Riding the Line-and ending it...

by Kate Pearce




This is the third book in the Turner brothers series of contemporary erotic Western romances I've written for the 'Cheek' imprint of Virgin Books. (won't you miss saying cheek imprint or is it just me?) It will also be the last-I think, in the Cheek line until further notice. Wow, was it me? Did I close the line?

Knowing that it was likely to happen made it easier to write this book. It gave me the chance to get a bit sappy and refer back to the previous characters and make sure that everyone knew they were happy and likely to stay together forever-ah...My first Cheek book was my first print book so I'm kind of sad to see the line go.


In this book we have half-brother #3, Dakota Scott, referenced in Where Have all the Cowboys gone? He's a good guy, much like his oldest brother, Grayson. Finding him a suitable heroine proved interesting until I chanced upon an episode of Celebrity Rehab and stared in horror at some of the D list celebrities as they tried to confront the mess they'd made of their lives. It was enough to make me pair the likeable sexy goody-two shoes Dakota Scott with the ex-child-celebrity from hell, Robyn Sparrow. She tests him, she drives him crazy and yet he still ends up loving her-and that, of course is really what she's been after all along.

Here's an excerpt from near the beginning of the book when Dakota has met a stranded Robyn in the gas station and offered her a place to sleep for the night. At this point she hasn't even told him her name...

She kept her hand on his flat stomach. “I said do you work out or are you naturally ripped?”
“I ride bulls for a living. I have to be fit or I’m dead.”
Uncomfortable with her scrutiny, he took a step back, difficult in such a small space. “Are you ready to eat?”
She blushed and stuffed her hand back in her pocket. “Yeah, whatever.”
“I’ll just grab a clean T-shirt.”
“Don’t bother on my account.”
She spoke over her shoulder as he followed her out into the main room. He found his duffle bag and hunkered down beside it to search for a shirt. Hell, was she coming on to him? Had he totally misjudged her? She sat back down on the bed, her body posture dejected. Dakota found an old white T-shirt and pulled it over his head.
“Look, if you’re hoping to earn some money here…”
She shot to her feet and stormed across to him. He stood up as well, unwilling to let her tower over him and flinched as she poked him in the chest.
“I am not a whore!”
“I didn’t say you were. I just want you to be clear about what’s going on here.” He met her gaze. “I’m offering you a place to sleep tonight, that’s all. I’ve never paid for sex and I don’t intend to start now.”
She raised her eyebrows. “So you must still be a virgin, right?”
Even though she was deliberately getting in his face, he caught the note of desperation in her voice.
“Yeah, that’s right. I’m saving myself for marriage. It’s all the rage with us cowboys, now. That Brokeback Mountain movie was one hell of a wake up call.”
“You’re not at all funny, you know.”
She held his gaze, her luscious lips tightly pressed together as if she was afraid to speak again.
“Are you sure about that?”
She stepped back, wrapped her arms around her waist and sat down with a decided thump on the bed. He turned his back on her and continued to sort out the stuff in his bag. He put his toothbrush and shaving gear in the bathroom and filled up the coffee jug.


It's a road journey, a sexual tease and a love story all rolled into one. Writing it reminded me of those classic old black and white movies with loads of snappy dialogue and sexual tension to die for. I enjoyed the characters so much, unlike Helen and Jay in Roping the Wind whom I loved but who seriously gave me a headache.

And as this is potentially my last solo post here at LB, (sob) here's a bit more where she's still trying to get him into bed.

“Holy shit!”
Dakota leapt to his feet spilling coffee and crumbs everywhere. He glared down at Jane.
“What the hell are you doing?”
She looked up at him, her expression one of injured innocence.
“What do you think I’m doing?”
He sat back down. “Nothing I asked for, nothing I want.”
“You don’t want a free, no-strings-attached blow job?”
His cock did and stirred in anticipation. He forced his mind back to cold showers, injuries he’d sustained while riding, bleak winter landscapes. It didn’t work.
“Listen, Jane or whatever your name is, I’m tired. All I want to do is get some sleep and be ready to leave as soon as those guys fix whatever is wrong with my truck.”
“It’s Robyn.”
He frowned. “What?”
“My name is Robyn.”
Her hand slid up his thigh again and he clamped one of his over it.
“Whatever your name is, I still don’t want you.”
She started to cry, the tears falling down her frozen face. He wanted to howl. Why did women do this? Didn’t they know how unfair it was? Hell, of course they did.
“Don’t you find me attractive?”
“I don’t know you well enough to say that.” Her lip trembled and the speed of the tears increased. He hastened to continue. “I’m sure you’re a beautiful woman and that someday some guy will make you very happy, but it’s not going to be me.”
“But I don’t want to be happy. I want to make you happy.”
Her fingers moved again, came to rest perilously close to where his disobedient cock yearned to be serviced. He slammed his hand over hers again, cursing silently as he rubbed against his own half-aroused flesh.
“I’m perfectly happy just as I am, thanks.”
She moved closer until her mouth was only a couple of inches away from the fly of his jeans. He tensed as she pursed her lips and let out her breath.
“You sure look like you could do with a blow job.”
He gave up the struggle to restrain her hand and resorted to grabbing her by the shoulders and forcibly lifting her onto the bed. She looked up at him, her eyes wide, her tears miraculously disappeared.
“You do want me.”
“Nope, my cock might because he’s got no sense, but I don’t.”
She cupped her breasts and rubbed her thumbs over her nipples. Dakota swallowed hard as his shaft throbbed and thickened in his jeans.
“Why are you doing this?”
She licked her lips, her gaze considering.
“Because I want to and because you’re here?”
He backed away until his shoulders hit the door frame of the bathroom.
“Sex should mean more than that, shouldn’t it?”
“Why? What’s wrong with two people whiling away a few hours fucking?”
Dakota folded his arms across his chest. Damn, he felt like her parent or something. Where had she learned such crap?
“If you don’t know the answer to that, I can’t help you.”
She knelt up, her hands balled into fists, her expression incredulous. “You think you’re too good for me, don’t you?”
“No, I’m tired, I want to get some sleep and that’s it.”


The bad news is that it isn't out until next Feb, so I don't have any to give away, although you can pre-order it
here in the UK and here for the U.S. I'll also be running some contests on my blog and newsletter, so keep in touch!

