Spotlight on Alonso Darlington

 

Alonso will be very cross with me for spotlighting him at this time of year. He would growl something about not being a damned mascot for a holiday corrupted by commercialism. Come to think of it, Alonso will be cross with me for spotlighting him anyway. He likes to keep a low profile, and I’ve already blown that for him, so I am not on his favourite persons list. Nevertheless, when someone asks me who my favourite male character is in my fiction, his name is in the top five.

 

Strangely enough, Alonso’s story revealed itself to me almost by accident. He was my first vampire. I was very intimidated by the thought of writing vampires at the time. I’m still not sure if he whispered in my ear or grabbed me by the throat and bared his fangs. Whatever he did got my full attention. Alonso Darlington is most definitely a vampire, and a pretty damn scary one too. His story was the first proper M/M romance I ever wrote. Calling it proper, however, might not be the best choice of words. Some M/M fans were a little put off by his early vicarious use of his succubus familiar to help him find out details about Reese Chambers and satiate his lust for the man while at the same time keeping him safe. Alonso doesn’t normally play well with humans.

 

I never imagined when Alonso Darlington shoved his way into my head that he would become one of the main characters in my Medusa Consortium novels, and that he would also become one of the characters my readers most lust after. Since his revelation to me, there have been multiple sexy vampires who have stepped out of the dark to seduce me with their stories, and his role as one of Magda Gardener’s most valued allies has made him an endless source of writing pleasure for me. Below is an excerpt of Alonso’s first encounter with Reese Chambers from my novella, Landscapes.Enjoy!

 

 

Landscapes Blurb:

 

Vampire, Alonso Darlington has a disturbing method of keeping landscaper, Reese Chambers, both safe from and oblivious to his dangerous lust for the man. But Reese isn’t easy to keep secrets from, and Alonso wants way more than to admire the man from afar. Can he risk a real relationship without risking Reese’s life? And if Reese finds out the truth, will there be any relationship left to risk?

 

 

Find Out Who He Is – Landscapes Excerpt:

 

It wasn’t that Reese Chambers made my cock hard – though he did. It wasn’t that he was beautiful in a rugged, leather and stone sort of way – though he was. It was that Reese Chambers moved me in ways I had not been moved in a very long time, in ways that I, who never lacked just the right words to express myself, found my vocabulary inadequate to the task. Talia would call it an obsession, and maybe it was; from my first sight of him mantling his sketchpad like a bird of prey over a fresh kill, alone in the midst of the crowded pub, I could think of nothing else. It was my first night back on British soil. It is said that you can never go back home, and it had been a very long time for me. But the need to come home was in my blood like fever these past years, as were so many needs that never left me, but only sharpened with the passing of time.

 

Next to me, Talia droned on about suitable residences in Cumbria, about the leasing of a car and the making of necessary renovations. The Twa Dogs was busy for a Monday night with tourist season past, but being invisible was always easier in a crowd.

 

*****

 

‘Find out who he is.’ I nodded in Reese’s direction. Before Talia could protest, I continued. ‘I have a roof over my head, and I’ve fed. There’s nothing that can’t wait until tomorrow.’

 

Talia’s cheekbones flushed with the rush of blood, and heaven knew how beautiful she was in such a state, porcelain pale skin, midnight blue eyes and hair, which was so close to black that no one but I would have noticed all of the other colours in her silken tresses. She knew what it was I asked of her, and she knew the delicate line she tread on the rare occasion when I did ask. A tremor passed up her long, straight spine, and a bloom of tiny goose bumps textured her bare arms. It would not be painless, what I asked, and I knew she feared it as much as she longed for it. I could hear the thud thud of her pulse in the thin, silken skin of her throat as she swallowed the sudden dryness of fear. ‘What do you want to know?’

 

I leaned forward to rake the tip of my thumb against the pulse point in her temple. ‘Everything, Talia. I want to know all of it. And when you know, come directly to me. I don’t care what time it is when you return.

 

 

It was nearing dawn when Talia returned to our accommodations smelling of sex, as I knew she would if she were to obtain for me what I wanted. By then my blood burned in my veins, and my body felt too close to me, as though the flesh that I dwelt in suddenly conspired to crush me with its demands. And though I knew that Reese Chambers could not have refused her even if she had come to him as a toothless, foul-smelling hag, I hated her that he had poured himself into her body while I had been left with only my fantasies kindling my lust to an inferno.

