Review Tuesday: Silk by Aurelia T. Evans -- #ReviewTuesday #Erotica #Horror

Silk by Aurelia T. Evans
Totally Bound Publishing, 2021

Seraphina, the youngest daughter in a powerful Fae royal family, used to be exquisitely beautiful. Then the bear shifter to whom her parents betrothed her destroyed half her face, trying to break her spirit. Ursalem doesn’t care what Sera looks like; he just needs her as a mate, to produce the dozens of Bearskin offspring required to rebuild his depopulated tribe. Though raised with the knowledge that she’d marry not for love but for politics, Sera refuses to accept an immortal life as a brood-mare. She flees to the only place where a hideously deformed creature such as she has become might be welcomed and succored – Arcanium.

Immortal djinn Bell Maddox has reservations about providing Sera with sanctuary in his supernatural circus. Her people were complicit in the recent demonic invasion and occupation of Arcanium. Nevertheless, her spirit, her despair and the magic he senses within her – not to mention his curiosity and love of contradictions – persuade him to accept her as a new performer and freak for his Oddity Row.

For fifty years, Sera has retained her virginity in preparation for her arranged marriage, her self-restraint reinforcing her chastity magic. In the libidinous atmosphere of Arcanium, among incubi, succubi, and ancient fertility gods, how can she continue to resist the call of the flesh? And if she succumbs to desire, what wonders or terrors will her power wreak?

I’ve been a devoted fan of the Arcanium series ever since Aurelia T. Evans published Fortune in 2015. I’ve reviewed many of the books here on this blog.

https://lisabetsarai.blogspot.com/2019/10/review-tuesday-funhouse-by-aurelia-t.html

https://lisabetsarai.blogspot.com/2018/12/review-tuesday-spider-by-aurelia-t.html

https://lisabetsarai.blogspot.com/2015/12/review-tuesday-ringmaster-by-aurelia-t.html

https://lisabetsarai.blogspot.com/2015/06/review-tuesday-fortune-by-aurelia-t.html

I love the genre-twisting complexity of these novels, genuine horror mixed with incendiary arousal, romance entwined with raw lust. Ms. Evans conveys a genuine appreciation of the weird, an affection for outcasts, and a gender-blind recognition that sexual desire is far more complicated than most romance readers are willing to admit. Most of all, I savor the moral ambiguity of Arcanium. Bell is neither benevolent nor evil, but something in between, a force of nature that can’t be constrained by human definitions of right and wrong.

Unfortunately, I haven’t yet read Haunted and Skeletons, the two novels that precede Silk. This interfered, to some extent, with my appreciation of this installment, which refers to the events that occurred when Arcanium was temporarily taken over by hostile forces. I don’t know the details of what happened, but it’s obvious this interlude fundamentally changed Arcanium, and Bell. Some of the denizens of the circus have left, new members have joined, and those who remained are clearly traumatized.

Thus, I was left to fill in the gaps in reading Sera’s story.

In some ways, this tale is very much a match for the earlier books. In particular, Sera’s sex magic lights up the scenes in which she takes the legless Carlo as her first lover, then experiences a breath-stopping erotic connection with the mythical Horned God. The scenes where Ursalem and the Fae try to reclaim Sera as their own are likewise wonderful. Bell is as seductive and enigmatic as ever, though I couldn’t help wish that the author had allowed the Fae princess to succumb to his sexual charms.

As a whole, however, I was somewhat disappointed by Silk. There’s an awful lot of talking, long philosophical conversations that slowed the novel’s pace. I also felt that threads of horror that run through the series were far less compelling in this installment. The author mentions some of her creepiest creations, such as The Gentleman and the clowns, but they don’t take center stage. Sera herself, despite her disfigurement, does not inspire any sort of fear or disgust. Perhaps we’ve come so far in accepting the horrific oddities of Arcanium that they’ve lost the power to terrify.

Of course it’s difficult to maintain the intensity and the freshness of a series across ten books. This is particularly true when the author’s fictional world is intended to be scary and shocking. As with any experience, we become accustomed to the violations of convention that originally made the circus so electrifying. For me, who has read seven previous in the series, entering the gates of Arcanium feels like coming home. I look for the characters with whom I feel the strongest bonds. On the edge of my seat, I wait for Bell to engineer some impossible choice for one of his creatures. I know what to expect – but in fact, that expectation diminishes the effects.

I need to go back and read the books I've missed, though. I’m not tired of Arcanium yet.

Review Tuesday: Funhouse by Aurelia T. Evans -- #EroticHorror #MoralAmbiguity #ReviewTuesday

Funhouse by Aurelia T. Evans

Totally Bound, 2019

I just finished Funhouse, the seventh book in Aurelia T. Evans’ incredible Arcanium series. Arcanium is a demonic circus controlled by ancient djinn Bell Madoc, a perversely charming chameleon who gets his kicks fulfilling people’s casually expressed wishes in ways that bind them to the circus. In general, I’m not a fan of series; I find that after a few books, they become overly formulaic and lose their zest. I’m still enchanted by Arcanium, though, largely due to its moral ambiguity.

Horrible things happen in Arcanium. People are disfigured, tortured, even devoured. The demons who populate the Oddity Row and perform under the big top don’t subscribe to any sort of human moral code. They’re happy to feed their lusts on human flesh and even human life. The humans who have attacked Arcanium and are in the process of being punished can be even more reprehensible.

At the same time, Arcanium offers a sort of sanctuary for individuals who really don’t fit in the outside world, as well as a path to self-knowledge. Neve, the protagonist in Funhouse, is a fine example. A brilliant PhD biologist who happens to also be a voluptuous redhead, Neve has never felt sexual desire. She marries Joseph because they enjoy one another’s company and have similar tastes – both are fans of Rocky Horror and H.P. Lovecraft – but though she tries to satisfy her husband, she feels no physical pleasure herself. This tears their marriage apart and brings Neve into Arcanium, when she wishes, in Bell’s presence, that she could “experience sex the way her husband wants her to do”. She becomes a sexually insatiable creature, suffering constant torment from the simple sensation of clothing on her super-sensitive skin. Arcanium is drenched in sexual tension, and Neve could easily find partners among the demons or the humans, but having been objectified all her life due to her opulent body, she resists.

