A. Regina Cantatis's Blog, page 14

Now lowering the pre-order price on "Knights in White Bondage"

I have it on good authority that $0.99 is a better price point than $1.99, so I've just made the switch on Amazon. It's my understanding that if you pre-ordered it at $1.99, you'll only be charged $0.99 when the book comes out and you are charged. But in the meantime, if you plan to pre-order but haven't gotten around to it yet, give Amazon a few hours to put the new lower price on the ebook's page.

Finally, remember that when the book goes live on November 28, it will sell for $2.99.

"Knights in White Bondage" now available at a pre-order discount

Below is the short version. Refer to the previous post for the longer version.

From now on I'll be publishing my ebooks exclusively through Kindle and giving my blog readers discounts by allowing them to pre-order for a reduced price.

Knights in White Bondage will go live as a solo piece on November 28 at the usual price of $2.99. But you can go ahead and pre-order it for $1.99 by clicking the link above. Enjoy!

A new e-book and new e-book discounts!

Where do I begin?

First, you might remember that I posted my latest ebook, "Knights in White Bondage," in the Secret Lives anthology. At the time I was under the impression that I couldn't publish the story independently for six months, but I recently found out that's not the case. The 60-day stipulation was in an early version of the contract I agreed to, but it got taken out in a later version. Now some of the other authors are publishing their stories solo. I'm about to do  the same, and please allow me to brag for a moment about this cover I created. ;-) When I think about my pitiful early efforts at creating my own ebook covers, I feel very proud of how far I've come. I think this one might be my best.

Now, I know a lot of you have probably bought Secret Lives and don't need another copy of "Knights in White Bondage." That's fine, but keep reading because I've found two great new ways to offer discounts on my other ebooks, including those I've already published.

Here's the plan.

1.  Almost all my books* will be available at deep discounts during Cyber Monday (December 1) and the two days afterwards. They'll be 50% off for about a day and a half, then 25% off for about another day and a half. So if you've been waiting to buy something (except the two asterisked titles below), that will be your best time to do it.

2. I'm abandoning Smashwords entirely because it's not generating any sales and I've found another system that works just as well for thanking my blog readers. Each time I publish something from now on, I'll set up a pre-order on Amazon and offer you reduced prices during the pre-order period. I'll always announce those on on my blog, including "Knights in White Bondage." It won't go on sale until Black Friday (a.k.a. the day after Thanksgiving and the biggest shopping day of the year in the US), which falls on November 28 this year. If you pre-order it you'll get the ebook for $1.99, but on November 28, the price goes up to the usual $2.99. Now again, I realize a lot of you have already purchased "Knights" as part of the Secret Lives anthology, and I'm not expecting you to purchase it twice. Just keep this information in mind for future books. And if you do want to publish "Knights" as a separate ebook, you'll get the link here as soon as Amazon gives it to me. Usually it takes them about a day. I'll make a separate post when I get it.

Happy Holidays, whatever you're celebrating soon. :-)


*excluding "Knights in White Bondage" completely, and excluding "What Do You Give the Alien Who Has Everything" unless you buy it through Amazon.co.uk (in both cases because Kindle won't let me change book prices more than once per 30 days per market).

Doubleplusgood

Let me start with a context-free quote. Context wouldn't help much in this case, anyway:


(c) Zdzisław BeksińskiThe tube of flesh is quite prophetic. The tube of flesh, the umbilical, is inserted at the base of the neck, although sometimes inserted by mistake toward the top of the head, which can result in unexpected visions. The umbilical feeds into the central nervous system. The nerves of the familiar's umbilical wind around the nerves in the person's neck. Above the recipient, the manta ray, the familiar, rises and grows full with the knowledge of the host. It makes itself larger. It elongates. The subject goes into shock, convulses, and becomes limp. Motor control passes over to the familiar, creating a moving yet utilitarian symbiosis. The neck becomes numb. A tingling forms on the tongue, and taste of lime. There is no release from this. There should be no release from this. Broken out from their slumber, hundreds are initiated at a time, the tubes glistening and churling in the elision of the steam, the continual need. Thus fitted, all go forth in their splendid ranks. The eye of the City opens and continues to open, wider and wider, until the eye is the world. 

That's a quote from a short story called "Three Days in a Border Town," by Jeff VanderMeer. Even after reading the whole story for myself, I'm not completely sure how much mind control the familiars exert over the people they're attached to, but clearly there's some. And doesn't it make you delightfully squirmy? You can read the full story online for free; I'll give you the link at the bottom of this post. But for now, let's move on.

