Making a change

In the summer of 2011, I started writing erotica. I started with true, but grossly exaggerated, and moved on to my first piece of fiction within weeks. I wrote a few stories, thinking they were the only ones I had in me, and then my real life took over, and I set the smut aside for a year and a half.

In the summer of 2013, I returned to writing. Skater's Waltz was churning in my brain for about two years. The idea of a woman skating naked was powerful, and I thought about it from a bunch of angles.  I thought of a bachelor party, hiring figure skating strippers. I thought of a skater at an early morning practice, all alone except for the Zamboni driver. Somehow I came up with the idea of a former competitive skater working out on a private, frozen pond, stripping while listening to a Jackyl song, Screwdriver.

That was my Literotica Nude Day 2013 contest entry. I felt good about it. It didn't win, but that was okay. What was important was that I was writing again. And I haven't stopped since.

Now I see stories everywhere I look. Every song gives me an idea. I overhear a sentence, and I see a plot forming as clearly as I saw the chick in Frozen building an ice castle. There's a lot going on in my brain.

My conflict comes from the fact that I'm weaning myself away from Literotica. I've enjoyed the feedback, the discussions, the friendships I've made. But the conflict I've found there has spoiled it for me. Too much posturing, grandstanding, fighting and backstabbing.

I'm just about to publish my first stories to Amazon. If I am giving up the feedback and friendship from Literotica, I need something in its place. I'm making the leap to trying to attain some monetary success from Amazon.

My biggest struggle is that my 20k word stories will never sell on Amazon. Erotica readers like shorties. I'm trying to embrace chopping my "babies" into shorter pieces of a series, but it hurts dammit. Sigh.

I have a plan, and hubby says I have to shut down my computer. I guess that's enough to get me through tonight, huh?

It ain't easy being a smut writer.