By Jade Melisande
I have a confession to make. I'm a writer of erotic fiction…that doesn't write fiction. Well okay, technically, the stories I write are fiction. But most of the stories I have written come substantially from my own, real-life experiences. No, they aren't word-for-word accountings, and they have been fictionalized: I create a character "avatar" if you will that represents the real me, I populate her world with semi-fictional people and semi-fictionalized events, but, if you looked hard enough, you could find the posts in my blog about my real-life experiences, Pieces of Jade, that correspond to many of the stories I have written.
The first time I tried to write a fiction piece from my own life, I thought it would be easy. That's why I did it. What could be easier than writing directly from reality? The call was for a story of newly awakened lust between two women. I'd just had my first affair with a woman. Easy-peasy, right? But storytelling isn't the same as reciting an incident. And it's more than just having to make up a story to hang the incident on. It's even more than just creating a character, with a life of her own, to populate the reality of the incident.
It's a matter of changing perspective. Of seeing myself from without, as well as within. I have to be both me: in my life, in that incident, in my head and in my body, as well other: this new person, this fictionalized "me," who does and feels these things that I have done in reality, and yet does them for her own reasons, and reacts in ways that are uniquely her.
Because she isn't me. She has her own hopes and dreams and motivations and story to tell. I have to be able to stand back from my self, from my reality, and inhabit hers. And so, in writing a fiction piece based on my own life, I get (and am forced) to live both in the reality and in the fiction. Writing from both deeply inside my own experience, and from within hers, without losing the essence of what it is to actually be experiencing it.
In a way, I have to become a voyeur to my own experience.
When Essemoh Teepee sent out the call for erotica stories by those of us that had attended the inaugural Erotic Authors Association conference, asking for stories about a fictional voyeuristic encounter in Las Vegas, I knew exactly what I would write. I had lived (part of) what became "Vegas Lights." But the requirements of the anthology had an added layer: one of my characters would actually be a voyeur. I had to create someone with a story of her own to witness the character that was me, doing…what I did (in part), there in that hotel room in Vegas. I got to live in my voyeur's head, and watch the action taking place…and watch as she took on a life of her own, responding in ways that surprised and excited me.
It was a challenging – and ultimately rewarding– experience. I had as much pleasure in writing it as I had living it. I hope you have as much pleasure reading it, and all the rest of the stories that came out of that one, incredible weekend in Vegas.
Author bio: Jade Melisande is a sex, kink and relationship blogger and writer living in the Midwest with her two partners. Find her in Orgasmic, Lesbian Lust, Power Play and the Mammoth Book of Lesbian Erotica, among others. Fine her writing about her life as a kinky, polyamorous woman at http://piecesofjade.wordpress.com. She tweets at @PiecesofJade.
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Voyeur Eyes Only
An erotic collection of shorts stories by best-selling authors with a central theme of voyeurism in Las Vegas.
What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas? Not anymore…
High above the Las Vegas strip, at the top of Skylane Tower, the rooms come with one special amenity; a high powered telescope. When a group of erotica writers descend on Sin City for their annual conference, the voyeurs witness first hand, that some authors live by the adage, ‘write what you know’.
A woman’s curiosity is piqued as she observes a beautiful stranger being bound in silky red rope. A man scouting for new sex slaves, watches as an elegant woman gets more than her hands dirty. A prostitute pulls a switch - sending her lover out on a call. A simple slip of the hand, causes a case of mistaken room identity and a linen closet at a nearby hotel, sees more action than all of them combined. And that is just the beginning…
They say perception is reality. Is what the Voyeur sees through their spyglass just a fantasy; on which side of the lens would you like to be?
Buy Links:
http://www.amazon.com/Voyeur-Eyes-Only-ebook/dp/B0072LGYFA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1328123615&sr=8-1
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The "Voyeur Eyes Only" tour is hitting fourteen websites over fourteen days - check this link to see where and when the other posts are: http://www.writermarketing.co.uk/prpromotion/blog-tours/currently-on-tour/voyeur-eyes-only/
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1 comment:
I love that moment where the character you thought you knew takes on a life of her own. She does have separate thoughts and needs. Seeing the world through her eyes is one of the joys of being a writer.
Nan
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