I liked Neve a lot, but the actual plot in Funhouse wandered a bit. In particular, I found the end a bit unsatisfying, since there’s no real resolution to Neve’s dilemma, other than her increasing acceptance of her abnormal state.

Nevertheless, I’m sure I’ll purchase Haunted, the next installment, since I gather it continues Neve’s story. 

 

Review Tuesday: Spider by Aurelia T. Evans -- #ReviewTuesday #horror #erotica

Spider by Aurelia T. Evans

Totally Bound, 2018

There aren’t too many authors whose books I’ll buy on release day, but Aurelia T. Evans is one of them. When I saw the November 6^th announcement in the Totally Bound newsletter, I hesitated only long enough to start up my special e-commerce computer in order to purchase a copy of her latest novel Spider.

Spider, the sixth book in the fascinating and disturbing Arcanium series, brings readers back to the alluring, terrifying circus created and nurtured by ancient jinni Bell Madoc. For Bell, Arcanium is simultaneously a plaything, a work of art and a cosmic mission. The appeal of his edgy big top performances and horrible but fascinating Oddity Row depends on his “people”: captive demons, human misfits, and unfortunate innocents whose unintentional wishes have bound them to the circus. Although Bell is capricious and can be cruel, he’s also exquisitely sensitive to the secrets that haunt visitors to Arcanium. The transformations he works upon those whom he entangles via their wishes make those secrets visible.

Elizabeth, the protagonist of Spider, lives her life in fear: fear of heights, fear of darkness, fear of insects, fear of disease. A member of a conservative, Amish-like religious cult (in fact, the illegitimate daughter of its prophet), in public she covers her hair and every inch of skin apart from her hands and her face. Like many unmarried daughters of the Petrosian Saints, she works as a nanny; Christian parents view the modest, sober, serious Petrosian women as ideal care-takers for their children.

A mistake leads Elizabeth to takes her charges on an afternoon outing to Arcanium—a mistake that will change her life forever. Trying to keep track of a teenager, a ten year old, a toddler and an infant, she idly wishes she had extra hands. Bell pounces upon her figurative statement. He has her abducted, brings her to Arcanium, and magically bestows another pair of arms and another pair of legs, turning her into his human spider. Then he installs her in his dreadful “fun house”, actually a prison he has created to punish evil-doers who have threatened Arcanium. Visitors assume the bloody horrors of the fun house are fake, but Elizabeth soon learns that every terror is real.

However, Bell has not brought Elizabeth into the circus for punishment, but to help her accept her fundamental nature. He knows that her many phobias mask a deeper fear—that she’ll be exposed as the elaborately tattooed porn performer her seductive, abusive former boyfriend had made of her. Indeed, as she adapts despite herself to eight-legged life in Arcanium, she gradually comes to understand that her true self is something even darker, wilder and more forbidden.

Totally Bound is a romance publisher, yet Ms. Evans’ books break every romance rule. That’s probably one reason why I love them. Here’s the publisher’s Reader Advisory for Spider:

This book contains plot-driven dubcon, monster sex, arachnophobia, public sex, extreme violence and horror-related gore, accounts of noncon and sex trafficking, double penetration, sex addiction, alcoholism and religious guilt.

Definitely not a book for the faint of heart! At the same time, none of this content is gratuitous, inserted just for shock value. Like many of the characters in the earlier Arcanium books, Elizabeth is broken inside. Strange as it might seem, her ordeals contribute to a sort of healing.

I find Arcanium’s mix of terror and eroticism refreshing and deeply enjoyable. Even after six books, Bell can still inspire my wonder. He wields incredible power, but he’s constrained by free will. His moral ambiguities fascinate me. He loves his people, yet also tortures them. He leads them to deeper self-understanding even as he selfishly uses them to increase the popularity of his circus. In this book, one character, with powers of his own, comments that Bell came into being before good and evil, that he is born of primordial chaos.

This book is the first in which Bell’s omnipotence is seriously challenged, by a mysterious outsider. I’m assuming that Ms. Evans is working on another volume that will explore this plot twist. I only hope it comes out soon!

My reviews of some of the earlier Arcanium books:

https://lisabetsarai.blogspot.com/2015/06/review-tuesday-fortune-by-aurelia-t.html

https://lisabetsarai.blogspot.com/2015/09/review-tuesday-aerial-by-aurelia-t-evans.html

https://lisabetsarai.blogspot.com/2015/12/review-tuesday-ringmaster-by-aurelia-t.html

Review Tuesday: Ringmaster by Aurelia T. Evans

Ringmaster by Aurelia T. Evans

Totally Bound, 2015

What is it about dark side that draws us? What is the lure of the forbidden, the attraction of the taboo, the terrible, irresistible appeal of cruel power and evil shadows? If I could answer this question, I could explain the unrelenting fascination of Aurelia T. Evans’ demon circus Arcanium.

Ringmaster is the fourth book in this erotic horror series, and, in my opinion, the best so far. This is the first novel where the focus character is one of Arcanium’s true Oddities—not a human cursed into the circus through his or her own unfortunate wishes, but someone born a freak and living with that destiny.

Kitty, a real-life bearded woman, has been part of Arcanium for nearly two decades. A victim of some genetic aberration, she has fast growing hair all over her body. After years of shaving, plucking, trying every strategy to hide her abnormality, she finally realized the futility of these endeavors. She joined the circus, where she could live comfortably among other societal outcasts.

Kitty has embraced her freakishness. She works miracles with her flowing tresses, artistically braids her beard, and shows off her voluptuous, hairy body to the astonished and embarrassed crowds who stroll along Arcanium’s Oddity Row.