It's been about two months since I finished VanderMeer's Southern Reach trilogy (I blogged about the first two books here and here). I've been dying to tell you what I thought about the conclusion, but other topics came first. Now it's time to finish what I - or, rather, VanderMeer - started. The first and second books in the series contained lots of mind control, seemingly via hypnosis, although I noted that the levels of control were too high to be caused by real-world hypnosis. Well, I was right. The character known as "the Voice" in Book 2 is a megalomaniac who loves thinking up new and better ways to warp people's minds. Here's a quote from Acceptance. I've taken out the Voice's real name and gender pronouns as well as a few other spoilery details:

Light hypnotic suggestion, conditioning that's more about Area X survival than any of the Voice's dubious "value adds," his/her claims to have found a way around the need, on some level, for the subject to want to perform the suggested action - "a kind of trickery and substitution." The stages you've seen described are identification, indoctrination, reinforcement, and deployment, but _____ has seen other documents that borrow the semiotic of the supernatural: "manifestation, infestation, oppression, and possession."

Most of the Voice's attention has concreted around _____, a volunteer with radicalized ideas about the value of free will. You wonder if the Voice prefers it when there's more or less resistance.

Then there's this quote:

They implant in the brain of _____ what the Voice calls "a pearl of surveillance and recall." Some tiny subset of the silver egg that is Central, passing first through the Voice's deforming grip. They make a man not himself, and you along with it to keep your job, to stay close to what is important to you.

Now, I have to admit that mind control doesn't play as big as role in Acceptance as I expected. Most of the MC takes place in Book 2, Authority. And I know my readers; MC is what you come here to read about. Still, there's so much else worth reading in the Southern Reach trilogy that I recommend it to you anyway just because it's fantastic. It's like Lovecraft on LSD with a side helping of three-dimensional characters and hope. Again I'm being careful to avoid spoilers, but if you've read the first two books and haven't decided whether to pick up the conclusion, here's some of what you'll learn: the ultimate fates of the biologist and her husband, what the hell the psychologist from Annihilation was up to all this time, what happened to the lighthouse keeper, why Whitby is such a basket case, and whether or not Control ever gains control of himself. You also mostly...probably...learn what caused Area X, although the details are open to debate. And I did debate them at length in a Goodreads thread on the series until I felt satisfied with my conclusions (even if not everyone agreed with me). If you've read the whole series, and/or if you don't mind being spoiled to hell and back, here's the thread. Feel free to hop in with your own thoughts.

Now back to VanderMeer in general. The guy clearly has an interest in MC; different forms of it show up in many of his stories, although not in fetishy ways. He uses it for the sake of horror, and believe me, that man knows how to do horror. The quote at the top of this post comes from VanderMeer's short story collection The Third Bear; and the title story is absolutely, no-question-about-it, unrelentingly horrific. So is "Predecessor." But "Three Days in a Border Town" is more like Mad Max with aliens, "Shark God vs. Octopus God" is just plain funny, and "Errata" is - oh God, just read it for yourself. I keep going on about VanderMeer because the more I read his stuff, the more I love it. I think a lot of you will, too; and several stories from The Third Bear are free online. You can find links to them all in this one helpful review. Just do yourself a favor and start with Errata. It's a standalone story with everything that's freaky and wonderful about Vandermeer in one tidy little package. Check it out and let me know what you think of it.

The Tipping Point

Over the last few weeks I've read some buzz in the EMC community about a brainwashing scene in "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." I saw a few animated gifs of the scene, and they were exciting enough to make me want more. Sadly, I wasn't able to find any clips on YouTube. So there I was, eating my heart out, imagining all the other MC fans out there, enjoying the hell out of a great scene I couldn't see.

Then, at last, I managed to see it. What a letdown. Those animated gifs were very nearly all there was to Agent 33's brainwashing. We never saw her actually succumb; she just went from fighting in one scene to happily brainwashed in the next.


Now, I do understand. I've never seen the show, but I've read enough to know Agent 33 was a throwaway character. The only purpose of her brainwashing was to make us worry that the same thing could happen to a more important character who was undercover with Hydra. Viewed that way, Agent 33's scenes did just what was needed...but they did almost nothing for my fetish.

