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You are here: Home / Archives for literature

BDSM Bedtime Stories!

January 25, 2013 By Trent Evans

Maintenance Night - Cover

The wonderful people over at the BDSM and Erotic Enchants groups on Goodreads have been running a wonderful new feature called BDSM Bedtime Stories. Essentially, this series features one book a week by offering an audio excerpt of the featured book. This week I’m very proud to announce that my book Maintenance Night will be featured.

Please click on the link below to have a listen to the excerpt:

http://youtu.be/4G-3GDXHhgQ

Once you listen to it, please let me know what you thought of it. In order to sweeten the pot, any person who leaves a comment on this blog post between 1/24/13 and 01/31/13 will be entered into a drawing to win an electronic copy of Maintenance Night or any one other Trent Evans book! I may draw one name or three names or … who knows?

After you’ve peeped the clip and left your comment, I would highly recommend you go check out the BDSM group on Goodreads. The place is chock full of welcoming, funny, and very open-minded people — it’s a home for pervs like you and me:) There is a shit-ton of great content on the site: advice, humor, instruction, book recommendations, reviews. crap-loads of smokin’ hot pics, free fiction, and general debauchery. It’s seriously one of the best places on the Interwebz for kinky people. You won’t regret checking it out!

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Filed Under: On Writing Tagged With: audio excerpt, BDSM, BDSM Bedtime Stories, bedtime stories, drawing for free ebook, Erotic Enchants group, Free ebook, Goodreads, literature

Cover Fail, and Thoughts On The State of Indie Erotica

January 20, 2013 By Trent Evans

Hello all,

So, I don’t normally talk about the writing/publishing biz here on the blog — this is supposed to be for the readers — but I wanted to write this for any of my readers who also might happen to be smut slingers like me:) This post covers a few things I’ve learned as I’ve gone along, as well as a handful of observations on the erotica genre in general.

1. Don’t do this (unless you don’t care about sales)

My fourth release, a novella titled Night Beach initially had a cover that I thought was sexy, but still within the boundaries (as well as anyone can guess — but that’s another story) of Amazon’s content guidelines. That initial cover is shown below:

Night Beach - Trent Evans - Updated Amazon - Smash

At first, all seemed well. The book was selling, a few readers said they loved the cover — so we’re rollin’, right?

Wrong.

The dreaded Adult filter was applied to the book’s listing on Amazon within a few days of release. This filter normally spells the death of sales for a title on Amazon, for a couple of reasons:

– First, the book is difficult, if not impossible, to find in general search — even if you search for the book’s title and the author’s name.

– The second, and much more insidious (and damaging) reason, is that the book will no longer be shown as an also-bought for any other non-Adult filtered titles. So, rather than have at least the chance for your book to show up as an also-bought for “50 Blinds of Bestseller”, you show up as an also-bought only for other Adult filtered titles.

I contacted ‘Zon customer service about it, and they confirmed that the book cover did indeed violate their content guidelines. They were very nice (as usual) and understanding of my plight, but they were firm that the Adult filter would remain until a new cover was added. Now, me being me, I shrugged my shoulders, muttered a “Whisky Tango Foxtrot”, and just went on with my business of writing the next book.

This was a serious mistake. Within about two weeks after release of Night Beach, my third book, a novelette titled Maintenance Night, took off, going from selling 5-6 copies a day to 20-30 copies per day. I still have no idea why. That part was RAD (and to those readers who bought the book, I can’t thank you enough), but the problem was that there was no new release that built upon that sales momentum. You see, since Night Beach was languishing under the The Scarlet Adult Filter, readers who bought and loved Maintenance Night wouldn’t see that others had picked up Night Beach. It was as if it didn’t exist.

Now, all this being said, Night Beach did still sell … some. In November, Night Beach sold 80 copies, more than 75% of that number selling at the mighty ‘Zon. But it’s likely that it would have sold significantly more, had it had the much improved visibility it would have enjoyed sans Adult filter. Is there any way to know for sure how many sales were lost? Of course not. BUT, one thing I’ve learned is this: make your books as convenient as possible to buy. Always give your reader an uber-easy way to spend money on you.

To bastardize a quote from Sun Tzu:

“Build your reader a golden bridge to your books.”