Through Kitty, Ms. Evans explores society’s attitudes toward people who are obviously “different”. From little kids who stare without self-consciousness, to men attracted to the novelty of sex with a bearded woman, to violent bigots who actively attack Kitty and Arcanium’s other Oddities, the world is full of so-called “normal” people who really don’t know how to deal with “freaks”. All of the Arcanium books have considered these issues, but Ringmaster looks at them more closely. The book helps the reader understand the world from a well-adjusted freak’s point of view. Kitty doesn’t want to give up her special qualities. In fact, she has deliberately used up all her wishes, in order to avoid the temptation to wish her hair away.

As a voluntary who deliberately entered the circus, Kitty has more freedom than those whose wishes have been turned against them by the enigmatic jinn Bell Madoc, the master and creator of Arcanium. In particular, she’s free to leave the circus bounds and have sexual encounters with people from the outside world. In Ringmaster, she discovers that her long-time though occasional lover Victor is dying from a congenital disease. To save his life, she offers him the chance to join Arcanium and be cured.

Victor’s decision to become one of Bell’s Oddities in return for a second chance at life upsets the emotional balance in Arcanium. Jealousy, lust and violence flare, in some cases triggered by the denizens of the circus, in others by ignorant and biased individuals from outside the iron gates. Crimes are committed. Punishments are inflicted. Be prepared for gore and death, as well as sex so rough it feels like battle. This is Arcanium.

Kitty has appeared as a secondary character in all the previous novels of the series. One has the impression of a woman almost unbelievably healthy from an emotional perspective, mature and balanced, especially compared to most of the other circus members. She’s warm, generous, a sort of mother figure who has the informal role of helping newcomers to the circus adapt to the constraints and consolations of life in Arcanium. She’s very sure of her identity as the sexy, furry Kitty Cat. She’s honest about her desires, while never leading her lovers to expect more than she can give.

One wonders how someone so seemingly normal can survive in the twisted environment of Bell’s circus. In Ringmaster, however, we finally get to see the darkness she keeps hidden.

He slapped her ass and her thighs as he finger-fucked her, speeding up his thrusts until she was arching her back each time, the partition pressing against her pubic bone in painful but delicious pressure.

“Damn you!” he shouted. He yanked his hand out of her and shook it. A few drops of her juices hit her back. “Damn you into my hell, woman. Don’t you know that I would have you like this on my dining room table, three pairs of anguish inside you, one in your rectum, one in your cunt and the other in your pretty little mouth? I would shave every inch of you so that you couldn’t have a single pretty hair on your vain body, everything beautiful about you stripped away until you were nothing. I would flog this skin”—he smoothed his hands over her back and cupped her sides where her ribs met her breasts—“with tails that ended in glass to gouge you into a mess of bloody meat, but it wouldn’t kill you. Oh no. There’s no death where I would take you. And take you. And take you. And take you until you were raw and bleeding and too broken to scream, so I would have my other slaves scream for you, because that is music to my ears, Katharine. Do you understand?”

He grabbed her braid above her hands, which pulled on her head and neck and on her wrists. She cried out, her mouth dropping open. When he lifted her up, her breasts hung heavy beneath her, and her nipples brushed the wood in agonizing tickles. All balance and control were lost. He had her helpless in his grip.

“I’m not going to take you with the magic making it easy,” the Ringmaster said in her ear. “Tell me not to.”

“No,” she gasped.

“That’s right,” he said, jerking her braid again. “Tell me not to.”

“No,” she whispered. She turned to peer up at him. He smoldered with hellfire black not just in his eyes but everywhere on his face, in his posture, in the tension of his muscles, everywhere. “Don’t stop.”

Kitty consorts with the cruelest and most vicious demon in Arcanium. Something draws them together, into bloody, painful, violent conflagrations of lust (like the one above). Indeed, their paradoxical complementarity goes beyond mere lust. It’s deeper, darker, far more hypnotic. One hesitates to call it love, but the connection binds them to one another at least as tightly.

The scenes between Kitty and the Ringmaster eclipsed everything else in this novel, for me. (I’m a bit uncomfortable admitting this. What, after all, does that say about me?) They left me stunned, crushed, and unbelievably aroused. Although I applaud an author who can create this kind of effect, I worry about what Ms. Evans’ can do for an encore. Once you’ve gone over to the dark side, human sex, even human love, seems pale and weak by comparison.

Review Tuesday: Aerial by Aurelia T. Evans

Aerial by Aurelia T. Evans

Totally Bound, 2015

What a guilty pleasure it is to return to Arcanium! Aerial is the third book in Aurelia T. Evans’ erotic romance/horror series, and possibly the best so far.

What is Arcanium? A demon circus, created and controlled by psychic jinni Bell Maddox, for his own obscure pleasure and for the edification, education and punishment of the creatures he binds to serve it. Some, like incubus Lord Mikhail, succubus Lady Sasha, and the child-devouring clowns Comedy, Tragedy and Murphy, are demons who’ve made bargains with the fortune teller, providing dark and seductive entertainments in return for permission to sate their particular hungers. Some, like Misha the sword swallower or the lion and tiger under the lash of the sinister Ringmaster, are human beings whose unfortunate wishes were overheard and twisted by Bell. Arcanium’s Oddity Row showcases Christina the armless and legless human torso, conjoined twins Jane and Joanne, Kitty the bearded woman, and other freaks. Some, like Kitty, are voluntary members of the peculiar Arcanium family. Others are living the consequences of rash behavior or thoughtlessly voiced desires.

Aerial offers the tale of Seth and Lars, two attractive and muscular young men who perform a stunning aerial act under Arcanium’s shadowy big top. They appear as background characters in the earlier volumes Fortune and Carousel. The latest book, which is set before Fortune, details how they came to be part of Arcanium.

As the story opens, Seth and Lars are strolling the circus grounds, appreciating what they believe to be the well-executed make-up on the oddities and savoring the undercurrent of sexual arousal that suffuses Arcanium. They’re old friends, team mates on a college soccer team, hoping for a future in professional sports. An argument tinged with homophobia and a careless wish from Seth change everything. Maddox, who has been wanting more male performers, chooses to interpret Seth’s metaphor literally. He physically binds the two men together with magic that requires some part of their bodies remain in contact at all times.

