Happy Birthday to Mine

Mine is what happens when you start reading heavily in a genre you’re not writing. I was in the middle of writing My Guys, the first book in a trilogy no one ever reads all three of, hanging out on the Erotica forum of the NaNoWriMo boards, and there was a lot of talk about femdom.

I was familiar with the concept—I’d even written some of it. But that’d been back in my Literotica days. Those works were both short and sex-heavy. What I began to read now was novel length romantic femdom, and suddenly—boom!—Derek was submissive. It worked really well for his personality, almost as though he’d been submissive all along, just waiting for me to figure out.

In the books I read while writing My Guys, the men were always tough alpha-type dudes and the women were strong-minded but hyper feminine. And yet somehow the woman would find a way to physically subdue the man, to fight him until she forced him to submit.

So I didn’t do any of that.

Derek is a tough dude—smart, strong, brave, well-liked. Amanda is tough too—smarter, taller, braver, but definitely not as well liked. Smart women rarely are. Derek submits to her not because she wrestles him into compliance, although she possibly could, but because he’s submissive. He gives his submission to her.

As for Amanda, I wanted to give the world a femdom heroine who was neither the Dominatrix of every man’s dreams, dressed head to toe in black patent leather, nor the girl next door, softly sweet in baby doll dresses and blue eye shadow. And then I wanted to give Amanda someone who adored her exactly the way she was, to make up for all the people who thought she should be someone else. Mine wasn’t written for men, although I hope they like it. It was written for women, to say “you’re valid without being conventionally beautiful” and “you’re sexy without being submissive.”

Mine has sold better than I expected it to, considering that it’s the centerpiece of a trilogy no one reads and that I have so few M/F titles. It tempts me to write another femdom story, to allow another woman to take charge without apologizing for being who she is.