Who’s Really to Blame for Seven Deadly Sins

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Okay, so here it is; the real story behind the story. Here’s the truth about what happened  when dirty minds ran amuck late at night after Eroticon 2012 in the Ibis Hotel in Bristol. I swear it’s the truth because I was right there running amuck with the best.

I can’t say we’d had too much to drink. We hadn’t. I can’t say there were any drugs involved, unless you want to count the cold tablets I was popping for the springtime sniffles I had. What I can say is that we were high on smut writing. We’d just spent the day at the first annual Eroticon in Bristol. That was last March. We’d had dinner with some of our naughty compadres, and then Lily Harlem, Victoria Blisse, Lucy Felthouse and I went back to our hotel, which had a lovely all-night bar. Since we live in opposite directions in the UK, we seldom get the chance to catch up and talk writing, so we were up for the long haul.

Seven-Deadly-Sins-Cover-450(1)Lily Harlem started it. Yes, she’s the one to blame! After some raucous conversation about what we found sexy and what we liked to write about, she pulled out a pen and a scrap of paper and we began brainstorming ideas for smutty anthologies. We considered sex at work for an anthology; we considered sex alfresco for an anthology, we might have even considered food sex. Oh, the possibilities! And then Lily did it! Lily brought up the idea of an anthology about the seven deadly sins, the perfect way to cover all the naughty bases in one filthy swoop.

My hand was the first in the air to write a story about lust. Bet that surprises you, doesn’t itJ Victoria wasn’t far behind me, volunteering for gluttony. Lily was all up for envy and Lucy put in for pride. And so the night went. I’m not sure how serious we all were at the time. It was long after midnight, and to say we were punchy is an understatement. When a party of rather inebriated lads flooded into the bar singing Iris folk songs loudly and badly, we adjourned to Victoria and Lucy’s room and continued planning and scheming.

The next day we all hopped our trains and went back home. My sneaking suspicions is that it was Lucy Felthouse who is to blame for what happened next, though I’m sure that Lily was partly responsible for filling in the three remaining sins with naughty writers, Sarah Masters took up the cause to wax filthy about wrath, Lexie Bay weighed in with sloth and Rebecca Bond took on greed.

And, after that the blame all goes to KoJo Black over at Sweetmeats Press who bravely agreed to take on the brainchild four under-slept smutters had mapped out on a scrap of paper in a hotel bar. Thanks KoJo! Nine months later, Voila! A very naughty, anthology is now available for your reading and viewing pleasure, with illustrations by John LaChatte in the paperback version and in the Waterstones eBook version. Thought the eBook is available in all the usual places, do remember, if you want the naughty illustrations in your eBook version, you have to get it from Waterstones.

I confess, this anthology is truly sinful X seven, and I do hope that this little peek into the naughty origins of The Seven Deadly Sins will lead you into temptation to get your copy, and then let the filthy authors and that dirty boy of an illustrater, John LaChatte do the rest. I forgot to mention you can also buy each of the seven stories separately in eBook format if you have a favourite vice.

Seven erotic tales from seven sinful sirens. The Seven Deadly Sins have never been so sexy!

Aphrodite Gets a Piece of the Action by K. D. Grace
A young voyeur finds himself faced with the almighty task of going global with Lust!

Caged by Rebecca Bond
Greed pushes a policewoman straight to the top. But her quest for power uncovers more desire than she ever knew she had!

Glutton to Gourmet by Victoria Blisse
Anabel has never known when to say ‘when’. But the dashing Roman shows her that quality is just as delicious as quantity.

Green Eyed Monster by Lily Harlem
Penis Envy takes on a whole new meaning when Helen hatches a plan to use her own “cock” to its fullest extent!

An Indolent Seduction by Lexie Bay
When the demon of Sloth sets his sights on the angel Industria, apathy becomes dangerously alluring.