An Interview with Pam Rosenthal

Kate Pearce interviews Pam Rosenthal




I first met Pam Rosenthal at one of the Romance Writers of America's annual conferences. We were both getting drinks at Starbucks and I saw her name badge and had a complete fan girl moment because I'd loved all her books. She was nice enough to say she knew who I was too, but I was still struck dumb to meet someone whose beautiful literary style of writing I admired so much.

Later, I got to know Pam even better when we collaborated with some other erotic historical romance writers over at the Spiced Tea Party blog. Her posts made me think for days and I also found out that she had an alter ego-Molly Weatherfield who wrote the classic erotic novel Carrie's Story. By that time I was also a Lustie and Molly's name came up frequently as someone whose writing was greatly admired-and I knew her! Pam very kindly consented to her first interview as Molly on Lust Bites and now she's back to share her new erotic historical release "The Edge of Impropriety"

Take it away Pam!

Kate. Why do you write in this particular time period? Is it the politics, the frocks, the repressed emotions?

Pam: All of the above. And Byron, Keats, and Shelley as well. The odd thing is that when I started writing romance, I thought my time period would be the French Revolution. Because that’s where my first romance, The Bookseller’s Daughter, was set. And because Carrie, the heroine of my Molly Weatherfield BDSM erotica, was a lover of French literature and a disciple, in a sense, of the Marquis de Sade. So I thought I’d want to write in the Marquis de Sade’s period – and never, never, in that stodgy old English Regency.

But it turns out that the English Regency wasn’t so stodgy after all, and that it was profoundly influenced by the French Revolution and by its own revolutionary geniuses like Mary Wollstonecraft. And so what I try to write about is the meeting of two worlds – the very proper ton, and the more raffish, interesting world of rebels and reformers that you’d find east of Regent Street.


K. Do you have a writing process? Do you plot or see it as it comes at you?

P. I start out with a beginning and an ending – in romance, these aren’t so far apart; the ending rather recapitulates the beginning, with all the wild desire now satisfied. It’s the middle that makes everyone crazy.


K. How many hours a day do you get to write and do you have a set schedule?

P. I try to write every morning for a few hours. When I’m not promoting a book, that is – promotion being God’s way of teaching us to appreciate the days when we actually get to write. And also (with a good interviewer like you, Kate) an opportunity to sit back and think about what we do, what works, and what doesn’t.

And what I’m thinking these days is that I ought to trust my own daydreams and fantasies more. The point of craft, I’m coming to think, is that when the daydreams and fantasies really get cooking, you’ll have the words, the syntax, and the general fluidity so you can get it while it’s hot.


K. How much research goes into your books? And do you do it all yourself?

P. A fair amount of research. And no, thank heaven, I don’t do it by myself. I have a wonderful research partner in my husband Michael – and I can’t describe it any better than I did in this guest post at the Wet Noodle Posse


K. What do you consider your strengths as a writer, what about your weaknesses?

P. My major strength, I think, is that I seem to be able to write about sex, to put experience that lies on the very edge of consciousness into words, syntax, and verb tense. Part of this strength, I think, is that I’m patient enough (and love the craft enough) to keep at it until I get it right. And part of it is that I probably have a few wires crossed in the erotic and intellectual parts of my central nervous system. So I think that even at my advanced age I’m still drawing on the energy of my own shy, wonky adolescent erotic curiosity and discoveries.

My major weaknesses are: first off, that I sometimes get so enamored of all that complexity and fragmentation that I don’t always move my plots along as quickly as the romance genre wants them to go; and secondly (as readers know, and I am sorry, really), that I’m a ridiculously slow writer. Which is why I think I should do more daydreaming and fantasizing up front and more writing it down (fast! And trusting to my craft!) after I’ve got the fantasies hot and bubbling (see above).



K. Do you fall in love with your heroes?

P. You bet. And my heroines. Gosh, don’t we all fall in love with our heroes and heroines?


K. Do you have a favorite character from all of your books so far? Is there anyone you'd like to keep writing about?

P. Not a favorite, exactly. But someday I’d like to find out what happens to Alec Hervey, David’s son in Almost a Gentleman, who in his sweet, brainy reasonableness is rather modeled on my own son. I haven’t thought of Alec for a while, but when the Library Journal reviewer told me how much she liked the preadolescent niece of my current hero (in The Edge of Impropriety) I found myself rather wanting to introduce this young woman-to-be to Alec – after she grows up, of course. (And hey, can I plug the Library Journal review of Edge?


K. Where do you think your books fall in the erotica/erotic romance spectrum?

P. Well, I know that these things are usually seen as a kind of spectrum from plot-driven erotic romance to episodic erotica. In the world of romance publishing, erotica’s seems to be measured by the number of sexual encounters per thousand words. While to some scholars, it’s erotica if the book is structured around its sexual set-pieces. see Teach Me Tonight.

Neither view works for me. I like to mix it up. And once in a while I get a reader or reviewer who sees it as I do – as in this recent Romantic Times review of Edge, where Kathe Robin says that “Rosenthal’s… always looking for new ways to burn up the pages and keep your mind focused on characters and plot, not just her wonderfully erotic love scenes.” I was thrilled that at least in that sentence Kathe sees it as an and rather than an or kind of thing, just as I do. And I cherish this comment from some long-ago blogger, who said of Phoebe and David in Almost a Gentleman, “even when they're across the room from each other, there's always this feeling that you're walking in on them in the middle of fucking.” I’d add that when they’re fucking I want there to be the feeling that the plot is progressing.

That said, and (at last) to answer your question, I think I write the erotica I want and need. Which changes with time. In the Carrie/SM books, it was about youthful freedom, intellectual honesty, and curiosity. But youth ends in maturity and commitment. And so finding a possible happy ending for Carrie led me to romance, which is about how we love and want to be loved. And it led me to try to write successful, and also erotic, romance novels.

These days I may be going somewhere different; I’m not sure yet.
But again, I wouldn’t be interested in writing (or reading) erotica that wasn’t as smart, as plot- and character-driven, as informed, and as technically adventurous as it can possibly be.


K. Who has influenced you as a writer?

P. Probably the only two books I’ve really entirely comprehended are Little Women and Story of O. So those are probably the deepest influences.


