S.M. Johnson's Blog, page 2

For me, vampire writing begins and ends with Anne Rice

Dear Anne,

You frighten me. Time and time again I read your descriptions of works-in-progress and the next release, and I think to myself, "Good gawd, what the heck is she doing and how is she going to pull this off?"

Yeah. Like The Vampire Lestat and the lost city of Atlantis. The actual title is "Prince Lestat and the Realms of Atlantis."

Love me, with a fangirly squee.



I mean, ridiculous, right?

In a normal life (my old life?) I would have been rushing to a store somewhere on the oh, so holy Release Date and I would have the whole book read in 24 hours.

People (i.e. family members) would know better than to look at me sideways, ask for dinner, or laundry or ANYTHING until I had been allowed to devour this book.

In my new life... I noticed the book while buying weird stuff (like a sewing machine I don't have a single clue how to use) at Walmart (hate and detest Walmart, but there we were, because we needed fabric, thread, a sewing machine, bedding, liquid starch, and light bulbs) - and I SEE IT. The new Anne Rice book. My life is so insane that I TOTALLY FORGOT the oh, so holy Release Date.

The truth? No one does vampires better (for me) than Anne Rice.

Of course Anne Rice and Prince Lestat, together, can investigate Atlantis. And not make it even a little bit ridiculous.

This:

"Think of our horror to discover the mythic story of a God who sent Himself in human form to the planet to die a horrific death through crucifixion to appease Himself with His own Incarnate suffering!"

And....

"...idea that God Himself works through pain and suffering to "redeem" His creatures from His own wrath."

(sigh).

I love her.

Oh, I have been disappointed at times - after all, there's no rule that says we must adore every word our favorite author writes. But these "new" sorts of Vampire Chronicles, the ones that pull together the vampires into a supportive Court - these in which we are given to understand many points of view... especially as we are presumed to have memory of their histories and their backgrounds....

Yes, please.

More, please.

And most graciously, thank you.

SM Johnson ~ Dungeon 5 Update

Let's see... I'm working on the cover art while rounding out the story. There's still editing, cleaning up, betas, and the final pass.

Honestly, while I wanted a Halloween release to free me up for NaNoWriMo in November, I just don't see that happening.

I'm struggling with a new daily life schedule.

It's not a difficult or trying struggle, it's more like... having to rework TIME.

As much as I wish it weren't so, there are still only 24 hours in a day, and I still can't write fast and like what I write.

I shall finish this book, in my own time.

SM Johnson ~ book reviews ~ Come Back to Me by Edmond Manning

Come Back To Me.

Is this a King book, a story of the Lost and Founds? It doesn't look like a King book, and it doesn't start like a King book, but I adore Vin Vanbly, and so I am going to trust him and follow where he leads.

I know that Vin is flawed. I know he has a dark and difficult past, a past that he insists has no bearing on the man he is today. Vin is always a bit sketchy about his past. Oh, we get clues here and there as we read about the Lost and Founds - we get a lot of clues along the way, but overall, we know Vin as a quirky but confident man, a man who brings out the best in other men, who reminds men of the kings they were meant to be.

Yes, Vin, I trust you.

Let's just take a second to recap thoughts when I first met Vin - here is my brief review of King Perry:

This book. O happy sigh. It is sweet. It is gentle. It is kindness and taking a risk and a leap of faith, and learning about trust and truth and happiness. Vin Vanbly asks Perry, a virtual stranger, to spend a weekend with him, and the condition is that Perry has to do everything Vin tells him to do. I know, sounds porny, right? But noooo, it's not at all. During the course of the weekend Vin tells Perry about some of the lost and found kings, and asks Perry to trust him over and over and over. This book is funny, and sad, and poignant, and just... a beautiful journey.

Buy it. Read it. You won't be sorry.

I'm going to suggest that I would say nearly the same words, in mostly the same order, for all of the Lost and Founds books, for all of the Kings, and that includes the latest released book, Come Back To Me.

If you're invested in Vin Vanbly, read this book.

It's darker than you want. Parts of it caused me grievous pain and heartache. Not that I could put it down.

