Tag Archives: Charlotte Stein

Charlotte Stein Tells Us About Her Novella, Restraint

It’s my pleasure to welcome back to A Hopeful Romantic, one of my very favourite authors, Charlotte Stein, who will be telling us about Restraint, her yummy novella from the Xcite’s Secret Library collection, Hungarian Rhapsody Anthology. Welcome back, Charlotte!

Hungarian RhapsodyRestraint came about because of two things: one, Xcite asked me if I’d like to be a part of this fantastic project, and two, I really fancy Armie Hammer and wanted to write a story about him being a repressed maniac. And so I did!

Basically, my hero is all uptight about sex. My heroine is not uptight about sex. Shenanigans then ensue. I have to say, I absolutely loved writing this story – it came quite easily, because as you may or may not know, I love tales about girls teasing guys to the point of insanity.

So there you have it! My contribution to The Secret Library, in a nut shell. Here’s some links for it, if you fancy having a gander yourself:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Secret-Library-Hungarian-Rhapsody/dp/1908262125?&linkCode=waf&tag=wp-amazon-associate-20

http://thesecretlibrary.co.uk/?page_id=8772

http://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-hungarianrhapsody-788380-166.html

And I would, because not only am I in this anthology, but so are Justine Elyot and Kay Jaybee. It’s practically a must buy!

And if you’re still unconvinced, go here:

http://thesecretlibrary.co.uk/

How amazing is The Secret Library? Look at those velvety covers! They’re divine.

Excerpt:

‘Artie, just fucking let go of me,’ I say, but he won’t, he won’t. And then somehow it’s just me and him, squirming and thrashing around in the bubbly water, limbs getting tangled, everything getting more and more frantic until…until…

We both go very still, all at once. I don’t mean to. Most of me wants to keep trying to get away, but once I feel the thing that’s very definitely happened I can’t even manage a weak wriggle. And as for him, well…he’s gone beyond rigid and into some state of temporary paralysis.

I turn my head just a little to see if I can make out an expression on his face, but there isn’t one. He’s just blank—so much so that I’d assume he was dead if I couldn’t see the flush creeping up over his cheeks.

And if I didn’t know what the hard thing was, that’s currently pressing right up against me.

He has an erection. Dear God, he has an erection. I can feel it against my thigh, so heavy and so obvious I don’t even need a paradigm shift to figure it out. It’s just there, like a pointed finger:

Artie is turned on. The squirming or the words or fuck knows what has turned him on, and now his big stiff cock is apparently super-glued to your thigh.

‘Okay, well—’ I start, though I’m not sure how. I’m almost grateful he interrupts me, because God only knows what words I would have used to finish that sentence. I thought you were a Eunuch, maybe? I can’t believe you’re actually able to achieve stiffness, perhaps?

I just don’t know, and apparently neither does he.

‘Please don’t say anything,’ he says, but strangely he doesn’t blurt the words out in a mean way. He hardly sounds angry at all, anymore—just mortified. And though that’s perfectly understandable, I can’t help thinking even stranger things, as we lie like that in a sea of bubbles.

I’m practically on my back, over the little plastic seats beneath the water. And he’s almost over me, his legs between mine and his big chest pressed against my breasts. I’ve got one arm around him, though I don’t know when that happened, and the second I shift just a little I realise he’s got an arm around me, too.

We’re almost in some sort of weird embrace. Somehow, we’ve struggled and shifted until we’ve locked our bodies together in a very familiar shape, and the longer this silence goes on for the more obvious that fact becomes.

His hand is pressed to the small of my back. The way that men do when…you know. They want to get a bit of traction and maybe fuck into you harder. And I can feel something in him, too—a kind of tension, vibrating through his body. As though we were in the middle of a good screw and I suddenly told him to stop.

Don’t come yet, I think, mindlessly, and this giant awful thrill spills through me.

What if he is about to come? What if he jerks and spurts all over the insides of his shorts—or even better, all over me? I can’t for the life in me imagine what someone like Artie would look like, if they had an orgasm, but I can feel my mind trying to gather the image together anyway.