Forced to live together, sleep together, shower together, even use the toilet while attached, Seth and Lars discover a mutual carnal attraction made all the more acute by the perpetual aura of lust that pervades the circus. As they try to fight their need while retaining their friendship, the circus draws them deeper into its dark heart.
 

This book does an incredible job articulating the confused emotions of men who have always seen themselves as straight discovering their homoerotic tendencies. The two heroes react quite differently to their mutual attraction. Ms. Evans portrays the tension between them with subtlety and conviction. Even as they fight their desire, the sex between them is incendiary—more arousing, for me at least, than their interactions with the female members of the circus, which serve to convince Seth and Lars (and I guess the reader) that at least they’re not completely gay.

Meanwhile, the author offers new glimpses into the histories of other Arcanium denizens. Each tale is different, simultaneously horrifying and fascinating. Like the freaks on Oddity Row, the stories make you squirm, but you can’t help wanting more.

At the center of it all sits Bell Maddox, a character of exquisite complexity. Seemingly cruel and kind by turns, he actually follows a sort of inhuman logic outside of human categories. For him, Arcanium is simultaneously a work of art, a delicately crafted machine, a source of perverse pleasure, and a morality play. He loves his creation; he protects it; he nurtures it. He collects souls to serve it.

Bell’s profound ambiguity gives the Arcanium series a depth that’s rare in the world of erotic romance. I applaud the fact that Ms. Evans does not try to explain him. He is what he is, what he has been for millenia, not man, not beast, not quite a god...a force of nature perhaps, or the personification of fate—fickle, unpredictable, generous and vicious.

In general, I don’t enjoy series. I get bored after a book or two. Arcanium is a major exception. I have the fourth book, Ringmaster, on my tablet already. I’ve been resisting the temptation to begin reading until I’d written this review. I wanted to remember and record what impressed me about Aerial before immersing myself in another orgy of sex, blood and magic.

I’ll probably start Ringmaster tonight.

Review Tuesday: Fortune by Aurelia T. Evans

Fortune (Arcanium Book 1) by Aurelia T. Evans

Totally Bound, 2015

Be careful what you wish for. Someone may be listening, eager to twist your words in ways you can’t begin to imagine.

A careless wish uttered by her jealous, self-centered boyfriend traps Maya DeLuca in Arcanium, a traveling circus suffused with dark, perverse magic. Psychic jinn Bell Madoc presides over Arcanium’s assorted demons and monsters, plus the humans self-condemned to servitude as freaks or entertainers because of their thoughtlessly articulated desires. Devious, manipulative and devilishly attractive, Bell makes Maya his personal plaything. He teases, tortures and tests her, inflicting pain and evoking exquisite pleasure with equal frequency.

Irrevocably bound to Arcanium and to Bell, Maya struggles against internal demons—shame, anger, guilt, self-disgust—as she tries to avoid wishing herself into more serious difficulties. Gradually, coaxed or commanded by her jinn master, she sinks deeper into the luridly carnal atmosphere of the circus. The demons and the oddities become first her friends, then her lovers. When Arcanium is threatened, Maya rises to its defense like some avenging angel. Bell rewards her with a final, extreme test of trust and endurance, one which teaches Maya what she truly wants.

I loved this book, for a dozen reasons. Rarely do I find such originality and freshness in today’s erotic romance. Aurelia Evans makes Arcanium feel real—bloody, dangerous, uncomfortable and unbearably arousing. The horror and the eroticism balance perfectly, both conveyed in vivid, visceral detail. In Arcanium, violence and fear are the flip side of sexual desire. You can scarcely tell whether your heart is racing from lust or terror.

It takes talent and courage to people a world with freaks and monsters—bearded women, quadruple amputees, conjoined twins, giants and midgets, flesh-devouring clowns—and make the reader care about them. Fortune deals with philosophical and moral issues rarely considered in erotic romance: what it means to be an outcast; the limits of rationality; the healing powers of both compassion and of anger; the nature of good and evil. Bell and his fellow immortals do horrible things, killing, maiming, disfiguring, causing unbelievable agony. With deliberate cruelty, he uses his victims’ words against them. Yet he makes the case to Maya that he’s not evil, but merely an instrument of the chaos that underlies creation. By the end of the book, one almost believes him.

The pacing of this novel particularly impressed me. The narrative tension climbs steadily to three successive peaks, each one emotionally shattering. I don’t want to spoil readers’ enjoyment by giving away details, but it’s very skillfully done.

I have one complaint about Fortune. I found some of Ms. Evan’s descriptions rather difficult to follow. For instance, there’s one scene in which Bell’s knife-wielding previous lover chases Maya into the maze of trapezes, high wires and catwalks near the top of the circus tent. No matter how many times I reread the description, I couldn’t get a clear picture of how these physical elements were laid out and thus, what exactly was going on.

This problem arises only occasionally. Other scenes—for instance, Bell’s and Maya’s frantic coupling atop a tentacled beast on the whirling carousel—paint easily imagined pictures in the mind (very dirty pictures, in this case).

Fortune is the first book in a series. Upcoming volumes, I gather, will deal with relationships among other inhabitants of Arcanium. In general, I tend not to read series. I’ll sample one book, then move on to another author or fictional world.

In the case of Arcanium, though, I’m not sure I want to leave.

June Newsletter: New Releases, Free Reading and a Contest!

Scarborough Castle and North Beach

Welcome to my June Newsletter! I'm getting it out early this month, partly because I have so much to share.

New and Upcoming Releases
 
I think that May was a record for me. Four releases in one month! I'm not sure where to start in telling you about them.

Her Own Devices is now available from LadyLit Publishing. This volume collects nine of my favorite F/F and lesbian short stories, including several not previously published. I'm not sure whether to call these tales erotica or erotic romance. Most have happy endings, and all focus as much on the emotional connections between the characters as the physical ones.
 
Fourth World, my new paranormal collection from Excessica is a different sort of beast altogether (and I use the word "beast" deliberately). This collection serves up seven morsels of dark, intense erotica&emdash;stories of monsters, myths and magic. The book includes two brand new stories, Naked in Varanasi and Renfield's Lament. The former is an unusual take on the succubus theme. The latter is told from the perspective of the vampires' loyal minion.
 