I loved getting to know Kevin and Mark. I loved seeing Vin on his home turf, learning more about his work in the garage.

I had several surreal moments with this "home turf" stuff - I visited the Witches Tower in Prospect Park just one week before Come Back To Me was released. I'd never heard of the tower or the park before that day, and so it was with surprised delight that I was able to almost literally be there physically as I read the book. I knew the trees, the trail, the bench, exactly as described.

Read them. Read them all. Buy them in paperback so you can line them up all pretty-like on your bookshelf, and read them again when you're feeling lost. Edmond Manning will help you find yourself. Or at the very least, let you know you can be found.

Peace out, Darklings. Be safe and read good books.

SM Johnson ~ Everything Changes ~ sometimes all at once!

Sometimes you don't realized you've been imprisoned.

One year ago I was fired with very little warning from a job I'd held for 11 years. As in... I'd never had any issues, never been in any trouble, never been verbally warned or written up for anything, ever, in over a decade. I was a union employee. The company has progressive discipline policies, but those policies didn't apply to me.

Why didn't those policies apply to me?
Because I'm an erotica author. Because I write about gay sex and BDSM.
Because a person in my care had questions about BDSM that I was comfortable enough (and stupid enough) to answer. They were safety questions. Not personal, not procedural, not titillating... but the fact that I acknowledged at work that BDSM relationships actually do exist in real life apparently crossed a line.
In the resulting fray, someone told management I write books on the subject, which allowed a conservative Christian manager to hold me up as an example of a predator with bad boundaries - and suddenly I was unfit to do my job. They looked at me as if clearly me and the person who'd asked the question were the only perverts in the whole state (perhaps the whole country), and CLEARLY I was planning a hook-up, because OMFG, I FOUND ANOTHER PERVERT!
Yeah.
For the record, I've been married for 24 years, and we're mostly monogamous. 
Not that it should make a difference, but I'm just pointing out that it shouldn't make a difference.
Every once in awhile I run into blogs/comments/discussions on whether erotica authors should "come out" at work or to their extended families, or what have you.
Well. I was out at work. I didn't share my pen name with just anybody, but a few co-workers that I felt closer to than just being work friends. I thought we were real friends.
*insert maniacal laughter here*
Yeah, that's funny. In the year since I was fired, I've heard from, mmm, maybe 4 people. 
I disappeared after 11 years, and only FOUR PEOPLE wondered enough about what happened to contact me directly. I devastated. I was in shock and utterly humiliated. I couldn't eat or sleep for several weeks. 
I missed my friends. I adored many, many of my co-workers. We depended upon each other in one crisis situation after another. I freely and happily gave away as much vacation time as allowed when they were in need.
I had no clue that almost all of them were transient friends.
This was the biggest heart-break of the whole mess.
So.
Should you come out as an erotica author at your (vanilla) day job?
I'm going to say HELL NO. Don't do it.
Your friends and family aren't going to buy enough of your books to contribute to you making a living at this. Oh, they'll say they will, but they don't mean it. Especially if they don't have a pre-existing interest in what you write about.
These days I decline to share my pen name. And what I say is this: The people who are interested in the subject I write about will find and enjoy my books. I write for a niche market, a very specified audience, and people who don't read that genre will not enjoy what I write. 
And that's all.
I do talk about being a writer. I talk about how I cannot be mentally healthy unless I engage in my art. I talk about finding or creating the free time to pursue "play" - the hobbies and passions that give life joy and meaning.
But I have learned that the collision of two worlds can change your life before you were ready for those changes.
But what's really interesting is... despite my shock and all my fury about the injustice of the event itself, it was time for me to move on. The environment in which I was working had become toxic to me. I was starting to believe that the system which claimed to help people, often harmed more than it helped. The system would much rather "manage" than "cure". I was becoming cynical and angry, and my health was suffering. I also felt helpless to change anything, and hopeless that things would change.
I agonized about whether to write full-time or finish my Master's degree. 
I'm the shittiest marketing and promotion person in the universe, I think, and have never made enough money writing to make any significant contribution to my household. And so I finished school.
And now, exactly one year out from this horrible event...
I stand with my head held high, a professional license, and a deep passion for the journey I am about to begin.
I'm still going to write. Probably not any faster than I ever have, but definitely more than I've been able to manage while in school. Oh, yeah, and there's the part where I wrote a quick outline Monday night day and then bled out over 8,000 words on Wednesday. That's amazing for me. I liked it. I think outlining might be my new plan of attack.
Life is very, very different than it was one year ago.
But it's so, so much better!
Have a fun and safe weekend, my Darklings, and make an effort to play out your passions, whatever they may be.
~SM