That tight, tense face of his, suddenly slack with pleasure. God, that mouth. Would he bite his plump lower lip, maybe squeeze his eyes tight shut? Someone like him would never moan, but the thing is—what if he did?

I’d die. I’d die.

Zombies, Threesomes, and Charlotte Stein’s New Novel, Reawakening

I’m elated to have one of my very favourite erotic novelists as my guest this week. The Mighty Charlotte Stein is here to tell us the story behind the story of her sexy, scary, exciting new novel, Reawakening. Welcome, Charlotte!

 

Reawakening started with 28 Days Later. In fact, every zombie based thing I write, dream or think about started with 28 Days Later.

Yep, I’m that sort of zombie fan. I mean, don’t get me wrong. I love the original George Romero movies. I really do. I think there’s room in this world for fast moving zombies and slow moving zombies – though hopefully not literally.

But there’s just something about the speedy, furious, ravenous zombies in 28 Days Later that gets to me. It had a visceral impact on me, that movie, and ever since watching it I’ve spent serious time imagining what the world would be like after a disease of that nature took hold.

Which is how Reawakening came to be.

Of course, there are other contributing factors. Like with most books, I usually start with a scenario and a hero (or heroes), and this book was no exception. At the time of writing I was pretty much obsessed with the new A-Team movie – not because it’s any good, but because Sharlto Copley and Bradley Cooper are so gorgeous and charismatic as Face and Murdock that they kind of warped my brain.

Which is probably a terrible way to describe the writing process, but it’s true. My brain was warped by the A-Team and zombie movies, and then I just had to write Reawakening. Of course, I’m sure there were other contributing factors, here. Important, writerly stuff like:

My muse spoke to me in honeyed tones and I couldn’t not eat nor sleep until I had committed the words to paper.

Or perhaps:

My tortured artist’s soul forced me to eke out each word in a pen filled with my own blood.

But really, if I’m being honest, my urge to write has and always will stem from my love of men, of relationships, of crazy scenarios I can never experience myself. I want to smell and taste and touch the zombie apocalypse. Even though it’s gross and probably flavoured with rotted limb.

And more importantly I want to smell and taste and touch Jamie and Blake, who are not flavoured with rotted limb. They are gorgeous and sexy and they bring my heroine back to life, through the magical wonder of threesomes.

What more could a girl ask, from the men in her life?

Blurb:

June has spent the last two years of her life trying to avoid death at the hands of murderous psychopaths and ravening zombies. So when Jamie turns up on the scene, careless, still whole and promising her safety on a little paradise island, she isn’t quite sure she can trust him. Especially when he tells her that it’s just him, and his equally big, burly, handsome friend Blake.

But Jamie and Blake are even better than her wildest dreams—sweet and funny and charming. And worst of all: sexy as hell. Though they’re trying to be gentlemanly with her, all she can think about is how much she wants to get tangled up in them, and forget the nightmare the world has become. She’s waiting for her reawakening—back to life and happiness and love.

And they seem like just the right sort of men to wake her—body and soul.

Excerpt:

All June could think was—Kelsey is dead, Kelsey is dead, Kelsey is dead—while the image of the ravening hordes feasting on Kelsey’s body played behind her eyes. She tried to shut it off, keep it down, keep running before they got to her, but Kelsey’s blood was still wet and all over her right arm.

And if Jamie hadn’t shot Kelsey—right as she was still screaming, and begging for help—she’d be one of them, now. That’s what happened. Once they bit you or bled on you or hell, spat on you, you had maybe thirty seconds.

Before you turned.

She needed to stop, just stop for a second. Lean against something and catch her breath. But Jamie had somehow led them into this building and he just kept running and running—only up instead of out.

June didn’t even know if Jamie was really his name, or if he was leading them right into a dead end. But he kept going, none-the-less.
She could hear the hordes, busting through the door below. He’d barred it, but they were coming in anyway, to this place that was an almost total deathtrap. The staircase was narrow and blanketed in darkness, one winding section after the next. Even if she dared to pause and look over the railing, she wouldn’t be able to see them until they were almost on her.

“Jamie, wait!” she shouted, but not because things would be easier if he had hold of her hand or was there to comfort her in this dire hour of need. She’d made it this far, on her own.