K. What's coming up next for you?

P. More erotica, of course (see above). Hot retellings of some canonical nineteenth century fiction. What I don’t know yet (again see above) is whether the stories will have happy endings or not.

Thanks Pam!


And thanks so much, Kate, for your wonderful questions and the opportunity to answer them.

Pam is offering a copy of "The Edge of Impropriety" to one lucky commenter!
Or buy it here

Dirty Laundry; Jane Lockwood guest blogs

While I'm off gadding around with cover models at the Romantic Times Conference I persuaded my dear friend Jane Lockwood, author of Forbidden Shores to write a great post for our blog today! So please welcome Jane and excuse me if I get back to, the cover models, um I mean promotional activities...
Kate Pearce x

"Ma'am, I should like to be under your Man Cook by Way of Improvement."

Thanks for having me as your guest on Lust Bites!

I'm Jane Lockwood and I write dirty books. Dirty historical books, actually--and I blog with our very own Kate Pearce over at The Spiced Tea Party, where we spend quite a bit of time talking about how to write hot books that are also historically accurate. If you want to hear more about that, and you're attending RWA National in San Francisco, Pam Rosenthal and I will present our workshop Writing the Hot Historical at 8:30 a.m. (aargh) on Saturday, August 2.

The commercial break is now over--sort of. Because I'm also giving a workshop later that day on Georgian servants, which is what I've really researched--and strangely enough, the material overlaps. Why? Socio-economic changes and all sorts of good stuff you’ll have to attend my servant workshop to understand.

But during the period, a genre of art became popular--portraits of servants at work. Of course portraits of women in the kitchen, particularly surrounded by suggestive vegetables, had long been popular (wow! look at the size of her .... cabbages).

Possibly portraits were a sentimental representation of obedient, diligent family retainers from a mythical golden age of master-servant relationships. Servants, after all, knew the secrets of the house and their employers, and they were supposed to be loyal and discreet—but not always. During the sensational divorce trial of Lady Diana Bolingbroke (1734-1808), her servants testified with enthusiastic attention to detail about locked doors and the hair powder on one end of the couch and the mud on the other (from the head and boots respectively of her adulterous lover). Yes, it was the House of Lords; yes, they were under oath; but you get the impression they went a bit above and beyond the call of duty.

Some portraits had a very strong erotic quality; look at this lady’s maid (she's very well dressed in her mistress's cast-offs) eyeing you up while she washes her mistress' undies. Robert Morland's series of women doing laundry was wildly popular, reproduced as engravings for the discerning gentleman. He actually produced two versions of the woman ironing--this one with her eyes modestly downcast, and another of her staring brazenly at the viewer. Note how cleavage takes center stage in both pics. Think about it. A woman doing something with her hands and allowing someone to watch—it’s full of erotic possibilities. Maybe she knows she’s being watched … or maybe she’s pretending she doesn’t know.

Questions, comments?

http://www.janelockwood.com
http://www.pamrosenthal.com
http://thespicedteaparty.blogspot.com


Jane has also offered to give away of copy of "Forbidden Shores" to one lucky poster.

Love Letters of the Desperate

by Kate Pearce
(please note, this post contains nothing erotic whatsoever...it's just plain silly)



Once upon a time, before the internet, email, text messages, IM's and cell phones, there was pen and paper. Nowadays you can break up with someone in front of a cast of millions on Myspace or YouTube or text the shortest message possible: "We is thru 4ever, I is over u, u suck". Paper, however, is the stuff some writers use and the way the government still chooses to communicate bad news to us. I grew up in that age, and when I say grew up, I mean I entered my teens and twenties and found love, or what I thought was love...

Names have been changed to protect the innocent...)

The Undecided.

Dear Kate,
It was great having that meal at the Chinese with you last Thursday after we missed the movie because your bus was late. I'm hoping you can help me with my problem. Because I went out with you I now have two girlfriends and I like you both-a lot!!! What would you say to me to help me know that you should be THE ONE?? Love S xx


Dear S, you don't have two girlfriends anymore. I resign. Hope this helps with your problem. Love Kate x




The Desperate to get away.

Dear Kate, thanks for our fun evening at the movies watching Pink Floyd's "The Wall". It was a great movie wasn't it? I'd like to apologize again for getting us lost in the seediest part of Soho for half an hour when I couldn't find my car. By the way, you might not be hearing from me for a while. I'm off to Kenya. Honestly, I am. The fact that I didn't mention it last night was because I got all embarrassed about the Soho thing. I'll give you a call when I get back, in um, a year or so. Best C x




The Can't Take No for an Answer Guy

Dear Kate, yes, I have written this letter to you on 25 sheets of lined green perforated computer paper. I know it is long, but I really need you to 'understand' me. There is no way you could not want to go out with me and I've proved that in this letter. All quotes, (which are underlined in red, with page number and paragraph noted) are from "The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy" which I know you must have read by now seeing as I've been leaving copies of it in your room for the last six months.

It is the best book ever written and it totally describes how you make me feel much better than I could because I'm a science student. Please feel free to comment on the text on the white lines between the green ones, not that you will need to comment, of course, because I have given you unanswerable PROOF as to why we are Meant To Be. All the best, your friend, soon to be boyfriend, A x

The Can't Take No for an Answer Guy part II


Dear Kate, I can't quite believe you aren't getting it yet. We are Meant To Be. Despite my three long letters, you still don't get me do you? And by the way, sending your friends around to reason with me, didn't work-although the little one was quite scary. She said they were doing me a favour because if you had come around, I would now have a black eye. I'm beginning to believe you are too misguided to understand our love.

I've decided to go out with another girl. Maybe that will bring you to your senses. While you think about that, please listen to the tape I've made you. It contains songs which describe my feelings at this moment. It starts with "You're as Cold as Ice" and finishes with "The Chain". Perhaps you will miss me more than you thought possible and ask me back. I'll be waiting...respectfully yours, A (Note no kisses)


Okay, I'm a fiction writer and I, um, might have 'embellished a little', but in essence, all these things did happen to me during the dating years. And I must also say, that these guys were all perfectly nice-just not for me.

So tell me, has anyone got anything to add to these sad, but true experiences? I'd love to hear about them. One lucky commentator will get to win one of my books!