SM Johnson ~ New Release!~ DeVante's Coven (Revamped)

Good morning, good morning, good morning, my Darklings!

What a wonderful day!

DeVante's Coven is available for purchase at Smashwords, and soon to available at Amazon (maybe even later today).

It's been fun smoothing out the edges of my beloved second book ever written, but I'm super anxious to get back to working on The New Dungeon books.

As always, those to read or follow my blog have the opportunity to snatch this one for free until September 14, 2016. Follow the link to Smashwords and at checkout enter coupon code SD63Z.

I will be adding more buy links as DeVante's Coven (Revamped) goes live at more retail outlets.



Smashwords

DeVAnte's Coven (Revamped) ~ Release date September 1, 2016

SM Johnson ~ Strip Tour, an excerpt from DeVante's Coven

Well. This book will be released very soon, so I thought it might be fun to tease you a little bit. This excerpt is somewhat explicit... enjoy.



Excerpt from DeVante's Coven by SM Johnson


He stared at the bed and remembered the image he’d stolen from Reed’s mind. It turned him on, never mind he was already practically naked from the little game of strip-tour.

While Daniel took it all in, Reed stripped off his own clothes, came up behind him, and pressed his warm body full-length against Daniel’s back, arms draped over his shoulders, hands caressing his chest. Reed’s cock stirred against Daniel’s backside and Daniel leaned against him, fingering the smooth skin of Reed’s thighs, feeling his own cock ache.

Reed spoke. “You don’t talk much.”

Daniel smiled at him, suddenly embarrassed that he was so weird about studying a place before he could be comfortable. “Just taking it all in,” he said, and even to his own ears it sounded lame.

“The second bathroom is through there,” Reed gestured to the left. “And that’s the full tour, so now you can lose the shorts.”

With that he toyed with the waistband of Daniel’s underwear and then tugged them down. He urged Daniel to the bed and Daniel went, Reed’s body pressing against him until he lay flat on his stomach and Reed was heavy on top of him. And warm. The heat that humans generated was amazing. Hot skin, hot mouths, hot blood.

The heat between himself and Reed was extraordinary, very different from his sexual experiences with Roderick.

Sensation exploded into Daniel as Reed’s hot mouth explored the back of his neck, the side of his throat, and finally his ear. Daniel shuddered.

Reed slid off him and said, “Roll over.”

Daniel did, and Reed kissed him on the mouth. It was a slow, sensual kiss. Reed’s hands explored his body as his lips and tongue explored Daniel’s mouth. Fingers brushed through Daniel’s hair and caressed his neck, moving down to close tightly around Daniel’s cock. Reed’s heat flowed into him, and Daniel gave himself up to hands and mouth, content to ride the moment helpless, to feel what this man would have him feel. And still the kiss went on and on. Daniel moaned into it.

Reed broke the kiss at last and sat up, just looking at him for a few moments, then said, “You are adorable.”

Daniel grinned at him.

“But how old are you?”

Daniel instantly shut off the grin. “I told you, twenty-one.” But he was unnerved by Reed, by his own utter willingness to obey the man and he didn’t think he sounded convincing. He ducked his head, felt himself blush, and looked at Reed through lowered lashes. “Don’t look at me like I’m some dumb teenager.”

Reed’s mouth turned up in a sly smile. “You are a dumb teenager. Hitchhiking.”

“I’m twenty-one,” Daniel insisted, fighting the urge to cross his fingers.