Or at least, she’d made it this far, with Kelsey.

No, it was just that—if he kept going, eventually they’d be trapped, on the roof. And she couldn’t have that. That was one of her and Kelsey’s rules—don’t run to someplace with only one exit.

Only it was just her rule, now. This guy, this Jamie…he didn’t seem to have any rules. He’d decided to run to the roof of a twenty story building then potentially wait outside until the hordes pushed through a probably very flimsy fire door.

Kelsey had said to her. She had said—wait. He’s as crazy as they are. A safe island? He’s nuts. We can’t go with him. He’s probably an insane apocalypse rapist.

And she’d been right, God help her. Maybe not about the insane apocalypse rapist part, but even so and besides—there was still time for that. He could be anyone, be into anything. He could have planned this all along…Kelsey’s death, the run to the roof…hell, maybe he had a whole party of insane assholes up there, just waiting to do horrible things to her.

Even if that was as nuts as he now seemed. Why would he trap himself on the roof, just to have a little fun with her? Nothing in her head was functioning in quite the way it should. Connections had been lost. Wiring had come loose.

She still called out to him again, when they got to the level before the last one. Her voice came out hoarse and breathless, burning lungs making everything difficult, Kelsey in her mind making everything worse. But somehow the words emerged.

“Jamie, stop. Take the nineteenth floor exit, okay—we can go back down on the other side of the building—answer me, fuck!”
He did, then. She heard him call out over her own shrieking breaths, the pounding of her sneakers on stone, and the sounds of the once-were-people below, slathering and barking like animals.

There were two cracks, like he’d fired her gun into the stairwell. Though she couldn’t see where he was shooting or at what. Then—
“Just keep following me, June-bug—come on!”

Only it sounded more like come own, because of the Texan twang Kelsey had sworn up and down was fake. And he’d called her June-bug again, because he was crazy, he was crazy, oh dear Lord he was probably leading them to their deaths.

This was all just some final mad hurrah. He was suicidal, and this was how he wanted to go out. Death by stairs or death by zombies—because they were zombies, no matter how much she tried to pretend otherwise—or even worse, death by roof.

Was that what he was going to do? Hurl himself off? Plummet to his untimely end? She didn’t know. All she could really think about was how close the first ravening cannibal was getting, and how unfit she really was. She’d started believing all the cardio was really beginning to pay off, but as it turned out, eighteen flights of stairs and she was out for the count. Her heart clawed at her ribcage. Her thigh muscles screamed and screamed.

While her zombie pals kept coming and coming, as though the stairs were nothing, really. Why, leaping up eighteen flights was like a morning stroll to them! They could have climbed these stairs forever and still had the wherewithal to eat her innards, once they got their claw-like hands on her.

She hit the fire door to the roof just as one of said claw-like hands brushed the back of her shirt.

It made everything inside her leap, including the heart she’d thought had escaped. Whenever they got really close—that was when you realized just how terrible they were. How awful the world had become. How much it wasn’t like a movie at all, but like a constant and unbearable pressure against your sanity, always threatening to make you go over.

She felt like going over, when the door wouldn’t close on them. For a second of pushing and heaving with their hands coming through and all over her, her mind tried to fly away. It told her to start screaming uncontrollably, while clawing at herself—that doing so would really be her best bet. No more running constantly. No more pain over Kelsey—and before Kelsey, Joanne and Pat and the old lady whose name she never learned.

Just peace, finally. One moment of agony, then peace.

Only it wouldn’t be, would it? No, it wouldn’t be. If she stopped pushing at the door and jamming it at them and just God, let the door snap their arms, let it crush them, let it kill them all forever, if she stopped…they’d turn her into one of them. And no matter how much she tried to let it hurt her that Jamie had pointed the gun and shot Kelsey between the eyes, it didn’t. It couldn’t.

Being one of them was worse. After all, it could have been that they’d caught a disease. It might have been that they were infected with something—like in 28 Days Later, rather than Night of the Living Dead. But part of her wondered whenever she stared into their hollow, ink-black eyes, if they’d simply lost their souls.

