I’m In Best Women’s Erotica 2012

The Best Women’s Erotica books from Cleis Press are one of the longest-running erotica series. Violet Blue has been the editor since 2006 and she’s shown herself to be quite the talented curator of dirty stories. The 2012 edition is out tomorrow (6th Dec) and I’m pleased to say that a story of mine made the grade this year. My story Tweetup is listed second and appears under my Louise Read More …

Women And Male-Male Erotic Fiction

The Sydney Morning Herald has featured an article about the popularity of male-male erotic fiction (slash, yaoi or gay male romance) with straight women. It features quotes from me, using my Louise Lush pseudonym. The journalist (Alyssa McDonald) has treated the subject well, talking to various different sources and not descending into sex-negative language. When Alyssa contacted me she wasn’t particularly well informed about the subject. Her main source of Read More …

Enter Filament’s Erotic Fiction Contest

Are you a writer? Enjoy writing erotic fiction? Then I urge you to consider entering Filament’s music-themed erotic fiction competition. Suraya and the lovely people at Filament want you to “write a fantastic, filthy, luscious, delightful piece of fiction that meets our guidelines and suggest the theme music.” For The Girls is sponsoring the whole thing and I’ll be judging the contest so get your entries in before the deadline Read More …

Sex Fantasy Stories

In late 2003 I bought SexFantasyStories.com and put a few examples of my erotic fiction on it. I then expanded it to include an AVS site a couple of years later. Since then, however, it’s been horribly neglected. The design was seriously ugly and very much in need of a revamp. And then I noticed it was getting traffic after Google’s nasty Panda algorithm change on Monday. In the meantime, Read More …

The Thrill Of Tagging Erotic Fiction

I’ve just finished hand-editing every single piece of erotic fiction at For The Girls. It was a huge job, manually going through eight years of content, looking at every single story (400+) on the site, fixing the text and photos and then adding categories and tags to each one. I’ve re-read every one of our erotic stories and there’s just so many brilliant pieces of writing. I’ve been immersed in Read More …

Erotica Label Black Lace Shuts Up Shop

The Guardian reports that major erotica publisher Black Lace will not be publishing any new titles in the coming year. The 16-year-old Black Lace imprint specialises in erotica for women, by women, and has sold more than 4m books worldwide, but its publisher, Virgin Books – part of the publishing giant Random House – has decided to stop commissioning new titles for both itself and its sister imprint, Nexus, which Read More …

A Backlash Against Female-Focused Erotic Fiction

Bam. Two negative, almost hateful diatribes against female-focused erotic fiction books in as many days. Instead of being condemned as a cheapjack book slut pandering to male fantasies, you will be profiled in the serious press, with a photograph of you dressed demurely, and women will not be ashamed to be seen reading your book on the Tube. Feminist websites will praise you for “provoking debate in intellectual circles” and Read More …

I’m In Best Women’s Erotica 2009

I really don’t know why I haven’t blogged about this before… I was actually bursting to tell the news when I first discovered my story had been accepted into Best Women’s Erotica 2009. But then I wasn’t sure if it was a secret, and then I just never got around to it. I thought I’d wait until the publication date. So anyway, my point is, I have a story in Read More …

Are Erotic Book Covers Sexist?

Thanks to The Girl for pointing me in the direction of Erotica Cover Watch. This is a new blog that asks the question: why are only women featured on the covers of erotic books? It’s a very good point and the topic naturally delves into the whole feminist issue of the male gaze and the continued way that straight women are still considered to be non-visual. It all comes down Read More …

Mills And Boon Gets Spicy In The UK

Romance publishers Mills and Boon are 100 years old this year and they’re about to launch the Spice erotica imprint in the UK, according to The Independent. In the past, M&B books only allowed sex within the confines of a long term relationship. Spice, however, features stories where people “have sex for enjoyment.” Phew, imagine that? The article has an interesting timeline of erotic milestones in the Mills and Boon Read More …

Tips For Aspiring Writers

In the wake of For The Girls’ fourth erotic fiction competition, I feel the need to make a post urging aspiring authors to follow a few simple rules when writing erotic fiction. I feel this because, even though there were plenty of absolutely gorgeous and cleverly written short stories entered, there were also plenty of bombs. Yes folks, there are people out there who fancy themselves as masters of the Read More …

FTG Short Story Competition Winners

The winners of the For The Girls annual short story competition have been announced. All the winners and judging comments are here. This year the theme was “transgression” and wow, it certainly inspired people to come up with wild, outrageous and very sexy stories. The top three stories: WINNER Julienne by Sommer Marsden Judge’s comments: Exhilerating and undeniably hot, Sommer’s intense story of a stale relationship revived at the point Read More …

Erotic Literature Becomes Thought Crime

Today’s depressing censorship/thought crime news is that a woman has been sentenced to five years of probation for writing sex stories. Yes folks, for writing fiction. I’ve already posted about this case. It’s difficult to speak out in defense of the author because the stories depicted child abuse, violence and rape – that’s why the government went after Karen Fletcher and her site Red Rose Stories. But this case sets Read More …