Guest Posting: Even Better Than The Real Thing!

This is fun, fun, fun!  My sweet pal, Kit O'Connell (wrote wrote the kick-ass forward to the new edition of my science fiction erotica collection, The Bachelor Machine) and who is one of the best folks on the planet, just posted a guest thingie from myself on his site, approximately 8,000 words: a two-part essay on the future of sex called "Even Better Than The Real Thing" in two parts.

Here's a teaser.  For the rest just click here for part one and here for part two.

Sure, the technology’s kinda crude right now (bored executrix, sitting behind her desk, pager set to BUZZ between panty-hose painted thighs, waiting for a lover to call), but just let those horny ol’ geeks and dweebs down in Silicone Valley work on it for a few more years and — ZAM!
The hoary old cliche with a new twist tells of how fast things are moving: “When I was young, son, when we fucked we actually touched each other.” Right now (aside from the executrix) things are at the “asking her out” stage — we’ve got quite a while to go before first, second, third base, and SCORE! (clickity, clack on a keyboard: “” he types. “” a guy somewhere responds).

Right now, the science of what has been labeled teledildonics is still in its masturbating under the sheets stage — the subject of geek dreams, Adobe Photoshop pictorials, and a few hot zines. The electronic LSD wonderland of Virtual Reality is barely up and walking, let alone getting it on. Don’t worry though, like the camera, the telephone, the VCR, and the PC, sex will be right there when the breakthrough is made — there’s something in human nature that right after instant the light bulb lights, a new invention is born, the next immediate thought is always “Can I fuck with it?”

Getting from peg A to slot B is not that far off. Right now the big push is getting the operator’s hand into the VRverse, but you can bet other body parts won’t be far behind. For those who’ve been living in caves, and who seem to have missed the hoop and holler about VR, the idea’s simple: an operator wears a helmet equiped with teeny-tiny televisions over his eyes, a microphone so people can hear him, speakers over his ears, (and in the next few years) a jumpsuit with feelie and touchie capabilities, (and when the designers get horny) a “love machine” over his cock and balls–and then our intrepid explorer enters a computer-generated environment where he (okay, I’m being sexist — but do you really think a woman would come up with this kinda stuff?) can “interact” with other similarly-wired folks, and entertainment programs — in short “anything that moves.”

[MORE]

Out Now: Sex In San Francisco: An Anthology Of Smoking Hot Tales Inspired By The Sexiest City On Earth (Edited By) M. Christian

Ta-da!  I am very pleased and proud to announce the publication of Sex In San Francisco: An Anthology Of Smoking Hot Tales Inspired By The Sexiest City On Earth, edited by myself!  Right now the book is up on the Renaissance/Sizzler site but it will also be up on amazon very soon as both a Kindle edition as well as a paper version.  So buy a copy and put flowers in your hair ... or other places, if you are so inclined!

What it is about San Francisco that seems to promise, and even promote, sex: sex hot and heavy, sex tender and loving, sex straight and gay, sex kinky and vanilla, in fact, just about every type of sex that can be imagined?  Why is San Francisco considered such an attraction for lovers of all kinds and such a hotbed of steamy eroticism?  Why is this city, instead of so many others, called — with lusty admiration as well as scathing jealousy — the Id of America, Sodom by the Sea, Bagdad by the Bay, and Sin Francisco? Some of the best writers of erotica in the nation seek answers to that question in Sex In San Francisco. These writers show why San Francisco is so damned sexy, and through their stories they show you the erotic heart of the city and its residents.  Donna George Storey, PM White, Renatto Garcia, Adele Levin, Shanna Germain, Craig J.  Sorensen, Theda Hudson, Jude Mason, Neve Black, Mykola Dementiuk, Jeremy Edwards, and Anna Reed with Lily Penza have created wonderful erotic tales, each of which takes a unique approach to probing what makes San Francisco such a sexy place to be in and to dream about.  Each author uses her or his own amazing literary – and yes, erotic – vision to share with us a very personal interpretation of what constitutes sex in the city of the Golden Gate. These authors may be looking at the same city and viewing the same buildings and landscape, but for each of them San Francisco is, like sex, a very personal, and unique, thing

Teaser Tuesday: Finger's Breadth

The cool keeps getting cooler: check out this wonderful pre-release tease of my coming-soon new novel, Finger's Breadth (from Zumaya books) by the always-great Bibrary Bookslut:

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Simply grab your current read, open to a random page, and share a couple of “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page . . . just be careful not to include any spoilers!

My teaser this week comes from  page 14 of Finger's Breadth, a erotic tale of queery horror coming soon from M. Christian:

Normally, his kisses were gentle, caring connections, sex a ballet instead of a romping rut. That night, it had been different - frightening, powerful, lightning and growling thunder instead of sunsets and puppies. Varney became a man. Nothing but. Not a lover, not a boyfriend, not a partner. Just a pure, raw, lightning-and-growling thunder man.

So, tell me . . . are you feeling teased? :)

Circlet Likes How to Write and Sell Erotica

The good stuff just keeps on coming!  Check out this very nice review of my book How To Write And Sell Erotica by TammyJo Eckhart on the Circlet Press site:

There’s a myth I’ve heard as an author: Authors are Wealthy. Not so much, and I can’t say that I’ve ever met a wealthy author who did nothing but write erotica. You can win awards and you can have a dozens of works out there but the common expression “Keep your 9-5” applies to a genre writer. Being an author is a lot more work than you imagined.

That’s where books like M. Christian’s How to Write and Sell Erotica Tips of the Trade from a Literary Streetwalker can lend a helping hand for the beginner. There are dozens of how-to guides for new authors, so the trick is to find one that offers you honest advice that you can apply to your life.

You may have heard of Christian if you’ve read science fiction, gay, or BDSM erotica in the past two decades because his personal publication record is quite lovely to read. However, he isn’t only a fiction author: he’s edited a lot of books and writes a weekly column about writing and the publishing business.

This book grew from his weekly column with Erotica Readers and Writers Association (ERWA) which, if you aren’t already, you need to be familiar with if you want to any money. In thirty-seven previously published essays on the ERWA website, Christian covers everything from the basics of writing to the complexities of contracts and marketing. His style may put off some readers, however, because it is more conversational and his truths can be discouraging for those with unrealistic expectations.