He looked like it. The one who’d managed to squeeze his mottled face into the crack she was struggling to close in the door. He had no pupils, no irises, no whites to his eyes. It was all just blackness, empty and weirdly unseeing, as though they operated on no more than a bloodlust now. Like upright land sharks roaming the land, blindly searching out prey.

She wrenched the door from him for just an instant then smashed it back into his face. It was a risky move, but oh so worth it. Worth it for the satisfaction, worth it for Kelsey, worth it for everything these things had taken from everyone. People’s souls hadn’t left. These things had stolen them.

And when it slithered away and the door quite abruptly shut, the idea didn’t go with it. It stayed, and festered—so much so that she wanted to open the door for one mad moment, just to smash it back in their faces again, and again, and again.

She wanted to, but Jamie was calling to her. And other sounds were starting to flood through her now, too, other big, big sounds that she should have noticed ages ago.

At first she thought it was some kind of weapon. That he’d found a chainsaw or a pneumatic drill or a wood chipper. Something he’d known was up here all along for them to use against the enemy.

But then the wind whipped up and she turned to see something far more incredible than a zombie eating wood chipper. It was so incredible that she forgot the zombies battering on the fire door, for a second. They’d bust through it soon enough because although they couldn’t figure out handles, the sheer pressure of them would figure out the release bar.

Though it didn’t seem to matter. For the first time in these two years of hell, it didn’t matter. She found herself laughing out loud, high and probably hysterical.

Jamie had only gone and gotten himself a helicopter. And not only that, but he apparently knew how to fly a helicopter. The rotors were going. They were kicking up the fine gravel that lined the roof of whatever building this was, and he was yelling to her—
“Come on, June-bug, get your ass in here!”

She thought of him talking about the island. About his buddy who was waiting for them. How they’d just wanted to find survivors, and populate their safe haven, and how crazy that had sounded when he first started yakking about it.

Then she ran to him.

Links:

http://www.allromanceebooks.com/product-reawakening-550153-140.html

http://www.resplendencepublishing.com/m8/318-201-107-490-1–reawakening-forever-dead-series-book-one-by-charlotte-stein.html

My Blog:

http://www.themightycharlottestein.blogspot.com/

 

Thanks so much for stopping by, and sharing some of the good stuff, Charlotte! Zombies and threesomes really rock!

Hot Under the Collar: Reading at Sh! Raises Temperature in Hoxton Area

I’ve been looking forward to last night’s reading at Sh! Hoxton from the moment I was asked. A reading at Sh! never fails to be fun and hot. And it was especially fun for me this time because it was the debut reading from my new novel, The Pet Shop. I hadn’t expected for my Pets to make their debut on eBook and Kindle quite so quickly, but they definitely got a warm welcome in the packed-out Sh! basement. And if you’re a person who loves the feel of real paper and a real book, The Pet Shop will be out in paperback in October, and there will be more celebrating. I love celebrating, don’t you?

 I shared the coveted pink setae with the luscious Queen of BDSM, and my dear friend, Kay Jaybee, who read temperature-rising excerpts from her hot novel, The Perfect Submissive, and her scorching new collection, Yes Ma’am.

 With Pets and submissives and discipline being the order of the night, Mistress Kay, always prepared for any occasion, lent me a lovely black leather collar to wear to help me get into the spirit of Pets. The woman always knows just how to set the mood.

 The Sh! Shop was all decked out for the occasion in the steamy erotic art of the lovely and very talented Dutch artist, Mayo. If you’re in the Hoxton area and haven’t yet seen Mayo’s lovely art, do stop in and check it out. You won’t be disappointed.

 I love reading, and I love to listen while others read. Last night I had the best of both worlds. And I have to admit, I was very proud to be able to do the first two readings ever from The Pet Shop. Though Tino was as rude as I expected him to be, even with me wearing Mistress Kay’s collar. I also had the opportunity to read one of my favourite scenes from The Initiation of Ms Holly as well. I was definitely in smut heaven.

