SPIDER Coming Soon!

Tags

arcanium, demonic circus, freak, nocturnal creatures, novel, series, spider

Guess what’s available for pre-order on Sept 27 and coming out in wide release on Nov 5? And I can’t tell you how awesome it is to have a spider on an erotic romance cover. So much of Arcanium is just me going, How can I make people aroused and uncomfortable or grossed out at the same time? And I really gave it my all in SPIDER.

 

Oh, what a tangled web she weaves…

One moment, Elizabeth is the modest, religiously devout nanny who accidentally brings her four charges to a slightly inappropriate circus filled with all the things a phobic like her could ever fear. The next, she’s sucked into the demonic world of Arcanium and transformed into Arcanium’s newest oddity, the Spider.

Her anxieties and phobias quickly attract the attention of the Creature, the gargoyle-like guardian of the haunted funhouse, who feeds on fear—and she offers a veritable feast from which he can relieve her, especially after she’s been locked in a glass box with giant spiders crawling over her eight-limbed body all day.

However, she also catches the eye of her jealous ex-lover, who helped make her into the scared, secretive woman she’s become, a woman who wrapped herself in the piety of her childhood cult just to escape him.

Between Arcanium and her own personal demons, Elizabeth has all four of her hands full.

 

I feel like when I wrote my blurb, I was dryly amused at all the elements that ended up in the novel. It was quite ambitious and slightly ridiculous. But it worked, so I left everything in. And so many elements led to a longer book, if you like that sort of thing. It’s a 120K novel, at about 302 pages according to the book page at Totally Bound.

And that’s not all. I’ve written and edited FUNHOUSE, and it’s been submitted. I’ve written HAUNTED (which is the continuation of FUNHOUSE), and I’m just waiting until it’s approved before editing, because I don’t know whether I’ll have to rewrite the second half of it. It took a decidedly dark turn, but Arcanium is an erotic horror series, so I might be okay.

Also, while waiting for FUNHOUSE to be accepted and HAUNTED to be approved, I’ve been editing the Nocturnal Creatures trilogy. Each book has been double-edited, and it’s ready for the pro edit. I’m hoping to write Arcanium’s next book SKELETON for this November’s NaNoWriMo and self-publish the first book in the Nocturnal Creatures trilogy on Winter Solstice, which is when the first book opens. The schedule’s pretty tight, but we’ll see. As I can afford it, I’ll be self-publishing the others, then possibly publishing an omnibus volume as well.

All that writing, while painful, had to eventually lead to this. We’ll see how it goes. But I’m excited for the Arcanium series, guys, and schedule willing, I might be able to finish it out next year.

Completed SPIDER

Tags

arcanium, novel, spider, stats, update

I’ve been a busy bee since last November. I finally found a system to writing that takes advantage of the hours when I’m still productive. It’s not as fast as when I was writing full-time, but it’s more than I was doing for two and a half years.

I finished writing SPIDER (Arcanium Book 6) mid-November, then started on FUNHOUSE (Arcanium Book 7 and 8 – it’s a two-parter) right afterward. Finished that in February. I was trying something new for Arcanium, a soft reboot, and it ended up making both stories much longer than the others, because they weren’t one-shots like the others. SPIDER’s first draft came in at 151K words, and FUNHOUSE clocked in at 199K words.

After three rounds of edits, I cut SPIDER down to 123K before submitting it yesterday, roughly two years after first starting (had to stop because it wasn’t working, worked on NOCTURNAL CREATURES instead) and a year after trying again. That’s still long, but if necessary, there are a few other things I can remove – it just wouldn’t improve the story to do so at this point. However, no amount of cutting is going to keep FUNHOUSE in one book, hence the two-parter.

I was upset about it for a while. Still am. But there’s nothing left to be done unless I want to scrap the three-book arc altogether and start over again, which I really don’t want to do, because the stories are good. I’ve grown in the two years since the first five Arcanium novels. The storylines are more ambitious. But long novels can be expensive through a publishing house, so even though I don’t want to split FUNHOUSE, it must be done, and I hope you can forgive me for any irritation that comes from that.