The Sweetest Revenge by Lucy Felthouse

Abigail’s crush on Mackenzie has made her do something stupid. Will Pride come before a fall…or cause them to fall in love?

Something Else by Sarah Masters
A man’s Wrath at the loss of his lover sets him on a vengeful path that leads him through a seedy and sexually charged underworld.

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Blurb for Aphrodite Gets a Piece of the Action:

There’s no place to go but down when, against all odds, sexually inexperienced, nerd’s nerd, JACK CALENDAR gets shanghaied into being APHRODITE’s PA. And she has him going down a lot! Who could have guessed that the moonlighting Goddess of Love had head for business? The hours are long, the work is difficult and the Goddess is demanding and insatiable. Then there’s her family, who make the Corleones look like the Brady Bunch.

A PA’s work is never done, and Jack wasn’t hired for his impressive organizational skills. Nerdy Jack is at Aphrodite’s beck-and-call, because he’s the only mortal she has ever known with a lust powerful enough to match her own. Jack’s never had so much sex. He didn’t even know one could have so much sex – with someone other than themselves, that is. Just when he’s starting to get the hang of serving the goddess, Jack meets the husband, whose jealous temper is volcanic to say the least. Can Jack survive a run-in with the original dysfunctional family, or will he end up just one more manipulated mortal fucked by the gods?

Excerpt from Aprodite Gets a Piece of the Action

‘Hey you! Ass-wipe! Don’t make me come up after you.’

Coming up wasn’t necessary. Startled, Jack lost his balance on the limb and fell out of the tree backward, his fall being slowed by the hard thwack, thwack, thwack of a half a dozen smaller, more supple branches before he hit the manicured lawn flat on his back leaving him winded and stunned.

‘Izzee dead?’ A voice hissed from somewhere above Jack’s prone, breathless body.

‘Course ‘es not dead. His cock’s still hard. Sonovabitch! Hat’s off to ‘im, I say.’

‘Don’t matter. When her dad gets through with him, he’ll wish he was dead.’

‘Shut up, you two. No one asked your opinion,’ a third voice said. Then the owner of that voice grabbed Jack by the arm and hauled him to his feet nearly dislocating his shoulder in the process. He found himself nose to nose to a man with perfectly coifed hair that looked like it came straight from an eighties cop show. And the rest of him looked like a poster boy for a hard core muscle mag, right down to the bad-ass eagle tat rippling up his bulging right bicep. If that wasn’t crazy enough, the man was wearing a toga, for chrissake! His pecs bulged and his nipples looked like they’d been clamped within an inch of their lives. And who the hell noticed a man’s nipples, Jack wondered, especially when Blondie’s old man was about to make him wish he were dead.

‘Tuck it in, Bub,’ Toga Man nodded to Jack’s cock which, embarrassingly enough, still offered a full frontal salute. He shoved and shifted it back into his track suit, but even then it led the way as he fell into step behind Toga Man with two black-suit security types flanking him. What the hell was the matter with him? He could die or worse and he still had enough wood to start a bonfire.

‘Big Z ain’t gonna be happy you watching his daughter do the dirty,’ the suit to his left spoke out of one side of his mouth.

‘You shut your pie-hole,’ Toga Man said. ‘You dunno what makes Big Z happy. Besides, she ain’t his daughter.’

Big Z? What the hell was this, Jack wondered, some kind of Mafioso toga party? They made their way through the enormous marble foyer of the house Jack hadn’t noticed being anywhere nearly so huge from his perch in the oak tree. But then it wasn’t the house he’d been looking at, was it? At last, Toga Man dismissed the Mafia-thugs and fast marched Jack, both hands protectively folded across the bounce, bounce, bounce of his erection, to another set of double doors at the end of a long hallway. He threw them open and with a hand on Jack’s shoulder, half shoved him into an opulent study. There, Jack found himself face to face with the bare ass of a bloke doing the nasty up the bumhole of another, a situation that didn’t prevent Toga Man from announcing loudly. ‘We found this scumbag up the oak tree watching Aphrodite.’

