Liebster Award Blog Meme: Inside the Brothel

LIEBSTER AWARD BLOG MEME

Jason Jack Miller, author of THE DEVIL AND PRESTON BLACK, tagged me in a ten question blog hop known as the LIEBSTER AWARD, so here it goes!

(1) Where did the idea for your current work-in-progress (WIP) come from?

My current WIP is a poetry collection titled, BROTHEL. As a forever student of literature and literary theory, I love psychoanalytic criticism, especially in the vein of Sigmud Freud and his thoughts on psychosexuality. After writing books about madness (HYSTERIA), grief (MOURNING JEWELRY) and love (ANEXORCISIM OF ANGELS,coming soon!), I wanted to write a book that studied sex from the angle of someone whose job was marketing and performing sex for a living, i.e. enter the Madam. The collection is darkly erotic and erotically dark and I’m having a wicked good time writing it.

Also, I just kind of wanted to write a book about sex. 

(2) Quote a favorite line from one of your favorite books.

"No sympathy for the devil; keep that in mind. Buy the ticket, take the ride...and if it occasionally gets a little heavier than what you had in mind, well...maybe chalk it off to forced conscious expansion: Tune in, freak out, get beaten."  — Hunter S. Thompson (Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas)

(3) Now quote your favorite line form your current WIP.

“Living and working in the whore house is a type of intimacy in itself, for you’re always being watched, and someone or something is always inside of you, whether it’s a memory or a person, and that makes it impossible to be alone.”

(4) What unique challenges has your current WIP had that your previous ones did not?

Writing erotica is hard. I never know if I’m being sexy or if I just sound like a jackass.

(5) If you saw our main character at a party, how would you react?

I’d pour myself a double shot of whisky and get ready for one hell of a night.

(6) Who would play your main protagonist/antagonist if your current WIP were made into a movie?

Maria Brink. Duh.

(7) What are your biggest inspirations for writing?

Music. All of my books have been inspired by a single song, and Brothel’s was Sick Like Me by In This Moment. This particular piece struck me because it's masochistic, it's hot, and it's dark--which covers the theme, the tone, and the mood that I'm working with in the collection. Brink is seductive, and she's seductive in a way where she shows no shame for asking/taking what she wants. Her sexual honesty in the video is spot on with my Madam. Check out the video, here.

(8) Summarize your WIP as a haiku.

I shake, I tremble/
There’s a pleasure in the pain/
I beg you, don’t stop.

(9) What role does music play in your writing?

The biggest role of all: I write to it, get inspired by it, and celebrate with it. I also create a playlist for all of my books. Here is the one for Brothel.

(10) What’s one thing you’ve learned about the craft that you wish you had learned earlier?

No matter what the subject, poetry is lyrical pain.

Reading List: 65 Books to Madness

This year--like every year-- I vowed to read 52 books. I like to have a healthy mix of fiction and poetry, but this year, I wanted to add in some nonfiction, some drama, and most importantly, tons of graphic novels. In fact, this was the year where I sat myself down and said "Stephanie, we're going to accept that we love comics and we're going to jump in and read a bunch this year. No more putting it off." So that's exactly what I did, and I loved it! In fact, I plan on finishing my three favorite series next year: The Sandman, Locke and Key, and Batman: Arkham Unhinged.


Now here is my reading list for 2014--you'll see I beat my yearly goal of 52.

• My favorite novel was: Suffer the Children by Craig DiLouie
• My favorite poetry collection was: The Pleasures of the Damned by Charles Bukowski

Next year, I'm going to vow to read more classic literature and start reading memoirs. We'll see how I do!

