Have I ever mentioned how much I love the oldie-baldies?  I do.  I love those physically fit bald men in the 50-65 age group.  What can I say?  I’m a grave robber (the opposite of a cradle robber…?)

And what’s not to love? Bald is the new leather.  I love those shiny crowns, I love that short greying stubble that runs from ear to ear, and I love the vast expanse of forehead.  When I see a bald head in a crowd, I think, “Now there’s a man oozing with T!”

And I’m not talking shaved heads, here.  A man’s got to be naturally bald to do it for me.  Why?  I guess because I associate male pattern baldness with increased testosterone levels, and increased testosterone levels with… well, happy thoughts…

Now, Patrick Stewart: sexiest man alive, in my humble opinion.  Take a second to open a new browser tab and search google images for the man.  It’s okay. I’ll wait.  Are you back yet?  No?  Don’t worry.  Take your time.  I’ve got all day.

Okay, now that we’re on the same page, Patrick Stewart is so bloody hot I can barely stand it!  If I concentrate on an image of that man for more than thirty seconds, my body erupts in spontaneous orgasm.  He’s just that good-looking.  I don’t know how many seasons of The Next Generation I watched just to ogle him.  Hell, I own two Star Trek movies on video and I’m not even a trekkie!  My Sweet (who is the ultimate trekkie nerd) is totally on board with the idea of a threesome between us and Captain Picard, and s/he’s not even into guys.

So, to all you men out there who are thinning on top, I have only this to say:  Don’t fight the hair loss!  Wear your baldness with pride!  Do it, if not for yourselves, then for me and the many other women out there who love to admire themselves in the sheen of a hairless scalp.

Power to the oldie-baldies!

Giselle Renarde

Canada just got hotter!

I am sure that I not the only writer that found themselves in the position of trying to juggle their daily life of home and work with the deep burning desire to write. You know what I mean. The kids fighting, the stack of dishes in the sink, never ending laundry and those oh so important, “we need you to come in, even though it is your day off,” requests by the frantic boss.

So when do we, the writers, find the time to sit down and give into our “muse” and pour out our creative juices onto paper. (0r computer, if you will). It can be hard at times to find time for everything. Especially during the summer months when my “little angels” are home from school and bored out of their little gourds.

While I am patiently waiting for my children to return to school, I am trying to squeeze in an hour here to write the next chapter of what ever story I happen to be working on and 45 minutes there to do another endless round of edits. I have taken the last resort of using my breaks at work to hurriedly scribble down my ideas for my stories and write dialogue. Then I take them home and try to transcribe them while the kids are taking their “quiet time”, which never lasts as long as it is suppose too. I am sure my co-workers think I have lost my mind.

My hubby and room mate have taken pity on me and try to keep the kids occupied for a few hours each week so I can work uninterrupted on whichever story I am working on. Aside from those few precious hours, normally on the weekend, I have resorted to stealing every minute than I can and search for more creative ideas to entertain my “bored” little angels. So does anyone have any ideas, aside from gagging them and putting them in front of the tv, that actually work? LOL.

Book Talk with J&J (Jessica and Jen) is a great new review blog. They review everything, from erotic to mainstream fiction. Lots of romance, of course, but also authors like Anne Rice, Stephen King, even Eckhart Tolle (who actually pronounces his last name “Tollie,” which just makes me want to giggle… but I love his stuff!)

Awesome site, great design, and two good, honest reviewers. Great combination! They also have weekly author interviews and author giveaways, too.

Check them out!

~*~*~Selena~*~*~

I was reading a magazine article yesterday that was offering a dystopian look at the future. What it predicted made the Seven Plagues of Egypt sound like a musical comedy. Food shortages, pollution, floods, famine, massive hurricanes, contaminated soils, antibiotic resistant bacteria and lethal viruses.  A real picnic. It was enough to make someone go home and load grandpas WWII pistol or head for the garage and find some clothesline.

What ever happened to the future of the forties and fifties? Now that was a future to look forward to! Radar guided and flying cars, anti-gravity belts, commuter rockets to the moon, food in pills, hypersonic airliners, everyone wearing spandex and form fitting helmets, no disease, no privation, no wars; it sounded wonderful. Especially to a boy of eleven.