“Right.” Reed brushed the back of his hand along Daniel’s jaw, just below the scars. “And I don’t believe it for a minute. You might,” he paused to peer at Daniel’s face, “might be nineteen. But I doubt it.”

Daniel shrugged. Reed could believe what he wanted to. Daniel wasn’t going to explain how he was eighteen in people years, plus two in vampire years.

He leaned up, pressed his face against Reed’s throat, and nipped at him. “Hey!” Reed exclaimed. “Don’t bite.”

Daniel let his smile shine. “Then be nice.”

Reed grinned back at him. “You don’t look like a boy with a vampire fetish.”

Daniel almost laughed out loud. Ahhh, if you only knew what you’d see if I let you. He said, “I don’t look like a lot of things. What do I look like?”

“A bright, fresh-faced all-American kid looking to tarnish his innocence. And that I can help you with.”

“Oh really?”

“Yes.” Reed leaned into Daniel, touching his cheek, then his chest, then the sides of his body, his movements so subtle that his weight was comforting, not uncomfortable, when he covered Daniel’s body with his own. “So,” he said, his breath soft across Daniel’s face. “Have you ever done this before?”

“Let myself be picked up by a complete stranger? I can’t say that I have.”

“I meant have sex with a man.”

“Oh. Well, I had a relationship with my guardian’s... um... son. But our thing kind of fizzled. He’s a lot older than me, and always had to be in control.”

Understatement. And he knew he was giving the impression with his offhand tone that it wasn’t a big deal, or maybe even that the sex wasn’t that great, although the tender moments with Roderick had been amazing. There just weren’t enough of them. Roderick always preferred blood over sex, so when they did get close in that way, it was because one manipulated the other, by bargain or agreement, so there was a level of obligation involved. It was never as spontaneous as this.

Reed must have read more into that than Daniel intended, because he touched Daniel’s left cheek, tracing the faint scars there. “Did he do this?”

Daniel shook his head, raised his own hand to push Reed’s away. When they were new, the claw marks on his face had been raised and bright red, but with the help from DeVante’s blood they had settled and faded to fine white lines. This amazing vampire body.

“Nah, that’s from an accident that happened a long time ago.” If he thought more about the bitch than that, he’d lose his erection.

Reed trailed a finger down Daniel’s chest, stopping to toy with his nipple. “I’m a lot older than you, too.” He pinched Daniel’s nipple, hard.

Daniel’s heart jumped. And his cock.

Reed’s words were clear and deliberate. “And make no mistake, lad, I am in control.”

“I know,” Daniel whispered, staring up at him. “I’m okay with that.”

Reed lifted his body and coaxed Daniel with his hands to lie on his stomach. Kneaded his shoulders, kissed his neck; trailing a line of kisses and gentle bites all the way down his spine until his mouth, his tongue, dipped right into... Daniel blushed to even think of it. Roderick had done the same thing to him once, a long time ago, and it had been just as embarrassing. He couldn’t imagine doing that to anyone, ever. And he felt a thrill of fear that he might be asked to return the favor. Reed’s tongue stabbing into him sent tremors through Daniel’s whole body, making his muscles tight and loose at the same time. Making him cry out Reed’s name, not even sure what he was begging for.

SM Johnson ~ project update ~ The New Dungeon

Good morning, my Darklings! I have been well, and I hope ya'll have been having a wonderful summer.

A quick update on the writing front...

DeVante's Coven (Revamped) has been to beta readers and I'm in the process of working through edits. I'm still on target to publish this one before the end of the month, and super pleased with the rewrite.

An interesting development on this series - I've more or less figured out where the next book starts, and it is not at all what I'd planned for Book 3, so that's weirdly exciting.

Writing is such an interesting process. Way back in, oh, 1991, when I started writing my first book ever, DeVante's Children, my plan for the vampire Roderick was that he would be nothing more than a catalyst between DeVante and Daniel. And then he was supposed to politely exit stage left and stop mucking up my stories.

Well. It seems as if Roderick will NEVER stop mucking up my stories, and while he was never supposed to even BE a main character, he has somehow become THE main character. And all this happened against my will.

