Jason Z. Christie's Blog, page 16

Penultimate Hustle: L.A. - Chapter Six

6 – Perfection

Janique held the door
open and the girls walked in, forming a vee ahead of her. Already,
she loved her entourage. They were a sexy little female gang. The
shop was quiet and empty, and the proprietor's eyes bulged at the
sight of them. But he played it cool, as though this sort of thing
happened every day.




“Hi,” she said. “I
need five thousand cards on your priciest stock. Black, with gold
embossed lettering, in this distribution.”




He accepted the list
with the text she wanted, and she found herself amused at the sight
as his eyes grew wider still.




“Wow,” he said.
“Ordinarily, I'd caution you about ordering so many at once, but
you seem, uh, very confident. Let me see what it'll cost.”




He forced himself to
focus on his adding machine for a moment, and eventually said,
“Eight-hundred and fifty-six dollars. My name's Romeo Montague, by
the way.”




“Romeo Montague?
Seriously?”




“Yeah. Montague's my
family name, and I guess my parents thought it would be funny. I'm
not much of a Casanova though, to mix metaphors."




Janique laughed. “How
long would it take?”




“This number? Oh,
three days.”




“We can make it an
even thousand. Two days.” She had no pressing need to get them that
quickly, but she was enjoying the power play.




“I'd have to work
overtime, but I think I can do that. I work alone,” he added.




An idea formed in her
head, but she resisted the urge to announce it too soon.




“Well, I can give you
cash, or-”




“How'd you like to
fuck the shit out of us, instead?” Mia said, shamelessly.




Romeo's facade
crumbled, and his face went pale, and then bright red.




“Gee, I don't know. I
need the money, and Julie'd kill me.”




“Your wife's name is
Julie? Close enough, I guess,” Janique said. “Do you have any
kids?”




He nodded. “Yep.
Pride and Joy.”




“That's their names?”




“Right.”




“Very cool. So what
do you say?”




“I'm torn. It's a
very, uh, tempting offer. I mean, I love my wife...”




“But she doesn't get
down like the porno bitches, right?”




“Right,” he
admitted.




“Well, we do
get
down like the porno bitches. And we're very discreet. Does she ever
come here?”




“No,
she hates the shop. She wants me to spend more time with her and the
girls. But the sales just aren't there to hire anyone, and I don't
trust anyone to run the place, anyway.”




“I
might be able to offer a solution. And I can promise you the best sex
you've ever had. Right now.”




He
caved, and moved to lock the door. “We Romeos do have high
libidos...”




“Wait.
You don't mess with nasty street whores, do you? Escorts, maybe?”
Janique asked.





“Me?
No way. I could never cheat on my wife.”




“Well,
this isn't cheating. It's business. Girls, set up the cameras.” she
commanded, and they scrambled to set up tripods near the back of the
room.




“Cameras?”
Romeo gulped in apprehension. He was afraid he was getting himself
into a blackmail situation.




“Company
policy. Otherwise, it's prostitution. And I need you to sign a
release form.”




“I
don't know about all this,” he admitted.




“Does
Julie watch porn?”




"Never."




“Some
women are like that. It's an insecurity or something. But at least
you know she'll never see it. Anyway, do we have a deal?” She
proffered the release form.




Romeo
sighed, defeated by his desires. “Yes.” He scrawled his name on
the form.





“I'll
need a copy of your driver's license, too.”




“Driver's
license?” He looked up, and Janique had her tits out. “No
problem.”




“Ready,
girls?” she called out.





“Yes,
mommy,” Gia said. “We're rolling.”




'Come
on, Romeo. Let's see if you can live up to your name.” She led him
by the hand to the center of the three cameras the girls had
arranged, and pulled her own handheld from her bag.




“Strip,”
she told the four of them. He hesitated, and Janique grew annoyed.
“For fuck's sake. This is not the time and place for modesty. We
don't care about what kind of shape you're in.”




The
girls disrobed, and then help him finish taking off his clothes.





“Ever
fuck a black girl?” Lateesha whispered in his ear.




Romeo
shook his head no.




The
girls tried not to look disappointed at his somewhat undersized dick,
which had grown hard, despite the stress and pressure of the
situation. Mia and Gia knelt in front of him, taking turns swallowing
his cock and licking his balls. When Lateesha tried to spread and
lick his ass, he panicked.




“What
are you doing?”




“Relax,”
Janique said, getting some nice shots of the action. This was good,
she thought. It had pathos.




He
did, and Lateesha tried again. But the moment she touched him with
her tongue, he pulled out of Gia's mouth and squirted on the carpet.





“Bad
Romeo!” Janique scolded. “I ought to make you lick it up.”
Something about him brought out her dominant side, one that she
ordinarily reserved for females. “On your hands and knees, worm.”




Powerless,
he did as she told him. Janique slipped out of her clothes
single-handedly, laid down in front of him, and spread her legs,
continuing to film. “Now eat my pussy,” she said. He was more
than happy to oblige.




Mia
and Gia got on their backs and slid under him, and Lateesha licked
his ass and balls from behind. Apparently, that was her thing. They
all began to get into it again, when he came a second time. The twins
devoured it, and then complained.





“Mommy,
he came again,” Mia said, disappointed.




This
was going nowhere fast.




