Confession: I Don’t Kill All My Darlings

One of the things I love about writing erotica is that I don’t always feel obligated to kill my darlings. I mean, the genre lends itself to some darlings, don’t you think? I kind of cringe when I read mine, but I’m sort of tickled, too. Purple prose is a guilty indulgence, like pressing a bruise.

Here’s darling from my story “A Good Maid”.

Millie’s view of his hands was always obstructed by fabric, but she knew his oiled fingers rubbed the patients’ lushest skin. The shriveled parts of aged widows would swell into plump tenderness. The scarred parts of lonely mothers would open again to rhapsody. Under Dr. Thorpe’s hands, that part of every woman glistened and shined. Even the ones who cried, eventually beamed.

Especially the ones who cried.

You can read the whole story in the newly released anthology Amorous Congress: A Collection of New Victorian Erotica now available at Amazon. 

The marvelous Oleander Plume interviewed me over at her site last week about the book. I had such fun with her questions. Check it out and find a longer excerpt of the story here.

Want another one?

This is from my story “Purity”.
From that morning on, he was all I thought of. His toes, his calves, the small of his back that dampened his shirt. During the daily communion, when he poured grape juice from the ceramic carafe and held the loaf up to break bread, I watched his fingers and silently begged: pour me, break me. When it was my turn, as he tipped the chalice toward my mouth, I let my fingers graze his hands. As he said, “Christ’s blood shed for you,” the tenderness in his inflection was undeniable. Around the campfire, when he strummed his guitar while we all sang “How Great Is Our God,” I often noticed him looking in my direction. I sat taller then, arching my back slightly. When the urges came to fold my arms, I nestled closer to the flames, letting the heat from the blaze quench the places I dare not touch.

“Purity” is about the sexual awakening of Sarah, a young woman raised by evangelical Christians. I felt fairly confident in the piece when I first submitted it to editor, Rose Caraway. But under her guidance, the story grew so much deeper. She helped me shepherd the characters toward each other. You can read the whole story in the steamy-hot new book The Sexy Librarian’s Dirty 30, Vol.2.

I talk a bit more about “Purity” in a guest post I did over at Stupid Fish Productions: “5 Mistakes I’ve Made Writing Erotica”.

Do you have any darlings you refused to kill? Feel free to post links in the comments. I’d love to press your bruises.

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Photo: Public Domain | Used under CC0 1.0