When I attended the General Motors Motorama in 1956, I was enthralled by the concept cars of the future. My father had bought a new Chevrolet Bel Air that summer, but that paled in comparison to those sleek, gleaming beauties slowly rotating on elevated stages under blazing lights. Beautiful girls in dresses and high heels opened the doors and let us see the interiors. I sneaked under a velvet rope and actually touched the fin of a Firebird II before a guard ran me off. What fun.

Comics and pulp magazines shaped our concepts of the future as well. Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon, Astounding Stories, Planet Comics and numerous others. Space travel seemed as easy as riding your bike to the movies. Exotic landscapes, benign and agressive alien beings, beautiful women in need of rescue from some menace or another.  Worlds of excitement and adventure much preferable to your math homework.

Well, our cars have yet to fly (and it’s probably just as well considering how poorly people drive), the moon is still vacant, fast food isn’t in capsules, airliners are relatively poky (and airports are barely controlled chaos), no anti-gravity, Mars (the god) is still in business and we’re not all slim, happy and smiling in spandex.

I suppose the saddest part of the new future as opposed to the ‘old’ future is the total lack of enthusiasm for the days to come. A tomorrow bright with promise is gone and melancholy has replaced it. The old newspaper axiom: “If it bleeds, it leads” seems to be the order of the day.

As far as I’m concerned, I refute these pessemistic looks at the future. The sciences are making tremendous strides in all aspects of our daily lives. Disease is being conquered, broken bodies are being repaired, automobiles are safer and more reliable, pollution is being dealt with, clothing is more comfortable and wrinkle free, people are living longer, computers are faster and more user friendly, intricate robots explore the planets, gadgets such as cell phones, iPod’s, mp3 players, plasma tv’s, etc. are part of our daily lives, and the list goes on and on.

No, things aren’t perfect.  Wars still rage, poverty stll exists, hate and predjudice still find harbor in many a heart and utopia is still a concept rather than actuality; but all in all things are better today than in the forward looking 1950’s. It’s been said that nostalgia is the realization that things weren’t as bad as they seemed at the time, thus ten years from now we’ll look back on 2008 and wonder what all the fuss was about.

Now if you’ll excuse me, UPS just delivered my Samsung Mark VII Time Machine that I bought on eBay and I’m anxious to try it out.

ciao everyone.

photo credit: carl.jones

Is it just me, or do the dirtiest things make you hot? The more taboo, the more I want to know about them. I’d have to say if I fell into any sexual category it would be The Voyeur. I don’t really want to participate in many things that I’m very interested in reading about. For example, degradation and humiliation of the deepest kind, a sub being used cruelly and treated like a mindless object. Why does it get me off? I have no idea. Would I really want to indulge in that kind of play? No way! I’m content to fantasize.

What’s your secret fantasy? The act you feel is so edgy you’d never want to admit it to anyone outside your own heart? You can post anonymously so don’t be ashamed to share. We all have secret desires and lusts!

When I saw the commercials about “Swingtown”, I knew I had to see it. The Washington Post has covered the show. The show is set in an American suburb in 1976. I was sixteen years old that year, but I was raised in a conservative household in a working class, heavily Catholic neighborhood. I lead a rather sheltered and naive life as a teen. I knew I probably wouldn’t relate much to “Swingtown”, but it turns out that I did after all. I came of age sexually when I was a freshman in college in 1978, so I did experience some of what happened in “Swingtown”, albeit a few years later.

“Swingtown” caught my attention because the characters went to a sex club in one of the episodes. I include a sex club in one of my stories in my new eXcessica collection of short stories, “Summer Heat: Steaming Stories For A Hot Summer Afternoon”. While the sex club in “Swingtown” was tame, the sex club in my book is anything but.

As I expected, the show has lots of product placements to help Baby Boomers flash back to their lives in 1976. When I saw a can of Tab, I spat iced tea all over myself. My father was always on diets, and he drank Tab like it was going out of style. I thought the stuff tasted like battery acid, and I wouldn’t touch it. I still go “ewwww!!” when I think of Tab. The show also has the dreaded tuna noodle casserole. I still cringe when I think of tuna noodle casserole. It reaches a whole new level of suck. The show is also full of songs from the 1970s, ranging from classic David Bowie (the good stuff) to cringe-worthy songs like “Seasons In The Sun”. All of this is obviously designed to make the Boomers go, “Gotcha!”

