Freeing Erotica through the Paranormal Romance

Thanks so much for hosting me on Love Bites and Silk Ties for Day 8 of my Landscapes blog tour and giveaway! It’s always a pleasure to spend time at yours crowing about my latest release.

Question: When is erotica not erotica? Answer: When it’s paranormal romance.

No really! It’s true. It’s been my observation that while erotica is considered the bastard step-child of the literary world, add a vampire, throw in a werewolf, maybe tuck a succubus and a demon into the mix, and the sky is the limits as to how sexy the story can be and still not be labeled erotica.

My theory is that because vamps, shifters and succubae aren’t real, they can do whatever they want in genre literature and not end up with the erotica label. Some of the best selling paranormal novels are some of the most erotic I’ve ever read, and some of those erotic passages in those novels are non-consensual, violent blood play, even bordering on bestiality in the case of shifter stories. Take erotica out of the contemporary setting and place it in the realm of paranormal and voila! The writer is suddenly free to explore possibilities that she would never be allowed without a paranormal backdrop.

I first became aware of this strange glitch in the labeling of genre novels while reading J. R. Ward’s extremely sexy Black Dagger Brotherhood series. It occurred to me fairly early in the first book that these novels have as much sex and it’s as steamy, if not more so, than a lot of erotica I’ve read, and yet no one would consider labeling the Brotherhood erotica. Then it hit me that this strange “free pass” for paranormal sex was not a new thing at all. In spite of not being able to have sex, Ann Rice’s vampires were still sexier than sin. Then there’s the case with Laurel Kay Hamilton’s Anita Blake novels that positively sizzled with filthy sex of almost every kind imaginable. They were never labeled erotica. That paranormal “free pass” isn’t new at all! Paranormal is sexy as hell, and yet it’s never relegated to the top shelf of bookstores, and it never comes with warning labels.

I can’t deny that that’s part of what drew me to write paranormal romance, but the bottom line is that I really couldn’t help myself. I reckon the fact that I was so drawn to write the paranormal is exactly the same reason paranormal romance doesn’t get labeled erotica, because paranormal is somehow, strangely, intrinsically sexy. How can anything be more intimate than having a vampire drinking blood through a … well for lack of a better term, a love bite? How can anything be more sensual than the touch of a werewolf’s fur? How can anything be more arousing than having a succubus invade your dreams with sex? And demons, well one word … possession.

Paranormal romance is about the loss of control in ways that would never be allowed in contemporary erotica because they would be impossible. The loss of control to the vampire, to the succubus, to the demon is somehow more acceptable because the victim/lover has little choice under the circumstances. And we as readers would certainly bare our throats to a sexy vamp or go to bed an hour early for a hot romp with a incubus. I’m convinced that the element of the impossible in the realm of any fantasy that isn’t just sexual fantasy gives the writer of a paranormal story much more freedom when it comes to writing sex. Where magic and the supernatural are involved, the normal rules for the universe don’t apply, and that includes the normal rules that apply to stamping a book with the erotica label. What that means for me, as a writer of erotic romance, is that I’m free to experiment with the love and lust of my characters when they’re in a paranormal setting in a way I would never be allowed to be in an ordinary romance setting. I find that very exciting, and it made writing Alonso Darlington and Reese Chamber’s story a whole lot more interesting.

Landscapes Blurb:

Alonso Darlington has a disturbing method of keeping landscaper, Reese Chambers, both safe from and oblivious to his dangerous lust for the man. But Reese isn’t easy to keep secrets from, and Alonso wants way more than to admire the man from afar. Can he risk a real relationship without risking Reese’s life?

Buy links: http://kdgrace.co.uk/books/landscapes/

Landscapes Excerpt:

It was nearing dawn when Talia returned to our accommodations smelling of sex, as I knew she would if she were to obtain for me what I wanted. By then my blood burned in my veins, and my body felt too close to me, as though the flesh that I dwelt in suddenly conspired to crush me with its demands. And though I knew that Reese Chambers could not have refused her even if she had come to him as a toothless, foul-smelling hag, I hated her that he had poured himself into her body while I had been left with only my fantasies kindling my lust to an inferno.

Though my need was such that my flesh was fevered and my cock an insistent throb, until she returned, I held myself contained within skin that felt too thin. When she saw the state that I was in, she pulled the heavy drapes with an efficient tug, then with a nod of her head, motioned me to follow her down into the basement room that had been prepared for me. When she turned to me at the foot of the bed, before she could opened her kiss-bruised lips to speak, I took her mouth, starving for the first taste of him, the taste of his saliva, the taste of his blood, mixed with hers. She’d bitten him; he’d bitten her back. He was rough, and he liked to be treated rough, but he kept that to himself. He was embarrassed by it. His lips were slightly chapped from so much time in the sun and wind, and they’d slid against hers, suckling and stroking and pressing until her mouth opened to his. With ravenous laps of my tongue, I tasted him in her mouth, and she held back the moan of response, so I could hear the echoes of his groans, heavy with need he’d not satisfied in awhile, and I felt kinship in my own unsatisfied needs. Images of him flashed through my head. Christ, his eyes were green, dark green like the evergreen forests of the north, and he kept them open when he kissed her, taking her in with his eyes.