 As always, a literotic reading at Sh! brings out the stars in the firmament of erotica and sexy stuff. The fabulous Rebecca Bond was there, snapping pics and tweeting blow-by-blow action to one of my favourite erotica writers, Charlotte Stein, who couldn’t be there. The amazing mag editor, sex writer, and founder of the women’s group, Fannying Around, Sarah Berry was there. It was also a treat for me to meet Kojo Black, author of the outrageously nasty anthology, The Candy Box. The totally fabulous author, journalist and broadcaster, Tania Glyde was there, along with poetess extraordinaire, Mel Jones. Sigh! And lots of other cool folks. The place was chock-a-block with people laughing and talking, fondling sex toys, listening to smut and sipping pink bubbly.

 As always, the Sh! Ladiez were the best hostesses in the world, opening their doors to smut, fun and fizz and making us all feel welcome.

 The evening ended with those of us who just couldn’t get enough of a good thing shambling off to Pizza Express to continue discussions of book covers and hooking readers on the first page while sharing the photos taken of the evening on iPhones and BlackBerries.

 I’d probably still be there if Raymond and I hadn’t had to catch the last train back to home, but we get to experience the fun all over again with photos shared over Facebook and email

 Back home again I’m making plans for more research in the Lake District for my next novel, Lakeland Heatwave. We’re off on holiday there on Monday. And I’m already looking forward to reading at the Portobello Sh! on July second when the goddess of erotica herself, Rachel Kramer Bussel, will be there promoting several of the anthologies she has edited. I can’t wait to meet her in person and I feel very honoured to be included among a list of writers so hot that if you wrote their names on the same sheet of paper, the paper would undoubtedly burst into flames. Oh yes, it’s gonna be a hot summer.

News Updates

Lots has been happening in my writing world the past week, and I’m anxious to share it with my friends.

Today I’m being interviewed by Romance Reviews Today where I talk about The Initiation of Ms Holly, The Pet Shop,why writing is my obsession, and lots of other cool stuff. Be sure to check it out.

Make sure to check out the fantastic Oysters and Chocolate site for my red hot story, ‘Seeing Red.’ It’s free!

The much anticipated Xcite anthology, Kinky Girls, which includes my sinful story, ‘Confessions,’ is now available. A must read.

The upcoming Cleis anthology, Obsessed, edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel will include my naughty story, ‘Topiary.’ And look at the list of other hot writers who’ll be included.

Obsessed Table of Contents

Silent Treatment Donna George Storey
One Night in Paris Kayla Perrin
Concubine Portia Da Costa
Love & Demotion Logan Belle
Mephisto Waltz Justine Elyot
Then Emerald
It’s Gotta Be Fate Jen Peters
Hooked Ariel Graham
Aftershocks by Bella Andre
Secret Places Adele Haze
Loser Charlotte Stein
Here in Between Kristina Wright
Spellbound by Garnell Wallace
Raven’s Flight Andrea Dale
Raindrops and Rooftops Elizabeth Coldwell
Topiary KD Grace
I Want to Hold Your Hand Rachel Kramer Bussel
Storm Surge Teresa Noelle Roberts
Under Cover Kink Louisa Harte

OTHER NEWS

I’m discussing possibilities for a very hot cover for The Pet Shop with Xcite. The October launch date may seem a long way away, but it’ll be here before we know it.

I’m working on a proposal for yet another novel. More about that as it develops.

More short stories, pointed thoughts and reviews to come, enough to keep you waiting with bated breath.

Charlotte Stein’s hot new novel, ‘Control,’ A Must Read!

Be warned. ‘Control’ is one of those novels. Once you’ve settled in to read Charlotte Stein’s delicious erotic romance, you won’t want to put it down until you’ve properly finished and relished every last word.

Madison Morris’s naughty bookstore, Wicked Words, seems a strange place for repressed Gabriel Kaufman to take up employment, especially when Madison’s training techniques evolve to a kinky threesome with aggressive Andy Yarrow. But Gabriel is up for the training, and they all get a lot more than they bargained for.

‘Control’ is a novel full of kinky, naughty heat with a plot that grabs you from page one and doesn’t let go until the very last satisfying sentence. ‘Control’ is sexy, funny, romantic, poignant, and always compelling. But it is the magnificent chemistry between her characters and the delicious interplay amongst them that makes Charlotte Stein’s novel truly unstoppable. Absolutely a must read.