. You must have said something about how much I can take. The smacks are sharp and perfectly placed, my bound wrists hanging in front of me. He gives me two fingers to suck, and I am grateful for the distraction as the whacks get even harder. I whimper against his fingers, but not in protest. After a round of blows so intense they make me wonder if I need to ask for a break, he finally touches me. I’m dripping wet, so the three fingers sink inside fast.
“You were right. She responded very well to her spanking,” he says to you in a loud, exaggerated voice, making me even wetter.
Then he slides the bra off my wrists, settles me on my hands and knees, ass in the air, and enters me. With only a few thrusts, I’m coming, my moans filling the air. “I love hearing you like that,” you say, and I smile. Maybe this isn’t so different from you watching up close and personal. “I want him to come on your tits and send me a photo. You’ll do that for me, won’t you?”
“Of course,” I tell you. And of course, it’s not just for you; I am a glutton for a man showering me with come. Yours is my favorite, but after the way this man just fucked me, I am ready to feel him give it to me.
He turns me over, removes the condom, and stands over me, cock in hand. He’s going to make it rain down on me. “Do you want to taste it?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say, panting. He strokes himself, while I stare up at him in awe. I can hear you doing the same thing. When he sinks down onto the bed next to me, his hardness mere inches from my mouth, I know it’s time. I open wide, and soon he’s spraying my breasts and face with his hot cream, his shout echoing in the room. We hear your frantic breathing and then the long exhale of release. The man runs his fingers from my breast up my chest and neck, pushing some of his seed into my mouth as I greedily swallow it, a little bit of extended bliss.
“Get his card, baby. Maybe next time we can all get together,” you say before hanging up. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?
Once again, here's where to
leave your review. Read more from the book via the excerpts posted at
bweoftheyear.com. And here's my smile plus a little cleavage to let you know just how grateful I am:
Labels: Amazon, Best Women's Erotica of the Year Volume 1, Best Women's Erotica series, book review, books, Cleis Press, Flying Solo, free erotica, free story, open marriage, Rachel Kramer Bussel, thank you
The Big Book of Submission: 69 Kinky Tales
Flying High: Sexy Stories from the Mile High Club