Love and kisses
Kate x

L is for Leather

Line up, Lusties and leather-lovers everywhere, the Erotic Alphabet series has reached the letter 'L' and yes, yay, yes, L is for Leather.



Oh look at the precious little book! As I said to editor Alison Tyler when I laid eyes on A-D, "Purty on the outside, dirty on the inside." What is the bodacious cover tramp wearing? Oh! I believe it's a Little Black Dress, which just happens to be the title of my story in this collection. But! First things first.



Oops! A photo of L Word hottie Shane made slightly less gratuitous by the fact that she's in a leather vest. L Word...L is for Leather... no?

This slim anthology begins with a bang. Our own Kate Pearce invites us to "Meet a cowboy after church who understands your deepest desires and knows a few good tricks with his leather belt," in her story Sunday Service.

On the second Sunday, she'd waited until the preacher hurried home for lunch before turning to find the cowboy behind her. He pushed her up against the shadowy side wall of the old wooden church and undid the buttons of his long duster coat to reveal a coarse denim work shirt, jeans and a low-slung gun belt. Then he opened the pearl buttons of her thick winter coat and leaned into her, his Stetson carefully angled over her head, his big body aligned to hers from shoulder to knee.

When he touched her lower lip with his tongue, she'd opened her mouth for him. He tasted of strong coffee and cigarettes and his kiss was as fierce and dark as she'd expected. The press of his erection against her stomach made her melt, her sex pulsing and eager for the first time in over a year. Without releasing her mouth, he picked her up until her legs came around his waist. His jeans-covered cock ground against her core. She came for him - even through the layers of her Sunday-best dress, petticoats and panties.

He smiled for the first time.

"Meet me in your father's barn after lunch."

And she had.

OK so Kate's contribution is simply one of the hottest short stories I've ever read. I'm not going to give anything away, except to say that there's lots of leather in this piece, including fringed leather chaps, an old leather belt, a new leather belt, and a saddle horn, and they're all put to terrible good use.

In Little Black Dress, written by Madeline Moore, aka me, a submissive woman interrupts her Dom's plans to abandon her by making the extravagant, guilty, blush and rush inducing purchase of the little black leather dress (part one) and then donning it to make a bold statement at his Bon Voyage party. (part two)

1) The invisible zipper rasped, then the leather was lowered over her head. The saleswoman started talking about the designer's triumphant show in Paris and how he'd recently selected just three shops in all of North America to carry his merchandise. Melissa half-listened but she was grateful for the background noise. It made the hammering echo of her heartbeat inside her head less overwhelming. She stood with her arms up. It had to fit. For a moment everything went black, then her warm body was welcoming the sheath of cool leather, eager to make the hide live and breathe again.



2) Melissa wore no jewelry whatsoever - her skin was the only accessory she needed with this dress, and vice versa. Did he really think he would ever find, anywhere, skin as soft and pale as hers? As if to prove her point, her throat pulsed blue with every breath. That wasn't it, he'd sworn up and down. "I couldn't ask you to give up everything," he'd said. As if he'd ever asked her for anything.

His jaw dropped when he saw her, though her arrival wasn't a surprise. He was caught mid-pontification, his index finger stuck midair.

"Melissa!"

She sank to her knees. The dress slithered up her stockinged legs with a hiss.

Gratifyingly, the crowd parted. He stared. She raised her face and stared right back...

..."Master?" She was trembling and she knew she'd paled to a ghostly white but she caught his gray glance and held it with hers.

"What do you want?"

"Take me with you, or kill me, please."

As if these excerpts aren't enough to make you want to buy the book, there are also stories by a host of other fine writers, with Alison Tyler, as always, contributing the final piece, appropriately titled, Hide.

Leave a comment and maybe you'll win the copy of L is for Leather we're giving away today on Lust Bites. Yeee-haw!

(All photos are from Photobucket except the tattooed cowboy, who comes to us courtesy of modernfabulousity.blogspot.com.)

Historical Hotness or not?

By Kate Pearce

When I first moved to the USA, almost ten years ago, one of the first places I looked for was a bookstore. To my complete surprise I found a huge romance section and I realized that I’d definitely come to the right place. In the UK there is Harlequin Mills & Boon, general fiction and Black Lace. In the USA romance meets sex in a BIG way.

I devoured a gazillion historical romance novels and discovered all about fantasy rape, forced seduction, massive weeping manhood’s, tinderboxes of love and orgasms described as fireworks, waterfalls, volcanic eruptions and I LOVED it.

But a lot has happened in the past ten years and the historical romance has changed considerably. Some would say for the better-(yay, most authors use the word cock now!) some would say for the worst. Erotic historicals sell really well in the US- if they are properly marketed. The problem is that no one seems to know where the line is anymore between erotica, erotic romance and historical romance. That causes issues both for writers and for the readers who get pissed off if they buy a historical and get graphic erotic sex or buy an erotic historical and get weeping manhood’s.


Madelynne Ellis author of A Gentleman’s Wager and Phantasmagoria started out writing erotica rather than romance and finds the US distinction of erotic romance as a sub-genre less easy to pin down in the UK. A common concern that Madelynne shares is that the sudden explosion in the erotic romance section leads to “Strings of sex scenes with very little emotional context or character growth.”






Deanna Ashford also believes the lines have become blurred and wonders whether it has something to do “With the gradually changing status of women now that we’ve all become rather less inhibited about sex.” I think she has a point and I also think that historicals still allow for a lot less PCness than is necessary in a contemporary erotic romance.








Pam Rosenthal aka Molly Weatherfield who also took a writers journey from BDSM and erotica to historical erotic romance, reckons we’re on our own slow journey back to where it all began, “Starting with the prose works of the second century AD, Greeks, romance has often been erotic, raffish, déclassé and articulated by travel to erotic places, pirate kidnappings and the like.” Her only hope is that if “we’re reverting to our low-rent origins now, I’d like to keep some of the art as well.”