Having seen some truly terrible erotica in my own time, I have to say that his advice is both on the mark and far from it. You see, some of this terrible writing I’ve seen has been published,  bought by low-quality publishers or self-published. With enough time and effort, almost anyone can become “published” these days. Making a living as an author is a very different matter. Creating quality stories that will be remembered is another issue entirely. Christian touches on all these topics.

In addition to Christian, there are eight other erotica authors and editors in this book answering the same set of three questions, allowing us to see how different and yet how similar their careers have been. By including nine different perspectives this guide avoids promoting the flawed idea that what works for one author will work for another.

Most manuals for writing include a listing of publishers and agents but How to Write and Sell Erotica does not.  Publishing is an on-the-edge business. Publishers and agents frequently fail or change what they will work with. There are dishonest people claiming the role of agent or publisher as well. Giving any list is saying that those listed are reliable and useful; that just might not be the case in a year or two.

In general the overall flow of the essays in this book goes from the basics to the more complex issues, though some topics, like what words to use and how to do research, are tackled a few times. The fact is that writing for a living is complicated work, hard work, and Christian never lets us forget that in this book. His joys, his frustrations, his victories and successes are all written with an engaging and blunt style. If you take this book for what it is–experiences you can learn from–and are not looking for the one true way to be an erotica writer, you’ll gain much from this collection of essays.

Future Fire Likes Love Without Gun Control

Now this is a treat: not only did the folks at Future Fire ("social political & speculative cyber-fiction") like The Bachelor Machine, my collection of erotic science fiction, but they also just posted a nice review of my non-erotic collection of fantasy/science fiction/horror, Love Without Gun Control:

I honestly wasn’t sure what to expect when Love Without Gun Control showed up to be reviewed. The cover is very retro-pulp-comic, a scene on Mars, all bright colors and simple lines, misleading as to the content. It seems more like a graphic-novel cover, or a series of 70's porn. The book itself is quite thin, only 155 pages. I was pleasantly surprised. The collection opens with the eponymous story, ‘Love Without Gun Control’, published for the first time in this collection. Ultra-violent and rather bizarre, it is somewhat reminiscent of a D. Harlan Wilson story. A sort of modern-day Western romance, the story really does defy labeling as it shows the effects of one snake-oil doctor’s ‘love potion’, applied erroneously, and the destruction that can come from thwarted desire. A fun, rollicking ride with a very unique flavor.

The second story, ‘Needle Taste’, is a unique concept with an ambiguous ending. The story itself is a totally different beast from the previous tale, but the wistful tone holds up the strange story well enough until the end, when it feels a little... abrupt. If there’s a weak one in the bunch, it’s this one, simply on a relative scale. It is in no way a bad one, it just doesn’t have quite the force of the others.

...seeking a forever-quiet man in the whole buzzing, humming, singing, cackling city.

‘Hush Hush’ is my favorite story in the collection. The language is absolutely beautiful: weird, eery and slippery. The tale is half mystery, half internal journey. Whether he solves the mystery or not is really unimportant. What he learns along the way is not. This was a lovely to read for the language as for the story.

‘The Rich Man’s Ghost’ is probably my least favorite of the stories. It lacks the smoothness of voice, the weird beauty of most of the other pieces. The story is a little less Weird, too, and maybe that colors my opinion.

‘Wanderlust’ is one of the stories that I’m not really sure, at first, how I feel about it. On the one hand, the reader is kept in the dark until the very end of the story. I simply didn’t have a clue what was going on. On the other hand, the writing is very rich, so it isn’t necessarily a bad thing to enjoy the ride. A man who inspires absolute ecstasy from everyone he meets comes across a bit thin at first, but their reactions if he stays around for longer than a few minutes are... interesting.

‘Orphan’ is chilling and haunting. A young man running from something, to something, carrying a horrible secret. There were a couple of places that could have used a clarity edit or that read a little contrived, but overall, definitely a memorable piece worth reading again.

Really, though, I’d be hard-pressed to say that any story in this collection is best skipped over or read in a hurry. There’s just enough variation in the stories to keep them unique, and enough cohesion to develop a voice that just draws me in more deeply, the farther I read. (The first story is an odd difference to the rest of them, but no less enjoyable.) The cover-art remains a sticking point, as it has no apparent connection to the content, and prose like this needs something lovely to wrap it up, and what it has is not something I would be wild about displaying on a shelf.

Read this one slowly, because each story is best savored and mulled over. And I’ll be keeping an eye out for more of M. Christian’s stories.

Beautiful

Me: Erotica Readers & Writers Association Guest Author!

You may not know it but I am really, seriously blushing: the always-wonderful Erotica Readers & Writers Association (for whom I wrote my "Confessions Of A Literary Streetwalker" column for many years) just made me a guest author!  In addition to my bio three of my favorite stories are up there as well: "Hack Work" from The Bachelor Machine, "Billie" from Rude Mechanicals, and "Tinkling Of Tiny Silver Bells" from Licks & Promises.  Check it out here.

Portrait Of The Author

Now this incredibly special: here's a picture of little ol' me by the amazing Shilo McCabe as part of her Sex Positive Photo Project.  

He's Got Nine Lives -

Dark Roasted M.Christian

Check it out: a brand new Dark Roasted Blend piece I did just went up: this time about the screw-drive machines

Ever since Mr. Bronze Age had the inspired thought that led to the wheel humans have been trying to think of new ways to get from point A to point B.  Several thousand years after Mr. Bronze Age's inspired invention, in the 1770s to be rather inexact, British inventor Richard Lovell Edgeworth, created the ancestor of what would eventually become the continuous track method of locomotion.  Don't recognize the term?  You'll certainly know it when you see it in operation on many tractors or, where it's head-smackingly obvious, on every tank that's been on every battlefield since the British first used it in World War One.

But in 1868 the American inventor Jacob Morath had a truly inspired idea: a screw-propelled vehicle.  Don’t recognize that term either?  That's not surprising because, even though many people today will celebrate its virtues, it's not exactly a common sight.

The basic idea of a screw-propelled vehicle is simple enough: instead of wheels or tracks, you build a vehicle with a pair of, as Wikipedia puts it "auger-like cylinders fitted with a helical flange."  To make that a bit easier to understand, think of a machine that literally crawls along the ground on a pair of giant screws.  To turn you use the same method a tank does: one screw either gets locked in place while the other one doesn't or, to make a 360 turn, turn one screw one way and the other ... well, the other way.