Fireborn Publishing has released my scifi romance short story The Last Amanuensis, a poetic and moving meditation on love and freedom. It's only 99 cents. Why not pick up a copy? And speaking of Fireborn, I don't think I mentioned that they've released Nasty Business in print.

Last, but hardly least, the altruistic anthology Coming Together: Outside the Box has hit the virtual shelves. Edited by the creative and outrageous Nobilis Reed, this collection includes my M/M cross-dressing story "To Boldly Go". You can read an excerpt of this light-hearted and sexy tale here.





Free Reading and Other News

In the free reading section of my website, I've just added a link to "Muse", an intense BDSM erotic romance story. Definitely an HEA (as long as you don't mind the kink!). This story, which was originally published in D.L. King's anthology Slave Girls, features a heroine who's an erotic romance author, and an most unlikely dominant. Check it out!

Speaking of free reading, I'll repeat my offer from my last newsletter. You can win a free book, just for giving me a bit of feedback. Next time you're looking for a bit of love or lust, visit my free reads page and read something there. You're sure to find something that appeals to you; there are more than fifty entries. Send me an email (lisabet [at] lisabetsarai [dot] com) to tell me what you read, and what you thought about it. In return I will send you a free novel or novella from from my back list. (Contact me for details.)

My trip to the UK was fantastic. I had an amazing time at Smut by the Sea, meeting authors and fans. I read an excerpt from Rajasthani Moon in the "smut slam" and just barely escaped a paddling from going over my five minutes of allocated time. I participated in workshops about writing historical stories, imagining werewolves, and letting your characters talk dirty. After the event proper, my DH and I got the chance to hang out in the classic Black Lion pub with Victoria and Kev Blisse, the founders of Smut UK and organizer of the event. (By the way, if you're in the UK, you should check out that link. There are several more exciting smut events coming up in the next few months!).

And Scarborough was lovely, though a bit faded from its former glory. Given my affinity for all things Victorian, I could easily imagine ladies in long gowns and smartly-dressed gentlemen taking tea in the grand hotels, strolling through the gardens or waiting for tramway to take them down to the shore.

We stayed in a cozy guesthouse with an incredible view of the ocean, just a few minutes walk from where the ruins of the eight-hundred-year-old Scarborough Castle perch on the headlands above the town. The photo above was taken from just in front of our hotel. Amazing!

Lisabet's Pick of the Month

My June pick of the month is Valse Gothique, the blog of erotic romance author Aurelia T. Evans. I am a huge and unapologetic fan of Aurelia's work. After reading about it, I can't wait to dive in to her most recent series, about a demonic circus called "Arcanium".

Contest!!!
 
You could win a $5 bookstore gift certificate. How? Read my new free story "Muse", then leave me a comment telling me what you thought of it.  I'll randomly draw a winner from among those who comment.

Cold, But Not Heartless

By Aurelia T. Evans (Guest Blogger)

I am an overly emotional person, except when I’m not.

Sometimes my emotions get so intense that the only solution is for some enterprising up-and-coming technician in my brain to turn the switch off for a while. The technical term is ‘dissociation.’ Authors are no strangers to dissociation. It’s practically a job requirement, not a symptom. The only problem is when it extends beyond when I’m writing and into my real life. The numbness, the inability to feel anything but emptiness, disconnected—it sure beats feeling like I’m stuck in the bottom of Jame Gumb’s Silence of the Lambs pit. It lets me stay functional. But it has its own problems, as you might imagine.

Most of my characters find themselves in the grips of powerful emotions. Sex magnifies everything. From passion to anger to fear to love, romance and erotica lends itself to torrents of feeling.

Julia is different.

She’s not the first character I’ve written who’s lost her memory. Tora, from Wolf Girl (coming out at the end of the year), has her memory wiped away by an external force. She’s a creature of pure emotion, since that’s all she has. Julia, from my vampire serial Bloodbound, took quite a different turn. When awareness returns to her, she’s cold, numb, emotions as stripped away as her memory, although not stripped away because of her memory.

Writing Julia was an interesting exercise. She’s not as easy for people to identify with, harder to pin down, harder to connect with because she can’t connect with herself. She’s a cold fish, a hard woman, bleached in mind and body. The qualities that appeal to the vampire love interest in question, Nathan, aren’t her stunning good looks or sparkling personality. Yet the vampire priest and I agree—she’s fascinating, especially the things going on beneath the blank surface of her thoughts. Because she’s far from empty.

Julia is damaged as a fallen family photograph. Something in her head is splintered. Bridges were destroyed long before her memory failed her. I find Julia darkly appealing, and I relate to her damaged side more than some of the other relatively well-adjusted characters that I’ve written. If someone wants a more connected character, I have plenty of others to choose from (since I have quite a few stories coming out this year and the next). Bloodbound is Julia’s story, the story of a woman whose coldness has helped her survive. And that’s how I like it.

The serial novel Bloodbound is my first attempt at self-publishing—it only seems appropriate that I get to start the process with an atypical protagonist. I’ve been making noise about indie publishing for a while, but I’m finally forcing myself to just do it. It helps that I have a banging cover—that’s one of the main reasons I’ve pushed myself to actually do it.

I’m nervous and cautiously excited, since self-publishing means everything’s on me. But erotica is fortunately an indie-friendly genre, and I have a wonderful support system for the process.

Allow me the pleasure of introducing you to Julia and some of the other characters in the first book in the Bloodbound serial, Blood Lost.

Blurb

Bloodstains on her clothing and bloodlust between the sheets, she’s never been more lost…and that’s why he chooses her.

As if wandering the streets in bloody clothes after losing her memory isn’t bad enough, Julia’s been kidnapped by vampires, then presented to Nathan, high priest of Dominion.

Nathan’s not interested in a bleeder, perfectly content with fellow priest Lucas as his companion, lover, and willing servant. However, when Lucas offers her to him, Julia’s endearing confusion and lack of fear intrigue him.