We recently had a discussion on The Spiced Tea Party blog about covers and whether they can help a reader decide if something is an erotic historical or a straight one. The overall consensus was that if it has a lone naked man on the cover it’s erotic, if not, it’s something else-although Pam told me to tell you that she does write very sexy even if she doesn’t get the naked male torso’s 


Jane Lockwood reckons the cover of her erotic historical “Forbidden Shores’ aka ‘Ass Bandits of the Caribbean’ did not help get the message of her book across to the reading public. It’s about the abolitionist movement and a distorted love triangle where Allen is in love with Clarissa, who is in love with March, who is in love with Allen. Not your everyday scenario and the lush cover-note no male torso- and decision to market it as straight historical romance caused dear Jane a few problems along the way.

Luckily for us, Jane devised a quiz to let us all know what we are writing/reading historically-wise.

Do you find yourself sitting on the sofa looking like an idiot because you can't figure out what you're reading? Or can't even remember where your book is? Or your laptop seems to have mysteriously disappeared into your pants?

What, exactly are you reading or writing? Here's a simple quiz to determine if your book is (a) a traditional regency, (b) a regency-set historical, (c) an erotic historical, or (d) historical erotica.


The heroine meets a gentleman she is attracted to. She:
a. Asks to be introduced to him by the patronesses of Almacks
b. Invites him to her bedchamber
c. Invites him and his three friends to her bedchamber
d. Invites him and his regiment to her bedchamber

The hero is wearing:
a. Immaculately polished Hessians, and a finely tailored coat and breeches
b. Boots, breeches and a historically inaccurate shirt unbuttoned all the way down
c. Not much, a sneer, oil, and a whip
d. Tattoos, scars, piercings, a sneer, oil, and an even bigger whip

The heroine is wearing:
a. Bonnet, gown, shawl, reticule
b. Gown, barely, and lots of hair
c. A little wisp of something from Victoria's Secret and lots of hair
d. Tattoos, scars, piercings, a sneer, a really, really big whip, and a shaved head

The secondary characters include:
a. Comic servants and saintly family
b. Comic servants and tiresome family
c. Sex-obsessed companions who may or may not be human
d. Underlings you never meet but someone has to get in the lube and leather supplies

Your hero likes to spend long hours in the library:
a. Reading poetry
b. Decoding secret documents
c. Twisting himself into a pretzel for future activities, based on an ancient tome of erotic practices
d. Oiling the rack and himself

Your heroine likes to:
a. Embroider, play pianoforte, visit the poor
b. Tame stallions, write novels, etc.
c. Practice twisting herself into a pretzel etc.
d. What? Time to do anything else? I don't think so

So now we all know what we are writing and we’re clear on the difference between straight historicals, erotic romance and erotica, yes? Although I don’t see any mention of homoerotic interactions like I have in my books there. But I’m okay with that as I edge closer and closer to Erastes, the welcoming and all-encompassing hand of historical erotic romance held out waiting for the moment when it all becomes just about love.

She's Madonna...

by Kate Pearce


"I love you baby, but face it she's Madonna, No man on earth could say that he don't want her"
(Robbie Williams gets it right usual)

I first heard of Madonna when I was at college back in the 'eighties'. My best friend from home wrote and told me all about her. In those days we actually wrote letters because there were no mobile phones, email or internets to help us communicate. To be honest I was in my snobby "I don't watch TV I'm an intellectual stage" so I tried to ignore the lure of Madonna, but it didn't last long.

Watching her role around on the stage in her wedding dress was a pivotal (ha ha)moment for me. Here was a woman who was sexy, dirty and not ashamed to show it. I kind of wished I could be more like her but settled for the black lace headband, gloves and black clothes.

Then for a while our paths diverged. I got into marriage and babies and she got into...well everything really. It was kind of like watching a car wreck but I couldn't look away as she pushed every boundary, challenged a few taboos and made a coffee table book that has become a classic. Of course, now days what she expressed doesn't seem half as outrageous as it did then and that's the important thing-she was a pioneer of the beauty of a woman's sexual experience and of how to get on in a still very masculine world.

She won me back with Ray of Light I actually understood what she was trying to say and I actually, god help me, empathized with her. who would've thought it? Part of my own personal philosophy for living comes straight out of a Madonna song Sky fits Heaven-how crazy is that?

Sky fits heaven so fly it
That's what the prophet said to me
Child fits mother so hold your baby tight
That's what my future could see

Fate fits karma so use it
That's what the wise man said to me
Love fits virtue so hold on to the light
That's what our future will be

And that's why I love her. She constantly re-invents herself, she's shown me it's okay to be sexy and how to demand sexual satisfaction and I thank her, I really do...
As she says herself in the song Like it or not

You can call me a sinner
You can call me a saint
Celebrate me for who I am
Dislike me for what I ain't

[Chorus]
This is who I am
You can
Like it or not
You can
Love me or leave me
Cus I'm never gonna stop



And of course, I'm going to finish with a link to my favorite Madonna video, complete with 4 cowboys a horse and Madonna giving me that come hither look she does so well...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5o5UmeKJ3s

(all lyrics copyright Madonna and Robbie Williams)
also want to apologize for how late this post is...I had a sick 5 yr old

Simply Sexual

by Kate Pearce

What can I tell you about this book? Firstly, I have no real idea where I got the idea for it from. I remember a few vague thoughts about Turkish pirates, sieges and white slavery and then these 2 characters appeared in my head, one of them complete with a name, which is really weird. So there he was, Lord Valentin Sokorvsky, a Regency noble man and a businessman, looking for a wife.

But I also knew that at the age of 10 he'd been kidnapped along with another boy, by Turkish pirates and sold to a brothel. Not one of those nice Princess and floaty drapery harems, but a place where he and his blond haired companion, Peter Howard are forced to have sex with each other and anyone with the coin to pay for them.

Rescued and returned to England at 18, Valentin has issues-big issues not only with his sexuality but with his best friend Peter, a man he's tied to in many ways. A man who is still in love with him. So the book is about an older Valentin coming to terms with his voracious sexuality in a way that satisfies both his needs and the needs of his new wife, Sara. Throughout most of the book, Val is in major denial about his relationship with Peter and with how he deals sexually with his wife.

Here's an excerpt:

Sara's breathing shortened and Valentin knew she was close to a climax. He pulled back, barely touching her, wanting to see her face in this most intimate moment. He drew back the folds of her dressing gown to expose her breasts and nearly lost what little sense he had left.