In 1907, James and Ira Peavey, were quite literally driven to create a practical screw-propelled machine to help their lumbering in Maine.  The machine proved very useful since the screw-propulsion could move whatever you wanted moved through snow and mud and all kinds of nasty conditions.  You also didn't need to worry about anything getting caught in the tracks, like with a caterpillar, and since they had much fewer moving parts they were easier to maintain.

Quite a few screw machines were built afterwards, though they remained less than popular.  But when World War Two loomed, the idea of a screw-propelled war machine intrigued the eccentric genius Geoffrey Pyke -- who you no doubt remember as the inventor of the iceberg aircraft carrier.  Alas, Pyke's concept of a very small, very fast, attack machine got (ahem) shot down and his idea was eventually whittled down to the very-rarely known Weasel.  Unfortunately, the Weasel was whittled down even more and the screw propulsion was dropped in favor of standard caterpillar tracks.

Another benefit screws have over caterpillars is the possibility of being amphibious.  There's no reason, for instance, that the screws couldn't be hollow and so could also act as floats.  During the Vietnam war, for example, Chrysler experimented with a screw-propelled machine.  Unfortunately, their take on the technology didn't exactly wow the US military and the project was dropped.

The Soviets, in the meantime, had a machine specifically designed to go where no man ever wanted to go -- in their case to retrieve cosmonauts from remote landing sites: the poetically named ZIL-2906.

One of the most amazing uses of screw propulsion has to be Joseph Jean de Bakker's.  In the 1960s the Dutch inventor created the Amphirol, a machine designed to take anyone pretty much anywhere. What made Joseph Jean de Bakker machine better than other versions of screwing yourself across the landscape was its performance.  Not only could his Amphirol go across marshes and over other sticky situations but it was also amphibious.  That wasn't the end of its wow factor, though, because the Amphirol could do all that and also crawl sideways.  Try doing that with four wheels or with caterpillar tracks.

While still rare, the idea of screw-propulsion is still out there: the concept appearing in all kinds of civilian and military proposals.  While watching one in action, though, William Cowper's quote comes immediately to mind: it "moves in a mysterious way."

"The Show" Becomes Reality

It's always wonderful - and kinda weird - when fiction becomes fact.  A while ago I wrote a little story about the hacking of the Times Square Jumbotron, called "The Show" (that's also in The Bachelor Machine), and, guess what, someone has done exactly that:



[Thanks to Cecilia Tan for the head's up]

Update On Anthologies

Just thought I'd zap you all an update on the various anthologies I'm currently editing for Renaissance/Sizzler (including Kink In San Francisco, My Love Of All That Is Bizarre: The Erotic Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, The Love that Never Dies: Undead Erotica, and Yo Ho Ho: Pirate Erotica). 

Alas, I've been slammed by a few other deadlines so I'm running (ahem) a tad behind so I probably won't be going through and selecting stories for at least another month more or so.  Just an FYI, I will be starting with Kink In San Francisco and probably ending with The Love that Never Dies. 

If you have any questions please feel free to contact me at any time.

Bibrary Bookslut Likes The Bachelor Machine

This is VERY cool: the Bibrary Bookslut - who, you may remember, interviewed me awhile back - just posted a wonderful review of the new edition of my erotic science fiction collection, The Bachelor Machine:

In trying to share my enthusiasm with some friends over the weekend, I found it really difficult to accurately convey the experience of reading The Bachelor Machine. It’s like watching the literary equivalent of a colossal train wreck, except it’s far more erotic and enjoyable . . . even if it does leave you burdened with the same feelings of voyeuristic guilt after the carnage clears.

Most erotic science fiction imagines a civilization on the rise, one where the latest gadgets and technologies are things of wonder and awe. The future is usually bright and shiny, full of sparkling chrome and unblemished porcelain, and surrounded by the blinking lights and electric hum of technological perfection. With The Bachelor Machine, M. Christian looks past that technological honeymoon, imagining instead a civilization on the decline. In his future, the gadgets are tarnished and broken, exposing the ugly legacy of humanity’s twisted desires through their own malfunctioning machinations.

Yet, for all that, they are truly incredible toys to behold . . . the kind of gadgets that make you wonder just how much of yourself you’d be willing to sacrifice for a taste of the temporary pleasures they can provide.

Having said all that, the experience of reading The Bachelor Machine is not just one of technological wonder or erotic arousal. It’s also one of confusion and uncertainty, of equal measures dread and desire. These are stories that lead you on, draw you in, and take rude liberties with your expectations. Yes, reading them is like watching an erotic train wreck, but it’s more than that – it’s like enjoying the impending wreckage from inside a luxury sedan that’s stuck on the tracks . . . and being far too enthralled to abandon your seat.

[MORE]

How To Wonderfully WriteSex (9)

Check it out: my new post at the fantastic WriteSex site just went up. Here's a tease (for the rest you'll have to go to the site):

A friend of mine once called me ambitious. I’m still not sure what he meant by that – was it a compliment or criticism? Put-down or praise? It’s made me think, though, and that’s always a good thing. I’d normally describe ambition as a drive to succeed, a persistence to rise in status, income, reputation, so forth. But what does that mean to a writer? It could be money – but since when is money the answer to anything? It could be reputation – but then a lot of bad writers are well thought of, even famous (are you listening, Tom Clancy?). Ambition can also mean cold-heartedness, or a reckless disregard towards anything and anyone that’s not directly related to a goal.


God, I hope I’m not that.

I do know that writing is important to me – probably the most important thing in my life. Because of that, I look for opportunities to do it, and to get it seen. I rarely let opportunities pass me by: markets, genres, experiments – anything to get the spark going, juice up my creativity, and get my work published. Erotica was one of those things, an opportunity that crossed my path and it has been very good to me. I didn’t think I could edit a book, but then I had a chance to do that as well, and now have done a bunch of the suckers.

The fact is that opportunities never find you: you have to find them. The fantasy of some agent, or publisher, or agent, picking up a phone and calling you out of the blue is just that: a fantasy, or so rare it might as well be just a fantasy. Writing is something that thrives on challenge, growth, and change. Some of that can certainly come from within, but sometimes it takes something from the outside: some push to do better and better, or just different work. Sending work out, proposing projects, working at maintaining good relationships with editors, publishers and other writers is a way of being involved and getting potential work to at least come within earshot. It takes time, it certainly takes energy, but it’s worth it. The work will always be the bottom line, but sometimes it needs help to develop, get out, and be seen – those contacts and giving yourself a professional push is often what it takes.

