They both nod understandingly.
‘I’m sure you’re run off your feet,’ says Alice, sitting down next to me. ‘Three kids and writing, not to mention your day job! But you’re here now and we’ve got some great plans.’
‘Oh, it’s not so much the time issue,’ I tell her. ‘Although obviously, a few extra hours in the day would be wonderful!’
They laugh dutifully. I join in, even though I’m lying. A few extra hours in the day sounds like a terrible idea. You can guarantee that if the government suddenly decided that the day had to last twenty-seven hours (and I wouldn’t put it past this lot) then I would not be spending that extra time relaxing or sleeping or doing anything remotely enjoyable. I, along with a large percentage of the population, would just end up with even more jobs to do. A few extra hours in the day would just extend the misery before I actually get to sink into a wine-fuelled bliss.
‘No – it’s more the genre in which I am writing,’ I continue, trying to sound intelligent. ‘I don’t want to risk being outed as an erotic author. It doesn’t seem like the most appropriate thing for a mother to be doing.’
Alice stares at me for a second, her face perplexed.
‘Are you saying that you think it’s embarrassing that you’ve written erotic fiction?’ she asks slowly. ‘Is that the problem?’
‘No, no!’ I laugh. ‘Not embarrassing, per se…’
‘What then?’ She leans forward and peers at me, her kind face open and honest. She isn’t judging me. She’s genuinely interested.
‘Okay, it is a bit embarrassing,’ I whisper. ‘I’m writing about sex, for goodness’ sake. I don’t want my kids to know about that. Or anyone else who knows me, for that matter.’
‘Okay.’ Alice sits back and shoots a quick look at Binky. ‘So what you’re saying is that it’s the sex aspect that you’re worried about?’
‘Yes!’ I take another sip of tea. ‘I don’t want anyone to look at me and judge me. I don’t want them thinking differently about me because they’ve read my book and seen what my fevered imagination is capable of concocting.’
‘I really don’t think that you need to worry,’ Alice says, her voice shaking slightly. ‘I’ve read a lot of erotic fiction and your first book isn’t exactly what I’d describe as hardcore.’
‘It’s actually very mild,’ agrees Binky. ‘In fact, we had a huge discussion about whether we could class it as erotica in the first place.’
‘Due to the minimal amount of actual copulation,’ adds Alice.
‘You should enjoy the fact that you’ve written a book that readers are raving about,’ says Binky. ‘And now that you’ve hooked them in and made them fall in love with Bella Rose and Daxx, we need to keep them reading – which means that Book Two needs to be more.’
‘More?’ I put down my teacup. ‘More of what?’
‘More sex,’ states Alice firmly. ‘And more humour.’
Binky nods. ‘Definitely more sex.’
‘Oh.’ I gulp slightly. ‘I see. More sex. Excellent.’
Binky leans across and pats my hand kindly. ‘You’ve got a very original voice, Hannah,’ she tells me. ‘We’d really like to see you let yourself have fun with this book. Let loose a little and see where you can take Daxx and Bella Rose on their sexual journey of enlightenment. How far are you prepared to go?’
Buggering hell. I do not like the sound of a sexual journey of enlightenment one bit.
I turn and look out of the window at the majestic skyline. I’m going to have to tell them that while it’s been a wonderfully exciting adventure and I’m very grateful for the experience, this is where I have to get off the bus. I wasn’t even supposed to be on this bus in the first place. I thought that writing erotica would be easy but it isn’t. And it’s even harder when the reason you’re a success is because your definition of raunchiness is other people’s definition of outrageously funny.
More Than Sex was only published because the sex is so bad that everyone thought it was a joke. They’re laughing at me, not with me, even if they don’t realise it – because it wasn’t a joke to me. It was the sexiest, most X-rated, taboo thing that I could possibly think of, regardless of whether everyone who reads it thinks it’s the lamest sex imaginable. There’s no way I can write something that’s more than that.
I can’t do it.
Can I?
