It is hard, coming back into this world. I sit here and have two series unfinished and my review blog here is in tatters. I have tried to keep it up over the last few months but it sits there languishing because my heart is not there yet. I have got a couple books in the queue to review but I honestly do not know if I am going to get to them.
Apologies to my readers and writers for the backlog.
I wonder if this was a time in my life that I am stepping away from. It is a shame because we lost so many good review sites for erotica, and I was there at the start of the boom and through the good times and bad. I honestly don’t know, it is still a very strong channel and it is hard to give up on an asset like that. There are also times I wonder if writing erotica is holding me back. There is only so long I can languish in the “adult dungeon” of online bookstores and not have my work scene because of search discrimination.
And from the looks of it, censorship and the oppression of ideas is only going to get worse in the future. I do not have high hopes for markets outside of the mainstream these days. It hurts to say this because there are so many in this community that I love and cherish my relationships with, on a professional level.
I know there will be a day I return to the series I have left hanging on the vine, and I will finish them finally. I do not even know at this point if they will even be categorized as erotica for those last few books. My heart has to be there, in that lustful zone of passion and fates intertwined. After Darthaniel passed away I don’t know if I will be in a place like that anytime soon. It is still too soon, and the wounds are still too raw for me.
I shall never forget that day.
So I wonder as I look out upon the vast wasteland of salted earth that social media has turned into. The fury of online mobs of both sides has made these places apocalyptic battlefields of social disorder. You have to find a mob that will protect you and post inside that community these days. There is no such thing as someone remaining neutral in an uncivil war. I have honestly avoided posting any opinions on social media because it is just too dangerous. I have answered posts with long and thoughtful replies, and then selected the entire reply and deleted it out of fear.
This is not going to get any better anytime soon. It is an infection that is deep under the skin and festering. The mob mentality only makes it worse.
I often tried to express my feelings before all this happened, and I saw what was coming. Out of fear I backed away. The fear of writing in a world like this paralyzed me, and then last year all hell broke loose. I lost my website, I lost my friend. I also lost my voice.
Just writing this is difficult, just sitting here in trying to make words come together feels like a burn victim recovering. The sting is very strong, and the words hesitate and stumble their way into sentences and paragraphs. I don’t know what to say.
I guess the only answer for me is to keep writing, even if it is just my thoughts. I did a wonderful series on trying to come back to writing last year by slowly walking through the entire book of Madame Bovary and I still love that series of rediscovery and finding a voice through a classic work of romantic fiction. Since then I have lined my shelves with books of all kinds, hundreds of them, and I have spent more time wandering the aisles of bookstores that nobody ever goes in to find rare and special treasures for my collection.
It is like I have discovered the beauty of flipping a real page once again.
Yes I know e–readers are so convenient and they hold millions of books in the palm of your hand. I can take my books with me wherever I go, and can pick up my phone and read them there too. I have a collection of thousands of books on my E reader, one which I recently replaced because the battery started leaking. It was a sad time because that e-reader had served me well throughout all of the proofreading of my books, so I guess I lost another piece of me recently. The new one is not as good, even though it is made by the same company. I get this empty feeling when I use it, is artificially slow and artificially empty and devoid of soul.
Darthaniel had a lot of virtual goods in his accounts, and now all of those are gone forever. I guess in a way virtual goods keep us buying and buying the same things over and over again, and in death we lose everything and can pass nothing on. When I look behind me at my bookshelves I know all of these will find a home someday, I can give them to a library, I can give them to friends, or even sell them to used bookstores. Someone else can enjoy these things someday.
I really don’t know where I am these days. I guess all I can say is “I am here.” I am here. I am just right here. This is where I am, questioning everything and knowing nothing.
It is what we call life.
I feel there is a book somewhere in this had waiting to get out. Like my experience of writing an entire dream as a short format novel in my work Bowlarama, that was something new and different for me. I really enjoyed writing that book even though it is locked in the adult dungeon over there at Amazon and nobody reads it. I look at a mirror and the woman I see says “you are done” and I find it hard to believe her. I’m not that same person anymore. Definitely not.
