Just a little update (and an apology) about the anthology, Sex In San Francisco: I know I've been promising to read the submissions soon but (here's the apology) personal things keep getting in the way. 
Wiki:Amanda McKittrick Ros (8 December 1860–2 February 1939) was a novelist born in Drumaness, County Down in Ireland. She published her first novel Irene Iddesleigh at her own expense in 1897. She wrote poetry and a number of novels. Her works were not read widely, and her eccentric, over-written, circumlocutory writing style is alleged by some critics to be some of the worst prose and poetry ever written.Amanda McKittrick was born in Drumaness, County Down on 8 December 1860, the fourth child of Eliza Black and Edward Amlave McKittrick, Principal of Drumaness High School. She was christened Anna Margaret at Third Ballynahinch Presbyterian Church on 27 January 1861. In the 1880s she attended Marlborough Teacher Training College in Dublin, was appointed Monitor at Millbrook National School, Larne, County Antrim, finished her training at Marlborough and then became a qualified teacher at the same school.
It was during her first visit to Larne that she met Andrew Ross, a widower of 35, who was Station Master there. She married him at Joymount Presbyterian Church, Carrickfergus, County Antrim on 30 August 1887. She died after a fall in her home in 1939.
Ros was strongly influenced by the novelist Marie Corelli. She wrote: "My chief object of writing is and always has been, to write if possible in a strain all my own. This I find is why my writings are so much sought after." Her admirers included Mark Twain, Lord Beveridge, and Aldous Huxley. Her novel Irene Iddesleigh was published in 1897. It was reviewed by humorist Barry Pain who sarcastically termed it "the book of the century." Ros retorted in her preface to Delina Delaney by branding Pain a "clay crab of corruption," and suggesting that he was so hostile only because he was secretly in love with her. But Ros claimed to have made enough money from her second novel, Delina Delaney, to build a house, which she named Iddesleigh.
Belfast Public Libraries has a large collection of manuscripts, typescripts and first editions of her work. Manuscript copies include Irene Iddesleigh, Sir Benjamin Bunn and Six Months in Hell. Typescript versions of all the above are held together with Rector Rose, St. Scandal Bags and The Murdered Heiress among others. The collection of first editions covers all her major works including volumes of her poetry Fumes of Formation and Poems of Puncture, together with lesser known pieces such as Kaiser Bill and Donald Dudley: The Bastard Critic. The collection includes hundreds of letters addressed to Ros, many with her own comments in the margins. Also included are typed copies of her letters to newspapers, correspondence with her admiring publisher T.S. Mercer, an album of newspaper cuttings and photographs, and a script for a BBC broadcast from July 1943.
Nick Page, author of In Search of the World's Worst Writers, rated Ros the worst of the worst. He says that "For Amanda, eyes are 'piercing orbs', legs are 'bony supports', people do not blush, they are 'touched by the hot hand of bewilderment.'"
Aldous Huxley wrote that "In Mrs. Ros we see, as we see in the Elizabethan novelists, the result of the discovery of art by an unsophisticated mind and of its first conscious attempt to produce the artistic. It is remarkable how late in the history of every literature simplicity is invented." This is how she tells us that Delina earned money by doing needlework:
She tried hard to keep herself a stranger to her poor old father's slight income by the use of the finest production of steel, whose blunt edge eyed the reely covering with marked greed, and offered its sharp dart to faultless fabrics of flaxen fineness.
Her novel Delina Delaney begins:
Have you ever visited that portion of Erin's plot that offers its sympathetic soil for the minute survey and scrutinous examination of those in political power, whose decision has wisely been the means before now of converting the stern and prejudiced, and reaching the hand of slight aid to share its strength in augmenting its agricultural richness?
Page comments: "I first read this sentence nearly three years ago. Since then, I have read it once a week in an increasingly desperate search for meaning. But I still don't understand it."
The Oxford literary group the Inklings, which included such luminaries as C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien, held competitions to see who could read Ros' work for the longest length of time while keeping a straight face.
Northrop Frye said of Ros's novels that they use "rhetorical material without being able to absorb or assimilate it: the result is pathological, a kind of literary diabetes".
A poet as well as a novelist, Ros wrote Poems of Puncture and Fumes of Formation. The latter contains "Visiting Westminster Abbey," which opens:
- Holy Moses! Have a look!
- Flesh decayed in every nook!
- Some rare bits of brain lie here,
- Mortal loads of beef and beer,
- Some of whom are turned to dust,
- Every one bids lost to lust;
- Royal flesh so tinged with 'blue'
- Undergoes the same as you.
As of 2004, none of her works are in print. Her books are rare and first editions command prices of $300 to $800 in the used-book market. Belfast Central Library has an archive of her papers, and the Queen's University of Belfast has some volumes by Ros in the stacks.