“Spank
his fucking ass, girls,” she told them, changing her approach.




Janique
rose and stood in front of him, looking down at him both figuratively
and literally. The girls paddled him with delight, and she was
unsurprised to see that he had already regained his erection.




“Romeo,
you're going to stick your dick in each of my girls before we go. Do
you understand me?”




“Yes,
ma'am,” he said meekly.




The
three lined lined up on their hands and knees, and Janique moved him
behind Lateesha, who was on the left this time. She guided his cock
into her and urged him on. “Fuck her hard,” she said, and he did
his best to follow orders. After a minute or so, Janique made him
pull out and she cleaned the delicious taste off of him.




“Next,”
she said, and moved him to Mia, repeating the process. When he had
finally reached Gia, Romeo couldn't take any more. Three strokes
later, and he came all over her 'Perfection' tattoo. Lateesha and Mia
lapped it up for the cameras, and then snowballed each other, before
spitting it all into Gia's mouth.




“For
shame, Romeo,” Janique said. “I was going to let you fuck me,
next.”




“I
don't think I could handle it,” he admitted, and laid back, panting
and exhausted.




Professionals
to the end, the girls switched off the cameras and pulled towels from
their bags. They dried the sweat from his body, and the twins laid on
either side of him and cuddled as he caught his breath. To Romeo,
that was the best part. He nearly cried at their gentleness and
consideration.




“I
want to buy the shop,” Janique announced unexpectedly.





He
raised his head to look at her. The girls moved to get dressed and
pack up the gear.

“I'm
listening,” he said. At that point, he would have given it to her.




“I
propose a lump sum buy-out arrangement, and I'll retain you as a
consultant. You can train some of my people, and draw a salary. Not
to mention,” she said, “you can have sex with one of them every
week.”




Romeo
was stunned, but he knew a good deal when he heard one. It was too
enticing to pass up.




“Deal,”
he said without thinking.




“Great.
Now you can spend more time at home, and get away when you need to.”




“This
is like a dream come true. How could I say no?”




“Please,”
she said. “It's what I do. This place is about to become Beverly
Hills' best kept secret. Girls, tell Mr. Romeo goodbye.”




Each
delivered him an open-mouthed kiss, and walked out without a word.





“We'll
be in touch,” Janique called out over her shoulder.




At
the curb, they found the cabbie waiting for them.




“San
Fernando?” he asked with a grin.

Penultimate Hustle: L.A. - Chapter Five, Part Two

While Natalia and her minions
worked on redecorating, Janique reviewed the existing footage to
determine how much usable video she had so far. It was hot stuff, for
sure. Mia and Gia were naturals on camera, and had been proven to do
pretty much anything. Lateesha's bathroom sodomy was an intense
vignette, but had only lasted about twenty minutes or so.




Still, she had about three hours
of footage, all told. Enough to advance her plans, she decided, but
she needed more. Janique realized that the spontaneous nature of the
encounters were part of what made them so enticing, and set about
devising more scenarios.





But before she could move forward,
there was business to attend to. Always business. She loved the act
of creation, and enjoyed being hands-on, but had decided that she
needed to offload as much of the day to day drudgery as possible. Too
much of her energy was being diverted to the details of running
things, and interfered with her art.




She walked into Janice's office,
and the receptionist (office manager, she reminded herself) quickly
put away the yellow legal pad she was writing on.





“Hey, Janice. Whatcha doin'?”




“Oh, just some creative writing.
For a little critique circle I'm a part of.”




“Cool!. Looks, I think we need
nametags and business cards. Do you have a printer you can
recommend?”




“Indeed, madame.” Janice
consulted her personal Dayrunner and wrote down the name and address
of a company she used for manuscripts. “Romeo should be able to
provide anything you need.”




“Romeo? That's hilarious.”




“Oh, it gets better. I won't
spoil it for you.”




“Perfection Printing. Nice. In
Beverly Hills, no less.”




“They do a lot of high-end
business work. Business cards are his specialty. He also does
run-offs of scripts for a lot of major studios.”




“Excellent. I'm going to work
out exactly what I need, and then take the girls on a little field
trip.”




“Do you need anything from me
while you're away?”




“Oh, just keep an eye on
Natalia. Don't let her smoke in the office.”




Janice smiled. “I don't think
that will be a problem.”




Janique returned to her desk and
began to work out what her cards needed on them. A smile crossed her
own face when she came up with the phrase “Private Independent
Movie Producer”. P.I.M.P. She loved it. The fact that she had
started a completely legal escort service wasn't enough. She wanted
to run the authorities' noses in it.




She went through the racks of her
own costumes and selected three schoolgirl outfits for Mia, Gia, and
Lateesha, and one for herself that suggested a principal or
headmaster.




Janique found them involved in the
process of setting up their bedroom, and distracting Natalia's movers
tremendously.




“Get dressed,” she told them.
“We're going shopping.”




The girls squealed with delight.




“And leave your panties and bras
here,” she added.




She changed with them, and the
sight of all that firm young flesh made her indescribably horny. The
schoolgirl outfits from Japan only heightened the effect. One
advantage she had in sticking with a particular body type, so far,
was that all of her many outfits fit the girls as well. Lateesha's
exaggerated tits and ass strained the limits of the fabric, however.




