Demonic Revenge, part one #StayingHome #RomFantasy #BadGirl

Surveying the chaos, Rémy des Quatre-Frères cringed at the cacophony assaulting his ears. It wasn’t so much the strangely dressed crowd or the general frivolity that tortured his sensitive lupine hearing, but the electronic noise les étrangers considered music. As if.

A large red banner bore the words: Welcome to Alpha-con! Meet and greet tonight 8pm. There were hundreds of women of all types milling about. Ordinarily, this would please Rémy to no end, but judging by the tone of the message he had received, this was no ordinary night. What exactly was an “Alpha-con” and why, in the name of the Gods, had his écrivaine summoned him here?

Conventioners thronged to what les étrangers called a “dance floor” and a scantily clad troupe of half-naked men gyrated in the most alarming manner. So appalled was Rémy by the spectacle he couldn’t force himself to look away.

But then he spotted her.

“Excuse me, pardon me.” Bustling his way through the crowd, he struggled to part the sea of bodies.

“Why aren’t you performing, cupcake?” One of the human women rubbed against him, laying her hand on his cock.

“Madame, I assure you I would not be caught dead in an outfit such as that.” He removed the offending appendage, motioning to the tiny scraps of fabric that hardly covered the male dancers privates.

Finally reaching Cindy’s side, he pressed his lips to her ear. “I trust you have a good reason to call me to this den of iniquity.”

“Rémy.” Relief washed over her strained expression. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

Taking him by the hand, she offered no explanation. Once she’d led him to a quiet hallway near the hotel kitchen, she threw her arms around him. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

Whatever had come to pass, his lovely writer shook from head to toe. Wrapping his arms around her, he made comforting sounds.

When her trembling lessened, he released her and asked, “Qu’est-ce qui se passé?”

“I didn’t know how to explain it in my message, but she’s missing. Vanished without a trace except for…well, you’ll just have to see it to understand.”

“Cindy―” he squeezed her hand, halting her frantic march toward the elevator― “who has vanished?”

She dropped her gaze to the carpet, mouth a tight, thin line, her face pale in the dim lighting. “It’s Denysé; she’s gone.”

A jolt of adrenaline coursed through his veins and he struggled to catch his breath. Throat constricted, muscles around his ribcage tense, he felt as through Cindy had hit his chest with a mace.

“Show me.”

Cindy led him to the elevator and pushed the button for the fourteenth floor. Chewing at her thumbnail, she tapped her foot as if she would will the infernal machine to move faster. Finally the doors parted with an odd dinging sound. The moment they opened, Rémy could smell brimstone and sulfur. His stomach churned, twisting in on itself.

Once she’d opened the room, the cause of her fright became apparent. A straight line punctuated with two small circles and flanked by two overlapped V’s smoldered in the center of the carpet. Despite the heat emanating from the symbol, the room was so cold Rémy could see his breath.

“Azazel.” He exhaled the name of the demon more than spoke it.

Tears in her eyes, Cindy huddled close. “I know. But why here at a writer’s convention of all places? And why Denysé?”

“I do not know, but this I promise you: Azazel will rue the day he clawed his way out of hell to prey upon my beloved.”

“Do you think she’s still alive?” Cindy’s voice cracked as she pushed out the question.

Rémy nodded. “As gruesome as it sounds, Azazel’s kills are always messy. It appears he has abducted her.”

Cocking his head to one side, he sniffed the air. Though the stench of brimstone made it nearly impos-sible to detect anything else, he picked up the faint aroma of something…no, not something, someone. The earthy scent of someone more ancient than he and definitely Old World.

“Stay behind me.” He stepped in front of Cindy, shifting to full lupine form. A black wolf with piercing blue eyes, Rémy stood ready to fight.

As if materializing from vapor, a tall, slim yet muscular figure stepped out of the shadows.

Shifting back to his human-like form, Rémy’s upper lip curled, a growl resonating in his throat. “What is he doing here?”

“I sent for him. I thought he could help,” Cindy replied.