The show opens with Bruce and Susan Miller and their daughter moving into a new neighborhood in the suburbs. Their new neighbors, Tom and Trina Decker, are swingers. So far, the show plays with the swinging idea, with the expected snippiness from Susan’s uptight best friend and sexy but safe games played at parties; but everyone is straight. I think that Trina Decker, played by Lana Parilla, is the hottest of the four main characters, and she seems clearly interested in Susan as well as Bruce, but bisexuality doesn’t seem to cross the show’s radar - this early in the season, at any rate. I have a strong feeling that Trina is bi. It’s just a hunch from the way she acts on the show. I’d like to see a little sexual variety that goes beyond the usual heterosexual swinging. I’ll give the show more time to tackle that topic, assuming it ever does.

Trina Decker is the woman in the picture below carrying the strategically-placed cantaloupes. She’s just scrumptious!

While I’m enjoying the show, it plays it safe much like the way “Sex and the City” played it safe. I have no problem with that in this show. At least “Swingtown” isn’t full of product placements the way SATC did. SATC was very materialistic, and I didn’t care for the show at all. I’m waiting to see if the show relaxes a bit and goes into more depth.

I like the way Trina described swinging. She said there’s no sneaking around and no lies. Everything is out in the open and on the table. That also describes polyamory. There is no cheating because everyone knows about each other and everyone is okay with the open relationship. Cheating involves subterfuge, which is not what swinging and poly are about. The show gave a good explanation behind open marriages.

One portion I’d take issue with is how the Playboy club was depicted. While the backward dip of the Bunny waitresses was accurate, not much else was. I read Gloria Steinem’s article “A Bunny’s Tail”, and I knew that the women wore bunny costumes two sizes too small for them on purpose, especially so that their boobs would get pushed up. Drunken men at the club pawed at them, and when they left for the night, the drunks walking around the building confronted them, thinking they were hookers.

The one character I identify with is Laurie Miller, the Miller’s teenaged daughter. She’s smart and leaning towards being a feminist. She’s also a free spirit. Remember that the second wave of feminism swept the U. S. in the mid-1970s. She reads Anais Nin, which is something I haven’t done. Not yet anyway. I read Erica Jong. I really identified with her regarding the obvious mutual attraction between her and her teacher for a summer class she chose to take. I took voluntary summer classes when I was in high school. I also dated college professors who were much older than me when I was in college. One scene in particular really struck home with me. Laurie went to see a feminist version of the play “Waiting For Godot”. It was a feminist, female-only version directed by her teacher’s close friend. A guy is interested in her, but she isn’t into him, and he treats her like crap. He goes to the play with her, even though he doesn’t really want to, and proceeds to humiliate her in public. She’s embarrassed by his behavior, and tells him to leave the theatre rather than continue to publicly humiliate her.

That scene reminded me so much of an experience I had as a college freshman. I asked a guy I was seeing if he would like to see me in a play I was cast in. He said he’d go, but he really didn’t want to. He wanted to go out drinking instead since I think there was a mixer that night. So, he asked all my friends what the play was about so he could give intelligent answers when I asked him how he liked it. He planned to go out drinking during the show, and show up at the end. My friends refused to tell him what the play was about, and one of them told me what he was up to. I confronted him, and he admitted what he had done, but he didn’t think he had done anything wrong, since he ended up going to the show after all. I didn’t need a guy like that in my life, so I broke up with him that night. I, like Laurie, didn’t need a guy around me who only wanted to humiliate me and use me.

So far, I’m enjoying the show very much. I can identify with some of it, but not all since I was too young in 1976 to experience the sexual revolution and feminism. As I said, I grew up sheltered and naive. It wasn’t until I went to college that I came “of age”.