With nowhere else to go without her memories, Julia accepts his offer and embarks on a sensual but deadly journey into the world of Dominion and its arrogant, esoteric elite…as well as the darkness of her own desires and the mystery of her past.

Excerpt

“Get the fuck off me, you fucking leech, evil prick, wannabe demon!” Monica struggled, kicking her legs back and forth, trying to scratch the priest with her good hand, but he somehow managed to evade every single attack.

“You think you’re the first fighter I’ve brought to him?” the priest said, laughing. All the kindness had drained out of his demeanor, although the warmth of his voice made his cold declarations all the chillier.

Now would be the perfect time for Julia to try to escape while the priest distracted himself with Monica, but this time there was no chance of saving Monica if Julia left now. It wasn’t that there was no point in saving herself, but there was less point. She had nowhere to go, no reason to save herself when there wasn’t a whole lot of self to save.

And even if she wanted to try just for the sake of blind hope, the dust motes in the center aisle moonbeam were coalescing as Monica fought, her jabs becoming more focused but no less futile. Julia hesitated with one foot on the stage and the other off, the younger girl trailing behind her and clinging to her shoulder to hold her back.

“I think that’s quite enough, children.”

Monica stopped fighting and instead stared, stunned, at the man coming up the center aisle.

Like the priest holding Monica, this man appeared at first glance unobtrusive, his presence quiet. Like the priest, he wore the uniform, but his clerical collar was black instead of white. His skin was naturally tan but somehow still managed to appear pale, as though the color underneath the translucent golden layer had leached out. The priest’s smile was gentle, but this new man’s smile—though following the same curve—gave the impression of a stalking cat rather than a content one. Although he didn’t appear old, his hair was prematurely silver all the way through, as though touched by frost, with lowlights of slate gray near the scalp where the hair was denser.

And whereas the priest’s eyes were nearly black, this man’s were nearly white. They pierced instead of welcomed, and although she wasn’t proud of it, Julia lowered her gaze when they attempted to bore through to the mind beneath her skull.

“My Master,” the priest breathed with religious reverence. “Kneel, woman,” he told Monica, but he truly addressed all three. “Kneel with me before your Master.”

“I kneel to no one,” Monica retorted. However, even she was shocked and awed by this unassuming man that somehow dominated the entire room just by existing, his appearance as average as it was inexplicably alien. She dropped to the floor when the priest buckled her knees with a solid kick.

The priest, too, knelt to honor the man, keeping a hold around Monica’s neck.

The younger girl collapsed not onto her knees but to the side, sobbing renewed as though she did not know how to stop. Julia forgot about her as soon as the girl released her grip on Julia and left her standing.

The white gold of the man’s skin was cool on her chin where he brushed his fingers like a frigid winter wind. Ever so gradually, he lowered his hand and she lowered herself with it. Anything to keep from looking into those eyes. He withdrew when she knelt at his feet.

“Rise.”

The priest gripping Monica stood in a single graceful motion, intimately familiar with the act. He pulled Monica up with him. The younger girl quivered as though she could feel the master’s chill from three feet away. She might not have even heard the man’s command as she proceeded to simply dissolve into a pool of exhaustion and fear.

Julia stood up and stepped back onto the stage, away from the man. She kept her eyes downcast, but not in deference.

“So these are the women you’ve chosen for me, Lucas,” the man said. He paced before the stage. Julia could hear that smile when he added, “I can tell you have reached the end of your patience with me, if these are the ones you have brought. Just picking them at random now, are we?”

“I tried picking them deliberately, but they were never what you wanted,” the priest, Lucas, replied. “I apologize if these seem like desperate selections.”

“Oh, I understand,” the man said. “It is frustrating when your Master cannot even articulate what he wants. How can you be expected to know what intangible quality might appeal to me, what a woman must have to feel right, when all you’ve ever known I liked was you?”

“Your commands have never been a chore,” Lucas protested.

“No, but you must indeed be at your wit’s end if that poor girl is any indication. Come now, Lucas, you already knew she was too young. And limp. A wisp of a thing not even fit for donation.”

The fine, shiny, black shoes paused before the despairing heap of the younger girl. That hand reached out and stroked across the girl’s forehead. Her sobs abruptly ceased, her eyelids fluttering. In a few seconds, she pitched forward. Her face almost hit the wooden stage, but the man caught and cradled it before laying her down. Her back rose and fell, which meant the girl was unconscious once more, not dead.

A mercy for all, Julia thought.

Bloodbound Release Schedule:

Blood Lost (Book 1) – February 14 (FREE!)

Bleeder’s Ball (Book 2) – February 28

Blood Pool (Book 3) – March 14

Blood on the Moon (Book 4) – March 28

Bleeding Heart (Book 5) – April 11

Bloodbound, the Complete Serial Novel – May 9

Links to Bloodbound Book 1
(The ones listed as not yet free may be free by the time you check!)

Smashwords, multiple formats, including Kindle (recommended, FREE): https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/519123

 

Amazon US (not yet free): http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00TJ44EIC

 

Amazon UK (not free): http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00TJ44EIC?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

 

Amazon Canada (not free): http://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B00TJ44EIC?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

 

Apple (FREE): https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/blood-lost-bloodbound-book-1/id967111963?mt=11

 

Barnes and Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/books/1121218815?ean=2940046575934

Links

Bloodbound serial novel page:

https://aureliatevans.wordpress.com/bloodbound-serial/

Blog: https://aureliatevans.wordpress.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100006673185670&fref=ts&ref=br_tf

About Aurelia

Aurelia T. Evans is an up-and-coming erotica author with a penchant for horror and the supernatural.

She's the twisted mind behind the werewolf/shifter Sanctuary trilogy, demonic circus series Arcanium (publication starts April 2015), and spiritual gothic/urban fantasy series Meridian (publication TBD). She's also had short stories featured in various erotic anthologies.

Aurelia presently lives in Dallas, Texas (although she doesn't ride horses or wear hats). She loves cats and enjoys baking as much as she dislikes cooking. She's a walker, not a runner, and she writes outside as often as possible.

