Guest Author - Zoe X Rider

Guest Author

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I am pleased to have a visitor to my blog today. Zoe X Rider is a friend from the wonderful, extremely supportive erotica section of the online forum Absolute Write, where I have been a member for four years. Zoe has a book release today, and I've invited her to write a guest post and share her novel. Welcome, Zoe!

***

Gay Subtext

by Zoe X Rider

I love writing m/m fiction.

I'm pretty sure I didn't always think about guys falling in love with other guys, though I did grow up watching The Monkees, shared not only a beach house but a four-person bed. I just didn’t quite realize why I loved The Monkees so much.

My love of m/m hit around puberty, which was about the same time my family got a VCR. (They were enormous back then—in size, I mean, not just popularity. The play button on our JVC VCR was as big as one of today's cell phones.)

One of the first movies my father rented (he was the one with the video rental card, and he never took us to the rental store with him) was the original Lord of the Flies. This event predated puberty by a few months; I loved the movie—those boys fending for themselves on an island with no adults interfering—but, as with The Monkees, I didn't quite understand what I loved about it so much. A few months later, I discovered a pile of William Goldman paperbacks at a flea market. Mistaking him for the guy who wrote Lord of the Flies (that would be William Golding), I bought ALL THE BOOKS. I was disappointed when I realized the mistake, but I owned them by then, so I went ahead read them.

The book William Goldman is best known for—The Princess Bride—was not among the collection I picked up that day. If it had been, who knows—things might have turned out differently. Instead I had A Soldier in the Rain, Marathon Man, Magic, Tinsel…and The Temple of Gold, which was a slim paperback about Ray, who, at the start of the story, is in high school. Since I wasn’t far from high school myself, I cracked that one open first.

Oh my God, The Temple of Gold. There I was, just beginning to be infiltrated with hormones, and I was reading about Ray and his best friend Zock with growing certainty that these guys were totes in love: they go hiking, they read poetry, they run away to Chicago together. I was riveted, waiting for the big scene where they admitted how they felt.

But no. It wasn't that story.

If my father were alive today, I'd tell him that my predilection for gay stories was his fault. The Lord of the Flies-to-Temple of Gold connection is tenuous, since it’s based on a mistake, but the book he put directly in my hands a couple years later was not. It happened almost three decades ago, but I can see the whole thing like it was yesterday: I was in the living room, sitting in the blue recliner he’d fall asleep watching sports in. It was a boring summer afternoon, and we lived on such a remote road that I could sit in that chair all day and not see a car go by. My walked in and handed me a paperback, stiff with age, saying it had been one of his favorites when he was a teenager. With nothing better to do, I sat there reading John Knowles' A Separate Peace, drinking off-brand soda and becoming increasingly antsy: clearly Gene was in love with Finny. Any minute he would confess. I desperately hoped the feelings were returned, but I sensed heartbreak coming.

Alas, it wasn't that story.

By the time I discovered S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders, I was in the full grip of teenage hormones, and my crazy ideas about the characters were helped along by the fact that the movie had just come out. (Mmm Matt Dillon.) By this point, I knew better than to hope for the romances to happen in the story; it was the eighties. Homosexuality didn’t show up in books featuring young adults. That was fine with me: I had plenty of room in my head to explore my own storylines. I got lots of mileage out of The Outsiders: Dallas and Johnny, Sodapop and Two-Bit, Johnny and Ponyboy. This was, in fact, the tipping point. Up till now, my fantasies had been exclusively me and some cute boy from school, or me and John Taylor from Duran Duran, but now all these guys were taking over: falling in love, making out, fighting, fucking, taking what they wanted from each other with neither apologies nor excuses.

The men were running rampant in my head.

During my teen years, I plowed through the rest of William Goldman's back catalog, from 1960's Soldier in the Rain to 1986's Brothers. There were a few I couldn't get my hands on, but I read everything I could. There were no more Temple of Golds in that back catalog, but I enjoyed them. And then I more or less forgot about William Goldman, until a day a few years ago, when I found in a used bookstore one of those books I hadn't been able to find before: Your Turn to Curtsy, My Turn to Bow.

It was The Temple of Gold all over again. Best friends, tons of homosexual subtext. Chad was totally in love with Peter—you can't tell me any different. And, of course, no actual payoff. Just the lingering sadness of what was hidden behind the text.