They changed heedless to the
workmen coming in out of the room, each of whom suddenly found reason
to stay and aimlessly move boxes around. Only Natalia had returned to
the truck.




“Line up and touch your toes,”
she told the girls.




When they had, she flipped their
skirts up, exposing their bare asses. One of the workers dropped a
lamp he was holding, and it shattered.




“Idiot!” Natalia screamed as
she walked in. Realizing what the problem was, she said, “Get out!”
and her hired hands reluctantly left the room. She stayed to watch,
however.




The girls, with Lateesha in the
middle, forming a reverse Oreo, widened their stances to keep their
balance as Janique slapped each of their asses hard enough to leave
bright red hand prints.





“Thank you, mommy,” they
responded.




Then she knelt behind them and
passed her tongue up and down their exposed pussies and asses,
relishing the scent as they grew increasingly wet. It was so
intoxicating, it almost turned into a scene right there. She stopped
herself with some reluctance before it did, and made a mental note to
someday develop a perfume that smelled like pussy, After “Still
Life With Woodpecker”, Chris had read “Jitterbug Perfume” to
her, igniting a love of fragrances that had persisted ever since.




Finally, she replaced their
too-short skirts and told them to stand. Janique smiled at a stunned
Natalia as they walked out.





###

Outside, Janique hailed
a cab, and two of them screeched to a halt at the sight of them.
Nice, she thought, and selected one based on the appeal of the
driver. She opened the back door, and the girls piled in.




“Can I ride in
front?” she asked.




“Lady, you can do
whatever you want,” he said, and tripped over himself as he got out
to open her door.




When he had returned to
the driver's seat, Janique said, “Beverly Hills, and step on it.”
She had always wanted to say that.




In the back, the girls
had assumed the same formation as they had upstairs, and couldn't
keep their hands off of each other. Each of the twins was taking
turns kissing Lateesha as they worked themselves into a frenzy.
Janique watched with interest, and fired up a Marlboro. She noticed
the driver's momentary discomfort and rolled down her window.




“Problem?” she
asked.




“No, ma'am,” he
said. “I mean, technically, they're supposed to wear seatbelts, and
no one is allowed in front, either. But...” He glanced in the back
and realized what was happening, losing his train of thought.





“Hey!” Janique
said, and the girls snapped to attention. “No orgasms.”




They laughed and went
back to what they were doing. After that, the driver had trouble
focusing, and his eyes kept moving from Janique to the rearview
mirror. When his inattention to driving caused him to run a
stoplight, she took his hand and put it in her pants.





“Eyes on the road,”
she said.




He nodded vigorously,
and after that, his driving was as excellent as his fingerwork. I
love my life, Janique thought. She couldn't help but be reminded of
“Even Cowgirls Get The Blues”. It was just a Tom Robbins sort of
day.




They slowed down as
they entered Beverly Hills and made their way to Rodeo Drive. Janique
realized he was trying to drag out the trip, but she could hardly
blame him. She was so wet, she had to force herself not to cum, as
well.





She was thinking about
Chris.




They had spent a lot of
time on the highway with Janique's legs up on the dashboard, her tits
out for passing truckers. More than once they had caused massive
slowdowns and traffic snarls as drivers tried to keep her in sight.




At the printer's, she
had to remove his hand herself. Without a hint of self-consciousness,
he rubbed it all over his mouth and mustache. He's be smelling her
for the rest of the afternoon. Then he reached for his wallet and
tried to hand her sixty dollars.





“Don't be silly,”
she said, handing him a hundred of her own, instead. The business
side of her wanted to turn a profit, but she was too sympathetic to
the plight of working people to allow herself to do that. “Thanks,
sweetie. We make movies. Ultimate Hustle. Remember the name.” She
almost added that he could have any of them for three thousand
dollars an hour, but resisted the urge. He probably had a family to
take care of.




“Yes, ma'am!”




Janique smiled. She
liked making other people happy.

Review - Titanic: QED by Catt Dahman

Well, I guess I don't have to worry about spoilers, now. It's all pretty much right there in the book description.

I really enjoy the tale Catt tells in this one. The previous short story collection I read from this author hearkens back to the past, so this story was the perfect match for her. The use of H.P. Lovecraft as a character is brilliant. It's never specified until the last page that Howard Philips is Lovecraft, but astute readers will pick up on this a lot sooner. It's very much a part of the Cthulu mythos, and by the time you're two-thirds into it, that becomes apparent. It's a great homage to a phenomenal writer and story-teller.

Although he wasn't actually on the Titanic (thankfully!), many of the other characters actually were. None of them stand out nearly as much, to me, as Maggie Brown, the plucky heroine of the story.

In fact, it's a sort of feminist piece, in part. The men, on the whole, behave admirably, as you would expect men from that era to act. Of course, not all do. A crisis can bring out the worst in us. But it's the women who stand out to me, as they are acting, not out of character as such, but beyond their ordinary station in life for that time period. You can also tell that a lot of research went into writing this.

Where Catt really shines is in writing horror, and that is here in spades. There's plenty of opportunity for it in this book. It really is a lot more than a mere Titanic/shark story. It succeeds as a literary mash-up of sorts. In fact, it's sort of a meta-prequel, in that it is a prelude to Lovecraft's entire writing career. That's an amazing and exciting accomplishment.

