Calls for Submission: Sex Objects

SEX OBJECTS: AN ANTHOLOGY OF EROTIC ROMANCE STORIES
Editor: Delilah Devlin
Publisher: Cleis Press in Spring 2014
Deadline: July 1, 2013 (although sooner is better!)

SEX OBJECTS: AN ANTHOLOGY OF EROTIC ROMANCE STORIES is open to all authors.

Editor Delilah Devlin is looking for hetero stories for a romantic erotica anthology tentatively entitled SEX OBJECTS: AN ANTHOLOGY OF EROTIC ROMANCE STORIES.

High powered, high ranking...and in high heels.

The term “Sex Object” brings to mind a curvaceous starlet on a casting couch or an iconic, bee-stung-lipped beauty being pursued by a powerful, capable man. Turn that concept upside down by allowing the woman to objectify a handsome, sensual man, using the concepts of role reversal and power play but from a female perspective, and you have the makings of something evocative and fun for the feminine, romance reading audience.

Imagine powerful women unafraid of going after the men they want...
* A beautiful divorcee stepping out for the first time as a single woman with a paid male escort.
* The movie producer using the casting couch to lure the latest movie heart throb into a torrid affair.
* A university professor calling a male grad student into conference to discuss his “thesis.”
* A worldly corporate boss asking for “dictation” from her personal assistant.

These women will be masters of their own domain, in charge and proud...capable of using sex for pleasure's sake...but ultimately succumbing to the pull of desire created by the "objects” of their desire.

SEX OBJECTS will seek contemporary stories, although the editor is open to a futuristic or historical. Exotic, international settings will be considered. Traditional themes/tropes can be used, but writers are encouraged to create tales that surprise. Delilah seeks unique stories from authors with strong voices, and above all, she’s looking to be seduced by tales filled with vivid imagery and passion.

Published authors with an established world may use that setting for their original short story.

Keeping in mind that this volume is targeted at women, the editor seeks mainly hetero stories, but will consider bisexual or lesbian encounters and polyamorous relationships. This is erotic romance, so don’t hold back on the heat. Stories can be vanilla or filled with kink, but a deep sensuality should linger in every word—and don’t miss describing the connection between strong-willed individuals learning to trust and love one another. Keep in mind there must be a romantic element with a happy-for-now or happy-ever-after ending. Strong plots, engaging characters, and unique twists are the ultimate goal. Please no reprints. These must be original stories.

How to submit: Prepare your 1,500 to 4,500 words story in a double-spaced, Arial, 12 point, black font document with pages numbered (.doc, NOT.docx) OR rich text format. Indent the first line of each paragraph half an inch and double space (regular double spacing, do not add extra lines between paragraphs or do any other irregular spacing). US grammar (double quotation marks around dialogue, etc.) is required.

In your document at the top left of the page, include your legal name (and pseudonym if applicable), mailing address, and 50 words or less bio in the third person to realsexobjects@gmail.com. If you are using a pseudonym, please provide your real name and pseudonym and make it clear which one you’d like to be credited as. Authors may submit up to 2 stories. Delilah will respond in December 2013. The publisher has final approval over the stories included in the manuscript.

Payment will be $50.00 USD and two copies of the published book upon publication.

About the editor: Ms. Devlin has published over a hundred and twenty stories in multiple sub-genres and lengths with Atria/Strebor, Avon, Berkley, Black Lace, Cleis Press, Ellora’s Cave, Kensington, Kindle, Montlake Romance, Running Press, and Samhain Publishing. In Fall 2011, she debuted her first anthology with Cleis Press, GIRLS WHO BITE. Since then, she has published SHE SHIFTERS and COWBOY LUST. SMOKIN’ HOT FIREFIGHTERS and HIGH OCTANE HEROES  release in summer 2013.

Direct any questions you have regarding your story or the submission process to Delilah at realsexobjects@gmail.com.