I still love finding storylines where I can read between the lines, whether the author intended there to be anything between the characters or not. It's not what I write—in my own writing, while I still have a fondness for stories about guy friends (who fall in love), and stories where guys shouldn't be into each other (but are), I get to bring everything into the open. But I'll always treasure the books where I find those storylines buried in the cracks.

Zoe X. Rider is the author of Games Boys Play, an erotic m/m, BDSM romance between best friends, out now from Loose Id.

Buy Link: http://www.loose-id.com/games-boys-play.html

Blurb:

Games Boys Play by Zoe X. Rider (published by Loose Id)

Brian and Dylan have been best friends for years. They have no secrets between them—except for the ones they’re keeping from each other.

When Dylan walks in on Brian engaging in self bondage, Brian’s mortified, but Dylan’s intrigued—to the point of offering to help Brian out next time he gets an urge to be tied up.

No. That’s all Brian can think. No way. But the idea of someone else being in control overwhelms his thoughts, and self-bondage is suddenly a pale substitute for the real thing. He gives Dylan permission, on a trial basis, and comes face to face with a side of Dylan he’s never seen before. A really hot side.

As their games pick up steam, so does their relationship, along with Brian’s courage to go after the things he wants. Like, Dylan.

It might be happily ever after, but there’s one secret left, and it could ruin everything.

What I Overheard - Back by Popular Demand

The Intrepid Eavesdropper

(Number Two)

***

I'm at it again. Listening in on conversations. But it's okay because it's in the pursuit of a greater good - right? Improving my storytelling and dialogue skills is a viable excuse - right? Of course it is. So, without further ado, here is round two of the fascinating snippets I overheard last week in two of my favorite coffee shops. Today, I'll start with short and sweet and move to longer and more involved.

***

It's not wrong if I have a good reason.

***

Snippet Number Four:  "Making It Better"

At the Starbucks in the hospital lobby, on a Tuesday morning. It's raining outside. A man is washing the windows with large sweeping motions. It's quiet in the coffee shop. All I can hear is the clicking of my laptop's keys and the swish-swish of the squeegee. There is a break between customers, and one barista is talking quietly to another. She puts her hand on her friend's arm and says this beautiful, heartfelt line: 

"You're less bubbly and happy than usual and I just want to make it better."

friends

***

Snippet Number Five:  "You're Having A Fucking Boy"

This is about as different as you can get. It's about half an hour later, and I'm still at the Starbucks in the hospital lobby, across from the Ultrasound Unit. A woman is on a cell phone, leaning against the shop's condiment bar. She's got the phone propped between her ear and her shoulder, and is shaking cinnamon and cocoa into her coffee as she talks. She stirs the coffee with quick, angry motions. To me, she seems more interested in her coffee than in the conversation.

She shouts into the phone.

"Guess what you're having?"

She listens to the person on the other end of the line, but only for a second.

"A boy. You're having a boy."

She makes a snorting noise.

"Another fucking boy."

She slaps a lid on her coffee.

"Yeah. It is."

She slurps her coffee, then stalks out the door.

***

This one still bothers me. There are so many questions that I will never know the answers to! Is this woman pregnant? She didn't look pregnant. Why is she annoyed that it's a boy? Does she already have five of them at home or something? Is she talking to the baby's father? She doesn't say "we're having a boy", she says "you're having a boy". Something seemed so wrong about this conversation.

All I can think is: That poor baby boy.

***

Snippet Number Six:  "Give Them Candy"

I am at my other favorite coffee shop, Zoka. I'm grumpy. I don't have my favorite table - I'm at the breezy table right in front of the door because that was all there was. But I'm coping. Not long after I arrive, two men pull out chairs from a large table clear across the room. One of the men - he's perhaps twenty-five years old and has the loudest voice I've ever heard - seems to be training the younger man (he's college-age) to teach an all-day-long SAT prep class. For over two hours, they discuss how to teach different sections of the exam to high school seniors - math, English, history.

"Essays," says the older man. "Some of them go on and on and on. Like this one."

The instructor flips open a four-inch-tall three ring binder, looking for a particular essay. He finds what he's looking for, then jabs the page with his finger. "You have to consider the voice. Is it too self-conscious? Too full of themselves? Look at this girl's essay." He turns a few pages. "Look at this part. She's inserting too much of herself here. Right there. See that?"

"Yes."

"And grammar. Identify the rules of grammar. Make sure they have a command of it - but then let them run with it and make it their own."

"Okay."

"That's the hard part. To know when they've gone too far."