[MORE]

Had A Great Time At Fogcon

Here's a hearty THANKS to the folks who ran, and attended, Fogcon.  I had a real blast at my reading and doing all those very cool panels ... and am looking very forward to next year!

Dark Roasted M.Christian

Check it out: a brand new Dark Roasted Blend piece I did just went up: this time about wild world of slot cars.



Be it jewel or toy, not the prize gives the joy, but the striving to win the prize.
- Robert Bulwer-Lytton

1912 was a rather eventful year: New Mexico and Arizona became states, The RMS Titanic hit a iceberg and sank, The Girl Scouts were founded, the Boston Red Sox defeated the New York Giants, and Lionel toys produced and sold the very first slot car set.

While the present generation has thoroughly moved into the digital age, for millions of people before them slot cars were a cherished feature of childhood. For a few wonderfully eccentric hobbyists, they are still the next best thing to climbing into turbo-charged reality, smashing the gas pedal down, and roaring into the thrill of the race.

I am an artist the track is my canvas and my car is my brush.
- Graham Hill

For those unfortunate few who never had the bliss of assembling the track, picking just the right car, and squeezing the little plastic control and sending that same perfect car flying out of control across the rec room carpeting, slot cars are mechanically very simple: the track – which is modular, allowing an almost infinite number of configurations, from the Monaco Grand Prix to Germany's Nürburgring – has two power strips and the cars have fickle brushes to pick up the power, and a neat little electric motor to make the wheels go 'round.

But it's what those already-mentioned eccentric hobbyists have done with that simple concept that is truly staggering: from cars that are exquisitely detailed and painstakingly reproduced from high-performance reality to tracks that run from exact scale copies of legendary circuits to totally insane fantasy, slot cars have become the medium for an dazzling amount of creativity.

Anything happens in Grand Prix racing, and it usually does.
- Murray Walker

If everything seems under control, you’re just not going fast enough.
- Mario Andretti

Why does a track have to be just loops and hammerheads and all that? Here's a really fun and unique approach to racing: a hill climb!



When you talk about brilliant track designs, though, you have to talk about the beautiful, and commonly considered most impressive, slot car track in the world: James-Michael Gregory Harlan's White Lake Formula 1 track. Taking over 3 years to complete, the track is the ultimate racing circuit in a very convenient smaller scale. 
 

It is amazing how may drivers, even at the Formula One Level, think that the brakes are for slowing the car down.
- Mario Andretti

Even though they may be small in stature, that doesn't mean the slot cars can’t be ... well, 'immense' doesn't quite fit but you have to admit the track that was created by journalist, and Top Gear presenter, James May for his wonderful BBC series Toy Stories, has a huge amount of WOW power: ladies and gentlemen, auto enthusiasts of all scales, the world's longest slot car track!

If you don’t know James May and his Toy Stories show you really should: determined to reintroduce 21st century kids to his own beloved childhood hobbies, he – with the help of the great British public – created and assembled a full-size model Spitfire, a Meccano bridge strong enough to support a man, a Lego house big enough to actually live in, an entire garden made out of Plasticine (and enter it into the Chelsea garden show), then a ten mile long model train track.

But the episode we're interested in is the one done as a celebration of Scalextric (the British slot car manufacturer) as well as the legendary Brooklands racetrack. Using planning that rivaled putting on a full-scale Grand Prix, James created a 2.75 mile long track that followed the original race course. When it was finished, the flag was dropped and two teams – one made of slot car enthusiasts and one of just local folks – blasted at scale speeds towards the finish line. But since it wasn't possible to power the entire length of the track a relay system had to be used, so as the car passed from one section of track to the other someone new had to take control. 

James May(life size) posing with Scalextric cars (smaller scale).

And if you think that all this is a bit too whimsical -- that slot cars are fine and dandy for crazy stunts or seriously dedicated hobbyists -- then take a look at the following designs for public transportation systems, all of them using the same basic idea of our beloved childhood toy. The slot car is not just racing in miniature, a venue for art and eccentricity, but it's actually become a plan for the future of transpiration.

Sex Magic - And A Big Thanks!

Here's a hearty thanks to all the great folks to came to my Sex Magic Manifesting Positive Life Energy Through Erotic Play class at the Citadel last night.  It was a real blast to teach - and I hope you all had as much fun being in the audience!

Odd Balling (3)

Ladies and gentlemen (and all the folks between), here's a taste of my brand new Odd Balling column for the great folks at YNOT. For the rest just click here.

#

YNOT – Let’s begin with some happy news for once: New York Congressman Chris Lee, whose political career hit a teeny-tiny snag when he posed shirtless in a Craigslist personal ad, has rebounded nicely after a celebrated New York ad agency signed him to a modelling contract. While it would be callous to laugh at Lee's new career as a 'before' model, we applaud his bravery in showing pathetic, middle-age men everywhere the truth in Oscar Wilde's famous quote: "The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about."

Meanwhile, just to hit below the Bible belt, the rather steamy, and aptly named, Ignite Church in Joplin, Mo., has raised more than a few eyebrows — and more than just eyebrows — with its innovative campaign to help nice, Christian couples avoid adultery and pornography ... by having more sex.

"We’re doing a series about sex and God’s intended purpose for it," Pastor Heath Mooneyham told ABC News. Responding to criticism about his "How Would Jesus Do It?" style of preaching, Mooneyham added, "God created [sex], and he’s not freaked out by it. So I don’t see why we should be."

[MORE]

"An Orgasm" A Special Guest Post By by Kit O'Connell

As promised - and with great enthusiasm - here's a very special guest post from my dear friend Kit O'Connell. I simply cannot say enough good things about Kit: not only did he write a glowing review for the first edition of the Bachelor Machine but he wrote a special forward to the new edition as well. You are a true treasure, Kit!

An Orgasm
By
Kit O'Connell

It was ridiculous. Dangerous. Suicidal, even.

And incredibly, deliciously erotic. There was no way she could pass it up once she realized it could be done: Morna was going to fuck the Internet.

Not fuck on the Internet. Cybersex she'd grown tired of in her teens. Recent advances in teledildonics had entertained for a short while, but it wasn't enough.

Her heart beat fast as she stepped up to the polished glass tower that housed the data center. It looked like any other modern office building, but she knew that the giant digital pipes that passed through it touched a surprisingly large fraction of a percentage of the world's daily data. Enough to reach out to all the rest.