1.      Embrace the Hideous Immaculate by Chad Hensley

2.      Orchid Carousals by Lucy A. Snyder

3.      How to be a Wicked Witch: Good Spells, Charms, Potions and Notions for Bad Days by Patricia J. Telesco

4.      The Hellbound Heart by Clive Barker

5.      Black Box Theater as Abandoned Zoo by Dana Elkun

6.      A Pilgrim’s Guide to Chaos in the Heartland by Jessica Goodfellow

7.      Old Man Scratch by Rio Youers

8.      Down the Road by Lee Blessing

9.      Ink by Damien Walters Grintalis

10.  NOS4A2 by Joe Hill

11.  Ruins of the Heart by Rumi

12.  30 Days of Night, Vol.6: Spreading the Disease by Steve Niles

13.  Fahrenheit 451: The Authorized Adaptation by Tim Hamilton, Ray Bradbury

14.  We are Three by Rumi

15.  Wilderness by Jim Morrison

16.  Notes from the Cathouse by Jack Ketchum

17.  Hair Side, Flesh Side by Helen Marshall

18.  The Woman by Jack Ketchum

19.  Female Serial Killers by Peter Vronsky

20.  Kin by Kealan Patrick Burke

21.  Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare

22.  Barfodder by Rain Graves

23.  The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien

24.  Suffer the Children by Craig DiLouie

25.  Bird Box by Josh Malerman

26.  The Pleasures of the Damned by Charles Bukowski

27.  Halloween, New Poems edited by Al Sarrantonio

28.  Jabberwocky and Other Poems by Lewis Carroll

29.  Doubt, A Parable by John Patrick Shanley

30.  The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman

31.  Tales of Jack the Ripper edited by Ross E. Lockhart

32.  100 Love Sonnets by Pablo Neruda

33.  The Troop by Nick Cutter

34.  Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn

35.  Hot Metal Tonic by Ron Gavalik

36.  Mister B. Gone by Clive Barker

37.  Songs of Ophelia by Theodora Gross

38.  The Sandman, Vol. 1: Preludes and Nocturnes by Neil Gaiman

39.  Snowblind by Christopher Golden

40.  The Book of Goodbyes by Jillian Weise

41.  Cosmopolitan Greetings by Allen Ginsberg

42.  The Sandman, Vol. 2: The Doll’s House by Neil Gaiman

43.  Locke and Key, Vol. 1: Welcome to Lovecraft by Joe Hill

44.  Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

45.  Swam Thing, Vol. 1: Saga of the Swamp Thing by Alan Moore

46.  Batman: Arkham Asylum- A serious House on Serious Earth by Grant Morrison

47.  Put Your Hands in by Chris Hosea

48.  The Sandman, Vol. 3: Dream Country by Neil Gaiman

49.  Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

50.  30 Days of Night, Vol. 7: Eben and Stella by Steve Niles

51.  The Sandman, Vol. 4: Season of Mists by Neil Gaiman

52.  Locke and Key, Vol. 2: Head Games by Joe Hill

53.  The Sandman, Vol. 5: A Game of You

54.  Prophets by Peter Adam Salomon

55.  Saga, Vol. 1 by Brian K. Vaughan

56.  100 Bullets by Brian Azzarello

57.  Lucifer, Vol. 1: Devil in the Gateway by Mike Carey

58.  Dolores Claiborne by Stephen King

59.  Batman: Arkham Unhinged, Vol. 3 by Derek Fridolfs

60.  The Tent by Kealan Patrick Burke

61.  Batman: The Long Halloween by Jeph Loeb

62.  Horns by Joe Hill

63.  Batman: Arkham Unhinged, Vol. 2 by Derek Fridolfs

64.  The Garden of Eden by Ernest Hemingway

65.  Batman: Arkham Unhinged, Vol. 4. By Derek Fridolfs

BROTHEL: Between the Sheets

Mi Amors,

My current WIP, Brothel, has made me look at relationships in an entirely different light, but most importantly, it's taught me a deep appreciation for love and all that it encompasses. As a result, I thought it would be fun to share some of my favorite literary quotes about love, and about being in love.

Lust can take the evening off, tonight.

Favorite Quotes:

“I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. I love you simply, without problems or pride: I love you in this way because I do not know any other way of loving but this, in which there is no I or you, so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand, so intimate that when I fall asleep your eyes close.”― Pablo Neruda, 100 Love Sonnets

“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.”― Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Selected Poems

"He's more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same."                 — Emily Brontë , Wuthering Heights

“And he took her in his arms and kissed her under the sunlit sky, and he cared not that they stood high upon the walls in the sight of many.”― J.R.R. Tolkien

“I fell in love with her courage, her sincerity, and her flaming self respect. And it's these things I'd believe in, even if the whole world indulged in wild suspicions that she wasn't all she should be. I love her and it is the beginning of everything.”― F. Scott Fitzgerald

"He was my North, my South, my East and West, My working week and my Sunday rest."- W. H. Auden

“If I knew that today would be the last time I’d see you, I would hug you tight and pray the Lord be the keeper of your soul. If I knew that this would be the last time you pass through this door, I’d embrace you, kiss you, and call you back for one more. If I knew that this would be the last time I would hear your voice, I’d take hold of each word to be able to hear it over and over again. If I knew this is the last time I see you, I’d tell you I love you, and would not just assume foolishly you know it already.”― Gabriel Garcia Marquez

“I've never had a moment's doubt. I love you. I believe in you completely. You are my dearest one. My reason for life.”- Ian McEwan, Atonement

“I have for the first time found what I can truly love–I have found you. You are my sympathy–my better self–my good angel–I am bound to you with a strong attachment. I think you good, gifted, lovely: a fervent, a solemn passion is conceived in my heart; it leans to you, draws you to my centre and spring of life, wrap my existence about you–and, kindling in pure, powerful flame, fuses you and me in one.”― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.” ― Jane Austen, Pride And Prejudice

"We love the things we love for what they are."— Robert Frost

“You carry away with you a reflection of me, a part of me. I dreamed you; I wished for your existence. You will always be a part of my life. If I love you, it must be because we shared, at some moment, the same imaginings, the same madness, the same stage.”― Anaïs Nin

And for my favorite:

“Let our scars fall in love.”― Galway Kinnell

BUY THE TICKET. TAKE THE RIDE.