However, it was really nice to be finished with SPIDER. Because FUNHOUSE was so much longer than expected, I’m about a month behind on my flexible schedule, so I had to do my edits in a hardcore fashion that makes it more difficult for me, but the outcome was worth it. I have a project to complete for April, but I should be able to get started on FUNHOUSE edits in May to finish in June. Then I’ll probably have another project to work on before starting to write SKELETON (Book 9). Hard to imagine I’ve written that much just within my wonderful demonic circus universe.

Time for stats, because I like numbers.

SPIDER Stats:

First draft word count: 151,181 words

Submitted draft word count: 123,034 words

Projected word count: 100,000 words (If I drank, this is why I’d drink.)

Days to write: I wasn’t keeping track this time. There were a lot of breaks. Let’s say a cumulative three months.

First line: “In retrospect, Elizabeth should have looked up what kind of circus Arcanium was before bringing the Bishop children.”

Largest number of sexual participants at once: 6. Boom.

Number of sex scenes: Roughly 8? But there’s a shit-ton of sexual tension, and the scenes themselves are intense.

I did a lot of things where I’m not sure whether I’ll have to tone them down or not, because Arcanium tends to push the envelope, and the issue of consent comes up a lot in SPIDER and FUNHOUSE due to plotty things. The fact that it’s horror erotica means that I hope people know what they’re getting into, but I still worry.

And because of the nature of SPIDER specifically, I paired a number of things with my sex scenes that don’t normally get paired with sex, which makes me happy. I hope they let me keep Arcanium hella weird. Because it’s only going to get weirder.

Finished a project

Tags

beasts, grayling, longest night, nocturnal creatures, novel, trilogy, vampire, werewolf, writing

I’m more active at my Facebook page than I am here, simply because I’m thinking more in the short form than long form these days. Novel-writing has been taking all my long-form brain cells. Namely, trilogy-writing. Did it start as a trilogy? No. It started as one of the three short stories I wrote in the attempt to satisfy a submission call for a werewolf/vampire MFM anthology. The first two were too long for the call. Intervention ended up working for it, and I sold Red Queen as a novella. But the project I’ve been working on demanded fuller investment. Little did I know how much fuller it would become.

So I started working on Nocturnal Creatures (formerly Tooth and Claw) in late June,  expecting it to be a single novel finished by the end of August. Turned out it wanted to be a trilogy to satisfy the threesome/moresome relationship arcs to more satisfaction, and I just finished the last book tonight, mid-February.

I’m tired, I’m frustrated, I’m way behind on my writing schedule, and I intend to throw this trilogy into the deepest, darkest digital trunk I can find and not look at or even think about it for at least a year. That’s how long I’ll need to recover from over six months working on one project. And no, it didn’t feel like three. It felt like all one book in three parts. For reference, I wrote each of the Arcanium novels in less than a month each because I was writing full-time. Six months more than pushes my limits.

The stories feel solid. I forced myself to take my time, go through everything now so I have less to work on later. But I’ve played and replayed this story in my head, and I can’t stand it one minute longer for now.

A teaser, though:

Longest Night (Book 1)—On the year’s longest night, out of the handful of eligible, unwanted women in the entire kingdom, Asha of the Gray is selected to marry the king, a monster who lives in the castle far above the civilized districts of the kingdom and who only keeps his wives a year. Word count: 73,386

Beasts (Book 2)—Leaving on a journey to unlock the mystery of the northern ghost kingdoms, the king leaves Asha in the care of his returned army of wolf warriors and under the watchful guardianship of his most trusted friend, the mercurial captain of the guard.  Word count: 74,286

Grayling (Book 3)—Upon the king’s return, the mysteries follow him and threaten to destroy everything he built as well as every connection Asha reluctantly forged with the demons, monsters, and beasts that surround her. Word count: 113,102

The total word count was 260,815, at around 406 pages of single space, size-12 font. The biggest challenge, aside from writing the whole damn thing at all after the first book, was that I wasn’t allowed to use the words ‘vampire’ or ‘werewolf’ once. Made things a little more interesting. It’s not the first time I played with high fantasy. I’d say it was set in a similar universe as Calling the Dragons Home, my first story published by Totally Bound. The whole election season riled me up. I suppose a took out a lot of aggression through the story. Romance it might be, it’s still got a heavy dose of Gothic horror in it as well, because I’m me and can’t help myself.