I shoved aside the silk of her low bodice exposing her breasts, breasts that his hands had cupped. My nipples peeked to sharp aching points at the feel of his calloused thumbs raking, pressing and releasing. I breathed in his scent on her breasts, burying my face in her cleavage, licking the taste of salty, slightly picante maleness, sniffing and tasting until I could stand it no more. In one violent jerk, I tore the dress all the way down and shoved it off her shoulders, away from the flesh he had licked and kissed and mounted. I cried out at the feel of him, weight on one elbow, knee spreading her thighs, fingers opening her heaviness, anxious to penetrate, anxious to relieve his need. And then, with Talia free of clothing, Reese Chambers’ essence filled the room. Talia’s panties were still wet with his semen mixed with her humid desire, and I tore them from her and forced her onto her stomach, onto her hands and knees, so that it was not her face I saw, but his that I imagined. With hands on her hips, I raised her bottom in the air and spread her still swollen, still slippery folds with fingers made awkward by my arousal, letting the scent of his hot bread and honey release intoxicate me. Then I buried my face in her snatch and, as I ate his lust from her, I knew him.

He was Cumbrian born and bred, and his accent was the soft lilting sound of the fells. He was a landscaper and a gardener by trade. His hands held the magic of the earth and his mind conceived ideas for beautiful outdoor spaces; those he liked best were patterned after Renaissance and medieval gardens. He was homesick and heartsick. He’d gone to Surrey to work with his father because the money was good. But his father had died recently and he had returned home to Cumbria. He didn’t care if he had to work in a pub or muck stables. He wanted to be home. He missed the people and he missed the fells. He missed the simpler, more honest rhythms of life. He was shy, even a bit reclusive. He read voraciously and widely, he liked astronomy and he was afraid of snakes, though it embarrassed him to admit it. He hadn’t had sex in a long time, and found it better to have a wank session than a meaningless encounter. The facts of him, the details of his life raced at me in a flood I consumed ravenously with each lap of my tongue.

As I ate Talia I felt the shape of his face, the curve of his chin, the rise and fall of his chest as he had done the same. I felt the soft tuft of bronze curls nestled between the hard rise of his pecs and the courser, deeper curls that caressed his testicles and his cock when it was at rest, but it hadn’t been at rest. How many times had he taken her? He was thick enough to fill her and the friction of him inside was delicious and maddening. The shape of him – I wanted to caress the shape of him, with my hands, with my mouth, and the taking of his essence from Talia was an act of ripping away something that should have been mine. As I bruised her arse with kneading fingers and, as I licked the last of his release from her, she managed a breathless moan. ‘Take the rest. God, Alonso, take the rest, and release me.’

About K D Grace/Grace Marshall

Voted ETO Best Erotic Author of 2014, and a proud member of The Brit Babes, K D Grace believes Freud was right. In the end, it really IS all about sex, well sex and love. And nobody’s happier about that than she is, otherwise, what would she write about?

When she’s not writing, K D is veg gardening. When she’s not gardening, she’s walking. She walks her stories, and she’s serious about it. She and her husband have walked Coast to Coast across England, along with several other long-distance routes. For her, inspiration is directly proportionate to how quickly she wears out a pair of walking boots. She also enjoys martial arts, reading, watching the birds and anything that gets her outdoors.

KD has erotica published with SourceBooks, Xcite Books, Harper Collins Mischief Books, Mammoth, Cleis Press, Black Lace,Sweetmeats Press and others.

K D’s critically acclaimed erotic romance novels include, The Initiation of Ms Holly, Fulfilling the Contract, To Rome with Lust, and The Pet Shop. Her paranormal erotic novel, Body Temperature and Rising, the first book of her Lakeland Witches trilogy, was listed as honorable mention on Violet Blue’s Top 12 Sex Books for 2011. Books two and three, Riding the Ether, and Elemental Fire, are now also available.

K D Grace also writes hot romance as Grace Marshall. An Executive Decision, Identity Crisis, The Exhibition, Interviewing Wade are all available.


Find K D Here:

Websites: http://kdgrace.co.uk/
http://www.thebritbabes.co.uk
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/KDGraceAuthor
Twitter: https://twitter.com/KD_Grace
Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/kdgraceauthor/

GIVEAWAY!

Giveaway: To help me celebrate the launch of Landscapes, I’m giving away a $30/£20 Amazon gift voucher. Enter via the Rafflecopter for chances to win!

Make sure to follow the whole tour—the more posts you visit throughout, the more chances you’ll get to enter the giveaway. The tour dates are here: http://www.writermarketing.co.uk/prpromotion/blog-tours/currently-on-tour/k-d-grace-9/
a Rafflecopter giveaway