The younger man nods and looks dubiously at the gigantic binder.

"Make a list," suggests the older man. "Put the most common things that give them problems up on the wall. Have conversations with them. Make them talk. Make them do worksheets, and then discuss them. Worksheets are good."

The younger man is scribbling notes. I think he looks flustered.

The older man leans back in his seat. "The best advice? They get tired around three o'clock. I say get some sugar into them."

"Really?"

"Always give them candy at the break."

I stop listening at this point - the minutia is mind-numbing. But as I go back to my own work, I can't help but think how lucky I am to be privy to this moment, and remember when my own children took the (very expensive) classes these men are discussing. I also know this: I would never have come up with this scene on my own. Never in a thousand years.

It really was this big.

***

Snippet Number Seven:  "You Just Have To Keep Going" 

The following snippet also took place at Zoka. It was the next day. Two men, dressed in slacks and collared, button-down shirts are sitting at the table next to me. No fancy lattes or mochas, just black coffee. Older man does almost all of the talking. He has a deeply lined face, a chipped front tooth, and steel gray crew-cut hair. He is constantly tapping his foot.

"I tell people to look at my hands." The older man holds out his hands. The nails are short and somewhat ragged, but clean. "I work with my hands. All my life, I've worked with my hands." Turns them over, shoves them in front of the younger man.

The younger man obviously knows what's expected of him and takes a good long look. "You work hard. You've done well."

Older man slurps his coffee. "Yeah. I have my guys. They go out there. Thirty years, they do their work. And people come to us."

"I've heard good things about your place."

"It's job satisfaction, that's what it is. I run a tight ship. Everything kept clean. Lots of light. No yelling at people. It's safer that way."

"Yeah."

A pause, while they both take a drink of their coffee.

"I keep the radio on to fifties type music," says the older man. "People ask me, why do you listen to that old stuff?"

"Well, why?"

"It doesn't get the customers riled up, you know? Not like that modern stuff." He talks about that horrible modern stuff for a while, then he moves on. "The most important thing is to keep the place safe. And clean. But you have to be careful. I tell my guys to be careful." He holds out his hands again. "Cause look what can happen. Look at that." He holds out his thumb. "I cut my thumb clean off! A short saw. They put it back on again."

The younger man gawks.

"See?" says the older man. "You can see where they did the surgery. The color is different."

Then was a long discourse about bone grafts, and skin grafts, and hundreds of stitches, and bandages that bled all over the place. The younger man looks kind of yellow by the time the older one is finished describing every little detail of his ordeal.

"Well. It doesn't look that good, but it works," says the older man, grabbing his coffee with the hand in question. "You just have to keep going."

The color is different all right!

***

And that's all for this time! I'll just keep going. I'll continue listening and gathering overheard dialogues and eventually I'll have enough for Intrepid Eavesdropper Number Three.

Thanks for reading!

***

My Editor Speaks

Rebecca's Moment in the Sun

A big welcome to my editor at Ellora's Cave. Rebecca is the person who keeps me in line, who helps me whip my stories into shape, who chases down stray exclamation points and italics, who lets me be inventive with dashes because I'm not allowed to use semi-colons. She is my cheerleader in the scary big world of publishing, and I am so very lucky to have her. 

I am thrilled to have her visit my blog today.

Rebecca

Thanks to Gail for hosting me on her blog! My name is Rebecca Hill, and I’m an editor for Ellora’s Cave, the premier erotic romance publisher.

Gail caught my attention from the outset as an author who obviously has new, fresh and exciting ideas, but she really revved my engines when she submitted Inn On the Edge, an erotic horror novel for EC’s “Shivers” line. I adore horror stories and I really want to see more women writing in horror, as well as a marriage between the visceral reactions of fear and arousal, so erotic horror is a genre I’m wildly enthusiastic about.

Why should Stephen King have all the fun? We know that a natural reaction to fear is sexual desire, so the two genres are a match made in heaven.

Many people think of romance as a “throw-away” genre, but in my opinion, entertaining fiction engages the emotions. Good fiction engages the mind. And great fiction does both. If a story captures me both intellectually and emotionally, I’d be a fool to care where it’s shelved. That’s why I edit for EC, and why I’m so delighted to work with ground-breaking authors like Gail.

In my opinion, Gail’s at the cutting edge of the next big thing. Her work in progress, Over the Edge, set in the same universe, promises to be just as gripping.