I'm dinging her a single star from my rating, but only to push the author toward further greatness. I realize it's a matter of taste and stylistic differences, but I'd have enjoyed the story more if the narration used contractions, for example. It doesn't really take away from the tale itself, though, and I recommend this book to fans of horror and the sea, and H.P. Lovecraft fans in particular.





Four out of five stars.




Get Titanic: QED at Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00CEW0T1M

Eight Free eBooks All Weekend Long

I'm using up the last of my Select free days, all at once. Now's your chance to get: Pageburner, Perfect Me, Cure for Sanity, Six Stories Short & Sweet, Six More Short Stories, Poetry: A Love Story, An Ultimate Hustle Primer and Self-Publishing Tips and Tricks.



http://www.amazon.com/Jason-Christie/e/B006P7E0K8/



If you enjoy them, I'd love reviews, of course. I'm going to try a different approach for a while and put my books on Kobo, B & N, etc. and make Radar Love and Perfect Me permafree. 

There's No Accounting For Taste

I write pulp fiction. I'm fine with that. In fact, that's all I ever really set out to do, write trashy paperbacks. Yes, I like to try and inject interesting ideas. I don't want to write forgettable books. I don't know if I'll ever write important, serious stuff like Neil Stephenson's Quicksilver (just started it, finally) or Cryptonomicon. Maybe, perhaps, someday. I'd like to.



The promise of indie writing, to me, early on, was in publishing things that you know a traditional publisher wouldn't touch, or would want to heavily modify. Not to write things that don't merit publishing, but stretching the boundaries a bit. I equated indie with underground.



That's really not the case. Most indie books, the well-written ones, seem to be worthy of a publisher. But not many of them jump out to me as something exciting and groundbreaking. Of course, there are tons of indie novels, and many I don't know a thing about. Please don't take this as a slag on indie writers. I just have eclectic tastes.



I can't help but look at everything with a writer's eye, and I'm sure many of you are the same.



Recently, I noticed that Archer, a great cartoon on FX, was only rated three stars on Netflix. That's curious, to me. It's really witty and well-written. I can imagine that some people who rate it as less than stellar are offended by humor that they perceive to be sexist, or racist. Perhaps it's the violence. I'm at a loss to explain it, especially considering Family Guy and American Dad are both rated five stars. If Archer was an indie novel, it would be dead in the water with those ratings.



I also watched "John Dies at the End", which was written by Cracked.com writer David Wong. It has a real indie sensibility to it, and is well written. From the moment you hear the narration, you realize that this guy is a good writer. I definitely want to read it, now. This, at least, is rated five stars on average, and I feel it deserves it. It's funny, original, and still tries to add bigger ideas into the story. Even Hollywood couldn't manage to dilute it too much.



Two indie novels that come to mind are "What Would Satan Do?" and "The Apocalypse and Satan's Gloryhole". By the titles alone, they'd never make it onto the shelves at Wal-Mart. I haven't read the second yet, but the first calls to mind "Good Omens" by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. That's definitely a good thing. Both are highly-rated, and the titles probably do well to keep out a certain readership that wouldn't like them anyway.



This is the promise of indie publishing, to me, and one reason I still retain a modicum of enthusiasm for it. My point, if I have one, is that there is a market for strange books that defy genres and easy categorization. Breakthrough books, in other words. The trick is finding your market, and getting your novel into their hands. Of course, if I knew how to do that, I probably wouldn't be writing this column. 

Chapter One Draft of "Terminally Pretty"

The girl stood on
a street corner, smoking a cigarette with angst. She was a little
nervous that her parents, or possibly her judgmental uncle, would see
her. An average day, in other words. That all ended when a stranger
in a nondescript sedan pulled up. I wonder if he thinks I'm a
hooker, she thought.





Then he aimed a
scary looking pistol at her.




“Get
in,” he said casually, without a hint of aggression. It was rather
friendly, really. A lift from a friend. The gun said otherwise.




His eyes were
mesmerizing.




Unsure of any
other option, Pet moved to get in. As she did so, he put the gun
away. She sat down and looked at him, then closed the door. Without
really thinking about it, she locked it. Finally, he
looked over at her, but left the transmission in ‘park’. She
looked back quizzically. 



“Seatbelt?”
he said, more a statement than a question.




Pet fastened it,
fumbling only slightly.




Satisfied she was
secure, he began to drive. After he was on the road for a bit,
incredibly, he laid his hand on the seat beside her, as if to hold
her hand. He said nothing, but looked forward as he drove. He didn’t
look so much pensive, more like shy. Pet found the situation somehow
adorable.




Always one to
take life’s little pleasures where she could, she decided she had
little to lose. And plenty to gain, she supposed. Following his cue,
she lightly held his hand, maintaining the same forward stare. He
relaxed a bit, after the initial shockwave had passed from his hand
to his heart.




They drove in
silence, lightly squeezing each other’s hands and smiling faintly.
It was nice. Pet enjoyed it, and she had been on creepier dates with
boys. Hell, she’d had creepier encounters with family members.




He let go, once,
to turn on the radio. It wasn’t anything she cared to hear, so
after a polite ten seconds, she then let go of his hand instead, and
changed the station to a local college station, alternative rock.




“Hey!”
her abductor blurted out. He sounded genuinely hurt. How dare she
overrule his music selection?




