Have you seen the movie Showgirls? Yeah, I know. It received wretched reviews, was universally bashed by critics and received the Razzie® for worst picture of the year and worst picture of the decade. Egad. In spite of all the bashing, though, I do have to say that I thought the sex scenes were . […]

Fifty two years ago today in Britain, on November 2, 1960, a significant jury ruling was made in defense of D.H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterly’s Lover as a book whose literary merit amounted to a “public good” and did not “deprave or corrupt persons likely to read it.” The trial, known as R v Penguin Books Ltd, […]

Following up on Liz’s post from yesterday, let’s talk about pain in erotic romance. This is a topic from which some will run away in fear, so it’s particularly suitable for today since it’s Halloween. Hollywood “erotic thrillers” have explored this topic thoroughly in several movies, good, bad, and forgettable. The first thing that comes to mind […]

At a recent book signing I attended, I stopped by the table where one of my writer friends was stationed. Wanting to lend my support I told her I’d buy one of her books and suggested she recommend one among the several available. She drew one out and said, “Well, you read a lot of erotic […]

While conducting research for one of my historical erotic romances, I studied the art of perfume making extensively. It’s an intoxicating lesson. As Mandy Aftel says in her excellent book Essence and Alchemy: A Book of Perfume, “Fragrance has the instantaneous and invisible power to penetrate consciousness with pure pleasure. Scent reaches us in ways that […]

In an earlier post I talked about the section on Ellora’s Cave’s website called EC for men. I’m intrigued by it for a few reasons. The target reader is primarily men, but all the authors seem to be women. And assuming that’s the case, do women capture what men really want? Why aren’t men writing these stories as well? Is EC […]