I’m taking a break to do some editing, because my brain’s ready to pop like an old toaster. As soon as I gather up my strength again, I’ll resume work on Spider, Arcanium’s sixth novel. At least the Arcanium stories are basically standalones. They really do feel like separate projects that way.

Leaving the Sanctuary

Tags

call for blood, sanctuary

I was so busy this week, I didn’t have a minute to post that I had an article in the LGBTQ publication Divine Magazine, where I wrote about my conflicted feelings about saying goodbye to the Sanctuary world.

Contortion Trivia

Tags

arcanium, contortion, contortionist, dark erotic romance, demonic circus, erotica, novel, supernatural, valorie

For every novel, I have a few interesting tidbits to share about aspects of the story and/or its place in its series. I love movie trivia, so it only makes sense I’d do the same for my books. Here are a few facts about Contortion, the fifth book in the Arcanium series. As always, it’s best to read the book first, lest you encounter spoilers.

1. Valorie is named after the actress Valorie Curry, to whom she bears no resemblance.

2. Lennon is inspired by but doesn’t physically resemble Tim Roth. John is inspired by Leonard Roberts. Valorie isn’t really inspired by anyone. She’s just in my head.

3. Contortion differs from the other Arcanium novels in several different ways. Like Kitty, she’s a veteran cast member of the circus, but she doesn’t bring anyone new in, so this is the first novel where there’s no formal introduction to Arcanium. Secondly, most of my main characters, they struggle with the demon side of Arcanium; Valorie struggles with her humanity.

4. When I wrote Ringmaster, I was writing about a woman with hair all over her body when my problem is that I have trouble keeping mine on. In Contortion, I write about a woman who can twist herself into knots. I can’t even reach my toes without bending my knees.

5. Between getting a dayjob and edits for other Arcanium novels, Contortion took over three months to edit prior to submission, even though it took less than a month to write.

6. Valorie’s jeans when she steps through the portal are high-waisted and acid-washed. It’s really quite bad.

7. I affectionately call this story ‘The Bitch and the Beast.’

8. I consider this the most human of the Arcanium novels thus far. Coincidentally, it was also the least interesting for me to write (doesn’t mean I don’t like it, because I enjoyed spending time seeing things through Valorie’s eyes – just in matters of comparison).

9. Was the second book written for NaNoWriMo 2014, started halfway through that month. I resolved to write 50k for each novel (at least 50k to finish the first novel, at least 50k to start the second novel), and I succeeded.

10. Shortest Arcanium novel thus far.

Ringmaster (Arcanium Book 4) Trivia

Tags

arcanium, demonic circus, erotic horror, erotic romance, erotica, novel, ringmaster, series, trivia, writing

As usual, I feel compelled to share some of the behind-the-scenes tidbits from the Arcanium series. Here’s a look at the interesting trivia for Ringmaster. (Highly recommended that you read the book before the trivia.)

1. Kitty’s story was the second story I came up with as a potential sequel, but the fourth Arcanium book written.

2. I originally revealed her secret relationship with the Ringmaster as a ‘Behind the Curtain’ short story in the first Arcanium novel FORTUNE. Most of that short story ended up in RINGMASTER.

3. Kitty’s full name is Katharine Clanahan. The Ringmaster doesn’t have a name.

4. I came up with the character of Kitty as a reactionary response to my form of OCD, typically called trichotillomania or excoriation disorder. I’m obsessive-compulsive about plucking, shaving, and pulling hair from my body, to the point where I have scarring and have to shave my head. I’m understandably resentful of social grooming norms. Kitty is my complementary opposite, and I love her to pieces. I was going to write her an erotic novel, no matter what.

5. Some of the ways she does her beard in this story are inspired by Captain Jack Sparrow and Albus Dumbledore.

6. Victor didn’t have a name for the first 8,000 or so words of the story. I just called him ‘&.’ Seriously.

7. The ending changed several times before I finally reached it.

8. A new oddity turned up in RINGMASTER that wasn’t been explained in the novel or in previous novels: Marcus, the rotting man. He’ll get an explanation eventually.

9. Two sexual encounters Kitty has are referenced but not expounded upon. Those stories will be in the accompanying ‘Behind the Curtain’ short stories for RINGMASTER.