Regionalism

Or Why do the Brits think we all sound like we're from Texas

I have a friend in my on-line guild (I play Star Wars, The Old Republic these days) who does this Minnesota sex-tape voice "oh yah, baby. Just like that. yah, oh yah." If you've seen Fargo, you know why this cracks me up, Every Single Time he does it. One of these days I'm going to get a recording of it... I might even use it as my ring tone...

Now, I watch a lot of movies from the UK (Love, Actually being one of my favorite "chick flicks"...) and the only thing I hate about it is that Colin goes to WISCONSIN and ends up hooking up with a lot of "American babes." Who all sounded and looked like they had guest star appearances on Dallas. Straw cowboy hats, shorts skirts and cowboy boots. Okay, seriously, I'm here to tell you that very few people wear heeled cowboy boots when they're walking around in the snow. Okay? ok.

Talking with one of my writer-friends, she was asking about how much of a southern accent she should put into her novel; one editor was saying "please take out all these apostrophes and put the g's back in to works like waitin', readin', and thinkin'." A good Southern expression is "fixin' to get ready." Another one is "y'all." True Southerners will sometimes say y'all's. Or even, "all y'all's."

• Y'all - You All. Y'all come back now, y'hear? (All of you, feel free to visit again soon!)
• Y'all's - You All's. Are these y'all's dogs? (Do these dogs belong to your entire family, or are there some neighbor dogs mixed in?)
• All y'all's - All of your stuff. "Get all y'all's shoes out of the foyer!" (Could all of the children please remove their shoes from the front hallway?)

One of my best friends is from New York. We have horrible arguments about whether the field-mouse batterer in the song's name is Little Bunny Foo Foo or Little Rabbit Foo Foo.

I say Bunny. She says Rabbit. We have been arguing about this for approximately twenty years. (Feel free to weigh in on that discussion... I'll bring it up next time we talk, provided y'all agree with me.)

I spend a lot of time doing research when I'm writing.

I wish the folks at Disney had done some...

 Here's a picture from Pocohontas... nice waterfall. Too bad Jamestown is a freaking swamp. There's no waterfalls. Hell, there's barely any hills around here at all. It's woods and marsh and muck, and by the way, it smells terrible. Also, floods a lot.

look how FLAT that is...

I was talking earlier today with one of my editors; somewhere there's a fine line between accuracy and readability. A military dress shirt is called a blouse, even when worn by a man. This may be accurate, but your average reader is going to assume typo, if they don't have extensive military background. Heck, I didn't even know it until I was told, and my father was in the Navy, my grandfather in the Air Force, and my ex-husband was a Marine.

In the end, you really need to decide if it's important to the story to be accurate...

(And yes, it's still a Chocolate Chess Pie, not a chocolate cheesecake.... you Northerners need to get some culture!)

It's Beginning to Look a lot like....

I'm a terrible gardener. I've got a black-thumb. I can even kill cactus and succulents, two kinds of plants I'm told are "damn near impossible" to kill.

So spring time doesn't usually fill me with tons of joy to get out there and dig around in the garden. I've managed to raise a couple pots of cherry tomatoes - at least until the squirrels got hold of them. But mostly, I've just ended up with pots of mulch and dead plant.

But - and here's the wonderful thing about being a writer; I don't have to have experienced something to write about it. I love doing research. I have several SME's (Subject Matter Experts) that I consult for information. And one of my best friends is a research librarian (probably the best friend a writer could have, aside from an editor. Oh, wait! I have one of those, too!) and she's always delighted to help me look stuff up if my research skills fail.

Which is how I came to write a story about a woman who loves her garden. Really, really loves her garden.

Garden Variety Excerpt


The carafe of wine slipped, unnoticed, from Jackie's hand and smashed onto the patio.  Shards of glass and splatters of Chianti barely registered as she stared, gape-mouthed, at the wreckage of her garden.