I've been thinking a lot lately about the tipping point in good induction scenes: the point where a strong, resistant character first starts to lose the battle. Sometimes it happens slowly, sometimes quickly. But there's always that one moment where the character hangs balanced between fighting to stay free and surrendering to the inevitable, and then they lose their balance. Maybe they're too tired to fight any longer. Maybe they realize fighting is pointless. Maybe they get tricked. Maybe their horniness gets the best of them. Or maybe - and I find this scenario particularly exciting - they were tempted to give in all along, for whatever reason, and they surrender half-willingly, knowing no one else will ever know they gave in on purpose. But however it happens, that tipping point makes or breaks a brainwashing scene for me - and probably for a lot of other MC fetishists.

But we didn't get to see Agent 33's tipping point. I've arranged these images to suggest what it might have looked like, but that's not how it played out onscreen. We saw her start to weaken, but we never saw her jaw sag or her eyes roll up in her head or her mouth start to chant mantras about compliance. Just think about how much hotter her fate could have been, if her character mattered. Think about the anguish viewers would have experienced if they'd seen a character they loved fall to the enemy...fall deliciously slowly to the enemy. With no one around to break their fall.

Then again, if Agent 33 mattered, someone would have been there to break her fall, just in the nick of time. Dammit.

"Secret Lives" is now available for purchase for a mere $0.99

Here we go, folks! The Secret Lives anthology, which includes my extra-kinky MC fantasy "Knights in White Bondage," is now for sale on Amazon for less than a dollar. I hope you'll check it out - and please leave some comments!

I'll be back this weekend with musings on the hottest part of the mind control induction process.

Supernatural sex and religious cunnilingus

Well, folks, the anthology will be out very soon, and - incredible news - it'll be priced at at mere $0.99. I was shocked by that, but the other contributors are more experienced at this sort of thing, and they swear that's the best price for an anthology. Our goal is to get onto some bestseller lists, thus building our reputations as individual authors and as a group. And that's only our first goal. Our second is to keep putting out more themed anthologies as the months go on. I won't be able to contribute to all of them because I don't write quickly enough, but I'll join in as often as I can. This is a fine group of people, and now that I've finished reading the galleys, I can tell you they're a fine group of writers.

Here are the story synopses, in what might or might not be their order within the book:
Tempted by Blood by Jacqueline Sweet—When the boy you love won’t give you what you need, maybe his evil twin will. Knights in White Bondage by A. Regina Cantatis—An enchanted thrall and her Mistress visit a fetish resort, where they fascinate their fellow guests and attract the attention of a would-be knight in shining armor. Forking Around by Audrey Lusk—When you see the world differently from everyone else, it takes something unseen to make it a less lonely place. Mrs. Wong's by Troy King—Take one jaded fixer, one mysterious young woman, a dash of magick, add a seedy dive, and mix thoroughly. Spooked by Ruby Madden—When Clementine inherits an aging Victorian mansion from her late aunt, never did she suspect she'd uncover a mysterious secret about a lover from the past, brought to the present, in the form of a ghost. A Dangerous Seduction by Heather Cole—Soledad has everyone fooled that she's an ordinary librarian until a mysterious shapeshifter makes her want to reveal more than just her true identity. Vixen by Christin Lovell—Plus size Jessickah Banderkoff is a bartender by day, a guardian to the Underworld’s Kingdom by evening, and the vampire king’s lover by night, but every good thing must come to an end, right?
And here are the keywords submitted by various authors. I've grouped them by story but, just to make things more interesting, I haven't put them in the same order as the listing above. I don't think you'll have any trouble figuring out which set is mine, though. ;-)
shapeshifter, paranormal, werewolf, gangsters, magic, anal penetration, goblins, witches, sexy librarian, bisexual, assassins, sex outside  Witch, tough female, gun, seedy bar, dive bar, Chinese food, bathroom sex, noir, private eye, thriller, demon possession, magic, Wong, paranormal, magick, summoning, fight  BBW, vampire, paranormal, werewolf, shapeshifter, Russian mob, underworld, erotic romance, action, vixen, femme fatale  BBW, interracial, BWWM, HEA, ghost, haunted mansion, romance, supernatural, paranormal, mystery, spook, spooked, witch, white-witch, murder, death, reincarnation, dreams, apparition, nightmare, love story  Paranormal, sassy, dimension travel, Borges, alternate reality, Lovecraft, Machen, invisible, alien, monster, man, stranger sex, giant ant-sex, romance, HEAmind control, lesbian, gay, fetish, latex, bondage, bdsm, fae, fairies, resort, total enclosureAnd here's my guess at what the keywords might be for the person who didn't submit any (To be honest, she had good reason: she was the one gathering everyone else's so she could submit them as a group): vampires, evil twin, Penrose Academy, school for magic, witch, wizard, alternate reality, enchanted mirror, warrior woman
Finally, in fulfillment of the clickbait in my title, I offer the following video. It's not totally off topic; if you read the older version of my story, when it was called "Someday My Prince Will Come," you'll remember it had some Egyptian elements. But really, do I need a reason to post a video of a beautiful woman promising you a religious experience between her legs? I think not.

