Over Exposure
The book signing I did before Christmas was covered by a local newspaper with a full page spread. That is free publicity and, as I wrote earlier, there’s no such thing as bad publicity. But the article was noticed by work colleagues who have ordered copies of the book and I am a little uncertain what the ladies of later middle age in the office are going to think about my stories of group sex and whoremongering.
My colleagues know me as a respectable middle aged father of three boys. Hopefully they’ll accept that when these adventures occurred I was a young man, led astray by bigger boys and naughty girls (lots of them). Hopefully, they’ll accept the basic premise of my book that Eve brought sin into the world and if she hadn’t offered me the Fruit from the Tree of Knowledge I would be good and wholesome; “I can resist everything but temptation”. It worked for Oscar Wilde.
As I edit the book for electronic publishing I wonder if I should tone it down a bit. Keep the actual adventures but take out some of the explicit detail. Although one of the criticisms of Fifty Shades that I read was that there was too much innuendo and not enough detail. Do readers want explicit detail, to know exactly how the girl in the story accommodates more than chap at a time, or do they want to relate to it in their own style, add their own detail so that they can imagine how they might have experienced it, rather than being told how some-one else did?
My book has received unexpected audiences. I was aiming at a young male market and I have been surprised at the interest from women. Perhaps this is a reflection of the rise of female chauvinism; the next generation of female liberation where girls wear the Playboy symbol with pride, not prejudice. If that’s the case, I should keep the detail in.
“We’ve all read Fifty Shades,” said a female colleague. “So we’re not going to be shocked by your book.”
“Fifty Shades is tame compared to my book.”
“I’m definitely going to buy it now,” she said. Her copy arrives tomorrow. I wonder if she’ll be talking to me the day after.
To tone it down or not to tone it down; that is the question?
My colleagues know me as a respectable middle aged father of three boys. Hopefully they’ll accept that when these adventures occurred I was a young man, led astray by bigger boys and naughty girls (lots of them). Hopefully, they’ll accept the basic premise of my book that Eve brought sin into the world and if she hadn’t offered me the Fruit from the Tree of Knowledge I would be good and wholesome; “I can resist everything but temptation”. It worked for Oscar Wilde.
As I edit the book for electronic publishing I wonder if I should tone it down a bit. Keep the actual adventures but take out some of the explicit detail. Although one of the criticisms of Fifty Shades that I read was that there was too much innuendo and not enough detail. Do readers want explicit detail, to know exactly how the girl in the story accommodates more than chap at a time, or do they want to relate to it in their own style, add their own detail so that they can imagine how they might have experienced it, rather than being told how some-one else did?
My book has received unexpected audiences. I was aiming at a young male market and I have been surprised at the interest from women. Perhaps this is a reflection of the rise of female chauvinism; the next generation of female liberation where girls wear the Playboy symbol with pride, not prejudice. If that’s the case, I should keep the detail in.
“We’ve all read Fifty Shades,” said a female colleague. “So we’re not going to be shocked by your book.”
“Fifty Shades is tame compared to my book.”
“I’m definitely going to buy it now,” she said. Her copy arrives tomorrow. I wonder if she’ll be talking to me the day after.
To tone it down or not to tone it down; that is the question?
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