 

Though my need was such that my flesh was fevered and my cock an insistent throb, until she returned, I held myself contained within skin that felt too thin. When she saw the state that I was in, she pulled the heavy drapes with an efficient tug, then with a nod of her head, motioned me to follow her down into the basement room that had been prepared for me. When she turned to me at the foot of the bed, before she could opened her kiss-bruised lips to speak, I took her mouth, starving for the first taste of him, the taste of his saliva, the taste of his blood, mixed with hers. She’d bitten him; he’d bitten her back. He was rough, and he liked to be treated rough, but he kept that to himself. He was embarrassed by it. His lips were slightly chapped from so much time in the sun and wind, and they’d slid against hers, suckling and stroking and pressing until her mouth opened to his. With ravenous laps of my tongue, I tasted him in her mouth, and she held back the moan of response, so I could hear the echoes of his groans, heavy with need he’d not satisfied in awhile, and I felt kinship in my own unsatisfied needs. Images of him flashed through my head. Christ, his eyes were green, dark green like the evergreen forests of the north, and he kept them open when he kissed her, taking her in with his gaze.

 

I shoved aside the silk of her low bodice exposing her breasts, breasts that his hands had cupped. My nipples peeked to sharp aching points at the feel of his calloused thumbs raking, pressing and releasing. I breathed in his scent on her breasts, burying my face in her cleavage, licking the taste of salty, slightly picante maleness, sniffing and tasting until I could stand it no more. In one violent jerk, I tore the dress all the way down and shoved it off her shoulders, away from the flesh he had licked and kissed and mounted. I cried out at the feel of him, weight on one elbow, knee spreading her thighs, fingers opening her heaviness, anxious to penetrate, anxious to relieve his need. And then, with Talia free of clothing, Reese Chambers’ essence filled the room. Talia’s panties were still wet with his semen mixed with her humid desire, and I tore them from her and forced her onto her stomach, onto her hands and knees, so that it was not her face I saw, but his that I imagined. With hands on her hips, I raised her bottom in the air and spread her still swollen, still slippery folds with fingers made awkward by my arousal, letting the scent of his hot bread and honey release intoxicate me. Then I buried my face in her snatch and, as I ate his lust from her, I knew him.

 

He was Cumbrian born and bred, and his accent was the soft lilting sound of the fells. He was a landscaper and a gardener by trade. His hands held the magic of the earth and his mind conceived ideas for beautiful outdoor spaces; those he liked best were patterned after Renaissance and medieval gardens. He was homesick and heartsick. He’d gone to Surrey to work with his father because the money was good. But his father had died recently and he had returned home to Cumbria. He didn’t care if he had to work in a pub or muck stables. He wanted to be home. He missed the people and he missed the fells. He missed the simpler, more honest rhythms of life. He was shy, even a bit reclusive. He read voraciously and widely, he liked astronomy and he was afraid of snakes, though it embarrassed him to admit it. He hadn’t had sex in a long time, and found it better to have a wank than a meaningless encounter. The facts of him, the details of his life raced at me in a flood I consumed ravenously with each lap of my tongue.

 

As I ate Talia I felt the shape of his face, the curve of his chin, the rise and fall of his chest as he had done the same. I felt the soft tuft of bronze curls nestled between the hard rise of his pecs and the courser, deeper curls that caressed his testicles and his cock when it was at rest, but it hadn’t been at rest. How many times had he taken her? He was thick enough to fill her and the friction of him inside was delicious and maddening. The shape of him – I wanted to caress the shape of him, with my hands, with my mouth, and the taking of his essence from Talia was an act of ripping away something that should have been mine. As I bruised her arse with kneading fingers and, as I licked the last of his release from her, she managed a breathless moan. ‘Take the rest. God, Alonso, take the rest, and release me.’

 

Out Now—A Kink a Day Book Four by Kay Jaybee (@kay_jaybee) #BDSM #erotica #femdom

Need some time out from reality?

If ever there was a time to indulge in some kink laden fantasy, then this is it.

What better way to escape from the world for a while, than by enjoying a daily, bite-sized, morsel of erotica?

Each book in Kay Jaybee’s A Kink a Day series provides eight hot reads. One for each night of the week and a spare in case you fancy a weekend lie-in.

Blurb:

From a restraint fantasy in a dusty South African quarry, to the soap-frothed kinky reminiscences of a soldier; the sexy end-of-the-line activities of a bus driver, to the hidden world where willing men do “Just As She Says”, A Kink a Day Book Four, provides a bite-sized moment of lust-fuelled distraction for each day of the week- with an additional erotic fantasy to enhance your Saturday morning lie-in.