2. What can I take away from this?

My experience actually calls for being somewhat conservative with the content of covers. There is a price for pushing the envelope (though really, I don’t think the first cover was that edgy), and when you do, sometimes that price is going to cost you sales/money. Be prepared for that eventuality.

Now, with regard to this specific instance, there is one aspect to this that I think really might help another writer who reads this. What follows are the commonly understood “no-no’s” vis-a-vis cover content:

– No female nipples or areolas

– No male or female genitalia or pubic hair

– No fully naked buttocks — there has to be at least a dental floss bikini or thong (this one appears to be sporadically enforced, as some do get through the review process with bare nekkid asses:)

– No profanity (this one appears to be only sporadically enforced as there have actually been erotica bestsellers that had f-bombs … in the title!!)

– No excessive gore (very subjective, so err on the side of caution)

Here is one that I got nailed on — and one that has snagged other authors too:

– No grabbing/squeezing/clutching of the naked breast(s) or even covering of the naked breast with a hand. 

Now, a case could be made that there wasn’t a thing wrong with the original cover for Night Beach, BUT it’s Amazon’s site, and they can do what they want.  I’m not going to sit here and tell them how they should run their business, nor what content they can or can’t accept on the covers. I can take it or leave it, and if I want to sell ebooks, I’m going to be taking it:)

That said, I really do wish that they would release a short list of definitive no-no’s, rather than leaving us poor authors/publishers to stumble around in the dark. I know why they don’t release any specifics — they want to keep their options open, and want to be flexible in case of any changes to the legal or regulatory environment. It’s smart business, but it is a bit of a pain.

But oh well — what the mighty ‘Zon wants, the mighty ‘Zon gets:)

Other Erotica Observations

There is a flood-tide of erotica on the market right now, presumably due to authors seeking to ride the (already rapidly receding) 50 Shades wave, and it’s only going to get worse. For those new erotica writers who are wondering why their sales are not those of the Land of (Breast)Milk and (Alien Pussy)Honey that the erotica genre is purported to exist, you can blame an excess of product for this … mostly.

One of the things I’ve observed is a large number of low word count, slapped- together titles in almost every conceivable sub-genre of erotica (I know a lot of them — yeah I’m a perv, I read a lot of smut). I render no judgement on those writers that are following the “quantity is king” philosophy. It works, and it will make you money — for now.

But for those new erotica readers just coming online now, I implore you to do one thing: think long term. At some point, the wheat does get separated from the chaff, and no matter how many titles you have published, if the quality of the writing is shoddy, if the story isn’t compelling, and the packaging is unappealing (read: unprofessional covers and flat, lifeless blurbs), those books will cease to sell. Why is this?

Word of mouth.

This is the single most effective way to sell books and to build a career. Word of mouth trumps everything, and will buoy a book no matter what. This is very, very important because in this new era of publishing, the traditional gatekeepers (editors, agents, publishers) are steadily being replaced … by readers.

This fact should feel both freeing and terrifying. To those erotica writers who concentrate on releasing well-written, edited, attractively packaged books on a regular basis (e.g. not less than once per quarter, and preferably more frequently), you will succeed. It may take 5 books, 20 books, or more, but eventually, if you put out quality, the readers will find you — and reward you.

To those erotica writers out there who are only concentrating on publishing as much product as you can, as fast as you can, you should be terrified. If your product is shoddy, readers will call you on it — and they’ll do more than leave you bad reviews on Amazon.

They’ll tell their friends.

The gold rush of 2009-2011 is absolutely over, and the days of being able to throw up any old cover and first draft of a smut book are long gone. Many, many readers have been burned over and over by just plain shitty indie smut books. If your product is rushed out, haphazard, sloppy, readers will notice it — and run the other way. Please, please don’t be that writer!

Whichever type of erotica writer you are, your challenge, above and beyond continuing to publish good books, will be discoverability. The volume of erotica is incredible, and as many others have pointed out, discoverability is going to be the irreducible problem faced by all authors, especially in a genre overwhelmed with a tsunami of new content every month. Worse, traditional publishers have (by and large) awakened from their comas and are changing their tactics. They are lowering prices, targeting sub-genres with more narrowly focused story lines,  and greatly speeding up things like submission response times and time to publication. Contrary to what you hear some self-pub evangelists say, trad publishing is not stupid, and it’s not going away. Not by a long shot.