I’ll be back for a guest post in the near future to talk about my editing methods – but don’t believe her when she says that’s a horror story all on its own!

Thank you Rebecca! 

What Rebecca hasn't mentioned is that not only is she a talented editor who works with a large stable of prolific authors, she is an author herself. She is the co-author of the erotic horror novella, "Smoke and Mirrors". I am thrilled to share this amazing book, which is available at Totally Bound.

Purchase Link for "Smoke and Mirrors" - https://www.totallybound.com/smoke-and-mirrors

Blurb for "Smoke and Mirrors"

Max has always been able to see things that aren't there…or perhaps his visions show people's true natures, in their reflections.

When he visits the circus one night, the last thing he expects is to fall in lust with the sexy knife-thrower, Lady Stiletto. But when he follows her into the funhouse — and into the hall of mirrors — they are both sucked into a warped and twisted world where time moves differently and nothing is what it seems…

Can Max find Lady Stiletto and save her from the madness of the mirror world? Or will he find only an echo, driven mad by the carnival of horrors they've been plunged into?

Reader Advisory: This story contains scenes of dubious consent, and mirror-world lovers who aren't all they seem.

What I Overheard - A Writer's Confession

The Intrepid Eavesdropper

I've never been a sneaky person. I've never listened outside closed doors, picked up a phone extension and listened to someone else's conversation, or hid in a place where I knew I'd hear juicy gossip. I  don't think of myself as an eavesdropper ... but on occasion, I am one. 

Let me explain. I am a writer. I sometimes write in public places. A favorite haunt of mine - I go there maybe three times a week - is Zoka, a nearby coffee shop with perfect-sized tables, lots of electrical outlets, long banks of windows that are positioned to let in the golden evening light, and a barista crew that is starting to call me by name. My only complaint? Other people like Zoka as much as I do. Which can be problematic.

Zoka Coffee Shop, Seattle Washington

My writing place

The place gets crowded. Those perfect little tables fill up. Students from the University of Washington meet at my coffee shop for their study groups - it seems to be a favorite of the college-age set. But others like Zoka as well. Prospective employers meet with potential employees for getting-to-know-you chats. Friends get together. Families on outings come to visit; there are three different father-daughter combinations who come into Zoka for after-school hot chocolates and a half hour of homework. And, always, scattered here and there, are lone writerly types pecking away at their laptops, seemingly oblivious. I am one of them.

Several times a week, for maybe three hours, I nab one of the small square tables in front of the windows. I have a favorite table - the sideways one near the front of the shop, even though it rocks just a bit and I sometimes have to stuff a folded-up napkin under one of its legs. I drape my jacket over the chair, order a mocha (and the occasional almond croissant), and set up my laptop.

And then it begins: other people's conversations start leaking into my personal space. I can usually tune them out, but sometimes, it's hard. There's no avoiding it. 

Working on my Next Novel

Instead of being annoyed by these verbal intrusions, I've begun doing some ... ah ... judicious listening. Overheard conversations are wonderful places to gather real-life dialogue and interesting details and plot ideas. Writers have been carefully listening and taking notes for ages - it's a time-honored way of honing dialogue skills. Listening in on other people in public places is eavesdropping, yes, but I prefer to think of it as "dialogue research" intended for "character color". I've been jotting down the best snippets for months now - and getting some great stuff. I've collected wonderful bits and pieces of dialogue, and I thought it was a great time to share them.

Snippet Number One

Last week, when I was about to pack up and leave the coffee shop, two women sat down at the table nearest to me. I couldn't help but hear the job interview that the older woman was conducting for the younger one:

Older woman:   "You like to read?"

Younger woman:   "Um, yes."

Older woman:   "I mean, like a lot."

Younger woman:   "I can, if you want me to."

(At this point, I was drawn in. Intrigued. What kind of job involves lots of reading?)

Older woman:   "There would be stacks of books to read. Stacks like you've never seen."

Younger woman:   "As in ... manuscripts?"

Older woman:   "You'll have so many you won't know what to do with them."

Younger woman (laughs self-consciously):    "I bet."

Older woman:   "You'll have to read and pass the best ones on to me."

Younger woman:   "Okay."

Older woman:   "You'll learn to tell pretty quickly which are worth sending on to me."

Younger woman:   "I can do that."

(Now I had the sneaking suspicion that a literary agent was sitting at the table next to me! Holy Cow! Who was she? Had I submitted a manuscript to her?)

