Literotica Authors 09: Lovecraft68

The moment you stop in the middle of a story and start thinking, "Which direction would lead to more votes?" or "Maybe if I do this it won't be as well received," is the moment you have just curbed your muse and sacrificed your true vision. You are now pandering, not creating.

I wrote a how-to on incest. Like all how-to essays for specific categories, it focuses on things the readership likes and dislikes. However, a how-to is meant to be a guide, some tips from an experienced writer to a new writer. They are not some kind of Bible or mathematical equation or formula that you are to follow step by step. If you do that, you're back to not writing your story, but another person's.

To circle back, there is nothing wrong with caring about numbers, but the question you posed is what advice I would give new authors. Once you have a bunch of stories under your belt, have gained a following, and been here awhile, then you can experiment with what goes over better, this or that? That's fine, just make sure that before you get wrapped up in that. You have found and established your voice and style.

In the inspiring words of my three-year-old granddaughter "Be your own Bean!"

Anything else about you or your writing that you would like our readers to know?

To be a good writer, you need to not just have the desire to write, but true passion, along with discipline and the will to sit down and do it. You also need motivation and inspiration. That inspiration can come from anywhere. Most people associate inspiration with positive things.

I'm not one of them.

I touched briefly on my past in my story "Naked Beneath," but will say more here. I had a traumatic childhood filled with abuse and dysfunction. My family was riddled with addiction, domestic violence was an everyday occurrence, and even as a child, I feared for my life.

I bounced around the system for awhile and fell into the vicious circle of those types of families. I had no addictions, I never hurt a woman or a child, but there wasn't a fight I'd shy away from, and if one didn't present itself, I'd find one. I was always angry, always looking for trouble and most of the time finding it.

I quit high school because I hated the kids around me, I pretty much hated everyone back then, including myself. Years later, I managed to get my shit together, survive my first wife (who was scarier than my childhood), and eventually meet the wonderful woman I'm still with today.

In my teens I started writing at the suggestion of a counselor, as a way to get the anger out on paper and in words, not actions. I took to it right away, mostly horror stories. Before I quit high school, a couple of teachers told me I had potential.

Then real-life shit happened, and I stopped. I mentioned to my wife not long after we met that I used to write, and she said, "You'll write again." I never believed her until I wrote the role play I mentioned earlier. I was off and running on mostly fun material.

I got the idea for "Siblings with Benefits" from an event in my past, and as I wrote it, all the pent-up rage and malice I carried for years and fought to suppress came back. The emotion drove the writing and the story became darker and darker. I was now writing for catharsis, purging a lot of old pain as well as opening old wounds, but now I had a way to heal them, by just getting it all out.

Negative energy leading to a positive result.

When "Siblings with Benefits" was done, I felt like I'd exorcised a lot of demons. Most of my work after that was more erotic and fun, but I always attacked a story as if it were personal, like it was someone daring me or telling me I couldn't.

My wife was diagnosed with cancer early in 2014 and we thought she wasn't going to make it. In a month I wrote my first horror novel. After her second surgery when she almost died from complications, I wrote my second one. I was back to writing in full rage mode.

I always write angry. Even when the stories are fun, I write angry. Every story, sentence, and word is a "fuck you" to the childhood I survived, and a "fuck you" to all the kids who called me a pound puppy because I was a foster kid. They're a middle finger to the people who mocked me when they found out I was writing. "You're a fucking drop out, you think you can write?" Most of all, it's me-versus-me where I'm constantly striving to prove I've become better than what I was born into and could have easily become.

When I write, I am where I am supposed to be, doing what I'm supposed to do, proving that I rose when I could have sunk. I appreciate rediscovering my gift for storytelling but take nothing for granted. That sad, scared, pissed-off kid is still in there, and he's the driving force behind the muse. Still mad, still full of venom, and still with something to prove.

I don't say this just to give a glimpse into my life and why I write, but with the message that its never too late to rekindle a dream (I posted my first story here when I was 42) and to never let anything or anyone stop you from doing what you feel called to do. The sins and mistakes of the past can be overcome to allow you to take charge of the present.

I mentioned "dream" several times in this interview, so I'll leave off with one of my favorite quotes from Oscar Wilde, one that sums up my motivation as well as some of my work: "They've promised that dreams can come true - but forgot to mention that nightmares are dreams, too."

Thank you to all who have supported me here throughout the years.

Thank you lovecraft68, and thank you for your honesty and openness in this interview!