Her rose red nipples glinted with gold. He stared at the rings that pierced her sensitive flesh. She flinched as he reached out a finger. With great restraint, he lightly touched the ring. She would be sore for a while. Even more sore if the ring was ripped out, as had happened to him. He still bore the scar on his chest. He traced the warm metal with his tongue and removed his fingers from her pussy.

“Does it still hurt?”

She bit her lip. “A little.”

He licked her nipple as gently as he could and she sighed.

When she healed, he intended to spend a great deal of time lavishing his attention on her breasts. God, it was possible that he’d never let her out of bed again. He cupped her chin and kissed her mouth, giving her a taste of her own pleasure. His cock throbbed. He wanted to be inside her with a primitive urge that shook him to the core.

Still kissing her, he reached down and opened his breeches. His breath hissed between his teeth as his cock sprang out, blindly seeking her. She dragged his breeches down to expose his buttocks and tight balls.

“Oh God, Valentin, I missed you.”

He groaned as her fingernails scraped his skin. Releasing her mouth, he slid back down between her legs and pushed her knees wide with his hips. She’d take his cock now and scream out her pleasure.

Sara quivered as he pushed her hand away from the jade dildo and grabbed the base of his shaft. His cock was bigger than he’d ever seen it before. He guided the massive weeping crown along the lower side of the jade, engorged red flesh to pale green, velvet heat to cream-washed stone. Her sheath swallowed him below the jade.

He waited until her flesh gave willingly and then continued his slow penetration. Sensations exploded over him, the clench of her pussy, the rock hard resistance of the stone above him. He was trapped in an erotic vise of his own making.

“Valentin.” Sara clutched his muscled shoulders, her fingernails digging deep. “Oh. God, I’m going to come.“

He pressed deeper until his balls slapped against her buttocks and held still as she milked his cock with the strength of a ravaging storm. He caught her screams in his mouth, refusing to end the kiss even when she nipped and bit at his lips in the final throes of her climax.

When she finished shaking, he pulled out and removed the jade dildo. He stared down at her beautiful, wet, fuckable pussy. So much for restraint. He was beyond that now and so was she.



It's available from Kensington Aphrodisia and is due out on the 29th, although it has already been spotted in stores. Of course, you can also buy it online at Amazon.com and Amazon uk

What's even more fun is I got to write a companion book "Simply Sinful" which comes out in November, which reverses the focus and gives us Peter Howard's story, complete with his sexual trysts with another man and the man's wife and his take on his complicated relationship with Valentin.

So how do you feel about sexually ambiguous Regency Rakes masquerading as romance heroes?

Comment and you might win your very own copy of my edgy erotic Regency-set novel "Simply Sexual"

Where the Magic Happens

I’m sure you all have a picture in your head of us Lusties, chained to our desks, slaving away. I’m sure you think it’s all champagne and sex toys, as we lounge in lingerie and write with fountain pens before being distracted by our boy toys (or girl toys) who come to give us massages.

Sometimes, this is true.

But most of the time, alas, there is another scenario in which we find ourselves….

A deadline looms. It’s way past our bedtimes, and our boy and girl toys are languishing alone in our beds. Their mournful calls fall on deaf ears. Instead, we’re typing frantically, vaguely nauseated from too many cups of tea or coffee. Our desks look like an office-supply store exploded. Our eyes burn; our fingers ache—will we ever be able to grasp a vibrator again?

The truth is, we Lusties are a varied lot, as proven by our writing spaces. Nine of us have bravely taken pictures of our work areas, mess and all.

Here’s the game: Can you guess which Lustie works in which space? Your choices are Dayle A. Dermatis, Kate Pearce, Janine Ashbless, Madeline Moore, Madelynne Ellis, Olivia Knight, Portia da Costa, Shanna Germain, and Teresa Noelle Roberts….


Workspace 1
This is my office. But I can't work there... Could anybody?


Workspace 2
Yes, I write in bed! (Desks give me backache.) Note essential author's equipment: laptop, mug of tea, copy of Writing the Breakout Novel by Donald Maass, and two dogs.


Workspace 3
This is my desk. On it I have a bobble head Nora Roberts (signed) so that when I ask her a question she always answers me. Also a Jane Austen action figure, complete with lap desk and quill pen! Underneath the desk on the red silk cushion is my pampered dog, Hunter, a King Charles Cavalier spaniel.


Workspace 4
This is one of the smallest workspaces I’ve ever had, but the one at which I’ve been most productive. You will see hard copy of my latest manuscript. (I prefer to do my first draft on the computer, then print and work from hard copy, then type the final draft on the computer.) I have all my essentials close by: glasses, a can of diet Schweppe’s Ginger Ale, a Dictionary of Sex, some Rub-A535, hand lotion, and gum. The bulletin board is papered equally with important information and my favorite celebrities, including Ms. Joni Mitchell. There are pieces of paper everywhere but the actual message holder, that weird metal spiral thing, is empty.


Workspace 5
My three cats (two are shown in the picture) boast a total weight of 45 pounds and any one of them, let alone two or more, takes up more than the area on my desk available for sprawling kitties while I'm actually working. Unfortunately they like my desk. A lot. And they're so darn cute that it's sometimes hard to boot them off so I can, for instance, get to my keyboard.


Workspace 6
I bought this treadmill specifically for its wide, flat handles, and then I Velcroed an old shelf across the handles as a makeshift desk. The laptop sits on top, and has its own bit of Velcro to keep it anchored. It's best for emailing and editing (I edit by ear, so I often plug my headphones into the laptop and listen as Word reads my work back to me), and if I go too fast, the keyboard gets all sweaty, and not in a sexy way.


Workspace 7
I do have a proper desk, honest! It has all my books on it, well, apart from the ones on the sofa, obviously. Quit smirking. You almost got a picture of my bath, which is where I write all my best stuff.


Workspace 8
I'm as likely to have a glass of wine at hand as I am a cup of tea, but I really do love having candles lit. I admit it: I'm a romantic at heart. Then again, the small calendar above the mousepad depicts penises from famous Italian statuary…. Guess I'm also a mass of contradictions!


Workspace 9
The real world is inside the computer, but all the essentials surround it. The oil is a mix of patchouli, mandarin and pine; the incense is sandalwood—these ingredients vary for each story. The notes are for “The Three Riddles” in the Enchanted novella collection—if you look closely, you can make out the heading “The first riddle.”