The Frank Ferguson-edited collection, Ulster-Scots Writing: An Anthology (Four Courts, 2008) includes her poem, 'The Town of Tare'.
On 11 November 2006 as part of a 50 Year celebration, renowned librarian Elspeth Legg hosted a major retrospective of her works, culminating in a public reading by 65 delegates of the entire contents of 'Fumes of Formation'. The theme of the workshop that followed was 'Suppose you chance to write a book', Line 17 of 'Myself' from page 2 of Fumes of Formation.
Even though I'm a diehard Apple fan, I have to admit I'm thoroughly enjoying my xbox 360. If there are any other gamers out there, look me up. My handle is Spotframe (don't ask me why, it was the name they assigned me). 
From an acclaimed author of erotic fiction comes two tales of titillating suspense. Begging Ivory: An antique object not only brings pleasure to it new owner, but assists in freeing her from an abusive relationship. Thicker Than Ink: Some tattoos are beautiful, others intricate and ornate. Still others provoke a variety of emotions - arousal, ecstasy, even a desire for revenge.
You can't run. You can't hide. No matter how hard you try, it creeps up on you, tenses, pounces, and then traps you in an terrifyingly inescapable truth: a good fright –a really nightmarishly fine bout of terror – can really put the libido into overdrive.
There are as many theories about why scares and sex go hand-in-bloody-hand as there are movies featuring unstoppable forces of demonic fury. In other words, a lot. In fact one popular idea about why we have such a strong connection between the two is because for many folks, the first time they are introduced to anything really sexual, it’s thanks to a horror flick. Or, to put it in UK terms, because they'd watched a video nasty.
And no wonder it's a popular idea: From Jason to Freddy to Michael (that silly fisherman guy in the pathetic I Know What You Did Series), the formula is the same: boy meets girl, girl gives boy head, boy (and then girl) loses head. For lots of teens, these kinds of films are the first time they'll see anything really sexual, even if it's just the first sight of bare boobs. You don't have to have a degree in psychology to figure out that if the next scene has those same jiggling tits sprayed with arterial blood there might be a connection between getting rabidly turned on and getting totally freaked out. Add to this that, for a lot of people, a horror film was the first chance to get really close to the opposite sex, even if the embrace was one of terror. Think of it this way: no one ever got lucky after a Disney matinee.
[For the rest yer gonna have to buy the mag]
Eros Ex Machina: Eroticising The Mechanical (anthology)
Rhinoceros Publications (March 1, 1998)
As the millennium approaches, technology is not only an inevitable, but a deeply desirable addition to daily life. Eros Ex Machina: Eroticising the Mechanical explores the thrill of machines our literal and literary love of technology. Join over 25 of today's hottest writers as they explore erotic relationships with all kinds of gizmos, gadgets, and devices. Featuring stories by: Kim Addonizio. Bill Brent, Pamela Briggs, Pat Califia, Rene Charles, M. Christian, Stephen Dedman, Jack Dickson, Janice Eidus, Amelia G, Paula Guran, Gerard Houarner, Maxim Jakubowksi, Kevin Killian, Nancy Kilpatrick, Marc Laidlaw, Marc Levinthal, Anita Mashman, Carol Queen, Stephen Mark Rainey, Shar Rednour, Mike Resnick, Thomas Roche, Chadwick Saxelid, D. Travers Scott, Simon Sheppard, John Shirley, Cecilia Tan, and Lucy Taylor.
Here's a special treat: Sage Vivant's intro to my new collection of erotica, Licks & Promises (from Phaze Books). It's no secret that I adore Sage, but this intro touched me tremendously.WARNING: The stories in this book may make you cry. There. I’ve said it. I know that’s not the best way to introduce an erotica story collection, but I can rarely read an M. Christian story without some kind of visceral reaction. So, I just wanted you to know up front that if you can get through this book without developing a lump in your throat or wiping tears from your cheeks, I honestly have to question your humanity.
Christian knows that sex is not purely about bodies, desire, and sex toys. He goes deeper, much deeper, dispensing with the puerile, predictable situations so common in erotic literature these days. He entreats his readers not to settle for the obvious clichés and the usual storylines where two (or more) people end up with their clothes off. Instead, he forces readers to consider the behaviors and thought processes that got those people naked in the first place — because that’s what the story is really about. The trembling, sweating, engorged body parts are just a bonus.
In the process of taking you on an emotional journey, however, Christian leaves you plenty hot and bothered. The man seems to instinctively know the perfect spot in his narrative for a well-placed nipple. He recognizes when a wet pussy needs filled and when it’s better to have it ache. He sends your libido careening on a roller-coaster ride that he alone controls. You’ve never been so grateful to be in such skilled hands, even as the landscape blurs by at lightning speed.
