Release day post: Writing erotica isn't as easy as it looks

Today is release day for Planning an Addition, the fourth and final novel in the Love Under Construction series. No, it's not the last you'll hear of the Walters clan - there are three Citadel books and four Legacy books coming, so hang in there and you'll be richly rewarded.

But there's something that's different about this book from anything I've done so far. This time around, I wound up with M/M components in the love story, and that's a new thing for me. So how does a hetero female write M/M?

She does a lot of research.

First, I read a few other M/M works, but I try not to do that. I don't want someone else's voice in my work, and that's a really good way for that to happen. I chose carefully, but I found that none of the works I read helped because my scenes are VERY different from those.

So next I found some works written by gay men, not stories, but actual accounts of their romances and encounters. Those were pretty interesting. Unfortunately, those were also not much help because the two individuals in my M/M were entirely different. One is bisexual, and the other considers himself to be straight. And that pretty much shot those works right out of the water.

Then I did the thing I always do. I started reading works that explain exactly how the sex act is performed between two men. I'm talking mechanics, physiological responses, etc. Not the most fun reading, but definitely the most accurate. I learned lots of things, some that I really wish I didn't know, but that's okay - that kind of information lends itself to far more realistic-sounding scenes. So I read and read and read.

And in the end, I had to do something I knew I'd do all along.

I just asked the characters. I let them talk, let them develop the relationship, let them experiment on their own. Their personalities are the key to virtually everything they experience in the books, of course, and letting them form their own relationship was the real answer to every dilemma in writing the work. It did something important. It let them do it their way and got me out of the way. How I felt about their relationship no longer mattered. They spoke, and I listened and wrote down the account just as they wanted it written. And guess what?

It worked.

What I wound up with was a rich, multi-layered, transparent look into the lives of a couple of people, one of whom is deeply in love, and the other, terrified. It also gave me a portal into the thoughts and feelings of the other person they brought along for that ride, and her perspective was interesting too, not to mention her inclusion in the relationship. Well, okay, it's more than interesting - it's frickin' hot.

I also discovered something else as I wandered down this pathway, and it's that there are very few menage books that feature all three of the characters actually in sexual relationships with each other all the way around. And I found they interacted in ways I never expected but loved. Some of those interactions were way past kinky, but that suited them. Not only that, they made no apologies for the way they felt about each other, but finally embraced it and let it grow. That encouraged me.

In the end, they were sweet and sexy and loving toward each other in a protective, familial way. I loved them before; I love them even more now. And holy hell, are they ever hot. Hot, hot, hot. Flaming hot. No, I didn't mean it that way, just hot. Okay, maybe I did mean it that way - sue me. But I love them and I'm especially proud of one of them for doing what he knew he wanted to do but was too afraid to admit to at first. You, Peyton Stokes, are my guy, and you rock. I'm so proud of you I could . . . no. I'm not going there.

I love this book, and I love that I'm getting to bring it to you. I hope you enjoy it, every hot, sweet, painful, sorrowful, joyful minute of it. And if you don't, you can blame them. They wrote it, after all.