I take a deep breath and let myself think about upping the ante and pushing myself to write something even riskier than my first book. I cannot deny that the thought is giving me a slight thrill of excitement. And I don’t know how far I’m prepared to go – but maybe it could be fun figuring it out. Plus I still have my dire financial situation to consider. I can’t just throw away an amazing opportunity because I feel a bit uncomfortable.
‘You really shouldn’t be embarrassed about it,’ Alice assures me. ‘You’re writing under a pseudonym and nobody has to know it’s you if you really don’t want them to. But surely it’d be empowering for your family and friends to know that you’ve followed your dreams and achieved something brilliant?’
I sit back and think about what they’re saying. Maybe I’ve been overreacting about remaining anonymous? Maybe the world won’t judge me too harshly if word gets out that I’m a published author of erotica? Maybe we’ve evolved to a level where women are entitled to be sexual without being slut-shamed?
‘Anyway…’ Alice’s voice is wheedling. ‘Why shouldn’t you write erotica? It’s not like mothers aren’t allowed to do it.’
Oh my god. Absolutely this.
‘I think they had to do it to become mothers in the first place,’ quips Binky.
Alice nods her head. ‘E. L. James has got two kids and I bet she stood in the playground with her head held high once Fifty Shades of Grey came out. And I bet none of the kids cared about it.’
‘Women have sex.’ Binky gives me a firm look. ‘It’s not just for the men, is it? That’s what we love about your book – it’s honest and funny and messy and awkward and it’s for women.’
It is this that sways me.
Why the hell shouldn’t I have sex? And why the hell shouldn’t I write about sex? And, now that I’ve written about it, why the hell shouldn’t I do everything that I can to get better and write about even more sex?
I am a teacher and a wife and a mother and a daughter and I’ve spent my entire life pretending that I know how to do stuff that I know literally nothing about. This is no different to when a newborn Dylan was placed into my arms and I was told that I could take him home from the hospital. I didn’t have the first clue about what I was supposed to be doing and he’s turned out okay, hasn’t he? I’ve brought up three kids and I’ve winged it all the way. I sure as shit can fake my way through writing Book Two (untitled) and it’s going to be the most informative, most factually correct and most goddamned provocative, titillating and libidinous work to ever grace the comedy-erotic fiction shelves.
‘Let’s do it,’ I say, looking at Binky and Alice and beaming widely. ‘Let’s get our freak on.’
I sing this last bit in my best hip-hop voice but, from the looks on their faces, I think it is safe to assume there are no Missy Elliot fans in the house.
I can do this.
My freak is ready to rumble.
Chapter Five
It’s Friday and quite honestly, it isn’t really being the day that I was hoping for. I felt so inspired and up-for-it after meeting with Binky and Alice yesterday and their enthusiasm and confidence was quite contagious.
However, it turns out that writing the sequel is proving to be every bit as hard as I suspected it might be. I sat at my usual table in The Daily Grind this morning (the fact that I have a usual table makes me feel like a totally legitimate author) and tried to imagine how Bella Rose would feel when she saw Daxx walking shirtless into the kitchen but I kept getting completely distracted by the new barista, whose ability to whip up a whipped caramel latte is truly second to none. Plus his muscles kept rip
pling every time he pulled down the lever on the coffee machine and it made the tiger tattoo on his arm move in a very enthralling manner. So I didn’t actually get very much done at all and ended up coming home, in the hopes that I’d be more productive here.
And while the whole writing thing is all very exciting and I know that I’m very lucky, it does feel slightly different this time. When I was writing before, I wasn’t sure that I’d ever let anyone read it. Now, every word that I choose feels like it has to be perfect. All I can think about when I sit down to write is a faceless, unknown reader, selecting my book over one of the millions of others that are out there – and then finding it lacking. I’ve been calling her Valerie in my head, in an attempt to make her seem less intimidating but I think I’ve just compounded the problem because she’s started to take on a personality all of her own. And Valerie is a very demanding mistress when it comes to her choice of erotic fiction.