Available from:

Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/2o6ED5R

Amazon US: https://amzn.to/2nctzUT

Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/books/1133876869?ean=2940163348657

iBooks: https://books.apple.com/us/book/a-kink-a-day-book-four/id1481859237

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/gb/en/ebook/a-kink-a-day-book-four

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/960583?ref=cw1985

*****

Here’s an extract from the beginning of Brick Dust:

‘Tell me. What else did he want to do to you?’

‘He…’ A layer of dry dust landed on Liza’s lips, making it difficult to reply.

‘Come on girl. We’ve got you this far, and hell; you don’t half look good.’

Liza could sense Mick’s urgency. Before he’d tied her up his tone had been methodical and controlled. Now, as the quarry foreman towered over Liza, observing her as she discovered what it really meant to be spread-eagled, naked, exposed, and vulnerable, his Praetorian accent crackled with barely suppressed lust.

‘He…’ She licked her lips, tasting stone grit on her tongue, ‘…he wanted to force me into begging to be fucked.’

With her arms at right angles to her body, and her wrists and ankles roped to parallel winch shafts, Liza had the strangest idea that she must look like an open pair of scissors.

After accepting the temporary job as administrator at the South African sandstone brick quarry, Liza’s main worry had centred around coping with the extreme heat after years of living on the cool English coast.

Once she’d arrived however, Liza had moved on from considering how she would keep cool to how she’d manage to keep her hands off her boss. Within half an hour of meeting Mick, Liza had been fantasising about what it would be like to sit on his lap; slowly rising her arse up and down, as her body engulfed his thick, solid cock…

That afternoon, sat at office desks, Liza had been struggling to coat the back of her neck with sun cream, and Mick had offered to help.

If Mick had stopped applying the lotion once he’d covered her neck, then perhaps nothing would have happened. But Liza hadn’t wanted him to stop. She’d daydreamed so often about the site foreman giving her a more thorough lotioning than was strictly necessary, she hadn’t complained when Mick lifted her vest top over her head and began to anoint the rest of her back.

It was only when Mick moved to her front, that the reality of discovery had invaded Liza’s brain. The idea that someone could walk into their office had dragged her fantasy fuelled imaginings from the tug Mick was creating at her crotch, and caused her to defensively cover her white bra with her hands.

‘What is it with you?’ Mick sat back, more amused than annoyed. ‘One minute you’re asking me to run my hands all over that hot body of yours, and the next you’ve gone cold. Who you hiding from?’

‘What makes you think I’m hiding? I just don’t want anyone to walk in and see me with your paws all over my chest.’

‘Come off it. You’re hiding. Why else would you be working in the middle of nowhere for six months when you could be running some nice clean company back home.’ Mick winked at Liza, the fact she hadn’t complained about his hands being on her tits silently hung in the air between them.

‘Anyway, you’re not the first. Nearly everyone who takes your job is avoiding something somewhere else. What’s your excuse for turning up here? Not just to give me wank dreams surely?’

Perversely pleased that she’d been having as much an effect on Mick as he had on her, Liza gave him a half smile. ‘You wank about me?’

‘Believe it. You’ve done some unbelievable things in my head…’

(A Kink a Day Book One, Book Two and Book Three are already available as eBooks from Amazon, Smashwords, Barnes and Noble, and all good retailers.)

*****

Bio

Kay Jaybee was named Best Erotica Writer of 2015 by the ETO

Kay received an honouree mention at the NLA Awards 2015 for excellence in BDSM writing.

Kay Jaybee has over 180 erotica publications including, A Kink a Day- Books One-Four (KJBooks, 2018, 2019), The Voyeur (Sinful Press, 2018), The New Room, (KJBooks, 2018), Knowing Her Place-Book 3: The Perfect Submissive Trilogy, (KJBooks, 2018),  The Retreat- Book2: The Perfect Submissive Trilogy (KJBooks, 2018), Making Him Wait (Sinful Press, 2018), The Fifth Floor- Book1;The Perfect Submissive Trilogy (KJBooks, 2017), Wednesday on Thursday, (KDP, 2017), The Collector (KDP, 2016), A Sticky Situation (Xcite, 2013), Digging Deep, (Xcite 2013), Take Control, (1001 NightsPress, 2014), and Not Her Type (1001 NightsPress), 2013.