She clasped his
hand again, a bit more energetically than before. He made a mental
note to punish her for her impertinence. But later. For now, he
wanted to enjoy the drive.




Pet felt the
urge, once, to ask where they were going, but she resisted.




“I
want you to know,” he said finally, “that you do this of your own
freewill.”




“Freewill?”
she exclaimed. “You pointed a gun at me!”




“Did
I?” he asked, and he looked genuinely confused. “Even if I did,
freewill.”




“What?”
An angry non-question.




“It
was your choice to get in or not.”




Pet knew better
than to argue with a maniac, even if he was kind of cute. Boys her
own age never did it for her. They were socially awkward, inept,
cliquish, insincere, and a laundry list of other negative character
traits. But when a forty or fifty year old man wants to get to know
you…




Sufficed to say,
she could have the pants charmed off of her by the right gentleman. A
gentleman who knows what he wants. And what she needs. Pet couldn’t
believe she was having these thoughts in her situation. And yet there
it was, she was scared and excited.




He drove them to a generic neighborhood, notable for its
featurelessness. He stopped in front of a large two-story brick home
and opened the garage. When he had pulled fully inside, he closed it
again, neat as you please. He opened the door to get out and she
released her seat belt, preparing to do the same. He motioned for her
to stay out, and proceeded to exit, closing the door behind him.




“Fool,”
she thought. He left the pistol between the seats. She could feel his
eyes burning away at her. For some reason, not a lack of
self-preservation, she didn’t grab the gun. She had a feeling about
this guy. Maybe she was crazy, too, she thought.




He rounded the
corner and opened the door for her. He didn’t pull her out or even
touch her, just extended his hand to her, and she accepted it and let
him help her out.




Freewill, she
mused.




But he didn’t
release her hand either. His grip was firm but gentle. She liked
that.




The door from the
garage to the house opened into an alcove that she suspected led to
the kitchen. Interesting, she thought. I hope he doesn’t just eat
me. Instead, he led her out of the side door and up to the front
entrance.




Again, Pet
scoffed. Now people may have seen her here. And a lack of clean room
measures meant she was already covered in his DNA should she escape.
Or chose to escape, she thought vaguely.




The foyer was
clean, yet as indistinct as the suburb it resided in.




He left the light
on, and reached into the next room to turn on the next set of lights.
Like he was scared of the dark or something. But the light brought
astonishment to her eyes. The living room was bare, save for shelves
lining the walls.




On them sat every
BDSM and bondage device you could imagine. She’d visited a few
adult toy stores, and she knew leather anything was pricey. Pet was
staring at a small fortune, by her meager standards. On the floors
were a few larger objects. Devices, really. She recognized the
Sybian, a sort of vibrating saddle for women, but this one had been
modified to sport an eight inch dildo of enormous girth.




The other was
even more outlandish. It was sort of a single-wheeled bicycle. You
sat in a chair and pedaled. The pedal indirectly drove a piston. The
piston moved an arm. And the arm sported another large dildo. She
noted the chrome and the little details, like the channels on the
wheel that let you adjust the depth of penetration. She decided it
cost as much as the rest of the room put together.




He led her past
the kitchen, which didn’t seem nearly as frightening as she’d
imagined it. Not really ‘Better Homes and Gardens’, but neither
‘Texas Chainsaw Massacre.’ He turned on the hall light. The first
door on the left was a bathroom. He didn’t turn that light on, but
he paused with her in front of the door so she could see it was
there. For what reason, she wasn’t sure. Whether threat or promise,
she took it in stride. When you decided you were as good as dead, you
could be rather happy-go-lucky about things.




She kept
gravitating to that one thought, that she was going to die. But at
the same time, she had the strangest feeling that everything was
going to be all right. Which really didn’t jibe with her, as she
didn’t feel being dead would be all right. Not at all.




There were four
more doors, two on each side of the hall. He led her to the first, on
the right. It was a fully furnished girl’s room, replete with
queen-sized canopy bed. Pet squealed in delight and ran in. Within
seconds, she was jumping on the bed, her head stretching the fabric
of the canopy.




He only stood and
watched from a little more than arm’s length away. Eventually she
tired of this and sat down on the bed, laughing and breathing deeply.
He smiled at her, and she smiled back. She was beautiful. And when
smiling, doubly so. When she was breathing normally again he extended
his hand to her.




“Come
on,” he said.




“But…”




He only held her
hand and pulled her along. The next room was a genuine dungeon, in
that it resembled the basement of a castle.




It had rock-hewn
walls, with ancient looking shackles attached to great chains. There
was an x-shaped, wooden table with red leather padding. There was
also an iron maiden, and a fireplace. In a holder to the side stood
several pokers and brands.




“Brutal,”
she said. “Medieval.”




He accepted her
faint praise with graciousness. And it was here that he embraced her.
He pulled her close, still holding one hand, and held her face as he
kissed her hard for what seemed like minutes. It was a lot more
intense than she was used to. Then he stopped and stared into her
eyes with the same intensity with which he kissed her.




Finally, she
dropped her eyes to the floor, subverting her will to his own, and he
led her by the wrist to the third room. This time, there was no light
switch. All the same, the room was designed to inspire awe.