Older woman:   "Most are junk. You can tell by the first page."

(Younger woman laughs.)

Older woman:   "Sometimes by the first paragraph."

Younger woman:   "By the first sentence?"

Older woman:   "Sometimes! Yes!"

(Now I had a burning desire to rewrite the first page, paragraph, and sentence of my current novel.)

I scootched my chair a bit closer, trying to look innocent. They began talking about plots, and two-page synopses, and authors who don't know a Story Arc from Noah's Arc. Famous clients were mentioned. Publishers were brought up. By the time they left, I was in danger of falling onto their table, I was eavesdropping so hard. 

The last thing I overheard? The older woman asking how soon the younger woman could start.

Snippet Number Two

A few days later, I was seated next to an innocent-looking young woman. She sat at her laptop, wrapped up in her work and listening to music through her earbuds. I hardly noticed her, until a handsome young man sauntered up, pulled out a chair, and sat down across from her. That's when things got interesting. Apparently, he was late meeting her, and she was furious, as in white-faced, cold-voiced, seriously pissed off. I wasn't quick enough to capture many lines of dialogue, but what I got could be great fodder for a future scene:

Girl:   "I guess you and I have different definitions of the word SOON."

Boy:   "... but I was sorting my socks, Babe."

Girl:   "Since when does 'I'm leaving right now' mean an hour and a half later?"

Boy (tipping his chair back on two legs)   "I knew you would wait for me - so why should I hurry?"

That's all I got, but - Yikes! Oh, the simmering resentment and rage at that table! I found it hard to believe that these two would be together much longer. Great dialogue or not, it was too much for me. I found another, quieter, location, and left them to their altercation.

Snippet Number Three

The last one happened only last night. Three college-age women were having an earnest study session. It appeared that they were writing essays for a religious class or study group. They had a bible verse, and had dissected it from one angle and then another and shared their thoughts with each other. All well and good. I wasn't paying much attention - but then their conversation took a different turn, and I was all ears.

Jasmine (the only name I caught):   "I get all blushy over him."

Friend One:   "You do?"

Friend Two:   "You DO?"

Jasmine:   "I think of him like a boyfriend, like I'm in love with him."

(My hands went still on my keyboard. Could Jasmine be saying what I thought she might be? Really?)

Friend One:   "That's so cool."

Friend Two:   "What would you ... do with him?"

Jasmine (slowly):   "I get this FEELING when I think about him."

Friend One:   "Me too, a little."

Friend Two doesn't say anything but I hear her suck in her breath.

Jasmine:   "I think of myself doing something ordinary with him, like he was a real person. Like we would go out in canoes by Husky Stadium. Like we would hang out and talk, and he would be the best friend ever, the best listener."

(A pause.)

Jasmine:   "...like he would paddle when I got tired."

(I blinked. Wow. This was some good stuff, some inner thoughts and emotions. It was the most uncomfortable I've yet felt while jotting down overheard dialogue. For the first time, I actually felt like I was eavesdropping - but I couldn't stop.)

Friend One:   "Yes, Jesus would do that. For sure."

Friend Two:   "Oooooh, Jasmine. That's so good."

Jasmine:   "Yeah."

Friend One:   "I would hang out with Jesus."

Jasmine:   "Me too, definitely."

Friend Two:   "I would too." (Pause.) "But we wouldn't go paddling. We would watch old movies together and cry at the sad scenes together."

Friend One:   "Oh my god. That makes me shiver."

Jasmine:   "But now I'm hungry. I feel compelled by Jesus' love ... to buy a brownie."

That's all I have for now.

I'm sure there will be more - keep your eyes open for Intrepid Eavesdropper number two.

P.S. If you are ever in Seattle, near the University of Washington, stop in at Zoka and tell them I sent you. Here is their Website: http://www.zokacoffee.com/about-zoka-coffee/locations/

Interview With a Healer

Healing Hands:

Fascinating Research for my New Novel

I have recently started a new erotic horror novel set in the same world as Inn on the Edge. Dahlia, my earnest and good-hearted main character, enters an Institute that teaches Curative Touch and soon finds herself tangling with Sex Demons. They manipulate her into helping them with their dark, twisted ulterior motives. Along the way, Dahlia will discover that she is a talented sexual healer. And, to make her choices even harder, she'll fall in love with a young Sex Demon.