And I was Hell On Wheels.

eXcessica new releases

DARKNESS CALLING

By Rachelle Le Monnier

www.excessica.com

Length: Novel

Category: Paranormal, Romance

Heat Level: eXcess 3

Price: $4.99

BUY IT!

In the back of beyond, all is not as it seems. Alec only wanted a quiet life, but when he met Pandora, all hell broke loose. After he was caught in a terrible storm, Pandora saved Alec’s life, but his brief taste of something tantalizing that night left him craving far more. It isn’t long before they are both caught up in a whirl of passion and intrigue that threatens Pandora’s life and Alec’s sanity.

Can their love survive the shadows from her past, or will her true nature destroy them both?

TATTOOS

By Dee Dawning

www.excessica.com

Length: Short

Category: Lesbian

Heat Level: eXcess 2

Price: 2.99

BUY IT!

Friday night at Mojo’s, while waiting for her movie-star-good-looks boyfriend, Eddy, to meet her, Mandy confides to her friend, Chelsea, that he never came home the night before. Chelsea, a fixture behind the bar at Mojo’s Bar & Grill in L.A., is in a quandary. She knows something her favorite customer, Amanda Carter, doesn’t–but wishes she did–Eddy has been stepping out on her. Hell, he’s even asked Chelsea out! But when he brings his latest fling into Mojo’s, right in front of Amanda, flaunting his infidelity to her friend, Chelsea decides enough is enough.

It’s time to tell Mandy the truth.

Seizing the moment, Chelsea reveals what Mandy’s philandering boyfriend has been up to. Mandy’s reaction is predictable—she’s crushed. However, her response is surprising, setting the stage for Chelsea to show Mandy the real depth of her friendship.

BACK TO THE GARDEN

By Selena Kitt

www.excessica.com

Length: Novel

Category: Anthology

Heat Level: eXcess 4

Price: 4.99

BUY IT!

Discover the deliciously taboo lure of an incestuous siren call with four stories bundled into a wickedly hot anthology that’s determined to keep it all in the family!

When Patrick’s father went off to war in 1944, he told his eighteen-year-old son, You’re the “Man of the House” now. Patrick’s mother has struggled to keep them afloat, and he does what he can to help. He knows she’s tired, sad and very lonely, but when circumstance brings a young woman into their lives for a brief time, it alters everything between he and his mother forever. Will Patrick become the real “man of the house” before his father returns from the war?

In “The Garden of Eden,” Libby has lived her whole life with her father, Ed, in a nudist colony. It’s a very open, natural life, and they’ve never had an issue—until Libby’s mother, Kim, re-enters their lives. Kim is appalled by their living and sleeping arrangements and wants to take Libby away from the nudist life. Libby, still devastated by her mother’s abandonment, wants to have nothing to do with the shopping trips and material things her mother is offering, but the longer Kim stays, the more everything —everything—becomes a greater temptation.

In “Lassoing the Moon,” Leila knows she’s always been closer to her son, Rich, than most mothers, since Rich’s father left when he was just a baby. He’s been the man in her life forever—but now he’s really a man, and his coming-of-age is a test for both of them.

In “Lost Souls,” eighteen-year-old Lily, raised by her fundamentalist preacher father, Adam, isn’t allowed to date or do anything against church “law.” Asked to the Halloween dance by a boy she really likes, Lily defies Adam. But when they are caught in a compromising position by her father, what will her punishment and repentance be?

Joni Mitchell got me thinking.

It takes more than the usual Swan Lake slippers and tutus to get me to the ballet. I don’t understand narrative in motion. I need words. That’s why I’m a writer. So when my dear friend invited me to The Fiddle and The Drum, I almost passed.

“No, you have to come,” she pressed. “It’s a collaboration between the Alberta Ballet and Joni Mitchell!”

Well, that changed everything. I’m half in love with Joni Mitchell. Of course I went, and Thank Ganesh I did! The Fiddle and The Drum was the most spectacular piece I’ve ever witnessed. Joni Mitchell’s music and words gave the dance the narrative structure I needed while her photography cast in shades of toxic green gave the ballet a haunting air. It was a daring, biting criticism of the American/Albertan obsession with oil and the lengths to which we’ll go to secure something that’s only helping us slaughter our beautiful planet.