It was an entire
Satanic chapel. At the rear center of the room there was an elevated
platform that held an altar, a massive slab of smoothly cut stone It
was easily large enough to display, for instance, the naked body of
an adult female. Above it hung a red, leather inverted cross in the
same style as the ‘X’ in the dungeon. The platform itself was
lined with racks of tall candles.




On the floor in
the center of the room was a perfect pentagram, a shorter candle
burning at each of the five points. To the left of the room was a
symbol she recognized from the cover of the Necronomicon. On the
right was an Egyptian ankh in embossed gold metal. As elaborate as
the tableau was, Pet was only mildly impressed.




“Not
bad,” she said. You got a few things wrong.”




“What
do you mean?”





“Well,
your first mistake is talking to me and humanizing me. True serial
killers are unable to perform any real bonding. I’m something of an
expert,” she said somewhat smugly. “That,”
she gestured, “appears on the cover of the Necronomicon, a known
work of fiction.”




“Really?”




“Sure.
The tip-off is the mention of Abdul Azrahad, the mad Arab. H.P.
Lovecraft. I’m unaware of that particular symbol appearing
elsewhere. Too hard to research. So, okay. As ooky symbols go, it’s
cool. Because it’s like you’re invoking Cthulu and the elder
gods. The great old ones. Which is fucking crazy, like Discordians
hailing Eris.”




“Who?”
he asked.




“Eris,
a particularly mischievous Greek goddess. She believed in creative
destruction. She made a golden apple engraved with the word
‘kaliste’, “to the prettiest one”. She then tossed it into a
room where the other goddesses were attending a party, provoking them
into a fight between themselves. My point is, it's foolish to hail
Eris, just as it would be to herald the return of Cthulu. Because
sometimes they listen...”




He absorbed her
lecture in silence.




“The
cross is tacky, but it works in a sexual context, this not being an
actual Satanic chapel, but a funhouse parody of one. The Baphomet is
cool, but it’s a very overused cliché. Especially when you
consider that the Church of Satan is about as scary as Ayn Rand on
Halloween. And this ankh! This just destroys everything. Why?”




“It’s…uh,
pagan?”




“It’s
a symbol of male/female union. If you had intended to make that
implication, that would have been a better answer.”




“And
now I know.”




Pet
rummaged through her purse and pulled out a cassette. “Can
you play this?” she asked him.




He looked deep
into her eyes and then shook his head. But when she handed him the
tape, he accepted it, with the reserve one would greet a dead mouse
fetched by a favorite cat. His free right hand went to his pocket,
where he produced a garage door opener-sized beeper and read the
number on its cracked LCD.




“I’ll
be back,” he said.




Pet made note of
the fact that there was a phone somewhere in the house.




She brought the
ball-gag and other items he left with her to the altar and sat down
on it. She could definitely see a need for a pillow, perhaps a long,
round one of red satin. The stone slab’s surface was polished to
mirror-like degree, and was icy cold to the touch.




Again, she went
into her over-sized purse, this time producing a peculiar brass pipe
and lighter. She’d taken a good three hits when he walked back into
the room with a cassette boom-box.




“What
are you doing?” he asked with some annoyance.




“Relaxing,”
she said “Want
some?”




“It’s
illegal!”




“Kidnapping,
rape and murder, now that’s illegal,” she said with a rather
bored air about her as she took a huge final pull from her Protopipe,
and put it back into her epic purse.




“You
assume facts not in evidence.”




“Such
as?”




“Such
as kidnapping. I think we had our talk about freewill already.”




“And
the rape and murder?”




“Rape
and murder?”




He put the red
ball-gag in her mouth and secured the buckle. He then directed her to
lie down on her back on the slab. She became wracked with a series of
involuntary shivers. He was momentarily distracted by his beeper
again, but his attention soon returned to Pet when he heard her
speak.




“Is
this thing supposed to keep me from talking?” she asked him.




“Put
on that tape. It’s perfect for this room. It’s really
atmospheric, like a Halloween sound effects record. The singer, King
Diamond, sings like a girl and says he love Satan, but I know these
are love songs about a girl. Plus they are really jazzy and cool, as
a band. It’s beautiful, if metal can be beautiful.”




He looked at her
but said nothing.




“Why
not?” she asked him.




“Those
bands are bad.”




“Oh,
please. The guy is a caveman. He’s an atheist, at best. And you’re
one to talk about evil.”




“Am
I evil?” he asked




“I
guess not,” she admitted. “Tighten
the buckle until it pulls my lips and cheeks in a little, so I can’t
talk.”




She raised her
head and he did so, and then he started her tape. Organ music and
laughter filled the room, culminating in loud, fast metal that was
indeed jazzy, but coupled with high-pitched wailing and
blood-curdling growls. He was by various turns frightened and
disgusted.




And turned on.




Pet looked at him
with rheumy eyes, already half in a trance. He began to run his hands
slowly up her legs from her ankles and she dropped her head back
down. He touched her nearly everywhere, to the point of being able to
smell her excitement. She was wet to an embarrassing degree.




With one hand he
held her face and neck while the other touched everywhere except her
breasts and between her legs. Pet began to moan through her ball-gag.




And then she felt
his beeper vibrate.




He released her,
a trifle hastily, she noted, and then climbed down from the altar and
left without so much as a single word. She found that she was not
having fun anymore. Being tied up and alone was not enjoyable at all.
And now that her excitement had been somewhat quenched by the
intrusion and subtle disrespect, correctly perceived or not, Pet
discovered she had to pee.