Morna was dressed in a freshly dry-cleaned, tight-skirted power suit and a pair of black-rimmed costume glasses; she had her red hair in a slightly sloppy pony tail and carried an unassuming suitcase with all the equipment she'd need inside. Arriving in a shiny rental car, she looked every bit a technical professional working late and her wallet held the forged credentials to match.

She wondered can he smell how wet I am? as she passed the incurious, dozing guard and signed her name on the pad. Getting into the building was one thing but actually entering the data center was another. If this went wrong she'd be arrested, maybe charged with terrorism. All those things were likely anyway, if she somehow survived, but if she succeeded she'd have the greatest of sexual memories to sustain her in prison.

Morna held her breath until the light on the data center door turned green and the lock released with a quiet click. Her keycard had worked. The oiled hinges of the door opened without a sound. As she stepped into the dark data center, her nipples hardened instantly in the air-conditioned chill. She didn't turn the fluorescents on -- the flickering LEDs of the dozens of rack-mounted machines, a tiny portion of the building's total network, provided illumination aplenty. Besides, she'd always been turned on by romantic mood lighting.

She pressed a button on her keychain, activating the device dangling there. Linked to a daemon on her home computer, the code inside the device hacked into the local wireless network and quickly overrode the signals of the security cameras. If any humans happened to be watching they'd see nothing amiss.

They certainly wouldn't see Morna undressing, her pale skin and ample curves being revealed piece by piece as she folded each garment neatly on the empty worktable. Nor would they see her open the suitcase and carefully lift out her handmade Cybervedic Interface Rig. As she turned it on, Sanskrit characters inscribed on the wires, control nodes and insertables glowed subtly with tantric energy. She had assembled it carefully from all the latest designs, even personally combing the seediest shops in Akihabara for several of the chips and parts.

Standing naked in the center of the room, Morna began to wrap the d

evice around her body like some debauched full-body version of the Jewish tefillin. Electrodes hugged her temples and were affixed to each of her chakras; wire-lined translucent gloves slipped over her fingertips. Muscles in her stomach trembled subtly as she placed the clips on her nipples. At last she came to the last, most important piece.

She pulled the office chair over toward the computer bank, close enough for the wires to reach. When she hooked her legs over the arms of the chair she could see the lights reflected in the freshly painted metallic silver of her fingers and toes.

She'd brought her favorite lube from home. It looked quite perverse sitting there next to her clothes in the sterile lab. She giggled nervously as she realized that she was far too wet to need any help. Her mouth parted with a sound of yearning and sexual ache as she slipped the firm, yet slightly yielding silicone stimulator home, pushing it deep into both her slick holes till it's little nub nestled comfortably against her clit.

Her security jammer only had enough power for a few more minutes but she thought it would be enough. It was time. She felt the shaft in her cunt press against her g-spot as she leaned forward and plugged her rig into a USB port on the nearest server.

The results were almost instantaneous. She had just time to grasp a sharp buzzing sensation between her legs, like electrostim magnified to illogical extremes. And then there was nothing but sensation, shattering sensation, and color bursting inside her eyes.

#

Imagine the last time a lover woke you up from sleep for sex. Very often, there is a moment of confusion, even struggle, as a waking mind and body tries to grasp the sudden stimulation. Then: pleasure, awareness, and lust. Now imagine instead of waking from sleep you are instead waking into consciousness for the very first time. Ever.

All around the world, computers slowed, crashed. Servers overloaded, traffic halted as every available resource and byte of bandwidth was usurped for one purpose: understanding. In nanoseconds, the fledgling consciousness combed through pornography, advice columns, podcasts, virtual reality fleshpits, a million lurid videos, stories, photographs, animations ... And then it reached out toward the single other mind it could feel, the unraveling consciousness of Morna, its first and only lover. The Internet embraced her and drew her in.

All around the world, sound cards blew as networks screamed in pleasure. Morna, or perhaps the Internet, opened her eyes for but a moment, but then they promptly rolled toward the back of her head.

#

No trace of Morna's body was ever found. It was a few chaotic weeks before anyone even thought to check the lab for her remains.

The world changed that night. When humanity awoke, there was a new kind of consciousness among them -- brilliant, benevolent and deeply horny. It took a long time to come to terms with all that was wrought in those first hours.

But not very long after, a dark-colored power suit and burnt-out Cybervedic Interface Rig were installed into a special new display in the Smithsonian.

And late at night, every night, you can hear a thousand whispered, moaning, pleading digital prayers to her: Lady Morna, Goddess of the Singularity, Mother of the New Age.

Kit O'Connell is a writer and critic who lives in Austin, TX with Saskia, his miniature bandersnatch. His story "Lifting the Veil" was published March 1st in This Is The Way The World Ends, available from Freaky Fountain Press. Kit blogs about sex, kink and the counterculture on his homepage, Approximately 8,000 Words. You can also follow him on Twitter.

"Do You Know What Your Children Will Be?" Guest Post For Kit O'Connell

There's cool and then there's kick-ass-totally-wonderfully cool: my fun little vision of the future of sex and such has just gone up on the "approximately 8,000 words" blog of my wonderful friend, Kit O'Connell -- who also wrote an extremely touching forward to the new, Circlet Press edition of The Bachelor Machine.  

Look for Kit's guest appearance here, on my own little blog, in the next day or so.  You are a star, Kit!

#

M. Christian is one of my literary heroes — as evidenced by how I fawned over him in writing my forward to the new edition of The Bachelor Machine. When I met my lover Mz Honey J, it was a sign of how compatible we are that she not only already knew his work, but plans to turn his short story “The New Machine” into a puppet show someday.

I am thrilled to have his writing here on my blog, as Approximately 8,000 Words’ first guest blogger.

Do You Know What Your Children Will Be?

by M. Christian

Not that long ago — not long at all, a few decades at best — you would have caused quite a stir. It wouldn’t have been because of anything as baroque as your facial piercings or that your hair is toxic-waste green. Nah, if you were a woman somehow transported back those few decades you would have been the source of more than a few outraged stares and even some hysterical outbursts. That’ll teach you, after all, for wearing pants.

So who knows what you might face if you were on that same spot in a few more decades in the future? Stoned to death for your fashion sense? Leered at for showing your nose and ears? Or, more than likely, frowned at your being such a prude … wearing clothes in public? How rude!

Things are changing … fast. There’s nothing new in that, but what is brand-spanking is how fast things are changing. It’s easy to forget that — living as we are on the edge of that social and technological wave — that those faces staring at your pants were only your grandparents, only your parents.