Review: Winter Howl by Aurelia T. Evans

Winter Howl by Aurelia T. Evans

Totally Bound Publishing, 2012

We live in a world obsessed with labels. Liberal. Conservative. Erotica. Romance. Gay. Straight. Kinky. Vanilla. The passion to pigeonhole affects (or perhaps I should say “afflicts”) both individuals and organizations.

In some ways, this trend to slice and dice everything into appropriate categories is a necessary adaptation to increasing complexity and information overload. However, it has many negative consequences. People – or let's get specific here, readers – seek out categories they've liked in the past (just as individuals consult media outlets that reinforce their already-established opinions). They resist exposing themselves to different types of literature, sticking with familiar genres, and thus lose the opportunity for new, possibly wondrous experiences.

Then there is the problem that some books simply don't fit neatly into any of the genre boxes, but have to be assigned a label anyway. Such works tend to be overlooked or even maligned, because they violate the expectations of readers who chose them based on the admittedly inaccurate categorization. Such books are rarely judged on their own merits, even though they may be more original and creative than average.

Winter Howl by Aurelia T. Evans is an example. The book is labeled as erotic romance, but it breaks the traditional rules of the genre at every turn. The heroine, Renee Chambers, has sexual and emotional connections with several different characters, rather than focusing on a single relationship. The book sets these relationships against one another – indeed, that's one source of the fundamental conflicts in the story. It is not clear which of her lovers, if anyone, is Renee's “soulmate”. One of her partners is another woman, her long time friend and companion Britt, even though F/F interactions tend to be unpopular in stories that also include heterosexual sex. And the ending, unlike most romance, is hard to predict as well as emotionally ambiguous. In fact, I can't quite imagine an unadulterated happy ending for Winter Howl. Every one of Renee's possible choices involves some gain and some loss.

Personally, I really enjoyed this book. But then, I'm a bit of a genre buster myself. Renee is a rich, surprising, three-dimensional character. Afflicted with severe agoraphobia and subject to panic attacks, she can barely deal with human society. She manages Sanctuary, an isolated rural compound that shelters abandoned dogs and canine shape-shifters seeking protection from harassment. The inhabitants of Sanctuary are her family, her support, her lifeline. She believes herself to be powerless, weak and fragile without them – especially Britt, her loving friend who doubles as a service dog on the occasions when Renee can't avoid dealing with the outside world.

Then the werewolf Grant arrives – a wolf shifter, made not born like the rest of Sanctuary's inhabitants. Renee is inexplicably drawn to him, despite his crude, violent nature. He brings out a totally different side of her – questing, hungry, willing to take risks. The connection between them feels alien, but is just as powerful as her bond with Britt and the other shifters.

So which Renee is real? The tentative, tender woman Britt lovingly initiates into Sapphic sexuality, or the raw, animalistic siren who bites her lover and marks him with her fingernails? Both, of course, and Renee must face the problem of arbitrating between these two disparate aspects of her personality.

The tensions between familiarity and growth, safety and danger, tenderness and passion, drive the plot of Winter Howl. Meanwhile, the book chronicles in delicious detail the carnal interactions between Renee and those competing for her lust and love. Ms. Evans' sex scenes are glorious, full of subtle detail, without any of the hackneyed prose that sometimes characterizes erotic romance. The early interactions between Renee and Britt are especially wonderful. Their relationship is not fully consummated from a physical perspective until well into the book. The author succeeds in making even the early fully-clothed session of exploration spectacularly erotic.

Renee's sexual collisions with Grant have an entirely different tone. They more or less attack one another. These wild, raw scenes may even turn off readers with more delicate sensibilities. As for me, I was impressed by the range of the author's imagination and her ability to bring both types of sexual encounter to vivid life.

Winter Howl is the first volume in Ms. Evans' Sanctuary trilogy. I am looking forward to reading Cry Wolf, the second book (already available), which puts the spotlight on Kelly, an intriguing minor character in Book One. This series may not fit within the standard constraints of erotic romance, but it's got me hooked.

Switching Gears

By Aurelia T. Evans (Guest Blogger)

Thank you so much for letting me guestblog today, Lisabet!

Winter Howl was my first novel and features a young woman who suffers from agoraphobia and accompanying panic attacks. Renee requires a service dog to get around outside her property—a service dog who is also a canine shapeshifter and her best friend and lover, but a service dog nonetheless around the rest of the world’s population.

Renee is the only person who lives at the sanctuary who’s human. Everyone else is a shapeshifter or a werewolf, and so she’s used to being the least powerful in the room (practically speaking). She’s awkward around people and doesn’t think much of her abilities and worth, the events of Winter Howl notwithstanding. She thinks she depends a great deal on her core pack of shapeshifters that help her run the sanctuary, and she’ll defend her sanctuary and its inhabitants to the death long before she’ll fight for herself. (None of those were spoilers for Winter Howl’s ending. They’re descriptions established in the first chapter of the novel.)

Enter Kelly in Cry Wolf, the second book in the Sanctuary series and a bit of a standalone, although it features significant spoilers for Winter Howl. It starts a few months after Winter Howl ends and directly deals with some of the repercussions of it.

Winter Howl was written from Renee’s perspective, and Call for Blood, the last book in the series (as far as I know), will also be written from Renee’s perspective, because in the end, the series is about Renee and her sanctuary. However, to understand Renee better, we have to bring in Kelly and tell her story, stepping back a little from Renee’s head and seeing her and her sanctuary through a different set of eyes.

If Renee’s a small, scared little girl in a big world, Kelly switches gears almost entirely. She’s a witch who was turned into a werewolf and really has more power than she knows what to do with, so she tamps down as much as she can. And she’s just left her werewolf pack after killing the alpha in order to protect Renee, and because she’s a bitch, she can’t just take alpha’s place, natch (there’s some serious misogyny ingrained in the werewolf pack dynamics, but that’s “just the way things are”). She could have been killed for it, but she had to be exiled instead because everyone else was afraid to take her on, although they’d never say so out loud.