Details of all her short stories and other publications can be found at www.kayjaybee.me.uk

You can follow Kay on:

Amazon- https://www.amazon.co.uk/Kay-Jaybee/e/B004O0S9GO/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1534155776&sr=1-1

Twitter- https://twitter.com/kay_jaybee

Facebook –http://www.facebook.com/KayJaybeeAuthor

Goodreads- http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/3541958-kay-jaybee

BookBub- https://www.bookbub.com/profile/kay-jaybee

Kay also writes contemporary romance and children’s picture books as Jenny Kane www.jennykane.co.uk  and historical fiction as Jennifer Ash www.jenniferash.co.uk

Release blitz organised by Writer Marketing Services.

October Steamy Paranormal Romance Freebies

 

 

 

Summer is seriously gone and the rains have begun in earnest here at Grace Manor. I’m trying not to let my SAD get the best of me. My antidote for dark and gloomy weather is always a good writing session or a good read. Both always make me feel the dark days a little less, and appreciate the power of words a little more. And a good read brightens up my day even more if it’s a goof FREEBIE!

 

October Steamy Paranormal Romance Freebies

 

Ah! October! Honestly, can you think of a better time to curl up with sexy witches, vampires, ghosts and shifters? With Halloween on the horizon, followed closely by All Hallows, the Day of the Dead, what could be a better treat than a scary-sexy demon? And the treats are even sweeter when they’re FREE! The October Steamy Paranormal Romance Freebiespromo offers a whole yummy list of sexy, steamy, scary reads by your favorite PNR writers, plus a chance to get acquainted with some new authors as well. Of course yours truly has a novel on that list. What a wonderful way to celebrate the autumn and gird your loins for the winter fast approaching.

Author interview with Queenie Black @queenieblackwr1 #topfive #amreading #romance

What is your favourite and worst part of the writing process?

I love the initial discovery, putting the story down in its first raw form. It’s an exhilarating and beautiful journey of discovery. I don’t know where it’ll go, and I love every minute of the process. The part that kills me, exhausts me and feels like walking through syrup is the rewriting, editing and polishing process. I can write the first draft in a few weeks, but the other stages can sometimes take years because I keep putting them off.

 

What are common pitfalls for aspiring writers? 

  • Waiting for inspiration. Too many aspiring writers think they can only write when the mood is upon them when really, it’s about discipline.
  • Thinking they can circumvent the process, cut corners and not do the learning. The end result is putting their work out there before it’s ready.
  • Giving up on a WIP because of rejection.
  • Trusting friends and family to critique their work and then believing it over professional feedback.

 

You use a pseudonym. Why is that? 

In my professional life I teach adults English as a Foreign Language and I also teach people how to teach English. I really don’t want my erotic writing to become common knowledge because I teach a lot of people from countries where things like this might be scandalous. I like to keep the two completely separate.

 

What do you think about writer’s block?

I’m in two minds about it. I believe people sometimes struggle to write but that’s often because they haven’t taken the time to fill the creative well, or because things in their life are emotionally challenging. Some situations can suck out the emotional resilience you need to be able to write. Time, self-nurturing and being kind to yourself should help. I’m not sure if I’d label that as writer’s block though.

 

Where did the inspiration from Hard-Pressed come from? 

Rose Dainty popped up in my mind. Dainty name versus big muscled woman and I started thinking about what would make this woman afraid to reach out and be who she needs to be sexually. After that I needed to find a partner for her who would be able to handle her strength, the work she does and her penchant for MMA and competitive contact fighting. Lucien was the perfect foil. A man confident with who he is, and well able to support Rose, be the partner she needs without stopping her from being her.

 

What are your three favourite books?

I never get tired of reading Edge of the Enforcer by Cherise Sinclair, Agnes and the Hitman by Jennifer Cruise and Bob Mayer, and What I did for a Duke by Julie Anne Long.

The last two are hilarious and the authors manage to twist the tropes so that the stories don’t pan out in the way you think they will. The first one is just stunning in terms of the characters and the way two people with hang ups and very different needs find a way to have their Happy Ever After.

*****

Excerpt:

I mounted the six shallow steps and faced the double front doors. Twin carriage lights cast a soft gleam over the brass plaque with its discrete lettering:

Club Hard

Private Members Only

I desperately wanted to run back down the steps, leap into my car, and drive home, but if I did, nothing would change, and I’d go back to dividing my time between working out, Candy Crush Saga, and the occasional night out with my friends. I might miss out on learning something about myself, something that could make a difference in my sex life. Worse, I might miss a chance at love.