Buy Seven Deadly Sins Now

Print:
Amazon UK
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eBook:
Amazon UK
Amazon US
Waterstones

Getting Medieval with Toni Sands and Her Sexy Knight Shades Trilogy

It’s my pleasure to have the delectable Toni Sands as my guest to talk about her hot new historic Knight Shade trilogy. Welcome Toni! Knights, chain mail, sexy damsels! Do tell!

Toni Sands Knight Shades trilogy9781909335783_FCThank you, K D, for inviting me along today to chat about my latest project. Forgive me if I loosen my lacings and settle my skirts around me. This huge scarlet cushion you’ve thrown me is the perfect match for my gown. And the delicious gooseberry wine you’ve poured must surely be down to your hard work in the vegetable garden?

I hope you’re sitting as comfortably as I am so I can begin …

Wow! Fit guys in chain mail pursuing gorgeous girls with cleavages deep enough to make Friar Tuck choke on his game pie? It sounded fun to me. So I took up the gauntlet thrown down by my lovely Xcite editor and allowed the knight of my dreams to sweep me up on his trusty steed and whisk me away to his raspberry stone castle.

Well, not quite … and I do apologise for involving you in my fantasy. But it’s not difficult to dream of bygone times, when we carry so many images from our childhood. There are countless stories of princesses seeking their Prince Charming, usually a gallant warrior or swordsman with great legs. Think of the many books and movies based on those chivalrous boys who thunder down the jousting ranges, lance in hand. Robin Hood always seems to be around in some form or other, so purely in the interests of research, I checked out Men in Tights but only after my personal favourite among the Jupiter Knights (Tebal the camp one) arrived in my story. I have no idea how he turned up but I love hanging out with him. A Knight’s Tale is another fun flick celebrating ‘silly boys with a horse and a stick’ while the Arthurian legend forms the basis for innumerable stories, movies and TV dramas, not least the BBC’s Merlin series.

My Knight Shades Trilogy (hope you approve of the name) is a mix of medieval, zany and romance. And erotic encounters. Oh and there are Toni Sands Knight Shades9781909335790_FCmagic forces at work within it too. Our hero, Sir Gavin, hits the ground running in Book One as he and his stallion, Sarum, gallop towards a crystal cleft, the portal to another world. Magic allows a writer quite a lot of licence when suspending the reader’s disbelief but hero Sir Gavin’s own strength of character and the power and determination brought about by bonding and of course love ensures the enchantress doesn’t quite get it all her own way.

Yes, I did mention strength of character though you may huff with disbelief when you read Woman of Power and see our hero’s lusty reactions to the beautiful women he meets. Please give him a break! In Woman of Power, he’s newly returned from the Crusades and kind of like a monk who decides chastity’s not really his thing. Lust really does turn to love for Gavin where one particular lady’s concerned but the object of his desires is out of bounds. Plus, Gav’s personal journey towards emotional maturity is hampered by the tricks performed on him by that evil witch playing a complicated game of souls.

The next book, Wicked Woman, takes my knight to a frozen landscape, in part inspired by a visit to the Nordic European country of Iceland. If you like quirky and aren’t put off by freezing temperatures, you’ll be blown away by Iceland. It’s the perfect place for a writer of erotica – so much going on under the surface with thermal energy bubbling away and geysers discharging clouds of steam. The city is ablaze with lights and the bars and restaurants are often lit subtly. Very flattering if one is past the youthful, dewy stage!

Gavin and his fellow-knight accept hospitality from a woman holding a girls’ weekend while the men folk are away on a hunting trip. As Gavin might say, ‘What’s a knight to do?’ Enchantress Sibilla makes more than one appearance, ramping up our hero’s determination to escape her clutches.