This, that, and the other

Where to begin? I have so many things on my mind this week that I can't share them all in one post. I'll leave at least one of them for next weekend but don't worry; you'll still have plenty of nuggets to choose from here.

First up, I'm about to publish another story - in an anthology called Secret Lives that will debut on or around Halloween. The cover at left isn't quite the final version. For one thing, there are now seven authors involved instead of six; and for another, the cover artist (and story contributor) Jacqueline Sweet might decide to tweak the image some more.

My own contribution will be a vastly improved version of one of my oldest EMCSA tales, "Someday My Prince Will Come." I've retitled it "Knights in White Bondage," and I promise you'll find it at least twice as hot and three times as kinky as it used to be. I've learned a lot in the years since I wrote the first version. As for the other writers, I'm not sure what they have in store, but our theme is supernatural secrets; and among our number are the aforementioned Jacqueline Sweet, who writes for the EMCSA; Devon March, who collaborated with Jacqueline Sweet on a not-quite-but-nearly-MC story I loved called Fifty Shades of Gay Tentacles; and at least one woman who specializes in vampire erotica. I'll tell you more when I know more.

Now on to some e-publishing notes. First, I'd welcome some feedback on an idea I'm considering. I think I'm going to take my existing stories off Smashwords and offer them exclusively through Kindle Unlimited. The only time I get sales from Smashwords anymore is when I announce a new story here on my blog and offer 25% off coupons, and I can still give you those. What I'm thinking is that in the future, I'll publish new stories on both Smashwords and Amazon for one week, offering the Smashwords coupon as usual. But after that first week, I'll remove the story from Smashwords and sell it only through Kindle Unlimited. Does anyone have strong feelings about that? If so, sound off below. Remember that I've set up my comment section so that you can speak in total anonymity, and I don't delete anything except spam and troll posts.

Lastly (for now, anyway - remember that I have lots of other things on my mind), may I ask an easy favor? An Amazon commenter dropped a negative review on What Do You Give the Alien Who Has Everything? because she didn't realize she was getting into an EMC story and got squicked out. Now, I'm not angry with her, and I'm not blaming her; I can understand why she didn't know what she was getting into. Amazon's new, stricter rules meant I had to word my synopsis very carefully to keep away from the ban hammer. But I'd appreciate it if some genuine EMC fans would balance out the negative review with some positive ones. I don't want anyone to be rude to the other reviewer; I'd just like some EMC fans to tell potential readers what they enjoyed about the book (As someone named Kevin has already done - thanks, Kevin! ;-) )

Kinky elves

I was going to post something more sensible, but I've been sick for a week and a half (which, BTW, is why I didn't post last weekend), and my brain still isn't back to normal...by which I mean "as normal as it ever is." So this is what you get today.

Never mind why, but I've spent the day Googling for Tolkien-related art. I've found some great stuff; and then I've found, well, this sort of thing. The artist clearly has skill, and if she finds my post here, I hope she'll understand that I'm not really making fun of her...well, not entirely. I'm delightfully aghast (which is quite possibly how she meant me to feel anyway). And since I know a lot of my readers are into Tolkien and/or BDSM and/or gay sex, I hope you'll enjoy these pics as much as I did.

And now, without further ado, I present a very non-traditional love story between an Elf and a Dwarf.

A gift exclusively for my blog readers

This is a thanks and a sort of semi-Easter egg for those of you who've bought What Do You Give the Alien Who Has Everything? It's a map of the Imperators' complex to help you orient yourself and show you at least some of what's in store for you on Mahé (I've quite intentionally left a few things out of the image).

But first, at right is someone else's more official map of Mahé. It's the capital island of a chain that lies in the Indian Ocean northeast of Madagascar.  Like the story says, the Seychelles is the most exclusive resort area on the planet, and the Glacis District (where my story is set) contains some of the most exclusive hotels in the Seychelles.

Now on to my map. Yes, it's the cartographic equivalent of a ransom note cut from different magazines, but I didn't try to make it look real. That would have taken weeks. Instead I tried to give you a good idea of what's where, to aid you in navigating the story. The only other place to find a map like this is on your own notepad - if you choose to draw one of your own.

Helpful hint: if you right click and open the map in a new tab, it gets helpfully huge.