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*

Today’s blog post is brought to you by the letters S. L. U and T.

Let’s talk dirty, and then let’s talk about whether ‘dirty’ is an appropriate word to use when describing something that is – at best – morally neutral. One of the constant struggles of being a lefty (weep for me) is that I frequently embrace things in the bedroom which would, in real life, horrify me. Words like ‘slut’ and ‘bitch’ used in the street? Fuck you and goodnight. Used in the bedroom? Get fucking in me right now.

I like to be degraded, and used, and treated as if I’m nothing. And in the process of that, guys I’m with often use words which are pretty powerful weapons. Words can be incredibly hot, and incredibly offensive, and sometimes both these things at once.

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Did you know that men have evolved to have slightly louder voices than women? Well, it’s true. As a general rule, men will speak at a higher volume than women do, and will tend to dominate more conversations. This is because, in our evolutionary past, it was necessary for men to put in most of the hard work to find mates. Alongside the usual: standing around looking rugged, they also used their mating megaphones (a primitive feature which eventually evolved into the mouth) to shout for female attention. ‘Ugg!’, or what have you – I don’t know, I don’t speak neanderthal, but it was basically a primitive version of ‘hey darling, I am ready to impregnate you in order to further the species! Check out my spaff-packets and make your choice!’ The rest, as they say, is history.

Now, before you start writing me angry letters about how actually neanderthal men communicated by dropping a dead mammoth at the feet of their lover, please understand that I made all of the above up. I mean, obviously.

The initial fact may or may not be true, I don’t know. It sounds maybe a bit plausible, doesn’t it? That men have evolved louder voices? I’ve not checked it, of course, that would take ages. But what I have done is constructed a vaguely plausible story as to why people might have evolved that way, then carefully ignored any facts or examples that might not fit.

Do I win £5?

Crappy evolutionary dating theories

Believe it or not, I get sent quite a few emails from people who have found The Answer when it comes to dating – ‘how to be an alpha male by killing the metaphorical 21st century mammoth’ or what have you. Normally I delete and ignore.

Yesterday’s captured my imagination, though, because it was funnier than the others.

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Apparently I have a habit of running competitions that cause a lot of admin. But this time it’s admin of the good kind, because I now have a list of hundreds of brilliant books by women, as recommended by people in the competition entries. Perhaps reflecting my ‘lovely sexy nerd’ demographic, there are plenty of erotic and sci-fi suggestions on the list. There were also over 400 recommendations in total, with over 270 individual authors suggested and over 330 individual titles. There’s something for everyone: have a look.

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