I like to think I might have - and I have lots of unfinished and not properly started projects on my Mac - but there was something about that particular meeting, by a swimming pool in South Africa that made me think "I can really do this". Raven was extremely supportive (via Facebook) once I was back in the UK and it was a real thrill to find that a year later, almost to the day, we were both releasing books on Breathless Press. Admittedly something like her 23rd against my 1st. I have a long way to go.
Heh, it's not a race. You'll have 23 one day! Your blog is fairly recent (four months old). Was that when your submission was accepted or when you finally took the jump into blogging?
It was totally because of my submission being accepted. I'd never thought I had enough to say to justify a blog - and sometimes I think blogging gets in the way of writing - but I realised I ought to be out there doing it. I still don't find it easy to come up with something that I think people will be interested in.
I know. That's why I do features and interviews. It's a lot easier to talk about other people. One of the recurring features on your blog is Sunday Snippets. Do you consider doing other, similar blog sharing features?
I'm not a very prolific blogger so I latch onto things like Sunday Snippets. All ideas gratefully accepted!
I might know of a few. snicker, five?Instead of blogging, what social media do you use to meet authors and readers? Which have you found most beneficial?
Your novel, His Secret Dancer, is a transvestite story. What inspired you to write one?
I actually met the man who inspired it. On the same South Africa trip where I met Raven, me and Mrs Nostromo were having dinner with a lovely gay German couple. We got to chatting about what we did now and what we used to do and the tall, bearded, slightly balding, slim one just dropped into the conversation that he'd been a burlesque dancer. Then he showed us a picture on his phone. My jaw hit the floor. He looked really quite different in big hair, make-up and fishnets. I've still never seen a pair of legs as good.
I'm sure he was suitably flattered by that. How long did it take you to go from idea, to draft, to publisher?
From end to end it's been almost a year to the day. HSD was rejected at first attempt by Breathless Press, but rejected with such positive encouragement that I really had to revise and resubmit. It was written in scribbled notes and on my phone and on a laptop when I had space. Quite often I'd be on a train on the way to a meeting and surrounded by people all talking 'stakeholder engagement' and 'data granularity' and I'd be writing a steamy scene between Tomasz and Danielle. So next time there's a bloke on your train intent on his laptop you never know...
Ah, yes. I've talked to ladies who write on their tablets at their kids soccer games. You really don't. How did you choose Breathless Press? Did you submit to any other publishers? Did you consider self-publishing?
After I'd read a couple of Raven's book from Breathless Press I decided that I wanted to be published by the same house. And I found their submission guidelines quite clear. I looked at self publishing but I'm very traditional in my views on books. Not that I don't think it's a very good idea.
Would you share an excerpt with us?
Tomasz gazed at her, barely able to breathe, let alone speak. Her half closed eyes burned into him. He gazed deep into them for a moment, falling into them, then his attention fell to her hand, still resting on the damp silk mound of her pussy. Her breathing was labored and heavy, her lips, soft and red, parted. His hand cupped the bulge in his perfectly pressed trousers, slowly stroking along the length of its hardness but he couldn’t stop.
Her eyes locked onto the movement of his hand. A smile that was halfway between an angel and a slut spread over her face. She looked up and her eyes met his again, hers burning with a fire that held his gaze, and she slipped her fingers inside the dampness of her panties, gently sliding a single fingertip over her still pulsing clit. A soft moan escaped her parted lips like a whispered invitation.
He stepped forward and cupped her face in his hands, gazing even deeper into the post orgasmic haze of the infinite depths of her green eyes. She looked up at him, inviting his kiss, wordlessly, and with her other hand reached for his hand, the hand that was slowly, rhythmically, rubbing up and down the aching need of his rigid cock. She flattened her palm on his and moved with him.
They kissed, no words needed, his mouth on hers, but hers the more powerful, needing to own and control his mouth, her tongue seeking out his. Her hand pressed against his, taking control of his movement now, slowing it so that she could feel how long and hard he was. And he was, so very hard, and long. She wanted that, she needed that, in her, fucking her. She pulled his hand up over his confined erection, slowly, so that they both felt the total extent of his arousal, and then pushed it more forcefully down and out of the way. He complied totally with her direction . He was hers now, hers to play with, to use. The kiss intensified, and her fingers unzipped him, reaching in, finding and grasping him. She felt the wet silky tip of his cock under her fingers as she undid his belt with her other hand, unbuttoning and freeing it so that she could wrap her fingers around the full length of him.
Then he lifted her, his hands on her hips, up onto the tabletop, and pulled himself closer to her. She responded, wrapping her legs around his waist as her fingers eased aside the wet silk of her panties. She guided the moist head of his cock to rub against her clit, still tingling and pulsing, before she slid it lower to rest, achingly, against her pussy lips. She denied him entry, her hot, wet labia brushing, teasing him. Her hand wrapped around him stopped him from thrusting into her, despite his burning desire now to just fuck her hard and fast and unload his tight balls deep inside her. She kept him there, for just a few seconds that seemed like hours to him. She let him enjoy the wet kiss of her pussy lips on the moist tip of his cock, savoring the moment before she let his thickness disappear into her, before she let him become enclosed in the hot, wet embrace of her cunt. She was going to ride him to heaven and he was going to love every second of it.