I won something!

Cool news!

"Where have all the Cowboys gone?" won a 2007 Reviewers Choice award from cataNetwork. I didn't get anything quite as magnificent as a golden cock, but I did get a logo to show off on my website.

On the Seventh day of Christmas...

My true love sent to me...

Seven Stetsons swinging




























Six Purring Pussies

Five silver rings

Four bloody men

Three hundred Spartans,

Two detectives dancing,

And a werewolf tied to a tree!

Happy Holidays to everyone on Lust Bites and much joy in the New Year!!!
Kate x

Smut Slot - Roping the Wind

by Kate Pearce
Don't you just love smut Fridays? I know I do! Here are a few excerpts from my upcoming book for 'Cheek' "Roping the Wind", a stirring tale of a washed up cowboy and his orthopedic surgeon.

It comes out in the UK on December 6th. Unfortunately, those of us who live in the US will have to wait until Feb 5th 08-unless you comment on this post of course, and get lucky!

It was an exhausting book to write as both the characters kind of leapt off the page and started fighting from page one. And as soon as they discovered their mutual kinky interest in leather, things got really interesting...

It’s available to pre-order at Amazon UK and Amazon.com

“I knew I wouldn’t hurt you.” Jay touched her lip with the finger he’d used on her clit. “You were already wet and ready for me, weren’t you?” His cock jerked inside her as she licked his finger tip. “Did you touch yourself? Did you get yourself hot for me?”

She bit his finger as he slid out of her. “I like to think that you did, although according to our deal, your body belongs to me and I should really be giving you permission.”

He grinned as she drew in a sharp breath and pressed his hand over her lips. “Uh, oh, darlin’. Don’t be shooting your mouth off. I don’t want to have to get mad at you.”
Over the top of his hand, her blue eyes snapped murder. Without releasing her, he leaned down and picked up his leather belt.

“How about I put you over my knee? We’ll call it a round dozen if you promise to ask me nicely next time you want to play with yourself.”

He paused to catch her reaction, realized her entire attention was fixed on his leather belt. Lust and dark excitement stirred deep in his belly. He lowered his voice.

“You like the sound of that, yeah?”

He looped the belt in his fist and brought it up to caress her throat, sliding the soft leather down toward her breasts. Her nipples puckered as he rubbed the belt over them. Her breathing shortened to soft pants and he took his hand away from her mouth.

“Yeah, you do, don’t you?”

Helen shuddered as the leather belt danced over her butt.

“Next time you feel like playing with yourself, call me.” Jay said.

She struggled to breathe as his fingers delved between her butt cheeks.
“You don’t own me.”

She jumped as the leather smacked against her skin twice. His hand returned, smoothing the pain away.

“I own this pussy.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

Two more sharp cracks of the leather made her writhe, mingling pain with pleasure making her want, more.

“Just tell me you won’t do it again without permission and I’ll let you go.”

Helen pressed her lips together.

“Nothing to say?”

She tensed as he slid two long fingers past her anus.

“I’d like to fuck your ass now. My cock thrusting into all this warm sensitized flesh.” He added two more fingers making her gasp. “I bet you’d come so hard they’d hear you screaming on the Bay Bridge.”

He reached up to the workbench and picked up a long scrap of soft leather, showed it to her in his hand. Her eyes widened as he wrapped some of it around his thumb and applied it to her clit.

“Did you know that cowboy boots can be made out of almost any kind of leather?”

“No…I didn’t”

“Goatskin, shark, lizard, alligator, ostrich…good old American bison.” He rubbed her clit a little harder. “This is deerskin one of the softest. Does it feel good against your skin, Helen?”

He watched the slow play of his thumb, the way the leather darkened as her juices soaked into it. She tried to move her hips against the solid thrust of his embedded fingers but he kept them still and deep.

“I like deerskin myself. The color, the suppleness and the way it stretches over a last.”

“A last what?”

He chuckled, bent to kiss her just above his rubbing thumb. “Shoe last. The three dimensional wooden pattern a boot maker carves for each customer.” He licked a corner of the leather into his mouth, tasted her unique scent mixed with the animal musk. Licked her again, harder now, from his knuckles and back over his thumb. She shuddered in his arms.

He withdrew his fingers, studied how wet they were and licked them clean. Holding her gaze, he wrapped the leather around them.

“I wonder how they’ll feel now, inside you?”

He slowly slid them back inside her, felt her internal muscles grip him like a fist as she came so hard she almost fell off the work top. He removed his fingers, stood up slowly and grinned at her.

Strangely enough, this story made me write another short piece which will be included in “L is for Leather”, which is an exploration of my character’s fantasy life and was super cool to write!

So comment to win a chance to win a copy and have a great weekend.
Kate x

Vampires! Vampires! Vampires!

by Madelynne Ellis et al.

We're trying something new at Lust Bites today, the magic extendy post. Yep, you read that right, it starts off small and grows with stimulation! So hang on to that refresh button and don't be surprised if there's some gnashing of fangs along the way.

Vampires are such a horror (and erotica) genre staple that it's easy to forget that the modern image of the gentleman of the night only dates back a couple of centuries, to a fateful night on the banks of Lake Geneva, Switzerland.


Prior to Dr John Polidori's Byronesque "Vampyre", our fanged fiends were typically uncultured monsters, crawling around graveyards and generally making Nosferatu look like Brad Pitt.


Well today on Lust Bites (see we're even appropriately named) we're celebrating our favourite Vamps. The ladies will be along during the day to introduce you to their personal favourites. I'm expecting a certain Angel to sneak his way in there amongst the Draculas and Lestats, along with a few less obvious surprises, and of course we'd love you all to share you're own favourite vampires, be they from literature, stage or screen.

Anyway, to start us all off, I offer you my personal Vampire favourite, this is Alex (aka Julian Sands in Tale of a Vampire), doing what Vampires do best. As for why I love him, well you only have to look here and here to know that I like them bad, angst-ridden and bloody.