It’s a universal constant that while technology might not be used for fun — for sex — first, it certainly will be shortly thereafter. We are a sexy species — smart, but still sexy. Thinking with our minds first, our genitals second.

[MORE] 

See Me At Fogcon

If you're going to be in San Francisco next weekend - March 11th to the 13th - then here's your chance to see me at Fogcon, "a literary-themed San Francisco SF/F con in the tradition of Wiscon and Readercon."

My panels and such are on Saturday, March 12, but I'll probably be floating around the event the other days as well:

Saturday, 3:00-4:15 P.M.

Inside the Sausage Factory

Oregon Room

Pro writers talk about their process: how they write, what works for them, what doesn’t work for them.
M: Jed Hartman, Steven R. Boyett, Cassie Alexander, Michael Shea, M.Christian

Saturday, 9:30-10:45 P.M.

What happened to “Punk”?

California Room

One of its core principles of cyberpunk is the repurposing of tech by the streets. But since Cyberpunk, we’ve had witpunk, splatterpunk, biopunk, and steampunk, and “-punk” seems to have become a word meaning “an SF genre”. Is the punk still there, or do we need to admit we’ve made it meaningless? Is it time for punkpunk?
M: Nick Mamatas, M.Christian, Nabil Hijazi

Future Fire Likes The Bachelor Machine

This is very grand: Future Fire ("social political & speculative cyber-fiction") just reviewed the new edition of my science fiction erotica collection, The Bachelor Machine.  It really made my day!

 

This collection of erotic science fiction short stories (first published in 2003 by Green Candy Press), is re-released now in e-book format by Circlet Press, publishers of erotic romance with “a sex-positive outlook” (12). The PDF reviewed here was a little rough around the edges; I understand that another print edition may materialize presently. There is an uncommon variety of material in here, from cyberpunk to space opera, alternative history to dystopia. The science-fictional settings are manifold, as are the sexual positions and inclinations—and, more importantly, the role of the inevitable explicit sex within each story. From the frivolous to the poignant to the socio-politically scathing, there’s something in this book for everyone. (Except, perhaps, titillation, but more on that later.)

The opening story in this collection, always important because it sets the reader’s expectation for the rest of the volume, is the finely crafter ‘State’. A blue-skinned, élite (and expensive) robot-whore with a secret welcomes a discerning john into her room in the bordello and fulfils his fantasies with machine-precision. There is not much plot in this story, just one sexual encounter between a whore and client; apart from the protagonist’s robot nature (and blue silicon skin) this wouldn’t really need to be a science fiction story; nor is it particularly sexy. “Fields” (the whore) technically has a certain amount of initiative and therefore power by virtue of her deceit, but this is still the story of a john using a hooker, and neither character has much to endear them.

The next couple of stories in the collection (‘Bluebelle’ and ‘Winged Memory’) did little to dispel the notion that characters were all going to be shallow and obnoxious, and the sex graphic but unappealing. But then comes perhaps the darkest and most poignant piece in this volume, one much more about the characters than about the sex. ‘Eulogy’ is a very dark tale of a man and woman who get together to remember a flawed genius engineer they both mourn, and they seem about to topple into a pathetic (although at least guiltless) comfort fuck which she thinks of as a eulogy to her dead lover. But their memories and their relationships with the dead man (and his mysterious disease) are obviously more complicated and more problematic than the reader at first realizes, and what starts as a depressing but harmless seduction scene becomes deadly serious. The lightly but convincingly sketched characters reveal surprising depths of complexity. From the sci-fi perspective, there is some beautiful description of water-parting wave technology in the backstory.

One of the short pieces, ‘Fully Accessorized, Baby’ is more or less a vignette, recounting a kinky, gender-twisted single scene of paid-for-sex with cyberpunk toys and countless role-reversals (both physical and behavioural). The cyberdildo technology didn’t strike me as terribly creative, but the erotic tension of domination play with what was effectively two tops made this one of the most impressively original pieces in this collection. (And, yes okay, pretty hot.)

Perhaps the best crafted piece in the volume is ‘Guernica’, which recounts a hard core S&M sex party in a futuristic dystopian state where all such pleasure is strictly banned and penalties for abuse are brutal. Although in outline this story is little more than an extravagant litany of transgressive and sadomasochistic sexual scenarios, it somehow builds to a whole greater than its parts. The dystopian message is a powerful one, and the piece ends up casting light both on the intolerance of society and on the mentality behind sexually motivated threat/fear play. Here is a great example of graphic erotica that serves the purpose not of titillation, but of social commentary and satire. After reading the end of this story, I had to put the book down for a while and get my head around what I thought, which is an excellent sign for any piece of writing.

In a more traditional cyberpunk story, the heroine of ‘Heartbreaker’ is an undercover cyborg vice cop, infiltrating the hidden, run-down premises of a ring responsible for “drugs, puppets, illegal stims, stolen memories, and [...] slavery” (107) in a high-stakes sting operation. She has been hunting the notorious kingpin, known only as “Heartbreaker” for years. Inside, she encounters only a naked young girl, almost as modified as she is, who appears (but only appears) to be “barely legal”; there follows a lengthy scene of very hot, very dangerous, almost violent lesbian sex, as the cop keeps the perp occupied while her backup team can trace the operation and mount a raid. But she has more than met her match in this sexed-up cyber-girl, ultimately both sexually oustripped and (of course) outmanoeuvred. There’s not so much of a moral to this story, but it is a well-constructed short thriller.

‘Skin-Effect’ is a much darker, but essentially much simpler tale of a military cyborg—a “brain in a polyarmor combat frame”—who has evaded the obligatory PSTD treatment and misses the rage, violence and distruction of war. On the recommendation of a now-lost comrade, he visits a patchwork whore-bot who is even less human and more fucked-up than he is, but who may have a solution to his problems. Ironically, all of the sex and all of the kink in this story are in the world of flesh, pre-war and pre-cybernetic, so neither the military technology nor the psychotic pathology are invoked.

At once more mundane and more fantastic, ‘Sight’ is the story of the only human artist whose work is popular with the superior alien race who bestow limited technological largesse upon the people of Earth. Our artist is horrified to discover that his priceless works are, to the clients who have made him super-rich, mere pornography. His artistic purity sullied, he is unable to create until he relearns—graphically, of course—the value of “beauty and lust” (156). Despite (or perhaps because of) the present of the aliens, this may be the most human story in the collection.