Before work, Jackie had checked the seedling beans, twining tomato plants, and a few decorative flats of strawberries, and everything had been pristine.  She'd plucked a few weeds from the warm soil, bound up a falling tomato vine, relocated a few bugs, and discussed the latest celebrity news with the attentive bean sprouts.  After a day of manning the phones at East Agency Collections, being called multiple names – as if she were the one who'd run up thousands of dollars of credit card debt and then tried to default on it – and being bitched out thoroughly by her manager, Jackie had been looking forward to a glass of wine, a book of poetry, and the company of her pleasant, non-meddlesome, non-annoying, quiet plants.  As far as Jackie was concerned, plants were much better company than most humans.

Especially now.

All four vertical trellises that Jackie had painstakingly put together herself lay in shattered ruins.  There was potting soil all over the patio.  Her budding garden, lovingly tended, was torn asunder; the plants yanked rudely from their clay pots and shredded.  There was seemingly nothing that could be salvaged.  This was no act of a careless child, not the destruction of someone's dog that had slipped their leash for a few short moments.  This was wanton, cruel desecration.

“Who the hell would do such a thing?” Jackie was barely aware that she spoke aloud, tears of rage and grief spilling over her lower lids.  She turned her head from side to side, as if seeking answers, but there was nothing.  With all the potting soil scattered all over the patio, she would have thought at least that there would have been some tracks, but the earth gave up no trace of the murderer of her garden.

All she saw was one flicker of life, one tiny, tenacious plant that clung to life.

She dropped gingerly to one knee, avoiding the shards of pottery and glass, scooping up the runner bean sprout. She’d bought them just last week – very expensive – from Garden Variety nursery.

“I'll make it right,” she promised.  Jackie pulled together a handful of soil and pressed it into her empty wine glass.  It wasn’t the best solution, but perhaps it would be enough to keep the one plant alive until she was able to get to the nursery.  “I'll make everything all right again.”

“I promise.”

Just not today, she thought as she closed the porch door on her savaged plants.  Maybe things will look better in the morning.

Guest Post: Erzabet Bishop

I just met Erzabet not all that long ago, she's in one of my various writer groups (she has a story out in Coming Together: Hungry for Love, Dark Hunger, which as you all know is one of my favorite collections! Zombies! Yay! err... I mean Grrr Argh!) and she's very fun! So, let me introduce her to you, and let's see what she has to say...

What are your greatest challenges in your writing career?

I think finding the time to do everything I want to do is the greatest challenge for me. I write erotica under Erzabet Bishop and under my real name I also write horror and YA. It is a balancing act, especially working everything around a full time job and family.

When did you find out that you wanted to be a writer? What inspired you to put pen to paper?

I have always written. Pretty much since I could thump out stories on my parent’s old typewriter.

Of your published works, do you have a favorite? Why? 

Oh…that is hard. I am excited about my new single title short called The Erotic Pagans Series: Beltane Fires coming out on April 15th from Naughty Nights. It is about a girl who has just been through a bad breakup and finds some sexy solace in the arms of a forest god. Smokin hot!

What are your biggest pet peeves for other people's grammar? Are there any mistakes that you find yourself making regularly?

The biggest pet peeve I have and something I have to definitely watch myself for is echoing. Using the same word or phrase over and over again can be a problem. The more I write, the easier this is becoming to fix. I read everything aloud now to make sure the flow sounds right and tweak it mercilessly before it goes anywhere. I also rely on my beta readers to tell me when something is off.

Do you ever want to go back and edit an older story? 

Yes. I go back to earlier works and think “Oh wow. I wish I had the writer brain I have now compared to what I knew then.”

How do you decide on character names?

I think about the kind of story I am trying to write and go from there. You never want to have names that are too close together either, so I make sure they are distinct.

Tell me about your first publication. Who was it with? How did you feel when you got that acceptance?

My first publication was for Coming Together: Hungry for Love. It was an anthology of zombie erotica stories to benefit the American Diabetes Association. I remember being over the moon happy and thrilled that my dream of becoming a writer was actually going to come true.