She tried to wait
for his return, but soon realized she wouldn’t really be able to
communicate with him anyway. So she cupped her hands and pulled them
through the loosely buckled leather cuffs.

Pet was humming
and smiling, pleased with herself for having so cleverly escaped.
When he had tightened the restraints she had managed to put her
wrists in an awkward position that afforded her some wiggle room.




She walked
unclothed to the door and looked both ways in the hallway like a
child tentatively crossing the street. Pet was haunted by the belief
that she had done something wrong in her relatively juvenile life,
but she was unsure what it could be. Seeing and hearing no one, she
fairly tip-toed her way down the hall to the bathroom, where she
naturally turned on the light and shut the door.




Shortly
thereafter, the man returned to find Pet missing, having in essence
left him at the altar. He panicked and ran from the room, grabbing a
knife as he exited.




When he saw the
light on under the bathroom door, he felt foolish. And then angry
about feeling foolish. He stood to the left of the door and when Pet
began to walk down the hall, grabbed her from behind.




She saw the knife
before she felt it, the same one that had unnerved her when she saw
it the first time in the grotto. By then it was too late to scream,
his hand now covering her mouth so tightly it hurt. He simply
returned her to the altar and tied her up again, never saying a word.




The hand with the
knife hovered between her spread thighs.




Well,
this is it, Pet thought, I’m
going to die.




He rotated his
elbow, raring back to drive the blade home, and said in a whisper, “I
am your punishment.”




Even in the last
seconds of her life, she was incredibly turned on. As the knife blade
flew toward her crotch, she found herself thinking, “And I am
yours.”




As the last
possible instant, he spun the knife around in a deft maneuver that
was clearly a practiced one. Instead of puncturing her with the
blade, the over-sized handle slammed home, leaving Pet writhing in
orgasm with the blade protruding.




For a few moments
it quivered and vibrated like a tuning fork as she squirmed and
rolled from side to side within the confines of her bonds. When she
finally looked up, he was gone. Pet hoped he would be back, and soon.
He had tied her much tighter the second time and she wasn’t sure
she could escape again.




After a while,
she began to suspect she had been abandoned. She focused her efforts
on a series of contractions intended to push the knife handle out. It
was over-sized and wooden, which made it slow going despite her
outstanding muscular control. Two minutes later, it dropped to the
altar with a clatter just as he re-entered the room.




Wordlessly, he
removed her gag and began to untie her. She sat up, rubbing her
wrists as he released her ankles. Neither mentioned the knife. Pet
swung her legs around and sat at the edge of the altar, naked and
unashamed.




“That
was fun,” she cooed. “For a little while, I thought you were
gonna kill me.”




The face that was
looking at her turned away. His hand went to his pocket, and she knew
his pager was going off again.




“I
have to go,” he said. “My wife…”




“Your
wife?” she shrieked, leaping down and advancing on him, causing him
to retreat from the finger jabbing at his chest. “I
knew you were no serial killer! You don’t fit the profile.”




Pet didn’t
wonder why she felt disappointed.




“Asshole,”
she hissed.




“Now
what?” he asked.




“Now
what?” she mocked. “You’re
asking me what to do?”




He looked into
her violet eyes pleadingly.




“You
leave. I stay. And in return, you give me…everything I want.” She
looked at him, awaiting his response to her challenge.




“Or?”
he asked.




“Or
you kill me. Or you go to prison for life. Or I kill you. There are
lots of ways to go with this, I think. It’s all the same to me,”
she sniffed.




Checkmated, his
eyes searched the floor.




“Can
I go?” he asked without looking up.




“One
more thing,” she said, causing him to look up at her.




“What?”




“Kiss
me…”




Chapter Two:

http://jasonzchristie.blogspot.com/2012/09/chapter-two-of-terminally-pretty.html

What Writers Can Learn From "From a Buick 8"

Spoiler alert: Don't read this if you are planning to read "From a Buick 8" for the first time.





I love Stephen King. He is undoubtedly my favorite writer of all time, and that puts him ahead of even Asimov, Heinlein, Rand, and Tom Robbins, all of whom were big influences on me. Even then, there are probably a few novels of his that I haven't read yet. He's just so prolific.



In fact, King has probably prevented me from reading other authors. I have a bad habit of falling back on books I've already read, from time to time, instead of reading something new. I have Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson in hardback, still untouched. For some reason, I picked up "From a Buick 8", which I'm now reading for the third time.



But unlike many other stories, I'm reading this one because it confuses and befuddles me. It is definitely my least favorite King novel. Why? There doesn't seem to be any resolution to the story. While "Duma Key" seemed to be a rehash of "Rose Madder", and "Lisey's Story" was apparently so forgettable that I can't recall a single detail from it, "From a Buick 8" stands out as the most disappointing work of his that I have read.



I've heard it referred to by some as a "Post 9/11" novel. Some things just don't make sense. You can even find support for this in the text itself.



But I don't want post-modernist writing, I want a story with a resolution. Even the connections to The Gunslinger series are vague and tenuous, at best. To put it another way, there's no "there" there.



And yet...



The story is solid. The writing itself is, of course, impeccable.