Sometimes I feel as if the story isn't even mine - like I'm nothing more than a conduit. Heh.

Roderick is playful and wicked, but not too wicked... and he emulates the Vampire Lestat, although he isn't nearly old enough to compete on Lestat's level.




Okay, so there's the vampire update.

Now, what you're all waiting for (grin) and update on the next DUNGEON book.

Yep, I know it.

It goes like this.... a new idea! (ding-ding-ding-lightbulb).

Book FIVE is titled Aftermath. Well, technically it's titled The New Dungeon: Aftermath.

Ya'll probably know that Roman sold the club called Above the Dungeon to help pay Jeff's medical bills, right? Yeah. So the club has a new owner, and it's now simply called The Dungeon. Dare's cousin, Maddox-call-me-Doc, is the current manager. Doc comes up with a fun little thing called Members Only night, because the new club is kind of tame compared to the old club, and Doc thinks if he creates a safe play space, people will come.

Of course they will!

Like Thomas, Dare, and Zach. And an old friend from book 1 makes a reappearance with all kinds of complicated crap (and a kitten). Weird, hmm?

Kinky fuckery happens. Life stuff happens. You know my books. Well, okay, nothing as bad as someone breaking their neck happens, so don't get too nervous. But yanno... sometimes life kicks your ass.

So that's Aftermath. And it's about 2/3 written - so I'm right on target for a fall release. "Fall" meaning before November 1st, because, well, NaNoWriMo starts on November 1st.

And during NaNo I intend to complete the first draft of DUNGEON book 6, which will be titled Nervous. (Technically... The New Dungeon: Nervous).

And THIS book will be somewhat different, in that there's only ONE romantic/sexy pairing.

Gods, I know! How will I write a whole book with just one (or possibly two) point of view characters? Such a challenge!

You will get to know the guys in Nervous (Avery and Julian) very, very well. And it will be hot. Trust.

When I'm done with book 5, I'll find some photos and post and excerpt and introduce ya'll to Avery and Julian, but that's getting a little ahead of myself.

Oh, but just so you know, Avery's a member of The Dungeon... so don't spazz, you'll get to see what some of the other boys are getting up to now and then (grin).

Ok, so there's the update. DeVante's Coven will be released this month. The New Dungeon: Aftermath will be released by November 1, 2016. A Dungeon book with new characters will be released Spring or Summer 2017.

Oh! And depending how well I manage my schedule, Reserved, the short story, will eventually become a full novel.

Whew! I'm really excited!

Take care, my Darklings. Let's stay in touch!

If you like my FB page, SM Johnson Writes, you can hear from me a bit more regularly.


~SM

~SM Johnson ~ Leelah Alcorn ~ #transstories

I recently posted to my FB page an essay written by the partner of a transgender man. It was a bit of an enlightening experience to see this journey from a seldom heard from point of view.

I would like to feature more transgender stories on this blog and on the SM Johnson Writes page on Facebook, so if you know anyone who might be interested in sharing a story, please direct them my way. I'd be willing to edit for anyone not confident of their writing skills, and protect a person's identity if they prefer.

I want to create more LGB and Trans safe spaces.

This line of thought reminds me that I want to post #Leelah Alcorn's tumblr note here periodically. Leelah was a human being driven to suicide by her family's refusal to accept her for who she is. No, more than that, they PUNISHED her and ISOLATED her using parental control tactics, as if she were a puppy that just needed to be trained up right.

Pretty sure I've said this before - we have the honor of raising children to become individual, autonomous people. We do not own them. There is no inherent rule that children should turn out just how the parents want them to be. To even think such a thing is utter bullshit.