What does this mean for the lowly indie smut slinger like me? It means things are going to get much, much harder. It means in order to survive, and increase your visibility/discoverability, you will need to make your product the best quality you possibly can. Keep writing, but do take the time needed to make the book a good quality book. You need to acknowledge that a significant portion of your potential readership is likely to look askance at anything written by an Indie. Accept that, then set out to prove them wrong. Sloppy indie authors have hurt the rest of us, of this there can be no doubt, so for those of us that are in this for the long-haul, who will be making careers of this, our job is to win those readers back, one by one. I’m still working on this myself, and my own products aren’t yet where I want them to be, so I’m constantly improving them where and when I can. You should too!

Make your product as indistinguishable from trad products as you possibly can (this is where great covers, blurbs that snap, and professional-looking, clean formatting comes in). Don’t give these skeptical readers any reason to pass over your book at a mere glance. Make them “pick it up” and read those first lines. That’s where your quality writing will get the chance to do its work. And this is how you win back those burned-by-indies readers.

Yes, taste is 100% subjective, but that’s beside the point; a quality product needs to be noticed, and read (which will increasingly become the most difficult hurdle to jump) before taste even figures into the equation. THEN, if it’s well-written, compelling, at least some of those readers will tell their friends, who in turn will tell their friends. Again, word of mouth.

But you need to give them a reason to look at your book. More important than this: don’t give the reader a reason NOT to look at your book.

Smut readers are voracious, the demand never-ending (and we LOVE you for that), and if you push their buttons, and if the books you have for sale are fairly priced, they’ll snap up everything you have on the market. And they’ll keep coming back for more, as long as you keep publishing good books.

Contrary to all the doom and gloom you are seeing of late in indie circles, I think this is only the beginning … for those indies who are willing to put in the work, and to fight for every one of those readers. Those readers will take a chance on a new author, but increasingly they will demand quality — and they deserve nothing less.

Best,

Trent

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Filed Under: On Writing, Trent's Thoughts Tagged With: 50 Shades of Grey, 50 Shades wave, backlash against indies, BDSM, bdsm erotica, BDSM fiction, books, content guidelines for Amazon, cover fail, cover images, edgy covers, formatting, literature, Maintenance Night, Night Beach, On Writing-, professionalism, quantity vs quality, smut, state of erotica, strategic thinking, Sun Tzu, tips for new erotica writers, traditional publishing, Trent Evans, whisky tango foxtrot, writing

Naughty New Years!

January 1, 2013 By Trent Evans

Welcome to the Naughty New Years Bloghop!

Alas, my own New Years was quite mundane. Aside from neighbors who decided to scream like banshees into the cold night for an hour or so, and a barrage of fireworks resembling the Second Battle of Fallujah, New Years was very quiet. Okay, I guess that means it wasn’t particularly quiet after all 🙂

If only the lives of smut-slingers were always as exciting as our books! Sigh.

For me, 2013 looks to be overflowing with naughty, smutty— however you want to describe it. There will be the beginning of a new erotic romance BDSM menage series, a sequel or two, and even a special project! I hope to have lots more of what readers have come to expect in Trent Evans stories. Stay tuned:)

I’ve seen quite a few bloghops, but I can’t recall seeing any as large as this one is — over 200 writers and websites. That means if you’re intrepid, and visit (and comment at) every site involved with this bloghop, you can enter for the grand prizes over 200 times! Even better, you will discover a TON of original, talented writers in the erotica and erotic romance genres.

Comment below to be eligible to win an electronic copy (in your choice of format) of any one Trent Evans book. You’ll also automatically be entered to win one of two grand prizes:

  • $100 dollar gift certificate to EdenFantasys

  • An Erotic Digital Giftbasket: 10 new releases, including a Crossfire novel from Silvia Day AND The Siren by Tiffany Reisz.

Be sure to visit other stops on this hop (there are a lot of great writers represented here). The complete list of participants can be found here.

Until next time!

Best,

Trent

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Filed Under: On Writing Tagged With: discovering new erotica writers, entertainment, Grand Prizes, literature, Naughty New Years Bloghop, Skye Warren, upcoming releases

30 Days of Kink – Day 16

October 29, 2012 By Trent Evans

Day 16: What are the most difficult aspects of having a sexuality that involves kink or BDSM for you personally?