Done with that part of my life, I should say so. Beginning a new one, for certain.
I need to keep writing. I can’t lose my voice.
I have already lost too much.
Apologies to my readers and writers for the backlog.
I wonder if this was a time in my life that I am stepping away from. It is a shame because we lost so many good review sites for erotica, and I was there at the start of the boom and through the good times and bad. I honestly don’t know, it is still a very strong channel and it is hard to give up on an asset like that. There are also times I wonder if writing erotica is holding me back. There is only so long I can languish in the “adult dungeon” of online bookstores and not have my work scene because of search discrimination.
And from the looks of it, censorship and the oppression of ideas is only going to get worse in the future. I do not have high hopes for markets outside of the mainstream these days. It hurts to say this because there are so many in this community that I love and cherish my relationships with, on a professional level.
I know there will be a day I return to the series I have left hanging on the vine, and I will finish them finally. I do not even know at this point if they will even be categorized as erotica for those last few books. My heart has to be there, in that lustful zone of passion and fates intertwined. After Darthaniel passed away I don’t know if I will be in a place like that anytime soon. It is still too soon, and the wounds are still too raw for me.
I shall never forget that day.
So I wonder as I look out upon the vast wasteland of salted earth that social media has turned into. The fury of online mobs of both sides has made these places apocalyptic battlefields of social disorder. You have to find a mob that will protect you and post inside that community these days. There is no such thing as someone remaining neutral in an uncivil war. I have honestly avoided posting any opinions on social media because it is just too dangerous. I have answered posts with long and thoughtful replies, and then selected the entire reply and deleted it out of fear.
This is not going to get any better anytime soon. It is an infection that is deep under the skin and festering. The mob mentality only makes it worse.
I often tried to express my feelings before all this happened, and I saw what was coming. Out of fear I backed away. The fear of writing in a world like this paralyzed me, and then last year all hell broke loose. I lost my website, I lost my friend. I also lost my voice.
Just writing this is difficult, just sitting here in trying to make words come together feels like a burn victim recovering. The sting is very strong, and the words hesitate and stumble their way into sentences and paragraphs. I don’t know what to say.
I guess the only answer for me is to keep writing, even if it is just my thoughts. I did a wonderful series on trying to come back to writing last year by slowly walking through the entire book of Madame Bovary and I still love that series of rediscovery and finding a voice through a classic work of romantic fiction. Since then I have lined my shelves with books of all kinds, hundreds of them, and I have spent more time wandering the aisles of bookstores that nobody ever goes in to find rare and special treasures for my collection.
It is like I have discovered the beauty of flipping a real page once again.
Yes I know e–readers are so convenient and they hold millions of books in the palm of your hand. I can take my books with me wherever I go, and can pick up my phone and read them there too. I have a collection of thousands of books on my E reader, one which I recently replaced because the battery started leaking. It was a sad time because that e-reader had served me well throughout all of the proofreading of my books, so I guess I lost another piece of me recently. The new one is not as good, even though it is made by the same company. I get this empty feeling when I use it, is artificially slow and artificially empty and devoid of soul.
Darthaniel had a lot of virtual goods in his accounts, and now all of those are gone forever. I guess in a way virtual goods keep us buying and buying the same things over and over again, and in death we lose everything and can pass nothing on. When I look behind me at my bookshelves I know all of these will find a home someday, I can give them to a library, I can give them to friends, or even sell them to used bookstores. Someone else can enjoy these things someday.
I really don’t know where I am these days. I guess all I can say is “I am here.” I am here. I am just right here. This is where I am, questioning everything and knowing nothing.
It is what we call life.
I feel there is a book somewhere in this had waiting to get out. Like my experience of writing an entire dream as a short format novel in my work Bowlarama, that was something new and different for me. I really enjoyed writing that book even though it is locked in the adult dungeon over there at Amazon and nobody reads it. I look at a mirror and the woman I see says “you are done” and I find it hard to believe her. I’m not that same person anymore. Definitely not.
Done with that part of my life, I should say so. Beginning a new one, for certain.
I need to keep writing. I can’t lose my voice.
I have already lost too much.
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