I've taken the unpopular stance of late that writing should be about ideas, or that stories should be told in a fresh and exciting manner. If you can do both at the same time, better yet.



"Buick" is interesting throughout. The story is well-told. I, like many others, was just unhappy with the resolution. There are lots of true-isms, good character development, all the little things you expect from a good writer. I would be thrilled to achieve this level of mastery. But the book leaves you wanting more, and not necessarily in a good way. Sadly, a resolution will never be forthcoming.



Perhaps it's intentional. It's an oft-discussed novel for that reason. Looking for meaning in the bigger picture that the story presents, however, leaves me just as clueless as when I started reading it.



There's still a lot for writers to take away from reading it. As I've said, it's well written, with lots of smaller points to be made. As a study of the craft of writing, it's as valid as any of King's novels. To me, it fails at the end by offering no real explanation for anything that's transpired.



I guess it can be considered a success in that I'm now reading it for the third time. How many novels can you say that about? Combine the strengths of King's storytelling with a satisfying ending, and you'd have the makings of a great book. You can find writing lessons in unlikely places, I guess.

Rethinking Your Marketing Strategies

The self-publishing world changes so fast, even the self-publishing world can't keep up. Does that make any sense? The things that worked a year ago no longer apply, in many cases. Sometimes what worked last month doesn't seem to work today.



Facebook and Twitter are not dead ends for promotion. but they need to be handled correctly. Yes, Hootsuite is awesome for automating posts. I don't recommend you use it that way, unless each post is hand-crafted and compelling. Simply shoveling links onto it is not going to get people interested in your books.



Instead, you should try to engage readers on a one-to-one basis. In other words, be an interesting person, apart from your writing. Reading, like writing, is an intensely personal endeavor. If you make promotion impersonal, you run the risk of actually driving readers away.



If you have a mailing list, you should only use it to announce new books to readers. They don't need to hear about every free run you do. Trust me, they already know about your back catalog, at that point.



Kindle Select doesn't seem to be working very well, anymore. It may seem thrilling to give away five thousand copies of a novel. but the sad truth is, most of them won't even be read. Worse yet, some of them will be read by people who really aren't interested in your work, or the genre itself. This can only lead to bad things, like negative or lackluster reviews.



My books started out with a lot of promise a year ago, and have gone steadily downhill ever since. Looking back, I can see why things began so well. I got review copies into the hands of a number of interested bloggers and book reviewers. When you dump tons of copies onto the market, it becomes very hit and miss.



Things have shifted to the point that many successful indie writers are moving to paid advertising, and are no longer interested in giving books away. This makes a lot of sense, as oftentimes, something that's free doesn't have much value. A person who pays for your ebook, even at $.99, is much more likely to actually read your work, not to mention review it. I daresay someone that pays $2.99 for your ebook is almost definitely going to read it.



And that's what you want, readers. Free downloads may lend you some visibility, initially, but it's a bit of a false economy. Ten ebooks placed in the hands of people who will actually enjoy them and review them favorably are worth much more than ten thousand delivered in a scatter-shot manner. You'll find that eventually your reviews will reflect this.



In fact, if you're really serious, you'll put paper copies in the hands of reviewers. This opens you up to many more avenues of promotion, as there are a lot of book reviewers that only review paperbacks.



Do your research. I see a lot of new authors who are emulating what worked for others in the past. But things are changing rapidly. Instead of following last year's advice, take a look at what successful indie authors are doing today. In most cases, you'll find that they're ahead of the curve for a reason. They're leading, not following.

Avoid the Revision Nightmare

Hopefully, you've done everything right as far as self-publishing goes. You wrote your first novel, edited it extensively, and then rolled it out for readers and reviewers before you began work on your second.



But what if you didn't? I released eight or so novels in the same one-year span. The initial covers were terrible, and I definitely needed to do more editing. I then went on to produce audiobook and paperback editions, compounding the problem.



What I ended up with was a frustrating collection of documents. If you're foolish enough to operate this way, making a single change, like squashing a lone typo, can be difficult. But getting your work organized can help to minimize the problems involved. I don't have to point out what uploading the wrong version, possibly an older, less edited one, can do to your readership.



The first thing I recommend you do is sign up for an online storage service like Google Drive or Dropbox. Storing your work outside of your computer is the first step toward avoiding disaster. Another advantage is having only your most recent edits on hand to avoid confusion.



Then you should build a hierarchy of folders, something like this:



Book Title

     >Smashwords

     >Amazon

     >Createspace

     >Calibre

     >Cover



Once you do this, you can propagate changes throughout the documents safely and easily. No, it's not ideal, but in most cases, it's still a lot easier to edit multiple versions than it is to create new editions from scratch.



Had I to do it all over again, I probably would spend the first year on a single novel. Since I didn't, I have found that this is the easiest way to take control of the situation. Hopefully you'll learn from my mistakes. Even if you only have one novel, be ready to do revision control on it, and organize things from the start. Your writing career will be much more pleasurable if you prepare for multiple versions at the beginning of the publishing cycle.

Radar Love - Free Today and Tomorrow

You can get my romance novel Radar Love for free on Amazon today and tomorrow, May 1st and 2nd.



http://www.amazon.com/Radar-Love-Ultimate-Hustle-ebook/dp/B006LRKASI/