Oh boy, this is going to be hard. No guts, no glory …

The answer to this (like many aspects of a person’s personality, I suppose) has significantly changed over time. As a young, budding perv the overwhelming feeling I dealt with day in and day out was shame.

I just knew I was different. To a teenager, different = damaged = freak = worthless. When I was young and, really up until a few years ago (I’m in my mid thirties now, if anyone wonders), I spent most of my time just burying who I was. Burying it deep. Is that the kink version of  “in the closet”? I suppose it could be somewhat analogous to that. I think it’s simpler though — it was a complete and utter denial of a vital aspect of my personality, and what made me uniquely me.

For those of us who are kinky, just admitting what we are/like/want is difficult enough; I suspect there are many of us who never even quite get to that point. For me, it was worse … because I was (am) a sadist.

Note to those of you who may be freaking the fuck out at that admission (hopefully there aren’t any, but just in case), please read through my earlier entries on this blog in the 30 Days of Kink. Those entries should clarify for you what I mean by “sadist”. Hint: it definitely doesn’t mean I’m a serial killer. Mmkay).

Believe me when I tell you, it was a long, harrowing road to get from here to there. How would you like it as a young kid to wonder:

– If you were irretrievably broken?

– If somehow people might be frightened of you?

– If you were simply nature’s aberration?

– Why modern psychology’s idiotic definitions (don’t get me fucking started on that subject, dear Lord) essentially labeled you as someone that yes, was broken, was a simple biological aberration?

Yeah, heavy, heavy shit. When you’re young, and dumb, and have zero perspective, everything seems Earth-shattering, immediate, profound. Your problems seem so unique, as if nobody on Earth has ever had to deal with what you’re struggling with.

Then you grow up and realize you are but a tiny, tiny speck of nothing in an unimaginably immense universe of everything — and all of this, and I do mean all of this, has happened before. Over and over and over again.

For some people, that’s a terrifying realization, but for me it was freeing. My problems weren’t insurmountable. Hell, my “problems”, weren’t even problems — they were just me.

So, there’s the self-doubt out of the way. Now comes the isolation. Yes, in this interconnected world isolation (at least in the modern west) should slowly become less of an issue. We hope. For those of us old enough to remember life before the connectedness of the Intertubes though, isolation was a huge concern. There just are only so many pervs to go around. Depending on the research (and the researchers’ particular definitions) I’ve seen online, the percentage of people who practice some form of BDSM are anywhere from 1-25% of the general population. Now, this may be self-serving, or simply wishful thinking on my part, but I suspect the actual number is closer to the upper end of that range.

Somebody bought those metric shit-tons of bodice rippers in the 70s-80s.

Somebody bought all those copies of 50 (yes, I know, I know — the damaged hero trope was what really roped in — heh — the 50 readers. I still ain’t buyin’ that rationalization).

Somebody watches (and pays for) all that internet BDSM porn.

Okay, I’ll get to my point. Though maybe 15-20% (my estimate) are pervs of some stripe, that still leaves us as islands in a sea of vanilla. Worse, the BDSM umbrella is so broad that the spectrum underneath it from A to Z  is incredibly diverse. How many of that 15-20% are like me with a penchant for both pain/impact play AND total power exchange? 1% of that 15-20%? Maybe not even that — but you see what I’m getting at here.

Isolation is still a serious hindrance to pervs the world over. The internet is a lifesaver for us, as even if we can’t connect physically, we can communicate with like-minded souls.

The last one I’ll mention is perhaps the most vexing (and sometimes painful) one of all. The feeling of  “otherness” in relation to your fellow man. The society we live in is oriented around the vanilla, and for good reason — vanilla is what most of us are, and it works, generally. But pervs always feel as if we are on the outside looking in, both on a societal level and a personal one.

How many of us can speak freely about who we are at the workplace? At home? Or how about in the unassailable redoubt of our own minds? Vanilla people by definition won’t understand, simply because it’s beyond their human experience. Okay, that’s not fair — some do. But to most it’s a baffling mystery at best, disgusting perversion at worst. I’m not worried about those people. What I think pervs struggle the most with is having to keep that part of them from those that are closest to them. It’s akin to walking around with a suit of armor or a mask on your entire life — one you take with you to work, to that Thanksgiving dinner with your family, to your fucking doctor’s office. It never, ever comes off, and it gets to a point that you forget how to take it off. How to be that fully formed person you are. Perhaps that shielding of oneself becomes a permanent part of you.