10. Many thanks to bullwhip expert Anthony De Longis for his Youtube video. I’ve used a bullwhip myself and have one in my closet (from a cattle ranch, not for play), but it’s been over fifteen years since I’ve wielded it, and I really needed a refresher.

Aerial (Arcanium Book 3) Trivia

Tags

aerial, arcanium, demonic circus, erotic romance, erotica, horror, m/m, novel, series

It’s been a rough set of months, so I haven’t put up a trivia collection for Aerial. I love reading movie trivia and getting tidbits of information about TV shows and music. I continue the tradition with my novels. Enjoy! (As you might imagine, this is best read after you read Aerial.)

1. The only Arcanium prequel, set three years before FORTUNE. So the timeline is out of sequence, yet AERIAL just felt right as the third book. It wouldn’t have made sense as the first one, since everyone would have expected Arcanium to be a primarily MM series. But AERIAL is only one of two Arcanium novels with a prominent MM relationship. The other is SILK (Arcanium Book 8).

2. Often through the sex scenes, I’d get so into it that I’d forget Seth and Lars had to be touching each other. I’d have to go back and change the choreography to reestablish the connection.

3. Seth is inspired by Simon Baker, Lars by Taye Diggs, the twins by Jewel Staite.

4. Lars’ name used to be Lance. I decided against the puns.

5. This is my first primary MM novel ever, and my first story written entirely from a male POV. It was nerve-wracking to write, to say the least.

6. By the time I’d worked a while on this book, I realized I like putting characters in mobile homes, even though I’ve only been in one once in my life.

7. There were many times while working on AERIAL that I just wanted to shake Seth and Lars, throw the Kinsey scale at them, and say, “Bisexuality exists!” But as straight-identified men, they have a bit of a mental block against the sexuality spectrum. To them, it’s either straight or gay, period. It makes for wonderful but not particularly enlightened angst.

8. I often wrote ‘Seth and Lars’ in AERIAL to the point where my brain started combining the two while I typed, and I’d want to write ‘Sars and Lars.’ Not sexy.

9. Seth and Lars had their characters first fleshed out in a ‘Behind the Curtains’ short story in the original FORTUNE. I integrated most of the aspects of that short story into several scenes in AERIAL. I also integrated parts of the Joanne and Jane ‘Behind the Curtains’ short story from FORTUNE into AERIAL.

10. The hardest part about this story was the choreography—in the ring and in the bedroom.

Carousel (Arcanium Book 2) Trivia

Tags

arcanium, carousel, erotica, horror, novel, series, trivia

I love learning movie trivia, so I thought I’d share some interesting facts about Carousel (Arcanium Book 2). As you might imagine, these might be best after reading Carousel.

1. When I was thinking about all the Arcanium stories I wanted to tell, Carousel popped up out of nowhere, with none of the established Fortune cast or the possible oddities or skill sets that I have in my list. But it took on a life of its own at the last minute. I was excited to start it.

2. Caroline is named after the main character in the movie The Skeleton Key. Whenever someone calls her by name, I tend to imagine Gena Rowlands calling it in that creepy, horror-movie voice with her Louisiana accent, even though Caroline is from Oklahoma.

3. Riley is a conglomeration of inspirations, but Colm is inspired by Julian Sands.

4. The female clown Tragedy, in look and behavior, is partially inspired by Emilie Autumn.

5. While I knew the clowns were going to be a part of Carousel, I hadn’t planned on the clowns playing quite as big of a role. That kind of just…happened.

6. Tragedy and Comedy’s names are self-explanatory. The male clown Murphy is named after Murphy’s Law.

7. Colm started out as human. Then I got bored. Changing him to demon made everything better.

8. Caroline is my youngest protagonist so far.

9. I wrote Carousel and Aerial (Arcanium Book 3) back to back, more than half a year after writing Fortune.

10. I’d really love to ride the Arcanium carousel.

Fortune (Arcanium Book 1) Trivia

Tags

arcanium, bell, erotic horror, erotic romance, fortune, horror, jinni, maya, novel, series, trivia

I have a ridiculous fondness for movie and music trivia, like when you go to IMDB and click on a movie’s trivia to see interesting little behind-the-scenes facts. So here’s some trivia about Fortune (Arcanium Book 1) – best read after the book, of course, but whatever floats your boat.