Seems like the polar opposite to Renee, and in some ways, Kelly has to be for this series. But while it was a true pleasure to write someone with shitloads of power who got to choose to defer, choose to submit or dominate, choose to join a pack or not—all these different choices that a girl gets to make when she can kill you with her brain or her teeth or any number of ways like a mystical Swiss Army Knife—one of the big themes of the Sanctuary series is fear. Fear that requires the need of a sanctuary in the first place. And while Renee’s fear stems a great deal from seeing herself as weak, Kelly’s is the flip side of that coin—she’s just too darn powerful. Renee fears not having control, and Kelly, of course, fears losing it. Renee fears she doesn’t have any power. Kelly fears she has too damn much.

It’s really no wonder why they get along, or why telling Kelly’s story also tells a little bit of Renee’s as well. And fear, my friends, is something that I truly love—it is a destructive love, but addictive nonetheless—and so I need to write about.

Cry Wolf Blurb

As a werewolf and witch, Kelly belongs to neither pack nor coven, making her a perfect addition to the ragtag collection of dogs, humans and canine shapeshifters at the Chambers Dog Sanctuary.

After recently being transformed against his will, Malcolm—one of the Sanctuary residents—wants nothing more than to shed his werewolf skin and return to his shapeshifter pack. Kelly tries to help him accept his new wolf nature, but then some of the shapeshifters discover Salvation, an organization that claims to cure magical hybrids. Kelly has long since made peace with lycanthropy, which tempers her volatile magic, but when Malcolm begs Kelly to accompany him for one last attempt to resume his old life, she agrees for his sake.

Upon arriving at Salvation, however, the already shaky balance of her life becomes even more tenuous, forcing Kelly to decide which part of herself, wolf or witch, she loves—or fears—more.

Excerpt

Kelly and Malcolm have already had the wild, crazy, naked, woodsy sex with the feral edge that Kelly loves and Malcolm’s getting accustomed to. Now Kelly gets to experience something she’s not used to and isn’t sure about at all—tenderness.

Although she had been unconscious for several hours, she was actually tired by the time she made it to her trailer. When Malcolm stepped out from behind it, she was fully prepared to tell him that she just wanted to go to sleep. Surely he could run on his own.

But he smelled of the forest. He had already been running.

“What—?” Kelly began.

Malcolm took her hands in his, his hands swallowing hers as he leaned down and pressed his lips against hers. As slow and gentle as his kiss, he pushed her up against the trailer. His erection was an insistent bulge confined in his jeans, yet his actions were anything but urgent. His body seared her with the most delicious kind of heat.

When he broke the unhurried kiss, Kelly followed his lips.

He smiled then pulled her closer against his strong, lean body. He used his height to his advantage, standing straight so that she could not reach him. Kelly was dizzy with the kiss. His taste mingled with the whiskey that still hazed her head and coated her tongue.

“What are you doing?” she asked, surprised by the tremble in her voice.

Malcolm put one finger on her lips. “Shhh. I just want to know if I still can.”

He reached behind her and opened the door to her trailer then lifted her up so that they did not have to separate. As soon as they had made it in, Malcolm captured her mouth again, sliding his tongue deliciously over hers. She expected him to bite sharp teeth on her lip, but he didn’t.

He smoothed his maddening hands over her back and thighs through the fabric of her dress. The fact that Malcolm could not stand up straight in the short-ceilinged trailer served as an excellent pretext to bend her over his arms, to take control of the kiss but not dominate. Kelly’s legs grew weaker the deeper he kissed her, but beyond the pleasured mists in her mind was deep-seated confusion she could not articulate.

Butch Cassidy yowled for attention on the kitchen counter. Kelly automatically held a hand out for him to rub his cheek over her fingers.

Malcolm tried not to laugh. He relinquished her mouth to look around for Butch Cassidy’s food container. He poured a little into the empty bowl. Butch Cassidy gave the interloper a glare, but he accepted Malcolm’s gift with a flip of his mostly lame tail—limp from an early injury.

“Where were we?” Malcolm murmured against her cheek.

“I’m not entirely sure,” Kelly said.

“I may be wrong, but I think we were headed to bed,” Malcolm said. He kissed her chastely on the lips before moving less chastely down to her neck.

As his hot, wet mouth did the most sinful things to her neck from ear to collarbone, he unbuttoned the front of her dress. He made quick work of each small, pearly button with surprisingly deft fingers. Again, Kelly kept waiting for the teeth, to feel his canines rake across her flesh and spike the simmering excitement in her blood, but although he bit at her, they were nothing more than nips.

Once he had unbuttoned the dress past her waist, he pushed the sleeves down over her shoulders and let gravity do the rest. Kelly had to let go of him to shed the dress in favor of skin, the long length of pale, inked limbs. The moonlight came in through her bedroom window and illuminated the rumpled bed.

She tingled all over. As soon as she could, she tangled her fingers in his black hair, raked her nails over his back, but he pulled that hand off.

“I don’t understand,” Kelly said, another quaver in her voice. She realized that she was near tears, though she didn’t know why.

“This is how I made love,” Malcolm murmured, twining their fingers and pressing an open-mouthed kiss to the black ink on her sternum. “When I needed it, this was what I did. I need to know if I still can.”

“But why don’t you—?” Kelly began.

“Just relax, Kelly,” Malcolm said. He flicked the tip of his tongue over her nipple, catching slightly on the bar piercing through it. “Just relax and let me try. Let me take care of you.”

Kelly’s eyebrows drew together, but she combed her free hand through his hair down to the back of his neck and bit her lip, nodding.

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About Aurelia

Aurelia T. Evans is a hopefully up-and-coming erotica writer with a penchant for horror and the supernatural. She’s had short stories featured in Amber Dawn’s Fist of the Spider Woman, Kristina Wright’s Fairy Tale Lust, and Mitzi Szereto’s Thrones of Desire. Her first novel about shapeshifters, werewolves, and the woman who loves them, Winter Howl, debuted November 2012. The sequel, Cry Wolf, was released February 2014.

Blog link: http://aureliatevans.wordpress.com/

Facebook link: https://www.facebook.com/AureliaTEvans