I know given the trash I write this may come as a shock to some people, but I grew up quite religious. In fact, until I divorced the ‘preacher’ when I was thirty-five, I had spent much of my life in the church. One of the big things, after getting saved and finding Jesus (who knew he was lost?), was rededicating your life. Every year churches, whether they were Methodist, Baptist, or Charismatic, brought in guest evangelists for ‘revivals.’
Now, that may sound like a funny topic for the ‘porn’ writer to discuss. But the truth is…that is how I feel right now.
After three years of drowning in a writer’s block, and about seven of feeling like a sell-out as I tried all that Amazon shit in vain, I feel revitalized as a writer. I am passionate about writing again.
I spent the past couple of months going through my old stories on Literotica. Which ones still speak to me. Which ones do I need to finish?
Of course, there are the obvious. If I don’t get around to Ægir’s soon, Alan is afraid that one of my hacker fans will discover our address and hunt me down, kidnap me and ransom me for the ending. A close second is Nightwalker’s Woman.
And I promise: I will get to those. In fact, Chapter 11 of Ægir’s is written. The problem is figuring out the final pieces of Chapter 10. I am doing a bit more research on animism in Native American culture before tackling Nightwalker’s.
Of course, I have committed to releasing my books that are on Amazon at Literotica, as they come off Kindle Unlimited, of course. I am in the process of posting chapters of Nothing Done In Love, which is one of my personal favorites. It symbolizes for me the very essence of sexuality:
Nothing done in love can ever be wrong.
I put a great deal of myself into Joy Danvers. She, of course, got more famous and made more money than I have, but does not matter. And in her daughter, I have mirrored the struggles of my own prodigy. It is not always easy being the child of that ‘cool’ Mom. Having condom application around the kitchen table after school while sharing plates of homemade cookies. Having your masturbatory history openly discussed.
My eldest daughter was twenty-one (or two, I forget) before she lost her virginity. She blamed me. She said that I took all the mystery out of it. And it is for certain that my adult children have all turned out much more ‘respectable’ than I raised them to be. I try like Joy not to be too disappointed by their blocked sacral chakras. So, I do understand the struggles that Kaitlin has in coming to terms with loving two men and breaking all of society’s rules.
If you have not discovered this story already, I hope you will check out Nothing Done In Love.
Of course, one of my most popular and inspirational stories, Sergeant Mike’s Miracle Tour will be coming off of KU this week. Book One of that series is already available on Literotica at My Country Tis of Thee. But Book Two, Labor’s End will be available shortly as well. I will be posting the whole thing to Novels/Novellas rather than releasing it chapter by chapter (wish I had done the same with NDIL).
What I am to do with Shared Burdens is the big question. The final book of that trilogy and the climax of the story was actually the first to be written. It has been written and re-written with at least two versions on Lit. Red, White, and Blue Halloween was the original short story that won a contest. I then rewrote it strictly from the heroine’s perspective in Esther’s Story. But when I published it on Amazon, it was from both Esther’s and Sergeant Mike’s points of view. The thing went from a 10,000-word short story to a 30,000-word novella to a 60,000-word novel. I suppose I worry that it will seem I am beating a dead dog with this one, but the story had undergone significant changes with each re-write.
I am also working on the next chapter of Rings of Fire/Apocalypse. My biggest worry is what category in which to stick it. The storylines that are entwined include lesbian, polyamory, BDSM, and a bit vanilla. The Arrangement is in the novels/novella section. Rings is in Romance. I am thinking that Apocalypse will also go in novels/novellas, I just need to double-check the word limit on that one.
I have also taken up the gauntlet of finishing one of my trashiest, yet most romantic, stories: Teach’s Darq Secrets. I already had a couple of more chapters written and saved on my computer. Heck, I actually outlined that one, a huge shock for this pantser. (Term meaning I write by the seat of my pants, i.e. no planning.)
But what shocked me was the sheer number of other stories that called out to be finished. A couple that I am currently working on include:
And the others are almost too many to list: Fall of Man, Forbidden Fruits, Might Have Beens, Small Town Secrets, Sommer Loven, Work Outs, and Zombie Soldiers.
And that does not even take into account my non-fiction writing.
Yes, like those Revivals that I was forced to attend as a child, my passion for writing has been freed to soar and grow with the realization that I was never intended to be an author. I am a writer…and writers write.
That is my new religion…well, faith is more accurate. No matter the category, all my stories reflect my basic Three Rules of Life and Love:
1) Life sux.
2) Love is the only thing that makes it worth living.
3) Great sex is the best way to show that love.
Those are pretty good rules, not just in terms of my writing, but how we live our lives in our @HomeCrazzyHome. Speaking of which, on top of all that writing, I have a wedding to plan. And now, Alan and I even have a date. In order to keep life simple, we are getting married (or civil partnership…whatever) on the fourth anniversary of the day we meet. Which just so happens to be May Day/Beltine, the traditional day in Celtic culture for weddings (and wild fucking in the fields too).
So, I am off to the next story…whatever that may be.
(I better live to be one-hundred…just to finish all these stories at Literotica.)
Tara Cox - Literary Erotica 