It did with me. I’m trying to remedy that, but it’s a struggle — and I suspect it always will be. Being able to talk to you helps. It helps a lot. Even if only one person ever reads this, and gains a modicum of perspective, a glimmer of hope, a sense that they can change and start being who they really are … well then all this will have been worth it. Until Day 17.

Trent

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Filed Under: Trent's Thoughts Tagged With: 30 Days of Kink, BDSM psychology, confession, growing up, isolation, kink, kink acceptance, kink shaming, literature, maturing, personal pain, science, sex positive, sexual development, sexual empowerment, shame, society

New Release – Night Beach by Trent Evans

October 12, 2012 By Trent Evans

Hello everyone!

My new release Night Beach is on the shelves. It’s  a novella length (approx 22000 words) contemporary BDSM title that follows a day and night in the life of three people looking to take their relationship to a new level of intimacy. I hope you check it out.

As always, if you read and liked it, please leave a review with your preferred retailer. These reviews are hugely helpful to authors, and will help us get you more of the stories you love 🙂

Best,

Trent Evans

New BDSM erotica release!

Night Beach

————————————————————————————————-

(Contemporary BDSM erotica)

A Dominion Trust story.

What is a modern, independent woman to do when the only thing she truly wants is to be enslaved? Erica, a young, beautiful college student is looking for that something which speaks to what she truly is deep down inside. Is it possible to finally find peace, even happiness within the strict bonds of utter submission?

When Blaine a powerful, successful businessman realizes he and his wife are ready for something new, a deeper exploration of the love and lust they’ve shared as husband and wife, the naive, fetching Erica enters the picture. As a member of the Dominion Trust, Blaine has seen the unique energy of other couples who’ve taken a submissive into their beds, and into their lives.

Blaine’s wife Kathryn, a fiercely driven executive in her own right submits to her husband in all things, but as the years have gone by, new needs, darker desires are stirred within her. Is she ready for a submissive of her own? Is their D/s marriage ready for a third, a slave, to join with them?

In this story, three people come together to find out if happiness really can be found in the complicated dance of dominance and submission, pain and pleasure of a BDSM menage relationship.

Warning – this contemporary BDSM novella contains the following:

D/s, Spanking, Paddling, bondage, clamps, sadomasochism, rough explicit sex (MF and FF), and a young, wide-eyed woman exploring the depths of her submission.

Note – This is a novella. Word count: approximately 22000 words

For mature readers only.

Available through:

Amazon (Kindle)

Amazon UK (Kindle)

Barnes & Noble (Nook)

Smashwords (Apple, Sony, Diesel, Microsoft Reader, Palm) – Coming soon!

All Romance (various formats) 

Kobo (various formats)

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Filed Under: On Writing Tagged With: BDSM, bdsm erotica, books, clamps, D/s, Dominance and submission, Dominion Trust BDSM series, dubious consent, FF, forced exhibitionism, Lesbian BDSM, literature, menage, MF, MFF erotica, New Release, paddling, pain, pain and pleasure, sadomasochism, sexual slavery, spanking, successful businessman, The Dominion Trust, utter submission

Call for Beta Readers – Night Beach

October 4, 2012 By Trent Evans

Hi all,

I find myself with a few openings for beta readers for the next release, Night Beach. This is a contemporary BDSM novella with a 22K word count. I can’t offer any compensation for a beta read other than an electronic copy of the finished product, and the undying gratitude of a new author:)

If any of you would be interested in doing a beta read for this book, please contact me via the form below. Thank you!

[contact-form][contact-field label=’Name’ type= required=’1’/][contact-field label=’Email’ type= required=’1’/][contact-field label=’Website’ type=/][contact-field label=’Comment’ type=’textarea’ required=’1’/][/contact-form]

Best,

Trent

 

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Filed Under: On Writing Tagged With: bdsm erotica, blogging, call for beta readers, Dominion Trust BDSM series, literature, New Release, Night Beach, novella, writing

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