The book is coming together - but I have so many questions: What exactly is touch healing? What sorts of maladies can a touch healer help with? What does society think of what they do? I am especially interested in what the healing feels like from the healer's point of view.

I had to interview a touch healer.

Gloria - a pseudonym - is a real person. She is a lovely massage therapist I've known for several years. I only recently learned that she has studied healing touch extensively, and has untold hours of hands-on experience. Her healing work is separate from her massage therapy work. I was thrilled when she agreed to this interview.

~~~The Interview~~~

Me: What is your background?

Gloria: I am a practicing massage therapist, with the anatomy and physiology coursework required for licensing in the State of Washington. I also study such things as herbal remedies, cranial-sacral massage, infant massage, and more. I also am very interested in Maya Healing techniques, and have attended several in-depth workshops in Central America with native Maya healers. I am always educating myself, incorporating everything I can into my work. I do not reject Western Medicine - I just feel like there are other, ancient, more gentle methods that are beneficial alongside it.

Me: Can you tell me how you approach a healing?

Gloria: First, I do "triage" - I listen to what the person wants, then decide if that's what they really need. For example: a person might want me to work on their knee, they might tell me it aches and hurts and can I please, please help with it. Well, I might or I might not work on the knee itself. I have to see if the knee joint is actually where the problem stems from. The patient doesn't always know. I'll do an evaluation. It may be that I'll decide that it is really the hip joint that needs work and not the knee.

Me: Do you prepare yourself emotionally before a session?

Gloria: Good question. I do prepare myself, I do have rituals. If I didn't, I could easily become overwhelmed, and if that were to happen, I wouldn't be much help to anyone.

Me: What are your rituals?

Gloria: I need barriers. I need to separate myself from the work. Rituals help. I have a calming, cleansing hang-washing ritual that I've used for years, using herbs and spring water and a pouring vessel that has special meaning to me. I wash my hands after every healing, outdoors if at all possible. Of course I constantly do hygienic hand-washing also, for obvious reasons, but that's different. My ritual hand-washing is deeper, more emotional, not meant to clean, but to spiritually cleanse.

Me: Any other rituals?

Gloria: I put myself into a different mind-space when I heal. To do this, I always change into my "practitioner clothes" - which is soft, comfortable clothing that I only use for this purpose. I don't do a healing in my everyday street clothes, it doesn't give me the emotional separation I need.

I prefer to do the healings in a quiet, secluded spot, preferably the same place every time. This applies for massages also. If this isn't possible, then I pay extra attention to my rituals.

Me: Is there anything you find especially difficult?

Gloria: Yes. People's need can devour you if you let it. I can't give people in need everything they ask for. One of the hardest things I learned was how and when to hold part of myself back.

It's not something I like to talk about, but there are the rare people that I call "Black Pits". I have to be super careful not to let this sort of person's problems rub off on me or overwhelm me. "Black Pit" people can have a miasma of upset and hurt hanging to them, troubles so powerful they seem capable of clinging to other people as well. That is why I find it necessary sometimes to hold myself behind careful barriers.

I do want to point out that these "Black Pit" people are not the same as the "people in need" I just mentioned. I also want to point out that in both cases, the hardest part is not being able to completely stop their pain.

Me: What does the healing feel like, from your perspective?

Gloria: Sometimes, if I'm having a really good day, I can read a person a bit. This is a sense of feeling what's inside of a person, inside their body. Sometimes I can feel problem areas with my hands before even touching a person, just from passing my hands above their body. It feels rather like a hot spot. This is something I've developed with time and practice. I'm pretty sure that, if I wanted to, I could work on this skill enough to be able to find tumors. There are healers who can do this, who are tumor hunters. But I'm not at that point.

When I first started, I discovered that I could sometimes read a person and know their soul, know everything about them. But I quickly understood that it was too much. It was an invasion of their privacy. It was too much information for me to deal with, too overwhelming, too many things that I didn't want to know about a client. So I trained myself not to "look" at a person that way. I haven't done that kind of looking into a person for twenty years.

Me: What else do you find helpful to your work?

Gloria: Timing is crucial. I have to stick to hour-long sessions. When I first began, I would let sessions with friends and clients get away from me. Sometimes they'd go for hours and hours. Some of the longest sessions were four or five hours long, which was ridiculous. It was a breach of boundaries and a terrible expenditure of healing energy. I didn't understand at first that over-doing it would make me feel sick the next day.