Along with intelligence and maturity, empathy abounds in these stories. Even when the characters make mistakes, stumble through circumstances, and generally screw up, Christian manages to show us their vulnerable side. He is not content to point out only how nasty or foolish people can be — he wants us to understand their motivations, learn what it feels like to trust or have trust revoked. He will show us where someone hurts and how sex healed the hurt. Or caused it.
In Christian’s world, lust is the springboard to passion, not a synonym for it.
The richness of language, the complexity of emotions, and the mysterious role of sex characterize M. Christian’s remarkable erotica. They celebrate life and castigate it at the same time. They explore disappointment and erupt with joy when you least expect it.
I defy you to get through this volume without shedding an appreciative tear, even if you’re touching yourself as you do it.
Here's some great news for all my fans - both of them - living in the UK: the great folks at the British-based Adult eBook Shop has a page featuring a lot of my new books, including my very recently released Rude Mechanicals collection!
Bondage, science fiction, fetishism, real realities and virtual realities collide in this unique collection by one of the most popular authors of erotica - ever!
"M. Christian's stories squat at the intersection of Primal Urges Avenue and Hi-Tech Parkway ... feral-eyed, half-naked ... Truly an author for our post-everything 21st century."
- Paul Di Filippo, author of the Steampunk Trilogy.
Two unforgettable novellas highlight Rude Mechanicals: In "Hot Definition," the story of a future just around our corner, Neko experiences the ultimate domination from the woman who is her master; and in "Speaking Parts," the second novella, two lovers, one with a camera-shutter eye, come together in a scorching, obsessive, edgy relationship that will take them both to the limits of sexuality and beyond. Plus four provocative, physically explicit short stories of sex and technosex.
"M. Christian writes like a dream!"
- Paula Guran, DarkEcho
It’s not an understatement to say that M Christian has a well-deserved reputation for excellence. He is the author of more than 300 short stories, the editor of 20 anthologies, four collections of his own short fiction and the author of four (or five) novels. (There is, as yet, no official confirmation as to whether he is the M Christian behind ME2). M Christian’s Confessions of a Literary Streetwalker column is one of the most popular parts of ERWA and this is probably because he speaks with authority about erotica as an author who knows his craft.
However, for anyone needing proof that Christian knows what he’s talking about, they need look no further than Licks & Promises. Licks & Promises is a collection of Christian’s scintillating erotic stories, published by Phaze books, and the contents will not leave the reader dissatisfied.
Sage Vivant provides an Introduction to this collection, relating her appreciation of Christian’s work and acknowledging the breadth of his skill. As Vivant explains:
Christian knows that sex is not purely about bodies, desire, and sex toys. He goes deeper, much deeper, dispensing with the puerile, predictable situations so common in erotic literature these days. He entreats his readers not to settle for the obvious clichés and the usual storylines where two (or more) people end up with their clothes off. Instead, he forces readers to consider the behaviors and thought processes that got those people naked in the first place — because that’s what the story is really about. The trembling, sweating, engorged body parts are just a bonus.
My favourite story in this collection comes early in the book. ‘Dead Letter’ is a tale about an author, which is probably why I enjoyed it so much. Filled with humour, irony and a richness of character, ‘Dead Letter’ introduces us to the story’s protagonist/writer through the eyes of his bored-but-besotted wife. The complexity of their relationship is vividly relayed, without hampering the pace of the story. The humour is sharply observed, only a little cruel, and tinged with empathy for the human condition. The denouement is as clever as it is moving. The following passage illustrates the depth of character, detail and humour.
Helen of Troy — diaphanous, luminous, and ethereal — glided into the room and banged her shin on the coffee table.
Dammit! She bit her lip so as not to put speech to it. Hopping, balancing with a hand tightly around an ornately carved bedpost, she vigorously rubbed her barked ankle.
“W-what —?” came Randolph’s sluggish voice from a point somewhere below a mountain range of goose-down pillows.
Crap! Both feet down, ankle clearly more painful than damaged, she smoothed her sheet, adjusted her dime-store tiara, took a deep breath, and crooned out a melodious “Oooooooooooo!” Then she whispered down low near her husband’s ear, “From the great beyond, I have come!”
“W-who is there? Who is it?”
The lights in the room were dim, so much so that everything seemed washed with a brush dipped in inky shade and shadow. The bed was a pale rectangle, the pile of pillows a gray smudge, her husband’s face a pale mask haloed by silver hair — and that damned coffee table completely invisible.
There are lots to be enjoyed in this collection. The quality of the writing is outstanding and the depth of characterisation is enormous. For any serious aficionado of erotic fiction, Licks & Promises is a necessity for the bedside bookshelf.
Ashley Lister
September 2009