Leelah’s Note:
If you are reading this, it means that I have committed suicide and obviously failed to delete this post from my queue.Please don’t be sad, it’s for the better. The life I would’ve lived isn’t worth living in… because I’m transgender. I could go into detail explaining why I feel that way, but this note is probably going to be lengthy enough as it is. To put it simply, I feel like a girl trapped in a boy’s body, and I’ve felt that way ever since I was 4. I never knew there was a word for that feeling, nor was it possible for a boy to become a girl, so I never told anyone and I just continued to do traditionally “boyish” things to try to fit in.
When I was 14, I learned what transgender meant and cried of happiness. After 10 years of confusion I finally understood who I was. I immediately told my mom, and she reacted extremely negatively, telling me that it was a phase, that I would never truly be a girl, that God doesn’t make mistakes, that I am wrong. If you are reading this, parents, please don’t tell this to your kids. Even if you are Christian or are against transgender people don’t ever say that to someone, especially your kid. That won’t do anything but make them hate them self. That’s exactly what it did to me.
My mom started taking me to a therapist, but would only take me to christian therapists, (who were all very biased) so I never actually got the therapy I needed to cure me of my depression. I only got more christians telling me that I was selfish and wrong and that I should look to God for help.
When I was 16 I realized that my parents would never come around, and that I would have to wait until I was 18 to start any sort of transitioning treatment, which absolutely broke my heart. The longer you wait, the harder it is to transition. I felt hopeless, that I was just going to look like a man in drag for the rest of my life. On my 16th birthday, when I didn’t receive consent from my parents to start transitioning, I cried myself to sleep.
I formed a sort of a “f*** you” attitude towards my parents and came out as gay at school, thinking that maybe if I eased into coming out as trans it would be less of a shock. Although the reaction from my friends was positive, my parents were pissed. They felt like I was attacking their image, and that I was an embarrassment to them. They wanted me to be their perfect little straight christian boy, and that’s obviously not what I wanted.
So they took me out of public school, took away my laptop and phone, and forbid me of getting on any sort of social media, completely isolating me from my friends. This was probably the part of my life when I was the most depressed, and I’m surprised I didn’t kill myself. I was completely alone for 5 months. No friends, no support, no love. Just my parent’s disappointment and the cruelty of loneliness.
At the end of the school year, my parents finally came around and gave me my phone and let me back on social media. I was excited, I finally had my friends back. They were extremely excited to see me and talk to me, but only at first. Eventually they realized they didn’t actually give a s**t about me, and I felt even lonelier than I did before. The only friends I thought I had only liked me because they saw me five times a week.
After a summer of having almost no friends plus the weight of having to think about college, save money for moving out, keep my grades up, go to church each week and feel like s**t because everyone there is against everything I live for, I have decided I’ve had enough. I’m never going to transition successfully, even when I move out. I’m never going to be happy with the way I look or sound. I’m never going to have enough friends to satisfy me. I’m never going to have enough love to satisfy me. I’m never going to find a man who loves me. I’m never going to be happy. Either I live the rest of my life as a lonely man who wishes he were a woman or I live my life as a lonelier woman who hates herself. There’s no winning. There’s no way out. I’m sad enough already, I don’t need my life to get any worse. People say “it gets better” but that isn’t true in my case. It gets worse. Each day I get worse.
That’s the gist of it, that’s why I feel like killing myself. Sorry if that’s not a good enough reason for you, it’s good enough for me. As for my will, I want 100% of the things that I legally own to be sold and the money (plus my money in the bank) to be given to trans civil rights movements and support groups, I don’t give a s**t which one. The only way I will rest in peace is if one day transgender people aren’t treated the way I was, they’re treated like humans, with valid feelings and human rights. Gender needs to be taught about in schools, the earlier the better. My death needs to mean something. My death needs to be counted in the number of transgender people who commit suicide this year. I want someone to look at that number and say “that’s f***ed up” and fix it. Fix society. Please.
Goodbye,

(Leelah) Josh Alcorn

SM Johnson ~ In the Service of Pleasure ~ recent reads

Yeah, pleasure.

Is this part of your every day life? Do you seek it, ask for it, look out for it, enjoy it?

EXPECTED pleasure reading is amazing.

I have the distinct honor and pleasure of being a first reader for one of my favorite authors.

Can you imagine that - being one of the first to enjoy a favorite author's new book? Before publication? Of being able to send an email filled with questions and delighted exclamations (very often there are more of the latter) to your favorite author? Sometimes it feels surreal.