It’s all mildly terrifying and I’m pretty sure that I’ve got writer’s block because so far, the only thing that I’ve got is the first six words of the first chapter. And Valerie thinks that they are all quite rubbish.
There is one very excellent thing about being a writer though and, glancing up at the clock, I can see that it’s finally time for me to stop labouring over my manuscript and indulge in some author-reader connectivity or, as others might call it, some Googling of myself. I put the kettle on and then take my laptop across to the sofa by the back door, making myself comfortable beside Dogger. I’ve had to develop some rules for working from home because otherwise it’s all a bit too easy for the day to disappear. So I’m being strict with myself now. Writing happens at the kitchen table with a glass of water – and relaxation time happens on the sofa with a cup of tea. I’m actually getting quite good at being disciplined. As soon as my break is over I’ll return to the table, delete the six words that are on the screen and start again.
I’ve been eagerly anticipating this moment for the last hour. This is fast becoming my favourite thing to do and one of the best bits about being a writer. I hadn’t given it much thought to begin with because everything happened so quickly – but a few days after More Than Sex was released, the reviews started to come in and that was it. I was hooked. If I’m truly honest, another reason for the lack of progress with Book Two (untitled) is possibly due to the amount of time that I have spent searching for reviews online. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. It’s just Continued Professional Development – I’m keen to read what people say about the book, good or bad, and then use that to further my writing skills. I appreciate and take on board each and every comment. It’s like I tell the kids at school – a person is never too old to learn and it’s important to keep your mind open to the opinions of others.
I’ve had to limit my looking though, after Nick asked me yesterday how my writing was going and I complained that I didn’t have enough time to get anything done and that he was going to have to cook supper because I’d been so busy working on my book. Well, I told him that I was working. The reality was that I spent several hours searching for reviews online and twenty-eight minutes writing my opening paragraph. And twenty-one of those minutes consisted of me staring vacantly at the screen, wondering what Valerie would make of a first chapter that started with the words:
Bella Rose’s skin started to prickle with unbridled passion and also as a result of the temperature in Tulsa, Oklahoma being ninety-six degrees Fahrenheit (which in real money is thirty-five point five degrees Celsius). The high propensity of buildings meant that the trapped heat made it feel much hotter, which Bella Rose knew was part of the phenomenon known as Urban Heat Island and made living in this new city a very different experience to the ranch back in Wyoming. Not that the meteorological conditions were a problem. Bella Rose liked her climate the way she liked her men. And also her coffee. Hot and steamy and tattooed. Hot and steamy was good. Hot and steamy was what Bella Rose liked best. Long, sultry nights filled with sizzling, torrid passion as she and Daxx made wanton, steamy love into the early hours.
It took a lot of reading and re-reading for me to come to conclusion that Valerie would think it in no way realistic or even particularly sexy despite the fact that it includes the words sizzling and wanton. So I deleted everything except the first six words and I haven’t been able to come up with anything else since, which is why I’m trialing this new way of working. My new plan is to write for one hour and then check for any new reviews instead of refreshing my screen on a two-minute basis, which will hopefully mean that I’ll get some actual writing done and stop getting too distracted.
It hasn’t worked so far today but then again, maybe I’m just the kind of writer who needs feedback from her audience in order to thrive. That sounds reasonable. I cannot write in a vacuum. I need to bounce off the opinions of others and hone my craft, acknowledging that without the reader, there is no writer.
My new career might be fraught with risk and challenge but I can’t lie – it’s also incredibly exciting. Every time I think about the fact that I have written an actual, genuine book that actual, genuine people are reading I feel a thrill of utter euphoria and reading their comments makes me feel like I’m someone a bit special. Opening the first tab, I can see immediately that there are four new reviews since I last looked. My heart starts to beat a little faster and I lean closer to the screen, ready to soak in lots of lovely, critical appraisal.