I stayed, my feet rooted to the floor, but the insides of my hands were so damp, my finger slipped on the brass bell, setting off a short, discordant jangling. I winced as I rang it again properly this time. That certainly wouldn’t endear me to anyone.

Shifting from foot to foot, trying to keep the blood circulating in my toes, I looked around. Behind me, the gravel drive snaked away to a discreet carpark, and trees and shrubs created shadows within shadows. Autumn had finally reached London and in this exclusive part of it, crisp, clean air and earthy leaf mulch replaced the smell of fast food and exhaust.

I shifted again, starting to get irritated. If you were going to demand a woman wear nothing but a skirt that barely covered her butt, and a top that was little more than a bit of elastic bandage—on me it was ridiculous, if I sneezed, I’d pop out over the top—then you should damn well open the door promptly. Now, despite wearing my warmest coat over the absurd ensemble, there was a distinct draught zipping under my hem and freezing my exposed butt cheeks.

I lifted my finger to stab the bell again, and the door swung open.

Bloody hell. A real butler. I was no stranger to mansions with staff. Working as a bodyguard meant I saw the inside of a lot of wealthy homes, but so far, a liveried butler was a new one to me.

“Can I help you?”

I cleared my throat, wondering if there was any etiquette for addressing a butler, aware that my finger was still lurking in the vicinity of his eye. “Umm, I’m, ah, it’s Ms. Dainty. To see Mr. Dufort. I’m expected.”

He waved me through into a large marble-floored hall with a fire burning at one side. A wide, elegant staircase at the back curved away to the upper floors.

“I’ll inform Mr. Dufort that you’re here, if you’d like to take a seat.” He indicated a collection of sofas and easy chairs huddled as if for warmth around the fireplace. I made a beeline for the heat.

“May I take your coat?”

I crossed my arms tightly. No way was I exposing my scantily clad self. “Ah, thanks, but I’m a bit cold.”

“I see my guest has arrived, Henry.”

I turned away from the fire to see Lucien Dufort crossing the hall toward me. The floor seemed to drop a few inches and I had to grab the back of a chair to steady myself as his delicious, rich chocolate voice with its faint French accent wound around me, setting my heart hammering.

A tall, elegant man, he moved toward me with predatory intent, covering the floor in loose, confident strides, but it was his eyes that held my gaze, dark eyes, sharp with intelligence and power. He wasn’t a handsome man. His narrow-bladed Gallic nose, inherited from his mother, was slightly overlarge for that, but his lips were sensual, and the mix of tenderness and lust in his expression as he looked at me sent electric tingles charging down my spine.

“Rose, welcome to Club Hard.” He lifted my hand and pressed a kiss to the back of it, his tongue flickering into the little hollow between my two smallest fingers, mimicking the act of sex. Normally, that would be an instant turn-off, but when Lucien did it, everything inside me melted. I tugged my hand free and shoved it into my coat pocket. This was bad. We hadn’t even started yet and my hormones were doing a happy dance.

“Your coat, ma petite.”

I undid the buttons reluctantly and he stripped it off my shoulders, giving it to Henry before indicating my feet. “Barefoot, please.”

I obeyed, steadying myself with one hand on Lucien’s forearm. I could have rested it there all day, enjoying the feel of thick bone and the flex of hard muscles, but I quickly unzipped my boots and gave them to Henry, who took them as solemnly as if I was handing him the crown jewels for safekeeping. He disappeared, taking my things with him, and I stood shivering, waiting for Lucien to say or do something. I shouldn’t have felt vulnerable. I fought with this amount of flesh on display, so it shouldn’t have bothered me, yet insecurity and apprehension crept hand-in-hand up my spine. “Lucien?”

He cupped my chin, his palm warm and sure, his thumb stroking my cheekbone in a gesture I found calming. “Tonight, you will address me as Monsieur, or Sir.” His words sank deep inside me, reaching a place I wasn’t aware existed. A place I didn’t want to believe existed. I stepped back, dislodging his hand.

Lucien’s cheek creased in amusement. “So, ma belle perle, the challenge begins. Are you ready?”

*****

Buy links:

Amazon USA: https://amzn.to/2lXpCSP    

Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/2kswibm  

Evernight:  https://www.evernightpublishing.com/hard-pressed-by-queenie-black/    

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/958783  

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/gb/en/ebook/hard-pressed-18  

iBooks: https://books.apple.com/gb/book/hard-pressed/id1480423303

 

Blurb:

Master Lucien has one night at Club Hard.