What's the worst thing that ever happened to you that you've incorporated into a story?

Oh wow. I am working on a full length YA that deals with some pretty gritty teen issues of abuse, domestic violence and suicide. It is one of those projects that has to be just right before it gets sent out and I have been polishing it for several years.  It is hard to write because of the combination of life experience and getting just the right voice for the different characters involved. If what I went through can help someone, then it will be worth it.

How much of your life and the people you know end up in your work?

You know that shirt that says “Be careful or you’ll end up in my novel” or something to that effect? Well, that is so true. Everything has potential. I am a retail manager and I see some of the craziest things imaginable. One of my most recent anthology calls that I submitted to had a scenario based a little on observations of people at the store.

What projects are you currently working on? 

If I didn’t have a million irons in the fire, I wouldn’t be happy I think. I have a short due Friday about nightclubs and mayhem, an edit on my new story “Collared” in the Hell Whore Volume 2 antho coming out in July, several anthology calls coming up for April 1 deadlines (wicked fairy tales, zombies, two bondage stories, gothic horror) and my next installment in the Erotic Pagans series by Naughty Nights. Oh, and I am also working on a f/f story for the Coming Together: For the Girls Anthology that is due by April 15th. That doesn’t count the ongoing YA books (two).

What's your writing routine?

Since I work as a retail manager, my life is not on a set schedule. It changes day by day. I have to be very creative and persistent with my time on the computers. Yes, I have two. One for each of my personalities if you will.  The biggest thing is getting the ideas of what I want to write in my head before I even sit down. While I am doing housework and the like, I am plotting. While I count tills or recover the store, I am always thinking of the next scene and jotting down notes to myself so when I get the treasured time in front of the computer, it flows. Some days off (like today) I will have gotten my housework done, laundry under control and hit the social media and blog posts by 10 am so I can then more on to my music reviewer job and begin to write as I listen to my newest assignment. It is a puzzle that fits nicely together. On days that I work, I just have to fit writing in where I can.

Is there a character or story that's stuck in your head and won't leave, from either your work or someone else's?

Yes. Always. Whenever I write a story, the characters become alive and as I find breath for them, I try to walk a little in their shoes to feel what they feel. It makes for a lot of babbling while I fold socks, but it is a lot of fun.

When I review books for my blogs, I also find myself falling into certain characters and wanting to live there. Harry Potter, Dragonriders of Pern…those two were some big ones that I felt very immersed in.

What writers or novels do you consider “must reads”?

Wow. That could take awhile.  There are so many. Cari Silverwood, Kally Masters, Red Phoenix, Mari Carr, Tessa Wanton, Jane Austen, The Bronte sisters, Anne Rice, Melissa Marr, Lucy Felthouse, Lisabet Sarai, Lauren DeStefano, Libba Bray, Scott Kenemore, Rachel Kramer Bussell, Alison Tyler, Max Brooks…I could go on for days…Visit me on Goodreads for a longer list or check out my blog for more reviews.

Tell us three things about you that are interesting.

I am a dog mom of nine.

My husband and I love to watch monster movies together.

Crocheting and knitting are a passion-my newest fascinations are the free headband patterns on Ravelry.

Erzabet Bishop has been writing since she could first punch keys on a typewriter. Recently she discovered that writing naughty books was a whole lot more fun. She is the author of Beltane Fires due out on April 15th, 2013 by Naughty Nights Press and has been a contributing author to anthologies from House of Erotica, Coming Together, Horrified Press and Storm Moon Press. Check out her blog for book reviews, giveaways and more.

Blog / Twitter: @erzabetbishop / Email / Facebook / Pinterest / Goodreads / LinkedIn

ok, I like this desk better; I've had some astounding neat freaks recently and they're making me nervous

Writer's Call, Upcoming Deadline

Coming Together: Girl on Girl is a collection of lesbian erotica and erotic romance edited by award-winning author Leigh Ellwood. All proceeds from the sales of this anthology, and any individual titles released in eBook or audiobook, will benefit the National Center for Lesbian Rights.