What stayed with me, conflated with this gripping dance, was a single sentence from the program. Jean Grand-Maître of the Alberta Ballet states, “as Ms Mitchell is incensed with human folly, she made it clear to me from the onset that this ballet could not be escapist entertainment when the world is in such shambles.”

I had to ask myself, “What is my art, if not escapist entertainment?” I write erotica, for Shakti’s sake! If I am producing art, must it not make a more important statement? More than just some people fucking? I felt I owed it to my fellow Canadian to produce something better.

And then I thought about Tangled Roots, my new release. Sidestepping the entire debate of whether or not porn, erotica, and the like are socially important (and I do think this art form serves the purpose of uniting those with similar tastes, assuring us that we’re not the only ones in the world, oh, say, sleeping with a transvestite, off the top of my head…) I’ll simply say that this new novella redeems my body or work. Sort of. Maybe. In a way. (Sweet’s always telling me not to be so self-effacing…)

This piece, if no other, makes quite pertinent social statements about the shape of Aboriginal identity in Canada, about systemic racism, about how internalized dominance and subordination can both manifest in the same flawed individual. It’s deep.

I’m hoping Joni would be proud.

Bright Blessings,

Giselle Renarde

The other day, I was mourning (for the thousandth time) the loss of the TV series, Firefly.   The loss of its potential, of levels of greatness it can never reach—feels to me like the creative version of the tragic life-cut-short-before-his/her-time.  This show was artistically satisfying, even when it was being cheeky, thanks to things like character/crew chemistry, self-referencing intricacies, and outstanding dialog timing.

Everything blended into a powerful ball of goodness, but the dialog timing impressed me the most, and I wondered if that timing could truly be duplicated in print, or is written timing too dependent on reader preconceptions or tendencies?  Visual clues (along with all the subtle supporting factors, like tone/audible emphasis) make up for much of what registers with us in the video format: facial expressions, stance, even camera angle and background/staging.  Those are mostly lost in our medium (or not lost, really, but not controlled by the writer to the same degree a director would have).

We writers can develop characters as endearing/humorous/complex as a series; we can evoke a similar range of emotions, but we do not have the toolset, and I wonder if that prevents us from developing the level of interaction timing that a video can provide.  Have you guys ever seen literary examples of the timing that you feel is up to par with the timing/delivery of your favorite movie or TV line?  Whether you have or haven’t, why do you think that is?

In any case, the next time my memory fades enough for me to enjoy the Firefly series again (and this is one case where it’s good that I have a shitty memory, heh—I can re-enjoy my favorite books and movies without a bothersome detailed memory to spoil it for me), I will toast those writers, actors and directors, and I will curse the execs who thought it wasn’t teeny-bopper enough (and therefore, not viable).

No, this isn’t about the Ratt song.  This is a partial apology to the four or five of you out there who followed my earlier blogs, and a reintroduction of sorts.

Since my first blog, things have been going well regarding the titles I have for sale through eXcessica.  Pretty Baby has done all right, but I have better hopes for my vignettes Last Wish for a Dying Man and Gingerbread, due in no small part to having Last Wish reviewed by Manic Readers.

But I’m not all that into self-promotion, and this isn’t exactly the forum for it anyway.  And that brings me to the point of this post.  I’ve never really been comfortable with the whole self-promotion thing.  I understand that in this business, especially the way many erotic writers are published, promoting oneself is a major part of getting known.  It’s unlikely that anyone, much less a big-name publisher, is going to stumble across an erotic work and decide that it is just too good to not snatch up.  So, we have to get ourselves out there, in the hope that, eventually, that big-name publisher will scoop us up.

But like I said, I’m uncomfortable with the idea of posting on other blogs, forums, websites, etc for the sole purpose of getting people to buy my books.  Some people do it as easily as breathe; I’m not one of those.  Maybe it’s a confidence issue.  I don’t know.  Besides, between my girlfriend, an adorable but demanding two-year-old, and work, I have precious little time as it is to write, let alone brag about it.

But I’m trying.  I guess my best hope is to build a fan base that will spread the word and get to the point where I’m known.  But that’s going to be a long road.