That being said - I have absolutely NO influence on the direction of the story. Nor would I want to. I try to scour the text for typos and sometimes ask for clarification of things that might trip someone up who's new to the story world.

I clear the decks when the next book comes hits my inbox. It's like Christmas and my birthday all at the same time. I want NOTHING but to be left alone to enjoy the read.

I hope my beta readers feel the same about my work.

We, as writers, have a base level of insecurity about new books, I think, and nervously chew our fingernails waiting for a response from our beta readers. These are people we hope have read everything we've written, who know our "voice" and our "style". They're not content editors, it's not their place to tell us what our characters should do, but more... benevolent fans who trust our process, who like it when we surprise them with a new directions.

Speaking for myself - I really don't have a good sense of my own work. I'm never sure if I've managed to get what's in my head onto the page precisely as clear as I want it to be. Some scenes come quickly and easily, others I have to work harder to nail down, and sometimes I'm not even sure if I got the order of events to come together in the way that grows my character properly. Hell, most the time I can't even tell if I've put the thing together in any coherent manner at all.

And three people in a sex scene? Gah! Can the reader even tell who's doing what to whom? And is it hot, or just complicated?

All of that.

I want my beta reader to say, "Hey, Roman's swearing an awful lot in this book, and isn't that something he's consciously decided not to do?" Or "the way you've written that sex scene confuses me - I'm pulled out of my head trying to visualize how everyone is positioned."

I don't really want that reader to say, "Aw, you sent Jason out of town to grad school. But I really like Jason, can't you keep him?"

No, I probably can't.
I really can't manage to write the story you want to read. I can only write the story that I want to read. That's the only story that can hold my attention long enough to write a novel. In my fictional world, people don't always stay together. In my real world, three-way, polyamorous relationships fail, far more often than they succeed. Which doesn't make them any less interesting or intense or wonderful.

Which doesn't mean I don't pay attention to what people say about my books. I've come to recognize that most of my readers are much more invested in the M/M relationships in my books, and not much, or at all, invested in the F/F or M/M/F. Which is fine. Actually, it's better than fine - because I'm a lot more invested in the M/M relationships, too. So I quit dragging them through scenes wherein my only real motivation was to keep up with past POV characters. They don't like it, I find it an uninspiring pain in the ass - so how about let's just not?

The number one reason I write is to entertain myself. Because believe me, I sure don't do it for the money. But - I do make some attempt at continuity of story to give my readers a good experience.

The reason I beta read for a very select couple of authors?

Because I absolutely adore their work. I aspire to write to the level of their skill, which I admire. And I probably do. But overall - I do it because they let me, because they find my thoughts and questions helpful, because they trust me to honestly be able to grasp what they're doing with the story.

Oh, and because reading their work is my favorite thing anyway, so why not?

If an author blows you away with every book they write - especially an Indie author - and you're good at spotting typos and noting confusing bits - I recommend dropping a line and asking if they're seeking beta readers. We love and adore and depend on our Betas, and most of us don't have enough beta readers available to read on our often accelerated schedule, by the time we send to betas, we're often just waiting for that feedback before we hit the button to publish.

Tips and tricks for beta reading:

I read a word doc on my kindle and keep the "notes" feature of my phone open. I can turn that note into an email with a couple of taps to my phone screen, which makes keeping track of comments and typos a lot easier than when I was first tried to keep track of a piece of paper, and then later had to transcribe my hand-written notes.

Anyway. My only child wants to fill my 7 passenger vehicle with friends and head to the beach, so I'd better wrap this up. Yay - I get to spend the rest of the afternoon reading The Backup by Erica Kudish. Not as a beta, but as a paying consumer. And so far this book is SO fucking fabulous you can probably expect to see an actual review here, very soon.

Love to all of you, my Darklings. Oh, and hey - start reading the Quentin Black series by JC Andrijeski. Book one is called Black in White. Proceed from there and you'll eventually get to the book I just got to read, Black and Blue, which is a wild ride and a wonderfully fun read.

~SM