One night…to show bodyguard Rose Dainty that he can be the Dom she needs,

One night…to show her that submitting to him doesn’t make her weak, that true submission requires strength and trust.

Will pushing Rose to her limits prove to her she can trust him with her body and heart, and can she let go of her deepest fears long enough to enjoy her surrender? `

They both have everything to prove and everything to lose.

*****

Author bio:

I’ve always loved writing and I won my first prize for a short story when I was still at primary school. I’m an avid reader of romance and erotic romance and can usually be found with my nose in a book. The dynamics and sheer variety of human relationships fascinate me, and this is what I like to explore in my writing. I live in North Yorkshire with my husband and cat where I enjoy running and Tai Chi.

social media links:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/queenieblackwr1

Website: http://www.queenieblackauthor.com/

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/queenieblackauthor/

*****

GIVEAWAY!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Being Stuck is the Beginning

Like most writers, my first thought of being stuck is always in relation to my work, though this past year is one of the first times’s I’ve ever had writers’ block, because it’s basically been a very tough year emotionally, so I am learning to think of being stuck differently. Like writers, I have a lot of unfinished stories, most have been tucked away because I had other more pressing projects, or the energy just wasn’t there for them at the time. Some get finished, some don’t. Others have evolved into something else entirely or have been cannibalized by still other stories. Even if I am stuck in some part of a story with a plot logjam, almost always a good long walk will help me figure out what to do to move forward.

 

There are a thousand other ways to be stuck that don’t involve writing, and hat got me thinking about the anatomy of stuck. Just exactly what does it mean to be stuck? Stuck is the starting place for a lot of great novels. When I got to thinking about it, it seems to me that stuck is the starting place for most archetypal stories. It certainly is the starting place of the hero’s journey, which is the ultimate story plot, because stuck is quite possibly the scariest place of all — standing on a cliff with toes curled over the edge oblivious to the peril.

 

Stuck often takes the form of the perfect life, the ideal happy-ever-after being lived out day to day. While in the real world, that may be what we dream of and hope for, in fiction, there’s the reason why the happy ending is, in fact, the end of the story. What comes after the happy ending, from a reader’s perspective, is boring.

 

The subtext of happy ever after beginnings is “hold on to your hats, shit’s about to get real.” Our hero or heroine is stuck, and they are about to get unstuck in a really brutal, horrible way. In happy at the beginning stories, spouses die, are murdered, run off with someone else, kids are kidnapped or killed, great wealth is suddenly lost, in fact everything that matters is lost. That shattering point of becoming unstuck is where the story really begins. It is the being kicked out of Eden that we readers have been waiting for. Living the good life does not make for interesting reading unless maybe in a how-to book.

 

The second kind of stuck in story happens when the main character is truly stuck in a rut, same old same old, bored now, want out. This kind of stuck involves the hero or heroine of the story wishing something would change, wishing they were anywhere or anyone else. They are waiting, desperately waiting, for their life to begin. The story starts when they get their wish, and it turns out to be way more of a challenge than they bargained for. They are well on the path to discovery and adventure that will change them forever, if it doesn’t kill them first. It’s only at that point we readers have a story worth reading. And that’s the point at which we writers strive to make readers willing and happy to take that leap with our characters.

 

Whether the character is happy with his life and then loses everything or is bored with his life and then has change thrust upon him, the story can now begin. Enter chaos!

 

While stuck is the jumping-off place from which the real story begins, once that happens, it’s chaos that rules the day. Nothing is easy, nothing is orderly, nothing is safe. The driving force of the story is the mess that keeps getting messier and messier until the hero or heroine muddles their way through and out on the other side to their happy ever after, or at least their happy for now. At that point, there are two choices for the writer. Either consider the tale finished and write THE END, or make a sequel that tears away the stuckness of a happy ever after and cast the poor hapless character back into chaos for round two.

 

I wonder sometimes if, for the “bored now” characters, stuck is hard to endure because stuck isn’t the natural state of things.  For those characters basking in their happy lives, there’s always a neurotic dose of waiting for the other shoe to drop. Either way, stuck doesn’t last because life is in flux, and everything about it is in
motion. Nothing stands still for very long. The journey is cyclical, not static, and moving from stillness into chaos and back again is as much the shape of our natural journey as it is the shape of an interesting story. That being the case, it’s not surprising that readers love to live that journey vicariously, magnified, larger than life. And we writers love to write it for the very same reason. We see ourselves in that cycle, and on some level, even from the safe distance of story, we feel right at home.