Gavin’s liaisons, amorous or otherwise, have repercussions. Women tend to use him for their own means. But he’s no wimp and the third book is intended to hone his character in readiness for the challenge awaiting him as the story draws to a conclusion.

Unforgettable Woman, the final book of my trilogy and almost complete, is destined to be the most poignant book of the three. Gavin’s physical and emotional strength will be tested again as new characters join existing ones. It’s due for publication in January and I hope you’ll stay with my hot knight as he rides on …

Toni Sands Knight Shades SandraMay12 021Before I leave your roaring log fire, I’d like to follow the popular trend and talk a little about writing sex scenes, something which tests writers in many ways. Decisions … decisions. If my hero let his eyes do the touching, should my heroine take the initiative or not? Does she want to open the box of chocolates NOW? Or wait until later? The mind often provides the foreplay. Can a character’s fantasy have a greater impact on the reader than an explicit description of the actual encounter? I do hope so because this is an approach I use within my writing! If two lovers (or would be lovers) are kept apart for story reasons, the author can bring them together upon the page by giving one of them a chance to fantasise. All of us have dreams, don’t we?

I wish you all a sumptuous holiday season, whether you plan to drink mulled wine by candlelight, escape to a tropical hideaway or attend every possible party!

Love

Toni  x

www.tonisands.co.uk

Follow me @tonisands

To buy Book One, Knight Shades trilogy: Woman of Power, please visit

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Woman-Power-Knights-Trilogy-ebook/dp/B00A42VI14/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1355924241&sr=1-1-fkmr0

For my lovely US readers:

http://www.amazon.com/Woman-Power-Knights-Trilogy-ebook/dp/B00A42VI14/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1355925452&sr=1-1&keywords=toni+sands

To buy Book Two: Wicked Woman, please visit

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Wicked-Woman-Knights-Trilogy-ebook/dp/B00APMM2P4/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1355924241&sr=1-1

and for US readers:

http://www.amazon.com/Wicked-Woman-Knights-Trilogy-ebook/dp/B00APMM2P4/ref=sr_1_7?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1355925527&sr=1-7&keywords=toni+sands

You can pre-order the print version of Orchid Pink

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=Orchid+Pink

 

 

An Interview with Chris Unity Bowness Part 1

I had the pleasure of meeting Chris on FaceBook about six months ago, I think it was, and almost immediately we began a dialogue with the plan of getting him onto my site as a guest. After some long conversations and some planning and scheming, I’m very glad to welcome Chris to my site for a two-part interview that’s a true celebration of sexuality. Welcome, Chris, and thanks for joining me!

KD: Chris, we first met online in connection with some lovely discussions we had about my writing, which led to discussions of writing in general and a topic near and dear to both of our hearts, the celebration of sexuality. It’s always lovely when someone who has been merely an acquaintance on social media, through some strange quirk becomes a three dimensional person with an amazing story of their own. And that’s what I feel happened with us. Could you share a little bit about what led you to study sexuality.

Chris Bowness UnityChris: Firstly, I’d like to thank you for inviting me onto your blog, it is a great honour, especially from someone I have a lot of admiration for. Secondly, it’s wonderful when you make a connection with someone in these modern times who, before social media and the internet, may have never met…or was it destiny anyway…but that is a debate for another day.

I’ve always had a passion and thirst for knowledge when it comes relationships and sexuality even in my teens I was far more comfortable in the company of female friends discussing the latest articles in magazines like Cosmopolitan rather than in the stereotypical male domains. Also in those pre-internet times there were programmes like Sexcetera and The Good Sex Guide to name but two which just oozed not only sex positivity but also exploring pleasure within relationships.

After college, two of these friends started running Ann Summers parties and they not only kept telling me how I’d be good at them but also asking me how to give advice to customers. It was quickly after, though, I found out that men weren’t allowed to attend a party let alone run a party business I realised how I’d have to make my own way. Sure there are many jobs behind the scenes of places like this but I wanted a more frontline hands-on approach.

Since then there has been a long evolution to where I am today, happy not only with all the ups and downs that got me here but also how I now see myself fitting into this sector; what I want to provide, but also I have a clear idea going forward of how I want to deliver it

KD: From your own research, why do you think honest, truthful information about sex, especially in the information age, is so hard to come by?

Chris: When I started researching how I could fit into this area there were two main seeds that were planted in my mind. The first one came a number of years ago when I read an article that said that the main reason cited on divorce papers was lack of sex and intimacy and sex and the correlation between, not only the breakdown in communication within those relationships but also the breakdown in communication in society, not only about sex but the discussion of issues surrounding sex and intimacy.

This led me to the second seed being planted, I started researching how and where people could glean information and advice about solving problems of an intimate and sexual nature. This broke down into three areas ‘Googling’, websites, forums.

Firstly, searching the web I feel is bad enough when you’re ill and want to know if it’s serious enough to bother a doctor with. The ‘I’ll just Google’ approach can not only be quite contradictory but also sometimes prove dangerous for many reasons. I feel the same goes for relationship and sex issues. Searching a term like ‘Why has my partner gone off sex?’ can bring contradiction, confusion, and the whole range of results. But also, even in this information age, people still worry about searching for what would be deemed sexually explicit terms and the results that might bring.

Then came websites and blogs. There are very great informative websites out there – ones I have recommended articles from to people myself. However this is still very much a one-way form of communication with no accessible long term support.

This led me to forums. From mums forums, parenting forums, women’s forums and relationship and sex forums — all of them are flooded with people crying out for positive information about relationship and sexual subjects. I often found the responses to these from other forum users – often contradicting each other – frequently brought anxiety and stress to the original poster.

What I garnered from my research is that people wanted long term support and guidance through a range of relationship and sex subjects available to access whenever they wanted.

I know that there are many different types of relationships and I believe along with that everybody’s relationship is unique, like a fingerprint of intimacy. And while many places provide great advice templates to help introduce new things or solve issues, there seems to be a miscorrelation between that template and how people go about implementing it into their situation.

“Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don’t know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and  betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds;  it dies of weariness, of witherings, of tarnishings.”

~Anaïs Nin

Chris Bowness Newsletter logoUnity.1

KD: Could you explain to our readers what you see as the difference between a sex therapist and a mentor?

Chris: In searching for my place within the relationship and sex support area I realised just how many facets there were to it. There were not just therapists but also coaches and teachers who provided lessons in things like tantric sex or BDSM but also many more being areas being created. Only recently I read about learning intimacy through a sex surrogate. The counseling end of the spectrum felt like the last chance critical point of the relationship. As someone put it to me, ‘how could I go to a therapist and pay all that money just to find out how I can give my husband a good spanking!’

However, none of them really felt like they fitted for me. I generally have an issue over labels and stereotyping, anyway. I want to provide a more humanistic personal one-to-one approach almost a one stop shop for sex and relationship advice, providing on-going support or giving information that could be useful at the time or help prevent future problems — an MOT for relationships if you will. I wanted to provide a more humanistic personal one-to-one approach towards not just support and advice for problematic things but also the fun things people want to work on too.

It was then in an unrelated way I came across the definition of mentoring, and over time I have developed my own definition for relationship and sex mentoring:

“Mentoring is about a relationship approach to providing an ongoing and sustained level of knowledge and support in relation to improving the recipient’s personal, relationship or sexual development; through various forms of informal communication most usually – but not limited to – face-to-face; as well as providing answers to occasional questions and ad hoc help. It also goes deeper to providing a long-term relationship of learning, support, advice, dialogue and challenge.”

There is often an idea based around knowledge and development, about the planting of seeds. I also believe when it comes to relationship and sex development the ground you plant those seeds in has to be ready, prepared and happy to receive such seeds. I have often found that planting seeds by the positive promotion of sex and relationships messages is enough to make me available to those people who are quite often looking for help.

KD: What role did reviewing sex toys play in the journey you’ve made to mentoring?

Chris: We chanced upon a call in a now defunked  magazine asking for couples to review a range of adult products for a regular feature. When the opportunity fell through we started to email adult retailers looking for an opportunity to review items in return for free products. Not only did this bring a lot of fun into our lives but it also allowed us to provide clear concise knowledge to others not only on what’s best to spend their hard earned cash on in the bedroom but also advice on how to introduce and have fun with these products.

In these modern times, in these post 50 Shades times, there are still limited places you can go and actually get your hands on sex toys, see them for yourself, what they really look like and feel like and what they do – don’t you think that’s strange?  This helps bring a positivity to sex by adding things which help explore pleasure. That allows us to help others choose such products.

Finally somebody took a chance on allowing us to dip our toes into the review pool of pleasure devices. Now we are regular guinea pigs for a couple of websites and the developers of sex toys and other adult products. This gave me the motivation to begin looking at how I could be a part of this fabulous industry. Hopefully we can dispel that myth that suggests the use of sex toys is out of boredom or a failing relationship and get people thinking that this kind of exploration can help create a long term, healthy, passionate relationship.

A Taste of London by Lucy Felthouse

A Taste of LondonRyan Stonebridge and his friend Kristian Hurst are heading off on the trip of a lifetime. They’re spending their gap year traveling the world and expect lots of sun, sights and sex. The guys have a couple of days in the English capital before catching the Eurostar to Paris. Unfortunately, a family emergency means that Kristian has to head back home for a while, leaving Ryan to continue the trip alone.

Luckily for Ryan, he’s an attractive guy and there is no shortage of gorgeous women available to help take his mind off Kristian’s family drama.

Buy links: http://lucyfelthouse.co.uk/published-works/a-taste-of-london/

*****

Chapter One

“Come on, mate, let’s go and grab our travel passes from the machine,” Ryan said, his familiarity with the locale apparent by the way he marched along the train platform toward the heart of St. Pancras Station.

“What? Uh – okay.” Kristian re-arranged his bag on his shoulder and scurried to keep up with his friend.

Bypassing the huge line of impatient, muttering people queuing for the manned booths, Ryan headed to one of the ticket machines. By the time Kristian caught up, Ryan already had a travel pass in his hand.

“So, um, what do I need to buy then, mate? I’m not as au fait with all this as you.”

“Been practising your French for the trip, Kris?” Ryan punched his friend on the arm playfully. “No worries. We’re only taking one trip tonight so you just need a single to London Bridge on the Tube.”

“All right,” Kristian replied, carefully tapping the relevant areas of the touch screen, feeding his money into the machine and triumphantly retrieving his ticket.

“Okay, I’m ready to go!”

“Come on then.” Ryan hoisted his bag back onto his shoulder and walked in the direction of the Underground, with Kristian close behind.

“Hey,” Kristian said, pointing as they passed a map of the Underground, “don’t you need to check where we’re going?”

“Nope,” Ryan said, without breaking stride, “I know London pretty well, plus I double checked all this stuff when I organised this part of the trip. What can I say, it’s the Boy Scout in me.”

“Cool. I guess it makes things easier when you’re not checking a map every two minutes. So how long will it take us to get to London Bridge station from here?”

They stepped onto the escalator. Rather than standing still and letting the moving staircase do its thing, Ryan continued to walk, eager now to get this leg of traveling over and done with so he could have some fun. It had been a long day, or at least it felt like one. They’d actually only traveled around one hundred and fifty miles from the outskirts of the Peak District to the centre of London, a couple of hours on the train, but it had felt like longer. Perhaps because he’d been so eager to actually get to London and start their adventure.

“Not long mate. Probably about ten minutes. It’s a direct journey and at this time of day it shouldn’t be too busy. We can dump our stuff at the hostel then have some drinks next door.”

“There’s a pub next door? No wonder I let you sort out this trip. You’re a fucking genius!”

By now, they’d reached the bottom of the escalator. Ryan stepped off, then turned to face his friend. Tapping his head, he grinned and said, “It’s not just a hat rack, mate.”

Kristian laughed. “You’re right there.” He paused. “It’s a fucking chick magnet, too!”

Ryan frowned, looking genuinely confused. “It is?” Then he shook himself and smiled. “I wish someone had told me!”

“Are you kidding, mate? Everywhere we go, women are checking you out.” Kristian grinned. “Why do you think I agreed to go traveling with you? I’m hoping some of your apparent sex appeal will rub off on me and get me some action!”

Ryan laughed, then started walking towards the southbound platform for their connection to London Bridge. “So that’s your ulterior motive, eh? Never mind being my best mate, or seeing the world, you just wanna get laid?”

*****

Lucy is a graduate of the University of Derby, where she studied Creative Writing. During her first year, she was dared to write an erotic story – so she did. It went down a storm and she’s never looked back. Lucy has had stories published by Cleis Press, Constable and Robinson, Decadent Publishing, Ellora’s Cave, Evernight Publishing, House of Erotica, Ravenous Romance, Resplendence Publishing, Secret Cravings Publishing, Sweetmeats Press and Xcite Books. She is also the editor of Uniform Behaviour, Seducing the Myth, Smut by the Sea and Smut in the City. Find out more at http://www.lucyfelthouse.co.uk. Join her on Facebook and Twitter, and subscribe to her newsletter at: http://eepurl.com/gMQb9

The Grand Tour of A Very Full Room

writing image 2Every year I mention my fascination with the last week of the year, and 2012 is no exception. The last week isn’t like the rest. It’s almost like there are actually fifty-one weeks in the year, then there’s the crowded room at the end, a place not unlike my grandmother’s living room was, all crowded full of the bits and pieces and memorabilia of eighty-three years of living.

The last week of the year is a mini version of that living room, a mental version, a room that everyone has in their head, no matter how expansive the previous fifty-one weeks have been, this final week is the tiny space into which we crowd everything that’s happened in the past year. Then we settle in to the one comfy chair in that room that isn’t avalanching with memories and emotions, and we reflect.

It’s that time again, the last day in our overly crowded room of 2012. We have to enjoy it now while we can because we only have until midnight on 31st December, and then we’ll have to leave this room, lock the door behind us, never to return, and walk into the brand new huge empty room of 2013.

IMG00329-20120523-0945I’d like to take you on a very brief tour of my crowded room because I’m taking one last inventory of Room 2012, and what a crowded room it is! Careful there, don’t trip over all the gardening tools, and can you just step over that bag of compost. Yep, this was the year we got the allotment, weeds, rickety blue garden shed, asparagus patch and all. Hey, yoohoo! I’m over here, squished in the corner behind the four novels, one novella and three short stories. Yep, that’s me! I know, I know, I look a bit tired. Well it has been one of the most challenging years ever, so that’s not terribly surprising. There’s somewhere in the neighbourhood of 450,000 words in all those pages! Oh and then there was all the blog posts, and you know me. I’m noted for being pretty wordy.

That’s it, that’s it, careful there, just squeeze past the telly and around the stack of old Metro Holly 9 July 2012newspapers. 2012 was the year I made my first ever national television appearance on channel 5 news, thanks to the popularity of Fifty Shades of Grey and the wild popularity of the eBook reader. I almost didn’t get there after being sent to the wrong studio, then being stuffed into a cab to get across London in twenty minutes before show time. What an adventure that was! I also got to be on the radio with Phil Rickman. I love radio. It’s still titillates the imagination for me. And then there were newspapers! Wow, I had mug shots and everything! The Daily Express even sent a photographer and a make-up artist so they could capture the smutter in her natural environment.

Careful there, don’t knock over the pile of used train tickets and hotel receipts. It took me ages to get them stacked that neatly. 2012 was packed with readings and launches and adventures in London. And then there were the talks in the libraries in the Midlands! That was definitely one of the highlights of my writing year. The Initiation of Ms Holly was chosen by the wonderful Between the Sheets Project, as one of the top 30 erotica books to be included on the shelves in public libraries in the UK. Between the Sheets was a month-long celebration of erotica including a website and blog and talks by erotica writers in libraries around the UK. I felt like I was a part of history being made. And when Kay Jaybee and I went to speak in the Dudley area libraries near Birmingham, we were bowled over by the excitement and the enthusiasm for erotica and by the wonderful hospitality of the people from the Black Country.

This was the year I became another person. Everyone knows K D Grace writes very naughty erotica. But this was the year when I decided romance should come to the forefront, and Xcite agreed with me. That being the case, Grace Marshall made her debut with romance served hot, and the first course was An Executive Decision, book one of the Executive Decisions Trilogy, which was released in September and very well received, so well in fact that Xcite asked me to hurry on with the rest of the trilogy. That’s what I’ve been up to since the middle of October. The second book, Identity Crisis, has just been finished and is due to make its appearance early in 2013, and book three, The Exhibition, won’t be far behind.

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This was the year we got our allotment. Yes I know, I mentioned that, but since you keep tripping over garden tools and you noticed the freezer full of our over-abundant runner bean harvest, I thought I’d bring it up again. The plot we were allotted in April was about four, maybe five times our entire back garden and it was well-grown with weeds. We still managed a lovely crop of sweet corn, cabbage, French and runner beans and courgettes. And there was asparagus!

IMG00466-20121101-1054I can’t recall a year that I’ve ever worked so hard, and even with all of the excitement and the adventure I’ve never had a year that I’ve suffered so much from self-doubt, some of that, I’m sure, came from the stress of writing four novels as two different authors in one year, plus a 40 thousand word novella. This was a year that tested me and stretched me in ways I could have never imagined at the beginning, when I first walked into this room of 2012, back when it was the empty room. Now, as I reflect, I’m amazed that one year could contain so very, very much, and there’s so much more I could share with you, but really, I’m looking forward to the tour of YOUR crowded 2012!

For me, sales are good and the response to my work has been overwhelmingly positive, and I’m already excited about the projects that are ahead of me. As I look back at this very full room of 2012, I feel like the luckiest woman on the planet.

I spend my days doing what I love most, writing stories. I spend my evenings and nights with a man who loves me and is very supportive of my work. I’m surrounded by wonderful colleagues and friends, who encourage me and empathise with me and share the excitement, and I live in one of the most beautiful places in the world. I already know some of the fun I can expect in 2013, and it will include at least two more novels; the third of The Executive Decisions novels and, at long last, a sequel to The Initiation of Ms Holly. There are also some schemes and plans I’m not quite ready to share yet, but I will definitely be crowing about them when the time comes. Oh yes, I’m going to have great fun filling the empty room of 2013. The key is already twitching in my hand!

Ultimately though, it doesn’t matter if we’re sitting reflecting on all that fills our individual 2012 room, or if we’re frantically trying to fill it still  December Sunset after first hard frostfuller; at midnight tonight, we’ll all take a deep breath, open the door and walk out into the empty room waiting for us in 2013. All we’ll take with us is our memories of the room we left and our hopes for how we’ll fill this bright new room that stretches promisingly before us. Some of us make New Years resolutions, some of us just plow in without a plan of action, but one thing is for certain, this time next year, if we live that long, we’ll be sitting in the full room again reflecting on how the experiences of 2013 have shaped us, anticipating how we’ll take the experiences into the next empty room.

My wish for you is that your reflections in your full room be good ones, satisfying ones. And at the stroke of midnight, that you will enter that bright new empty room with hope and joy and anticipation of how wonderfully you’ll fill it up.