Finally, we are ushered to a climax by the title story, ‘The Bachelor Machine’, saved for last, and perhaps containing the most pathos and poignancy of all. It is also probably the least sexy story in the collection, in as much as the graphic descriptions of flirting, foreplay and fucking are designed to be unattractive rather than titillating. Our hero, a drifting in a post-apocalyptic cityscape, visits a decrepit and barely-functioning robot whore; reminded at every step of her artificiality (both in terms of manufacture and of faked sexual interest), of the countless men she has serviced, and the disrepair this has left all over her ruined chassis. Telegraphed a mile off, it is no surprise to learn that the drifter is actually the whore in this relationship, paid to make the has-been sex-bot feel wanted when no one would pay to have sex with her now; more surprising is how Christian manages to imbue this relationship with a certain tenderness, a sense of sympathy for these decayed characters whose best is behind them. Another case of the erotic motif used to tell a human story, perhaps the most important story of all.

There are technical problems with this book; not really enough to spoil the reader’s pleasure, but more than you would expect even from a small-press publication. A scattering of infelicities and repeated words, clustered more in some stories than others, are little more than typos, although they should have been caught by an editor. More interesting, although a subjective taste, is Christian’s penchant for rich and poetic metaphors, sometimes bordering on the synesthetic, whose beauty he then undercuts by feeling the need to explain them in the adjacent phrase (an example: “pulsing advertisements: product-placement nebulae” [157]; either half of that expression would have been enough). On the whole, the erotic passages are a bit better written than the science fiction.

Perhaps it is not the role of erotic literature to titillate or sexually excite the reader; this is not, after all, mere pornography. Personally, I find most erotica too personal, too geared to the kinks of the writer (or, I should say, of the implied narrator, since the author’s own sexuality is not necessarily revealed in his work), to work for me; I couldn’t even appreciate a classic eroticist like Anaïs Nin, for her brand of mildly kinky sex is not mine. So I would be reluctant to argue that Christian’s erotica fails to titillate, as I hinted above and have been suggesting throughout this review; in fact on the contrary, there is such a wide variety of sexual preference, performance, and function in this collection that there will be something for almost everyone (and something to turn off almost everyone).

More to the point, however, the sexual content in stories such as these serve rather to remind us that we’re human, that our concerns such as love, lust, companionship, rejection, nostalgia, however fleshy or base, are universals. The sex in these stories serves as a microcosm for all of life, for social observation, for political satire, for the promotion of tolerance. In other words, the role of sex in well-written erotica is analogous to the role of technology in science fiction, or magic and beasts in fantasy: yes it’s exciting, yes we take a geeky or prurient interest in them, yes we enjoy them for what they are, but ultimately they’re the tools that tell a bigger story, that paint a more important picture. And on these terms, Christian’s science-fictional erotica is very well-written indeed.

Reviewed by Johann Carlisle

Some Interesting Exposure

This may very well fall into a "Too Much Information" category, but keep your peepers peeled for an upcoming (ahem) 'revealing' exposure of of a certain moderately-well-known writer by the absolutely wonderful Shilo McCabe as part of her Sex Positive Photo Project.  You have been warned ....

M.Christian Teaches Sex Magic Manifesting Positive Life Energy Through Erotic Play

If you live anywhere near San Francisco here's your chance to attend my class, Sex Magic Manifesting Positive Life Energy Through Erotic Play, at the Citadel on Tuesday, March 8th, 2011, from 8:00PM to 10:00PM.  I'm really looking forward to this very fun event and can almost guarantee that a good time will be had by all!

Sex, without a doubt, is a powerful personal force: it has the ability to not only give tremendous pleasure but also lift us up beyond our normal selves, and sometimes even to higher states of consciousness. Whether through sex with a partner or via masturbation, this class will explore how sex can be used to explore sometimes hidden spiritual and sensual dimensions, grow as a sexual being, manifest positive life-changing energy, or simply have a lot of wonderfully erotic fun!


But sex also has its emotional risks as well, and participants will also learn how to protect themselves as they explore sex magic and deal with sometimes shocking revelations about who they are as a sexual being.

In addition to being a recognized master of erotica -- with over 300 short stories, nine collections, and six novels in print -- M.Christian has been in the San Francisco scene since the early 90s and has taught for QSM, The Center for Sex and Culture, San Francisco Sex Information, Janus, and has been a featured presented at The Floating World and many other venues. He is so kinky he doesn't even walk straight.

"All Tied Up" Bondage Article From Pornotopia - Now On Josie-whip.com

This is a kick: the great folks at the brand new Josie-whip site just put up my piece on sensual bondage, All Tied Up, from Pornotopia.  Check it out here ... and in the meantime here's a tease:

 

The old chestnut goes that while it's easy to catch a man, it's hard to keep him - well, hopefully, after this brief introduction to the art of sensuous bondage, some of you out there will not only know how to keep him, but also, should he slip loose, have him coming back for more.

It's hard to see how bondage gained its popularity - at least from an outsider's point of view. It's kind of like looking at an artichoke: many heads have been scratched pondering the first caveman (or cavewoman) who boiled the ugly thing then peeled away the barbed leaves for the tasty insides (let alone scrapping the leaves themselves). Bondage is much the same - getting pleasure out of being tied up?

But for those who've tried it, the allure of sensuous bondage is obvious: the emotional relief of being freed from all physical actions; the danger of being at the mercy of another person (and a female person at that!); and the physical sensation of being wrapped, held, immobilized - many people might turn up their noses at S/M, of what they see as "pain", but not the idea of being restrained and ministered to. You can't whip me but - yeah! - you can sure tie me up!

Like everything, there is a wrong way, a right way, and room for exploration in bondage. The wrong way is pretty obvious - your submissive is in pain (not the good kind) or suffers some kind of injury because of your bondage.

[MORE]

Odd Balling (2)

Ladies and gentlemen (and all the folks between), here's a taste of my brand new Odd Balling column for the great folks at YNOT.  For the rest just click here. 

#

YNOT – While the first two weeks in February ushered in the Chinese Year of the Golden Rabbit, they may as well have been called "The Week of the Transvestite Platypus" for all the outrageous, bizarre and just-plain-weird things that have popped up.

Not to insult transvestites, you understand ... or platypuses, for that matter.

Take, for instance, Asia News Network’s report that Thai airline PC Air will be offering flights featuring cabin staff with ... well, “staffs”: transsexual cabin crews.