Janine Ashbless says: Well, watch me throw down the glove! I'm the voice of dissent today, because vampires do nothing for me. I mean - I am happy with them as predators, or as vehicles for introducing dominance and/or a little necrophilia to an erotic story; it's when the author wants to use them as characters that my eyes glaze over. Why? This is epitomised by a montage scene in Interview with a Vampire where years pass over New Orleans. In these centuries human beings with their pitiful short lives have created beautiful art and architecture, established complex societies and communities, turned swampland into a thriving city. What have the vampires, with their eternal youth and their physical superiority and their accumulated experience, achieved? Well, they've killed some people and drunk absinthe. And one of them plays the piano a bit. Boring, boring bastards.

Having said that ... I do have a soft spot (and you can guess where) for Dracula in Dracula 2000 (or Dracula 2001 in Europe because the film got there later). He's a mean predator, he's Gerard Butler and he has a backstory so clever that I smote my head and shrieked "Why didn't I think of that?!"

Olivia Knight says: Whereas I love vampires because they're supercilious, arrogant, knowing, cultured, and effeminate. It's not always what one wants in a man, but they're top of the "what I look for in a vampire" list. The blood-letting is an unfortunate side-effect for me; the eternal rage and worldweary ennui of perpetual youth is delicious. They come with the added advantage that, being nearly immortal, they probably know more than me, and being a jumped-up supercilious arrogant little know-it-all myself, I appreciate occasionally being trumped. Mostly, though, Lestat's goth-rock and intensity are what catch in my throat. (Nothing to do with the narrow planes and sharp angles of his face at all)
One more thought - the moment of blood-exchange (preferably without the actual dead-body bit afterwards), the feeling what someone else feels, gaining access to their heads - closer than sex, more heated than mind-reading, complete and perfect union: yes, please.

Portia Da Costa - me like Frank Langella as Dracula. :) Suave.Seductive.Romantic.Mass Murderer - the Count who never flashed his fangs.

Madelynne Ellis back again. Darn I couldn't resist coming back for some more. Here's a snippet from my tale, Lust for Blood, in Love on the Dark Side. Because, you know Lucius is one of my favourites.

And he advances.

Perversely, he's prettier now than he was on the edge of the dance floor. It's an ethereal, otherworldly sort of beauty, frighteningly cold, and horribly arousing. A montage of images enters my mind from somewhere outside: licking the blood from his face, smearing it across his chest, him going down on me while I bleed. I can see his tongue delving between my pussy lips, and somehow that seems horribly wrong.

There's a girl dying, right now, because of him.

My sensible self fights its way through the fog in my brain, yelling: "Run! Run! You stupid bitch." But I don't run. I'm numbed. I just shuffle backward until I hit the sinks, which dig into my back, cold and impossibly real.

"What are you doing to me? Don't come any closer!"

My fist tightens around my phone and I wish for the nineties and something a bit heavier. This slender silver shell won't cause more than a slight bruise before it snaps.

"What am I doing to you?" His voice is in my head. His eyebrow asks the question. "I'm not the one with these fantasies."

Alison Tyler says: I can’t think what my first vampire movie was. I’m sort of afraid to admit that it might have been Once Bitten! But I am definitely a fan—in fiction and film, porn and prose. Kiefer is one of my favorites, but I think that Bowie will win the prize for me this time.



By Kate Pearce
I don't really get the whole vampire visual, probably because I'm a wussy and hate the sight and smell of blood. But, I do occasionally like to read vampire romances and two series really impressed me this year from J R Ward and Lynn Viehl. They are both quite different, Ward being more like an addiction while Viehl's are more gruesome and bone cracking.


Apologies for the Amazon tags but I'm rushing a bit here!

Deanna Ashford - I just go for sexy, brooding reformed vampires like Angel and Henry Fitzroy in Blood Ties. I find the fact that they are in some way trying to atone for past actions highly compelling.

Kristina Lloyd says: OK, so I realise David Beckham isn't actually a vampire, and that he doesn't look much like one either. However, he does look like my vampire, Billy, from my novella, The Vampire's Heart. There was a moment on Lust Bites back in January when Mat posted a pic of Becks looking mean and dirty in his army gear. I fell in love, right there and then, and you all saw me do it. And you can see it again right here! I was plotting my vampire novella at the time and I'd already invented Billy - a muscled vamp, blond mohawk, army gear, yum-fucking-yum. And there was Becks on our blog, my lead vampire come to life! Months later, and the novella's about to be published - next Thursday in the UK and January 1st in the US - in a volume called Lust Bites! Ain't life strange? Next week, I'll be here with Portia and Mathilde to tell you more about the book. Did I just do Becks and a shameless plug in one paragraph? I think I peaked.

Teresa Noelle Roberts:
I have mixed feelings about vampires, I have to admit. When I think about the genre too much, I get irked. They're so damn angsty and so many of them shallow, stuck in perennial adolescence despite their great age. You're five hundred years old and hanging out in a nightclub, Mr. Vamp. What's with that?

That said, I can't help picking up vampire-themed books, even if a lot of them don't end up being keepers. What's the fascination? Well, beside the obvious fact that vampires always seem to be preternaturally attractive and often kinky, it's the notion of defeating death.

I started reading Anne Rice back in the 80s with my best friend Gregg, who was gay. I honestly don't know if the books would have fascinated us so much if we hadn't secretly wanted some sexy supernatural force to offer us an escape clause from the mortality that was bearing down on so many of our friends. (Alas, Lestat didn't appear to whisk Gregg away before AIDS did, but I've had the occasional dream in which he appears as an aimable, bookish vampire. He once told me that, gifted with eternal life, he'd spend a lot of it catching up on his reading.)

Oh, wait a minute, this was supposed to be cheerful and sexy, right? I'll throw in a vote for one of my favorite vampires being Jean-Claude from Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake series. The flashy clothes and the "ma petite" get annoying, to be sure, but I love the fact that he's not, overall, filled with angst about being a vampire. He regrets things he's done in his long life, he's haunted by past experiences, but overall, he thinks being a vampire is pretty damn neat. Plus, he's a very incubus-like vampire; he gets more from the feeding if his "donor" is turned on, which sounds good to me.

Dayle Dermatis (aka 1/2 Sophie Mouette and Sarah Dale) checking in!

I don't go for angst. I don't go for brooding. But I do go for cheeky bad
boys, and that's why I love Spike: