Monthly Archives: August 2014

Sea Breeze

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OK, a confession. I haven’t actually drunk a Sea Breeze since I was, ooh, 17? The alcohol to juice ratio is way out. But I have a soft spot for them – they remind me of Monday evenings out on the town with my best friend, mixing cheap vodka and lemonade and eating pizza by the river and then going to a cocktail bar for just one (it was all we could afford) before they called last orders. These days I opt for more sophisticated poisons – New World Sauvignon Blanc, Prosecco, and, as far as cocktails are concerned, the Q-tini, a martini-style mix of gin, elderflower liqueur, cucumber, apple juice and a sprinkling of cracked black pepper.

But when Kristina Lloyd asked if I wanted to join in with her Kinky Cocktail Party to launch the start of her blog tour, it was too good an offer to pass up, but too bloody hard to write a kinky Q-tini story. So, Sea Breeze.

If you’re wondering what a Kinky Cocktail Party is, it’s a day long party to celebrate the launch of Kristina’s amazing new novel Undone. You should totally work your way down the menu, which you can find here. And Kristina will be here, talking about her male protagonist, Sol Miller, on Friday, September 5th.

Anyway, Sea Breeze. Kind of a continuation of this.

***

You think Sea Breeze, you think nice day at the seaside, blue skies, mojitos on the beach, right?

Yeah, not so much.

By the time we went for dinner it was pissing it down. I was still dressed for summer, squelching a bit in my sandals, wet strands of hair clinging to my face. I had to hold my skirt down to make sure I didn’t flash passers-by. I hadn’t checked the forecast before I packed.

We ate huge bowls of pasta, drank red wine, not white, as we usually would. It was pretty much winter out there, after all. After dinner, we headed down to the seafront, in the direction of the pier. I had plans to kick his ass. But the pier was in darkness. Piers shut at night, apparently. Who knew?

Back at the hotel the bar was deserted. We ordered more wine and took it upstairs.

We drank, kissed, talked.

It got late.

He stood up, undid his belt, and slowly pulled it free of his belt loops.

I said something, I can’t remember what exactly. It might have been ‘Ooh, belt…’

He made me lie flat on my stomach. He doubled it over.

And used it to turn my arse the same colour as the wine.

Cream doesn’t rise: the state of UK erotica

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Publishing has a reputation for being pretty cushy: reasonable working hours, long, boozy lunches, fannying around with the press releases…

Last week, I took my full lunch break twice. I went out with colleagues, and had wine with my meal. Why? Because a new Carluccio’s had opened round the corner and you could eat on the house while they trained their staff. And who wouldn’t say yes to free pasta, right?

It’s not the done thing. I have colleagues who never take lunch. Most people stay late. Publishing is, in theory, as commercial and competitive as any other industry.

Why ‘in theory?’ Because it’s also astonishingly reactive. And not in a good way.

Of course, things move forward. But god, they move slowly. We’d been listening to music on portable devices, using digital cameras and buying increasingly sophisticated mobile phones for years before the Kindle came along. Many publishing companies are struggling to come up with a long-term digital strategy: those that have are often big companies buying up smaller companies with both the entrepreneurship and the agility to push the envelope. The rest wait and see what they do and then follow in their footsteps.

Why is this? Honestly, I don’t know. Perhaps because people in the industry – myself included – often have a deeply romantic view of books. We do what we do, partly at least, for the satisfaction of advance copies landing on our desks – that fresh off the press smell, those uncracked spines, that sense that you’re still part of something that makes something tangible, something precious.

I wish, in fiction publishing, that that translated into the right books being published, the right books making it to the top of the bestseller lists. It doesn’t seem to, sadly. Fifty Shades of Grey (which was obviously where this post was going), is a very good example of increasingly commercial publishing: Vintage acquired the rights in March 2012, and the book was released for sale a month later. Given the hype around it at the time, the speed with which they turned it round makes much better business sense than what most people wish they’d done with it: given it a decent edit.

When I first started thinking about this post, a few weeks back, I was planning a different angle. I was planning to defend FSoG.   Because so much of the backlash against it is aimed not at the publisher, nor at the retailers who gave it prime position in their stores, but at the women who chose to read it. When a film comes out and the whole world goes to see it, you don’t hear people saying, for example, ‘Oh, God, you went to see Bridesmaids?!’ The same can’t be said of books. Those of us who wrote FSoG off as both poor fiction and poor erotica, have often been guilty of shaming those who genuinely enjoyed it.

In the autumn after it came out, a friend and I went to a panel discussion at Cheltenham Literature Festival called Fifty Shades of Blue. The session was billed as follows:

Join Brooke Magnanti, author of the Belle de Jour books and The Sex Myth, poet Ruth Padel, author Bel Mooney and journalist Bidisha as they discuss the Fifty Shades phenomenon and each choose their own favourite erotica. Which pieces of erotic fiction do our panel rate and which do they hate?

I don’t recall a lot of what was said during that hour, but I do remember that the bit where the panel discussed their favourite erotica was pushed to the very end. And all but one of the panelists cited a ‘classic’ as their favourite: Lady Chatterley’s Lover, The Story of O… Even the one person who didn’t pick something literary (and I honestly can’t remember who said what) chose a Jilly Cooper novel.

Granted, by that point Black Lace had shut up shop and, I think, was yet to reopen for business. But I was still buying and reading good BL titles that I found in service stations and online, and it felt shortsighted of the panel to completely dismiss anything that classed itself as pure erotica. It was literary snobbery – a reluctance to admit that you got off to anything that you wouldn’t happily have on display in your living room. I felt, and I still feel, that attitudes like that are as harmful to the genre as low quality, high volume titles like FSoG.

Recently, similar discussions have been popping up again. Many erotica writers are being shoehorned towards a particular model designed to mirror FSoG: if they’re not writing erotic romance, it’s hard for them to place their book with a traditional publisher. Which is crazy. It’s been over 2 years: when will longer erotic fiction start to reflect the fact that erotica doesn’t have to ≠ BDSM-themed romance? I like my erotica BDSM-flavoured, and it still drives me crazy!

When I first started learning to write, one of the things my writing teacher was keen to emphasise was that it’s hard to sell a book which classifies itself purely as contemporary fiction. A book is easier to market if you can compare it to something else: whose work is it like? What genre is it? Is it the new Fifty Shades, the new Gone Girl, the new Twilight? It bothered me, and it still does, a bit, not so much in relation to my own writing, but in relation to my own reading: how would I ever discover truly original new authors if everyone was being forced to compare themselves to someone else?

Part of the problem with erotica, perhaps, is that it hasn’t yet learnt to compare itself with books which, while not erotic, nonetheless share a sub-genre. Last Christmas, Kristina Lloyd recommended Elizabeth Haynes’ Into the Darkest Corner to me as a holiday read. I loved it, and when I came back I told her that, via Twitter. The author, copied into the tweets, joined the conversation.

Then, a few months later, she followed and DMed me to say she liked my blog. Obviously, I was thrilled: the author of a bestselling novel was enjoying stuff that I’d written. We had a couple of conversations and I ended up recommending Kristina’s second novel, Asking for Trouble, as I do to anyone who bothers to ask me what my favourite books are. A few weeks later, she tweeted the following:

It is, as Kristina said at the time, pretty unusual for someone outside of the genre to lavish praise on an erotic novel, no matter how good it is. But to me, this is how it should be: authors and reviewers of genre-fiction (and non-genre fiction) recognising erotica as they would any other genre, erotic novels being sold on the shelves alongside all other fiction, rather than squirrelled away in a dusty corner under the escalators (no matter how much that dusty corner turns me on), being part of the 3 for 2s, not having their designated shelf space slowly eroded over time. Only then will things start to change.

Cream doesn’t rise, said someone (non-euphemistically!) in a discussion about erotica the other day. No, perhaps not. But I sure as hell hope we find a way to make it float.

On connecting and loneliness

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If you only read for the hot posts, look away now.

When I set this blog up, I had no idea what it would turn into. My Twitter bio quite clearly says that I write about ‘sex and disability,’ but whenever I do, I feel slightly guilty, like I’m somehow letting down my readers. I lose followers, too. But I fully buy the argument that you should blog first and foremost for yourself, so this post, as you might expect of one written at 4am, is really a post for me. To help me make sense of things.

I have a friend who also has a medical issue that dates back to birth. In the last 5 years or so, she’s on occasion expressed frustration with doctors, saying that they never really understood her condition so what’s the point of expecting them to find long term solutions to pain and other problems that flare up. My answer has always been that things have changed since the early 80s. Doctors *do* have knowledge and solutions now that they didn’t have then.

What I didn’t realise was that that applies to me too. Naively, I thought that because I have a condition that affects 1 in a 1000, it was common enough that doctors understood it inside out, and always had.

That, of course, is not true. And it’s frustrating, given that I last saw a consultant at the age of ten. Since then, my only contact with medical professionals around the whole issue has been when something flares up. Knee and hip pain might get me referred for an MRI. It might get me onto a waiting list for a handful of sessions of NHS physio. I no longer get to talk to specialists about it.

Which means that occasionally, I stick whatever symptoms I’m having into google with ‘+ hemiplegia’ tacked on the end. ‘Depression + hemiplegia,’ ‘Anxiety + hemiplegia,’ that kind of thing. And HemiHelp, which is what that link above leads to, is a massively useful source of information.

Last night, I was talking to someone about why I feel so low, or, more specifically, why I feel so lonely. Part of the problem is that I feel like I don’t know how to connect with people – I have problems with small talk, bonding on a superficial level and making new friends. Sometimes, I said, it feels like I might be borderline autistic.

Well, she said, perhaps that’s true. Have you looked it up? So I did. And here’s what came back:

The answers to ‘does your child have associated conditions?’ were as individual as the children themselves. ‘Yes’ is the short answer, for 69% of parents. A majority of parents said that in addition to the visible physical effects of their hemiplegia, 67% of their children have learning difficulties, while 42% have epilepsy, 40% have visual impairments and 34% have speech impairments. Autistic Spectrum Disorder was also reported by a significant minority of parents (14%). Even more parents (86%) told us about other associated difficulties, with the main problem being irritability (61%). This is followed by attention span (59%), anxiety (55%), visio-spatial issues (50%), maths (49%), obsessiveness (44%) and reading (38%) (Parents’ survey: the findings. http://www.hemihelp.org.uk)

Ah. Suffice to say I think I have a fair few of those issues. Irritability? Definitely. Obsessiveness? Yes, that seems fairly accurate too. And the Visio-spatial issues and maths problems are also relevant.

So perhaps that’s why I have problems connecting. Perhaps that’s why I’m bossy, self-absorbed, selfish, and bad at friendship. It’s not a get out of jail card, but it helps to know there might be a reason for it.

Princess

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It’s a nice room, in a very nice hotel. My choice. I can be a bit of a princess, you see. 

He hangs up his jacket, draws the curtains.

‘Hey’ I say, goading him, ‘I thought you were an exhibitionist.’

He yanks them open again, and the window, too, a bit. Just so we can be heard. The street outside is not so nice.

Pulling me close, he drags my dress over my head, and flicks open the catch my bra. I shrug it off, and lose my knickers, too.

The room is warm – it’s been a hot day – but night has fallen, and it’s drizzling, so when he shoves me up against the glass it’s cold enough against my nipples to make me gasp.

He alternates kisses and filthy, filthy words. I only hear the ones that count. Dirty. Cunt. People. Street. Watching. Slut. Cunt. 

‘Touch yourself,’ 

Oh, fuck. I’m not sure I remember how. I haven’t used my fingers to make myself come since, oh, 2010?

I rub my clit and watch the rain bounce off the pavements. There are people down there now, talking, laughing.

Please don’t look up. 

They round the corner, out of sight. I’m relieved. No wait, that’s wrong. I’m not relieved at all.

I’m … disappointed.

My fingers slow, and he grabs my wrist. ‘Did I say you could stop?’

He spins me round, practically throws me onto the bed. ‘Don’t stop.’

I don’t stop.

I can be a bit of a princess, you see, and princesses do as they’re told.

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Comparison is the thief of joy

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Juniper, at The Cut of my Jib, makes me laugh. We were chatting yesterday and she sent me a message with this quote:

Comparison is the thief of joy.

‘That’s from Mumsnet,’ she explained, which was what amused me. I love the idea of her sitting there trawling Mumsnet for the perfect motivational quote. The original, according to the internet, is attributed to Theodore Roosevelt. Hmmm… somehow Mumsnet actually seems a more probable source. Anyway, more on this later.

I woke up this morning with a sense of shame similar to that I feel when I wake up and *know* that I sent a whole bunch of ill-advised drunk texts the night before. And yet last night I drank less than half a glass of wine. What did I do?

I tweeted about being blindsided by depression.

For someone who overshares about her sex life on the Internet, I feel way more uneasy about talking about my mental health in this way. ‘Look at me!’ it seems to scream. ‘I’m sad! Love me! Love me! Love me!’

So why do I do it?

Because late at night, when you’re alone and it feels like no one quite gets it, it’s easier to share with a faceless crowd on Twitter than it is to tell a real person. Imagine I’d phoned my mum at gone midnight and said ‘Mum, I can’t stop crying. I’m terrified about the future. I don’t know how much longer I can carry on like this.’ What good does that do? All that means is that two people lie awake worrying, rather than just one.

But when I wake up the following morning, it makes me cringe. Telling complete strangers that you’re sitting, shaking, in floods of tears? How pathetic. And that, broadly, is how I feel about my mental health more widely.

I was brought up to believe that mental health issues were something that happened to other people. Other *weak* people. At dinner, when I was a teenager, my mum would occasionally mention a friend of hers: ‘P’s just been put on Prozac again. Seems like everyone’s on it these days, doesn’t it?’ The disapproval was clear.

By the time I was first diagnosed with depression, Prozac was out of fashion. Citalopram was, and still is, the antidepressant of choice. I didn’t start taking it without a fight – my mum’s disapproval was still ringing in my ears – and I’ve never told my parents about the 18 months I spent on it, despite ultimately being honest about therapy.

It felt like a failure.

A lot of what you read about depression tells you that sufferers don’t talk about their feelings, that they suffer in silence, withdrawing, cutting themselves off from the world. I can’t even do that bit right: I’m a noisy, hysterical, selfish depressive – ask me how I feel and there’s every chance I *will* tell you just how shit everything is, that I’ll cry, that I’ll make you so uncomfortable you’ll wish you’d never asked. Most people suffering from depression lose weight. Not me. I stop eating meals, sure, but the food, the fatty, unbalanced, unsatisfying food, continues to pass my lips. Too often.

I’m a failure.

I mean, I’m not, obviously. I have a job that I quite like and that I’m quite good at. I have a handful of friends I see regularly. I’m fucking a guy that I both like and fancy. My family love me. But even though I *know* those things (and I never forget them), in the dead of night, or on an idle Sunday afternoon, they sometimes cease to be true. It feels like no one cares, like I don’t matter, like I’ll never, ever love or be loved.

Of course, everyone else’s life is perfect. That guy my friend’s fucking? Well, he’ll probably fall in love with her and they’ll spend every weekend doing romantic, exciting stuff together and I’ll never see her. (Did I mention I’m
a bitch, as well as being ill?) My other friends live too far away, we’ll drift apart, lose touch. My parents? Well, you can see where that one’s going…

But essentially, this is where Juniper’s quote (hey, Teddy, was that your quote? Forget it, it’s Juniper’s now) comes back in. When I’m low, what makes that low spiral lower still is comparing myself to other people.

It feels like everyone else has plans, exciting plans, every single weekend. Never mind that I’ve already used up my holiday allowance for the year doing fun stuff, never mind that I no sooner get paid than I spunk my salary up the wall doing all kinds of interesting stuff, it still feels like I’m doing it wrong, and everyone else is doing it right. Of course, the boyfriend on the arm in the Facebook pictures doesn’t help…

But it isn’t that, is it, really? I’ve been single and content before now. Friends have had partners who’ve come and gone, and we haven’t lost touch. I’ve been *happy* now and then. No, the problem is that I’m sick…

But sick isn’t a comfort either. People deal with depression in different ways, some better than others, but even I don’t know if I’d rather you told me everything will be ok in the end, or whether you treated me like I’m the same as I ever was.

Last night, I cried until the early hours. I went to bed shattered and burnt out. I woke up this morning feeling much like the sky looks after a storm – my skin was puffy and pale and my stomach was still churning with anxiety, but the worst had passed. My sharp edges felt blunted, as though I were a softer, more approachable version of my usual self. I’m sure a few people will breathe a sigh of relief, reading that.

But I’m not me when I’m sick. I don’t recognise myself. Yes, I have sharp edges, yes I’m a handful. But I’m me. And I have sass.

I want my sass back.

Good girl

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I’m lucky enough to live in a city that gives good date. As the sun goes down, it glints off the golden limestone. The tourists thin out. There are numerous riverside pubs and, well, it’s just bloody pretty, really…

So I was in a fairly buoyant mood as I headed through town earlier this week on my way to one of said pubs. On, get this: an actual date. I haven’t dated for a long, long time. Sure, I play around a bit on OKCupid and Tinder when I’m bored, but the idea of spending an evening messaging a bunch of different guys? Not really my idea of fun.

He seemed a nice guy, but then, the signs had been good from the start. He’d bothered to read my profile before he messaged me, he thought this was a good idea and he didn’t write as though grammar was an optional extra. In the flesh, he was tall, attractive and as intelligent as his messages had suggested. I asked for a glass of wine, he ordered a bottle. Apparently I pay even less attention to the One Drink Bailout than the guys who read my profile.

He asked as many questions as he answered. He didn’t make me laugh, but he did make me smile a couple of times. When I nipped to the loo and asked myself whether I’d consider a second date, I was leaning towards yes. 

When I later told him I didn’t want to see him again, I gave what happened at the very end of the date as my sole reason. Looking back, I was a bit uneasy even before that. As long as we were talking about his MBA, his background or his hobbies, everything was fine. When he talked about women? Not so much.

I could, of course, be completely wrong about this. He might have been recounting his experiences exactly as they happened. His last long-term relationship was true love. Her family didn’t think he was good enough, and they split. He would always love her, and she him, and if anything went wrong in her life, he’d still ‘do anything for her.’ 

Since then, he’d been out with a handful of women he’d met on OKC. And these women, he seemed to be saying, were invariably a bit crazy. One just wanted him for sex and wasn’t afraid to say so. Another, when he told her he didn’t want to see her anymore, started sending him abusive messages. Wow, I thought: of the guys I’ve met online, mostly it’s just a lack of chemistry or stuff in common that stops me going back for more. There’s not normally, y’know, drama.

We finished the wine. He asked if I wanted more. I said I was ok, but I was happy to get him a glass and keep chatting for a bit longer. He turned down my offer, and bought another bottle himself. Hmm. Rightly or wrongly, I let him pour me a bit more. I went to the bathroom again. When I got back, he’d moved our stuff to a table nearer the river. More romantic, I presume.

It got to 11:30, and I wanted to make the last bus. I was still undecided about that second date, but I figured I’d think about it on the way home. He offered to walk me the bus stop. As we rounded the corner of the pub, he cornered me up against a wall and moved in for the kiss.

I’m a sucker for a snog, and I think it’s a good indicator of chemistry, so we kissed for a while. Ultimately, I pulled away. It wasn’t that great, and I still had time to get to the bus stop. And that’s when he pulled a condom from his back pocket and asked if I was ‘sure I was a good girl?’

I should have told him that I’m neither good nor bad. I mean, when I got home that night, my knickers were damp. I have a history of one nighters. Briefly, the flash of that silver foil packet made my heart beat faster, made me crave something different, something one off. 

The rest of me didn’t feel sufficiently at ease to want to fuck him. I hadn’t decided. I wanted more time. All things that have nothing to do with whether I’m good or bad. 

‘Good girl,’ has a place in the bedroom, definitely. I’m less sure it has a place on a first date.