The exception to the time limit is when I'm studying. Sometimes I do special healing workshops where the healing sessions are allowed to be much longer, so students can explore these same issues in a controlled environment.

Me: How about sexual healing? Have you ever heard of that?

Gloria: Absolutely. There is a huge population of healers, and some of them do sexual healing and take it very seriously. And yes, some of them have sex with clients as a valued part of their work. Look up "sexual surrogacy" to find information about sexual healers.

Thank you to Gloria for allowing me this glimpse into the workings and inner thoughts of a healer. As well as being fascinating, you've shared invaluable information which will be a great help to me in my writing. You can put your hands on me anytime.

Adventures in Storyland

...And now, for something different!

I have a special treat today to celebrate the fifth day of Inn on the Edge. A romantic holiday letter, from Angie to Josh (the main characters of the novel), six months after their breathless escape from the Inn on the Edge Hotel and from the sex demon who held them captive there. Enjoy!

My Dearest Josh,

I've been in my studio trying to paint all morning, but I couldn't get anything done because I kept thinking about you. I miss you so much! I know you had to go to this training conference for your new job - but it's crazy hard to have you gone for two weeks. 

How can they DO this to people, scheduling the conference just before Christmas? Don't they know we're newlyweds and that this is our first Christmas together? Are they heartless?

Anyway, I wanted to tell you what I was daydreaming about when I should have been painting.

It's the Storybuilder. You never got to experience the magic Storybuilder necklaces with me when we were still at the Inn on the Edge, which breaks my heart. I know you've been reluctant to use them, but Josh - it's been months and months since we escaped the demon. We're safe now. We took care of Mr. Abiba! He's gone! We can play with the Storybuilder now. I know we can!

Still need convincing? Then let me tell you about my daydream.

Close the door to your office, my dear. Lower the lights, sit back in your swivel chair and make yourself comfortable ... prepare yourself for adventure!

First, we'll undress each other. We put Storybuilder Pendants over one another's shoulders. You arrange mine so that it falls perfectly between my breasts, and then you lean over and kiss me. (Like it so far?)

We say the magic words and the Storybuilder turns on. Colorful speckles of light scatter over our faces, our bodies, looking for all the world like miniature Christmas lights. Admiring the effect the light show has on our nakedness, we nestle closer to each other. Before long I'm settled on your lap. We kiss again, even though kissing isn't part of the formal script that activates the magic. (Now I KNOW you're liking it!)

The sparkling lights die down, signaling that the magic is ready. It's time to take turns building our Storyland. Quivering with anticipation - this is so fun! - I choose the setting: we're in a castle, a deserted castle in the middle of a dense forest.

We watch, wide-eyed, as real world of our bedroom fades away and is replaced with magic. Rough stone walls materialize around us. The ceiling is made of wide, hand-hewed beams. The flagstone floor is covered with a hand-knotted carpet. Amazingly, impossibly, we're inside a drafty, cool castle. It even smells old. (Did you expect it to look so REAL, Josh? I didn't, the first time!)

I decide the place should be decorated for Christmas, and more things appear: a fifteen-foot Christmas tree in the corner of the room, fat aromatic candles burning in a wide circle around us, bunting draped from the ceiling and doorways, and, permeating the air, the smell of cloves and cinnamon and eggnog. (Yes, that'll do nicely.)

Now it's your turn, Josh. You get to choose the characters we'll portray in our own private Story Land. You think about it for a moment while I gaze at your handsome flushed face - see? You're getting into this! - and then you smile and tell me that you are the Lord of the Forest, a rich and powerful man, who has had this charming wilderness castle built for one purpose only - to share with his secret love...the parlor maid.

(So I'm to be a PARLOR MAID? You funny, funny man.)

We watch as we're magically draped in rich velvets and supple leather (for the Lord of the Forest), and in a thin, ill-fitting frock (for the parlor maid.)

(Thank you very much, Josh. Would it have been so bad to let me have a ball gown?)

Then it's my turn to add to the Story again. I declare that we need a banquet table heaped with the best food and drink, fresh and savory and ready to eat. Because we're going to get hungry, after all I have planned for us.

Arching your eyebrow, you quickly add an enormous four-poster bed, complete with satin sheets and comforters and plenty of pillows.

I add a mirror over the bed. Why not?

You add a box of sex toys. Again, why not?

And there you have it, Josh. The beginning of a Story. The rest will have to wait until you are here, until we're together again. Until then, I'll be thinking of nothing else.

With all my love,

Your Little Parlor Maid