As much as he wanted to toss the Romanian prince out a window―or gouge his eyes out with a fork―Rémy knew Cindy was right. If Azazel was indeed the enemy they faced, Rémy could use all the help he could get…even if that help came in the form of an Old World cur.
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To be continued... find the next installment here: http://boundpassion.blogspot.com/

Hero's POV

In romance and erotic romance, it's a given that the tale will be told mostly from the heroine's POV. After all, most of the folks reading this genre are female and--if I've done my job properly--readers will most strongly identify with the heroine. While it's always nice to get a peek inside the hero's head from time to time, it's rare to find a tale told mostly or entirely from the hero's POV. Lately, I'm wondering why.

Yes, in reality, we rarely get to know exactly what is going on in the mind of our leading man and maybe that's a good thing, lol. I suspect we would find it uninteresting at best and terribly alarming at worst. But fiction by definition is not reality. Wouldn't it add to the experience to know all the hero's thoughts, intentions, insecurities and desires? If indeed readers do identify with the heroine, wouldn't it heighten the fantasy to project yourself as the object of the hero's affections?

I'm testing that theory with my latest WIP, titled If You Were Mine. This work of short erotic fiction is told entirely from the hero's POV from the moment he spies the heroine to him working up the courage to talk to her, his internal dialogue as they flirt and finally, and, finally, her seduction and submission. I do realize I'm imposing my own wants and desires on this whole process, but isn't that ultimately what fantasy is all about? This is how I would want to be seduced were I to be seduced *grin*.

Never having done so before, I'm struggling a bit to narrate an entire story as a man would speak--I mean, we all know men think and communicate differently, but trying to keep the masculine voice is part of the fun. I enjoy challenging myself as a writer and I'm hoping readers will enjoy something that's a little bit different. I'll keep you all updated on the progress.

So here's my question: Would you like to read an erotic romance told entirely from the male POV? Why or why not?

Cheers,
Cindy
http://www.amazon.com/Cindy-Jacks/e/B003XRMLLS/

Dysgra-what now?

Writing. It is my bread and butter. It breathe color into my life. I have constant story narration playing in my head. I eat, sleep and breathe writing. My son on the other hand...not so much.

I've known since the moment I started teaching him to form letters that something was amiss. I mean, I saw all those late night commercials with the six-month old babies who can read and write because of some miraculous learning system or website so why then couldn't I get my three year-old to trace successfully the letters of the alphabet?

When he began kindergarten his teacher looked down her pert little nose at me and told me he lacked the hand strength to properly grip the pencil and that I should have him color and model with clay as much as possible to correct the situation. There was only one problem: he hated coloring and Play-doh frustrated him. But I tried to sneak in these activities and work with him on his letter formation as much as possible.

Though he never won any awards for penmanship, he made it through first and second grade without too much trouble. Even then I noticed he avoided adding details to stories so he wouldn't have to write as much and that he consistently mixed up uppercase and lowercase letters, missed punctuation and had trouble spacing words on a page. To be honest, I chalked it up to disinterest and a lack of self-discipline. He's a boy who loves sports so he's never going to love academia, right?

In third grade, our school system switches children from penmanship paper to looseleaf paper. With smaller spaced lines, things really went downhill. Homework assignment after homework assignment came back with the words "I can't read this" or "Please write more legibly" scrawled across them.

I begged, bribed, cajoled and, yes, lost my temper on more occasions than I can count trying to convince my son to take his time with his writing, all to no avail. Homework became a nightly battleground that often ended with one or both of us in tears. I mean, he's a smart kid with a great imagination. It dumbfounded me that he seemed to refuse to use those abilities in school. Little did I know, that wasn't the case.

Things finally came to a head this summer when he was doing a math problem in his fourth grade prep workbook that required him to line up columns of numbers to calculate the correct answer. He consistently came up with the wrong answer because his numbers were so poorly formed and misaligned. I told him that this was precisely what I'd been talking about that if he didn't take the time to be neater, school would become more and more challenging. He replied, "Mom, this is the best I can do." He said it so sincerely and with such a serious expression I knew he meant it. This really was the best he could do. It was time to reach out for help.

After consulting with his pediatrician and his school, it's looking more and more like he has a mild form of dysgraphia. Dysgra-what now? Yeah, I said the same thing. Dyslexia I've heard of, but not dysgraphia. It's basically a neurological disorder where the nerve impulses from the brain that control the complex fine motor skills necessary to write get all jumbled up. It also explains why he struggled with basic milestones such as tying his shoes, doing buttons and zippers by himself and controlling a fork and spoon.

Upon hearing he has an actual physical impediment delaying his handwriting skills, I felt about two inches tall. How had I let my child struggle for years without picking up on the fact that something was genuinely wrong? His doctor kindly let me off the hook and told me that dysgraphia has only been identified in the past decade and it's not widely known. It's not something teachers look for as readily as dyslexia.

The school diagnostician assured me it's not the end of the world. "Though we'll keep working on the manual writing, most people don't write much by hand these days anyway. Typing is a totally different skill and he shouldn't have any trouble with keyboarding."

Okay, so I'm not the world's worst mother and I still find it disheartening that my son struggles with something I dearly love to do, but it helps to know that there are techniques and coping mechanisms we can use to help my son get the brilliant ideas out of his head and onto paper. Legibly :)

Find out more about dysgraphia here: http://www.ncld.org/types-learning-disabilities/dysgraphia/what-is-dysgraphia

#writing - Seven stages of book-flop grief

Hello everyone!

After a long hiatus this summer, I'm thrilled to be back at the keyboard. Just signed a spiffy new contract with Ellora's Cave for a book titled SHARING THE COURTESAN. Yay! With every new contract comes the hope that this book will go forth into the world and capture the imaginations of readers everywhere. Does that happen with every new release? Unfortunately not. In fact it doesn't happen with most published work.

Having pushed more than a twenty novels, novellas and short stories out into cyberspace, I'm no stranger to book-flop. What is book-flop, you ask? It's when all the months of writing, editing, crying, swearing and drinking (drinking coffee of course *wink, wink*) to produce a story net you very little sales. So what to do when the public doesn't love your baby as much as you do?

Step #1 - Cry. Yep, go ahead and let it out. Let's face it, no author puts out a manuscript hoping no one will like it. Well, maybe Ayn Rand, but for those of us who hope to entertain with our writing it can be a crushing blow to see that no one gave a crap about what we had to say. If you're not given to tears, then slam some doors, break some inexpensive glassware, whatever it is you do to let the frustration out.

Step #2 - Commiserate. Reach out to other authors. Writing can be lonely, isolating work. But when it comes to book-flop you are not alone. Sometimes it helps to know we've all been in the same boat.

Step #3 - Pamper yourself (or what I like to call the "wine stage"). Take a day to chill out (hence the wine), lick your wounds and do something nice for yourself.

Step #4 - Accentuate the positive. Okay, so no one showed much interest in your latest release, but don't dwell on that. Focus on the things about writing that make you feel good. Maybe it's awesome reviews from readers, maybe it's the success of past books, maybe it's the fact that you're a published author at all. I mean you DID write a book which is an accomplishment in and of itself.

Step #5 - Learn from the experience. Maybe zombie woodchuck shifters just aren't popular right now. Doesn't mean they never will be (okay, I know they never will be), so it might not be the right time to put out that sequel. Or maybe you need to shift your promo strategy and find the places that zombie woodchuck shifter fans hang out. We learn more from our failures than we do our successes.

Step #6 - Forget about it. Easier said than done, but if Babe Ruth focused on his last strikeout, he wouldn't have been in the frame of mind to hit 714 home runs.

Step #7 - Get back on the horse. Now that you've picked yourself up and dusted yourself off, get back to the keyboard and write another book. Maybe this will be the release that garners you fame and fortune...or at least a royalty check that isn't embarrassing to deposit. And if not--wash, rinse and repeat steps one through seven.

Happy writing!
Cindy