The words from the first review leap off the screen and punch me in the face.
What the actual fuck? I don’t know who Heather0933 is, but I sure as shit know that she does not have a clue what she is talking about. If she’s such a bloody expert on what entails good erotic fiction then where is her book, hey?
I struggled with this book and the beginning nearly had me giving up.
Well, I wish you had given up, if you were just going to be unkind about it.
I scan down to the next review.
The humour felt forced and unnatural and there’s very little plot.
It wasn’t supposed to be funny when I wrote it. Although she possibly has a point about the lack of plot – but does it really matter? Do readers really pick up erotica for the plot?
However, what she says next about some of my information being wrong is just plain ignorant. I fact-checked everything that went in. There’s no way I would include something that I hadn’t ensured was accurate. I spent hours researching, making sure that I had up-to-date knowledge about the setting in Wyoming and Nick and I re-enacted all the explicit scenes to guarantee that they were physically do-able. Any suggestion otherwise is just libelous. I could probably sue.
I’m quite fortunate that Nick didn’t try to sue me himself, if I’m honest. My surprise purchase of a sex manual entitled Kama Sutra: Three hundred and sixty-five positions resulted in an evening that neither of us is ever likely to forget. I still have the occasional night where I will wake drenched in sweat and clutching the duvet in horror as I re-enact the moment that Dylan and Scarlet walked in on us attempting to recreate the Coiled Cobra position. The fact that we were fully clothed did little to dispel the awkwardness.
I ended up donating the totally useless manual to the school charity sale, hidden under a pile of Enid Blyton books. That’s another thing that wakes me up now and again – the knowledge that I almost definitely inscribed my name inside the front cover, as is my habit on purchasing a new book. Nobody has confronted me about it though, so I’m either safe or it was bought by someone who hasn’t learnt to read yet.
Blinking hard, I scroll down to look at the next review. Kevin from Hull has given me three stars and the comment reads:
Very nice. Just what I’ve been looking for. My mother-in-law is delighted.
I wonder if Kevin from Hull has possibly confused my erotic novel with his new kettle purchase.
I fervently hope so.
Thankfully, I get lucky with the fourth reviewer who says that she’s never read anything so funny in her life and t
hat she hadn’t known that sex could be so entertaining.
Neither did I, until I unwittingly struck comedy-sex gold. Now all I’ve got to do is tap that again.
Heaving a big sigh, I give Dogger’s fur a quick ruffle and then return to the table. This book isn’t going to write itself and Valerie is waiting. I can’t let her down. I need to find a way to write in a sexy manner while injecting a jocular note into every sensual act that Bella Rose and the brooding, yet slightly stupid, Daxx perform.
I stare at the screen and try to remember what I did last time. After I’d read all the Fifty Shades of Grey books and been inspired to do a better job, I read a few other erotic works and tried to find a pattern. But what really worked was writing about what made me feel excited. And that was making sure that Bella Rose was a kick-ass, take-no-nonsense woman who knew what she wanted. It was all about writing a character that secretly, I would quite like to be.
So all I’ve got to do now is figure out what Bella Rose wants next and send her on a new journey. Her journey of sexual awakening or enlightenment or whatever, which presumably means that she’s going to be having quite a lot of it. Sex, that is.
I flex my fingers and position them over my keyboard. There are worse things that a woman could have to do with her time than fantasise about wanton, impassioned coitus.
I type the raunchiest word that I know onto the screen to get me started.
And then the phone rings and when I glance at the screen I see that it’s my mother. Of course it is. She’s always had the ability to interrupt any moments of illicit pleasure that I may be attempting to enjoy.
I could ignore her. I should ignore her.
I am incapable of ignoring her.
‘Hi, Mum,’ I say, lowering the lid of my laptop which I know is ridiculous but I just don’t feel comfortable talking to her with that word leaping off the screen. ‘Is everything okay?’
Faking It: The most hilarious and laugh out loud page turner you’ll read this year! Page 5