EDITOR'S CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS
Deadline: April 15th

We love women who love women…and women who may love more than one at the same time! Coming Together: Girl on Girl is a celebration of Sapphic proportions, and we want your hottest, sexiest stories about the love and passion Jeanette Winterson once described as “mirror geography.”

We would love to see:

Engaging characters we’ll remember long after we’ve read the story.

Smoldering sexual tension and explicit prose guaranteed to melt a digital reader.

Believable passion between two or more lesbian and/or bisexual or bi-curious women.

All sub-genres will be considered. Give us secretive lovers in Regency England, lesbians in space, interracial entanglements, whips and chains…or mix and match! So long as the focus remains on F/F sex.

We don’t want to see:

The usual no-no’s: no incest, underage folks, rape as titillation, bodily waste, snuff.

No men are allowed to play this time around, sorry. Your story can have male characters, but once it hits the bedroom it’s ladies only (unless your guy is just there to watch – we’d have to read the story first). Stories with trans-lesbian characters, however, will be considered. ;-)

If you have questions that aren’t covered here, feel free to contact the editor at ffcomingtogether@gmail.com.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

Direct all submissions to ffcomingtogether@gmail.com and CC submissions@the-erotic-cocktail.com.

Include “Coming Together F/F Submission” in the header of your e-mail. In your e-mail message, include a short summary of your story and a short biography, about 150 words.

Stories between 2,500 and 7,500 are preferred. The editor will consider stories as long as 10,000 if she finds them truly exceptional.

Coming Together contracts non-exclusive rights to publish, so previously published work is accepted. Please note it in your query, but remember you must own the rights to the work you submit. Stories over 5,000 words can be released individually through Coming Together as well, with the sales proceeds benefitting the NCLR.

Please use RTF, DOC, or DOCX format when submitting a manuscript. Include your real name and pen name and a working e-mail address. The editor will only consider manuscripts in the aforementioned formats attached to the query e-mail. DO NOT paste your story in the body of your message.

Please use Times New Roman font, size 12, and one-inch margins. Double-space paragraphs and set indentations to .3 – DO NOT use tabs or spaces to indent.

Coming Together is a non-profit organization, and all CT authors and editor have generously donated their talents to various causes. Compensation for inclusion in this work is a PDF contributor copy of the finished product and the satisfaction of knowing you are helping an amazing organization that fights for the civil rights of gay, bisexual, and transgendered men and women and their families.

Yeah, but... I'm raining on your Brainstorm

Fortunately for me, and the people around me, I am very comfortable inside my head. I may not always like the body that was given me to carry my brain around, but the landscape of my brain is well-mapped and familiar.

This is good, because I am a bitch to deal with for brainstorming.

On my own, I can usually manage. I tell myself stories before I go to sleep - I've found I worry a lot less if I'm making up stories than if I'm fussing about bills and my daughter's burst eardrum or the fact that I've had an ingrown toenail for A YEAR now, or that we really need to paint the bathroom downstairs... or or or. You know, I'm as prolific a writer as I am because it keeps me from going insane. Yes, yes it does.

I've got my methods and my madness. I often write characters and descriptions in notebooks (I love notebooks!) and then problems for them to solve, and I sort of flow-chart the story. Or at least I used to; I've managed to streamline the process a bit. (Have I mentioned how very very much I love Scrivener? If I haven't, let me do so now. Best. Software. Ever! I got it a few years ago, at a discount, for participating and completing a NaNoWriMo project... even without the discount, it's well worth the money it costs for a licensed copy. And you can try it out for free to see if it works for you. Okay, enough commercial. No, they're not compensating me for my endorsement.)

But sometimes I get stuck and I need someone to bounce ideas off of.

Advice: If I ever ask you to be a sounding board for me - run, don't walk - toward the nearest exit. Preferably screaming at the top of your lungs. Crazy writer! Crazy writer!

Seriously. You don't want to do it.

My idea of brainstorming is to reject everything you come up with. EVERY. THING. And I'll go through a ten minute rant for each idea, explaining just how wrong it is.

I've been told this is hideously annoying.

Despite that, it's really HELPFUL to me, and if you actually have a bag full of patience, or earplugs, that'd be awesome. Because all that yeah, but, no, I don't think so, this is why that wouldn't work, actually does help me. It shakes everything around in my brain and like one of those pinball games at the fair, all my marbles drop down and get sorted out at the bottom.

It does help.

You are helpful.

Even if I am raining all over your brainstorm.

So... who wants to be a sounding board for me? I'm stuck.

Guest Writer, Carmilla Voiez

Let's welcome Carmilla, one of my co-authors at Vamptasty/Hot Ink Press/Crushing Hearts & Black Butterflies Press (A trio of publishers who are closely aligned.)

 What are your greatest challenges in your writing career?

I love writing, but struggle to promote myself to readers. I suppose it’s the publicist part of the job with which I struggle most.

When did you find out that you wanted to be a writer? What inspired you to put pen to paper?

I’ve always wanted to be a writer. As a teen I had some poetry published, then life somehow got in the way. I started again after studying Creative Writing with the Open University in 2009.

Of your published works, do you have a favorite? Why?

Psychonaut is my favorite so far. It shows how I’ve matured as a writer and is quite an amazing feat of imagination, if I might say so myself. It doesn’t hurt that one of my writing heroes, Graham Masterton, read, loved and endorsed it.

What are your biggest pet peeves for other people's grammar? Are there any mistakes that you find yourself making regularly?

I hate it when writers use the wrong their or there, your or you’re, it drives me nuts. My worst sin is punctuation. I leave out commas. Luckily I have an editor who tells me off for this. I keep her busy.

Do you ever want to go back and edit an older story?

I read some paragraphs from Starblood at my launch for Psychonaut recently and realized I hadn’t used italics for some of the main characters direct thoughts. I started sweating and wanted to recall all the copies.

Tell me about your first publication. Who was it with? How did you feel when you got that acceptance?

My very first publication was a poem about a vampire child which was accepted by Bats and Red Velvet magazine. I was delighted. I still have the copy.

What projects are you currently working on? Are you willing to share a small excerpt from a work in progress?

I’m currently working on the last book in the Starblood trilogy and two short stories. One is an erotic short which is a modern take on a fairytale sexed up. The other is for an anthology I’m editing of psychological horror.

This is an unedited section from Black Sun. Please keep this in mind when reading.

“He steps through the gate. His skin glows in the soft twilight. She watches him for a moment then follows. The loose stones on the driveway cut the soles of her feet as she walks behind him on tiptoes.

‘Steve,’ she whispers then speaks louder. ‘Satori?’

He looks back at her for a moment and nods. Then he is walking again, away from her and she hurries to catch up.

Graves mark either edge of the driveway: ostentatious statues of former leaders in the community. Steve turns left and starts walking along a mud pathway between two of the more modest marble sculptures. The earth is soft beneath her feet and her soles sink into the earth. She follows his footprints, striding wider than normal to match his path perfectly.

‘What are we doing here,’ she asks.

He keeps walking and she follows. Her vision touches the headstones at either side of the meagre pathway.

The angels and dogs morph into simple crosses and the occasional teddy bear as they progress through time to the newer graves.

Steve stops in front of a black cross. A tree reaches with bare branches across the grave.

Sarah reaches the marker and stands beside him. The name on the tombstone is Rhiannon. She looks at Steve. His head is bowed and his hands pressed together as if he is praying. She kneels at the edge of the turf, where grass has grown and died back for winter. The earth embraces her knees and she trembles.

‘Raven,’ Steve says at last. ‘I promised I’d bring you here when you returned.’”

Tell us three things about you that are interesting.

I’m a lifetime Goth.

I used to be a clothing designer.

I have had every colour of hair you could imagine.