1. Fortune was originally called Arcanium and was intended to be a one-shot story. Then I thought about maybe doing a sequel with Kitty, maybe another with the aerialist boys Seth and Lars. I talked about the possibility with my editor, and she said to send in a series synopsis, which meant I had to have actual elaborated ideas. Then everything just sort of snowballed from there. Arcanium became the series, and I renamed the first book FORTUNE.

2. Actor Zeljko Ivanek inspires many supporting appearances in my stories. In the Arcanium novels, he’s Misha, the sword swallower.

3. Arcanium was partially inspired by the Wishmaster movies–among many other ‘be careful what you wish for’ tales, such as the wish episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the Goosebumps book Be Careful What You Wish For, the short story “The Monkey’s Paw,” musical Into the Woods, Aladdin, and more. FORTUNE and the Arcanium series hold several homages to them.

4. The primary inspiration for the Arcanium series, though, was a dream I had of a mother telling her bad child that she’ll leave her at the circus if she doesn’t behave and the bad child saying that she would rather stay at a circus. Then she’s left behind and learns that the circus folk are actually demons. This theme gets played out even more in Carousel (Arcanium Book 2).

5. One of my most sex-dense stories ever.

6. Arcanium arose from an experiment: Can I write a story that is both horror and romance? They’re usually diametrically opposing genres. Turns out, I can. And I can make a series out of it. They’re darker than your usual romance, with some truly weird elements to them, but it’s still romance.

7. In the original novel, I had short story ‘Behind the Curtain’ vignettes of other members of the Arcanium cast, what their wishes were, and who they’d paired off with. They were interspersed between every few chapters or so. I’d intended to carry that out through the whole series. Now they’re free stories that will pop up a few at a time to promote the series.

8. This book made me question my personal declaration that I’m not a size queen.

9. Maya is of Italian and Hispanic heritage. She’s the first religious protagonist that I’ve written for an erotic novel, but she’s certainly not the last.

10. The language Bell speaks is Farsi. He hails from the area of ancient Persia. Though he’s nomadic, he’s kept up with the changes in the language because he values his roots. Being psychic helps with the language adjustments.

11. I developed my best and most efficient editing process while editing Fortune. I use that process every time now.

12. Bell’s navel is anachronistic. He was never in utero, so no umbilical cord. Fun fact.

FORTUNE (Arcanium Book 1) is now available!

Tags

arcanium, bell, erotic horror, erotic romance, fortune, horror, maya, novel, paranormal, series, supernatural, writing

Welcome to Arcanium, the Circus of Lost Souls. Be careful what you wish for.

Book 1 in this erotic horror romance series, Fortune, is officially out everywhere and about half off at most vendors right now.

Totally Bound
Amazon US (print)
Amazon CA
Amazon UK (print)
Barnes & Noble
All Romance Ebooks
Kobo
Goodreads

In addition to that awesomeness happening, I’ve been interviewed about the start of the Arcanium series by Totally Bound for their Author Spotlight and on Goodreads.

Also, I wrote a long, soul-baring post for Lisabet Sarai’s blog on why I wrote erotica about oddities, in spite of the many anxieties I had about tackling such a sensitive, fraught subject.

“A person doesn’t decide to write about a circus best known for its oddities, some of which are human and others demon, lightly—especially with erotica. There were times when I wanted to hide Arcanium and never let it see the light of day for fear of doing it wrong.

The same issue cropped up to a lesser degree while I was writing the Sanctuary trilogy, when it came to Renee’s mental illness. I drew from my own experience, adding some legitimacy to the fantasy. But did I have a legitimate claim to marvels and oddities, and if I didn’t, what did I have to do to write the subject right? I had to look at this from every mortifying angle to make sure it was the right thing to do. I’m neurotic that way. It’s not always a bad thing.

I eventually realized I was overlooking many cases of the obvious. The biggest one was that asking the questions at all suggested I was writing in the right direction.”

Read the rest HERE.

Coming up this week: free Arcanium Behind the Curtain short stories (which you shouldn’t read until you read Fortune, so dive right into the fray, loves), Fortune trivia, and a blog tour.