Tag Archives: meta-blogging
Are you cut out to be a sex writer?
Are you interested in sex? Do you enjoy the fact that humans have sex in different ways, with a number of different people, in a variety of interesting positions? If someone tells you about a cool new sex game or a fetish that’s new to you, is your first reaction to go ‘ooh, wow! That sounds interesting please tell me more’?
You might want to be a sex writer.
If any of the above things have made you recoil slightly, a frown of disgust on your face, or made you feel like you should hammer out a comment about how some people are just ‘sick’, ‘creepy’ or ‘gross’? Then I cannot stress this enough, but please:
do not become a sex writer.
Biased, obviously, but I’m sad about the demise of FHM
I’m gutted that FHM is going to suspend publication. That might sound odd because I’m a feminist, and surely I should be ready to dance wholeheartedly on its grave, the way some people were accused of doing when Nuts magazine folded. It should also – to those who read FHM – sound perfectly natural for me to be sad, because for the last few months I’ve been a contributor.
I’m gutted on a simple level: I won’t be able to write things for them any more. But I’m also gutted for the other people who work there, many of whom were publishing some good stuff. Looking back on the FHM I first pored over in my teenage boyfriend’s bedroom and its more recent editions (October’s issue, for example, had an awesome feature on ‘rule breakers’ including interviews with a female CEO, a North Korean defector, and a 95 year-old sprinter), there’s a world of difference, although I appreciate that many of you might disagree.
I’ve been critical of some things FHM has done in the past (like their ‘sexiest women’ in 2012), but I’ve also been fairly open about the fact that I don’t think we should ban lads’ mags, or even imply that there’s no place for them in a society that has healthy views on sex. Sex is not the opposite of feminism, and being a feminist doesn’t mean ignoring or quashing straight male sexual pleasure. What it means, I think, is pushing for a broader representation of sexual pleasure – making it clear that the glossy magazine pictures are just one of a million things that might turn some people on.
Yes, you can run an anonymous blog and still be accountable
When I introduce myself to people, I use a different name. I have quite a few – I like them. One of them I wear so often it feels more comfortable than my ‘real’ name – I wrap it round me like a blanket, and it makes me feel safe.
Unfortunately, one of the questions I’m asked most frequently is: “is that your real name, though?” Like somewhere deep in my heart there’s a secret and special name, and the people I’m speaking to will be elevated above the status of mere acquaintance and into, I don’t know, God, if they can determine what the deep and immutable truth is. Problem is, knowing my real name doesn’t give anyone special powers, it just gives them a fact. And hand-in-hand with that fact comes a fairly big problem for both of us.
When I first started blogging I decided that anonymity was the best way to go – for a whole host of reasons, but primarily employment. We still live in a world where talking about buttsex on the internet and holding down a job at a company that gives a shit about your social media life is, if not impossible, at least tricky. As time wore on, there were more reasons, and then more. Recently, Kilted Wookie wrote a post about anonymity on his sex blog and it got me thinking about a lot of stuff. The primary thing was that there are far more reasons to be anonymous than I’d considered when I first began.
“I Call Bullshit” Man: the Superhero none of us deserve
Billy was an ordinary boy. He lived in an ordinary house, in an ordinary street, and every day he’d go out and play with his ordinary friends. Billy had a happy life.
But one day, as Billy’s friends took it in turns to swap brags about how cool their houses were and which level they’d reached on the latest Xbox game, Billy was struck by a bolt of lightning. Turning him from an ordinary, everyday boy into…
I-Call-Bullshit Man!
Now, in his superhero guise, Billy wanders the twisting corridors of the internet, shedding what he thinks is light into anything he perceives to be darkness. In comments and on Twitter he pops up, shouting that oft-heard phrase:
“I call bullshit!”
So here’s why I’ve been a bit weird lately
I’ve written another book.
Four words feels like all I can manage right now, but I’ll try to elaborate before I curl up in a corner and sleep for a week.
For the last six-ish months, I’ve been writing a new book – it’s about relationship expectations, sex and romance myths, and a whole bunch of other things including why it’s hard to fuck in a spreader bar without falling over, and why mental health issues can sometimes cock up your sex life. It’s a love story for people who don’t really believe in love stories, and hopefully a decent response to those relatives who ask ‘when are you going to settle down?’ If you’ve read my first book, it also answers the question I’m most frequently asked about that one – what happened to number 26?
I’ll have more info on it closer to publication, but for now I’ve only just finished the first draft, and I am in a state of total collapse, so I won’t give you all the details right now. It’s really hard to write about it without sounding like I’m boasting, and it’s also hard not to boast without sounding terse, but suffice to say this is intensely, desperately exciting for me, and also scary, because I really want you all to love it.
It’s going to be published by Blink, who are amazing and brilliant, and I have met lots of their team already (they gave me wine! And listened to me bang on about the merits of going to a spanking party versus watching series 2 of Orange is the New Black!). It’ll also be IN PRINT. This wouldn’t have happened without my agent, Lorella Belli, who is spectacular in every way, or Emily Thomas, my editor at Blink, who has actually made my day/week/month/year… sod it… life.
THANK YOU
I’ll do a whole bunch of thank yous in the bit at the end of the book in which I get to thank people, but for now I just want to say that I have been an appalling human for the last six months, as I stress and worry and hide away to write, and ditch plans last minute and cock up deadlines, so massive thank you to everyone who’s been so supportive, and helped me through it.
Not just my real-life mates, who’ve been amazing, but everyone on Twitter and Facebook and via email and comments on this blog, who has been kind enough to understand when I haven’t been able to respond quickly, and offered virtual hugs and nice words and all that stuff. And especially all the people I freelance for, who’ve been lenient when I haven’t been able to take on extra work, and so kind. You’re all awesome, and I’m incredibly lucky.
On a practical note, if I owe you an email I’m going to Get On It early next week (I need a few days rest, sorry), and if you do want me to work for you (freelance writing, consultancy, all that jazz), I’ve now got time to take on some more, so if you have money and you’d like some words, get in touch.
Buy books and stuff
I’ll let you know asap when it’s available for pre-order: if you subscribe to this blog I’ll make sure to tell you as soon as it’s available. You don’t have to have read my first book in order to read the second, but if you’d like to read book 1, which is basically a torrid history of all the people I’ve ever shagged, along with a few rants about why we shouldn’t be ashamed of being horny, please do buy it now because it’s relatively cheap and I have no idea if/when the price will go up.
I suspect I’ll have a lot of rewrites and tweaks and stuff to do, and I’m also going to do something SUPER FUN to celebrate the new book. I’ll tell you about it soon, but first: sleep.
* GOTN collapses into a pile on the floor*