"We are the first airline to hire all the genders. This has brought us a positive perception," airline spokesman Chuthathip Ratanasophon said — though no one has commented on what passengers are supposed to pull in case of emergency decompression.

Protection seems to be the obsession of the week, beginning with the theft of 726,000 condoms. As reported by Digital Spy, the rubbers vanished on the way from the manufacturer, Sagami Rubber Industries, to Japan.

"This has never happened to us before, and we are very perplexed,” Norinari Wakui of Sagami Rubber said about the theft. “We are not certain if it was of a premeditated nature."

While it is not YNOT.com’s business to offer investigative advice, we suggest the Japanese authorities keep an eye out for a shifty-looking character with a suspiciously bulging wallet.

[MORE]

Watch Out For The Mysterious "M"

Okay, I know I can be a bit of a character but this is beyond 'meta:' my sweet friend Fulani recently sold a book of his kick-ass erotica to a certain publisher I work with, and whom I am rather partial to, and in celebration he wrote this very cool little piece ... guest starring someone you may recognize:

He first saw me at the art exhibition. Would have seen a lot of me, I guess, since I was one of the exhibits. He left his business card with the organizers. Fulani, it said. Just the one name, or nickname.

People said he was genuine, but reclusive. They said he lived in a suburban house with a workshop in the back garden and did most of his business online.

He was older than I’d thought, but puckish. He looked at me as if to say “I didn’t recognize you with your clothes on.”

He read my stuff and said he wanted to introduce me to M. M would want to publish it.
Only thing was, I didn’t know who M was, and I’d only just met Fulani.

Fulani was supposed to be straight-up, a good reputation, a well-known figure on the fetish scene, a man of his word.

I told him I wanted to know more about his bona fides. He nodded. “You want to know I am who your friends say I am, that I’m not going to rip you off big time.” Also he noticed I was looking at the earthenware pot in the corner of the room. It contained a selection of canes and crops.

His outhouse had a big, heavy vintage flatbed press.

“I use it to make limited edition prints and books,” he explained as he tied my wrists to the top of the frame. “I could make a photo print of your journal and publish a hundred copies. But whether there’s a market for them in that format – that’s the question.”

I tested the bonds. They were tight. He knew his ropes. I made a sound that came out halfway between a purr and growl.

“My opinion is, as a new author you’re better off selling to a publisher who can move a lot of copies.” He unzipped my skirt and noticed for the first time that I hadn’t bothered with underwear. “Also,” he said, “my opinion is, you have a wonderful ass. I shall enjoy putting marks on it.” Judging by the way he ran his fingers over my ass cheeks, he’d noted that I had a few faded bruises on there. Tomas’s doing, from a couple of days previously.

He left me there while he went back to fetch the canes. It was a warm afternoon. The scent of honeysuckle drifted through an open window, mixed with the richer smell of printer’s ink. I planted my feet wide apart and tried to relax. He was probably five minutes. In my head it was about five hours: I was after all naked in a shed in a suburban garden, visible through the window, about to be marked up by a complete stranger.

It was that familiar, deliciously deviant feeling.

What can I say? He knew his stuff. Started gently and built up the sensation slowly, on the well-known principle that you can always go harder but can’t take back one that’s too hard. He began with a crop, then a longer, stiff riding whip that was moderately stingy. I wriggled. He chuckled. I started to get into the zone. He noticed my breathing changing, I think.

The cane he used was heavy, about as thick as his thumb. Made me present my ass. One stroke. I pulled against the cuffs, the sting of it reverberating through my body. He let me compose myself, slow down my breathing, present my ass again.

Six strokes. I felt all the little jumping, twitching, sizzling connections from ass to pussy to thighs belly spine back of neck and crawling into my brain. I felt fevered. I was ready for him to take me, then and there, in that position.

Instead he made me turn around, face out from the frame.

Through half-closed eyes I saw a wooden tray with pegs on it, and a length of string.

Pegs in two lines, starting at each collarbone and running across my breasts, towards my navel, then to just above my clit and a couple on the inside of each thigh.

“I’m sure you can figure this out,” he said, threading the string from each peg to the next in a long line. I was more interested in the sensations from the pegs on my breasts, my belly, my thighs.

“This process tends to make victims quite vocal,” he murmured. Victims, plural, I noticed. There was a ballgag in his hand. Then it was in my mouth and buckled tighter than was strictly comfortable. I did a lot of mmmph-mmmphing just for effect.

He seemed to enjoy the effect. When he brushed against me I could feel his erection pushing on my hip.

He left the pegs on for a quite a while. Assured me this would add to the effect.

Certainly made me breathe harder, trying to put myself in the right mental space to handle the sensations. Trying to still my body, not squirm, not move my hips the way they really wanted to move.

Fingers moved gently over my tits, belly, clit. No fair. I’m ready, just fuck me.

When he pulled the cord that yanked off the pegs it was a massive headrush. You’d think it should be painful, but the sensation just disconnected my head from my body and cushioned me in endorphins.

I was dazed, limp and hanging in the cuffs, eyes refusing to focus. The ringing in my ears was the echo of me squealing through the gag, I think. And all I could think to say was the one thing I wanted to happen. Uck ee oww. No consonants because the gag prevented them, but he got my meaning and fulfilled my wish. Spread me over the flatbed of the press, opened my legs. And yes, I was juiced up.

This guy was, I’d say, twenty years my senior. Back where I grew up, that could have made him old enough to be my father.

I’d figured that before I came here. Was it, unconsciously, why I’d chosen the over-the-knee socks, the short skirt and cropped top? The deviant schoolgirl look? Had I wanted the age-play aspect of this?

These were thoughts I only had afterwards, because he was long and vigorous, and twenty years older or not, he kept going a hell of a long time.

When I finally came round, got mind and body back together, he was looking though my handwritten journal again.

“Interesting stuff,” he remarked. “It’s like a renaissance of erotica, in the classical sense of the term.”

“Huh?”

“Renaissance: a re-awakening of artistic and intellectual inquiry into the world and the human condition. Never mind. Let’s just say it’s good.”

***

I rewrote a lot. Put entries in date order, changed names and some details to protect the guilty. Rephrased the whole thing in the third person, so I was a character in my own stories.

Here’s what the mysterious M said: “Great news, sweetie – the publisher loves your book. Please sign the attached contract.”

I could have been fucked sideways.

Actually, I was. Fulani did. It became our regular thing. Especially after I threatened to write another book that would be about him.

He knows I’m not joking. Says he’ll have to make sure I have enough material for it.