Man, 2014.

This year has been one of the craziest, most fucked-up beautiful years of my life, and the more I look back on it, the more I smile, and laugh, and cry. I’ve had quite the adventure this year, making more memories, taking more chances, and breaking more rules than I ever thought I could (or would!), and because I finally decided to step out of my comfort zone, I’ve become one happy girl these days.

Let’s take a look at things:

·         In January, I graduated from Seton Hill University with my MFA in Writing Popular Fiction with a concentration in Horror.

·         I made the final Stoker Award Ballot for HYSTERIA: A COLLECTION OF MADNESS.

·         By April, everything that I trusted in my life fell apart and I had to completely rebuild and reevaluate who I was and what I wanted.

·         I ended up writing an unplanned poetry collection in three weeks, An Exorcism of Angels, to which I sold to Raw Dog Screaming Press.

·         By then, it was May and I needed a serious break. I released my second poetry collection, Mourning Jewelry and then I left the state, traveled to Portland, OR and spent a few days running around the city with some of my best friends and most treasured colleagues.

·         When I came back home, everything shattered again, and because of that, so did I. So I left. I packed my bags, bought a plane ticket, and off I went.

o   I went a little Jack Kerouac this summer and spent about three months in a bohemian tirade.

·         I went to NECON and spent the night in the Lizzie Borden House.

·         I sold my thesis novel, The Eighth, to Dark Regions Press.

·         I moved out and left the place I called home for the past 25 years.

·         I bought my own place.

·         I got a full-time job that I’m in love with.

·         By October, I had become a steady guest at the reading series that happens at Riley’s Pour House once a month (hosted my Lawrence C. Connolly).

·         Arnzen and I battled Nosferatu poems at a Halloween reading in Dormont. Then we hosted a twitter contest for 4 hours called #HAIKUWEEN which was a bloody, wonderful time.

·         I ran around the states some more.

·         Another unplanned poetry collection started to evolve, and I took a step back from the MADHOUSE and opened the BROTHEL instead.

·         I joined the HWA as an active member.

·         I planned out my travel schedule for next year—which includes 2 weeks in Ireland.

·         I attended the first RDSP Writing Retreat. I made new friends, lovely memories, drank more mead than I should have, and sat in a 16 person hot tub after I won Cards Against Humanity and was titled the “worst-person-alive.” Cheers, you silly people. That’s a compliment.

·         I have a #topsecret project cooking with one of my writer gal pals.

·         I read 65 books.

·         I wrote over 300 poems.

·         I got a seriously badass tattoo.

·         And now…I’m writing a memoir.

So some things happened (insert Joker laugh here).

But if I learned anything this year—as both a woman and a writer—it’s that life is too short to be anything but happy. If you don’t like something, change it. If you want to do something, stop being afraid, and just do it.

Life is about taking chances.

Sometimes they work, sometimes they don’t.

But that’s when we find ourselves, and I’ll be damned if I’m ever going to look back on my life and say “I wonder…” or “What if….”

So buy the ticket.

Take the ride.

The journey is the best part after all.

With Love and Madness,

Stephanie

WYTOVICH HOSTS BROTHEL STRIPTEASE

Rise and shine, darling ones!

This morning, I have a treat for you. A show and tell if you will.

Before I started publishing horror, I wrote erotica. Sometimes I wrote it under my name, most of the time I didn't, but I always found it fun to write and I'm glad to be doing it again...even though not all of my clientele are exactly making it out these days. What can I say? The times have changed and my girls have tempers, and while some brothels play with feathers, we prefer to spice things up with knives.

What's a dead body between sisters anyways?
I feel the experience just makes our little family stronger.

So last time, I invited you to the Peepshow, but today, I'm extending an invitation to my BROTHEL Striptease. And in true burlesque fashion,  I plan to leave you with a picture in mind that raises more questions than it asks. Here are the titles of the next fifteen poems in my collection, and below it, well, that's a little something I wrote just for you.

Table of Contents cont.

16. Dance
17. Debauchery
18. Deeper
19. Die-sect
20. Drink Up, Lay Down
21. Eat Me
22. Ecstasy
23. Erotic Asphyxiation
24. Evening Girl
25. Evidence
26. Fame and Fortune
27. Flesh Notes
28. Flirtation
29. Foursome
30. French

EXCERPT:

 

"...and I've learned that lust is a little bit like love, and that love is nothing quite like lust, and when I close my eyes, I see his face, hear his voice, and every John I'm with helps me murder his memory a little more, and in some ways, that moment--no matter how long it lasts--is like becoming a virgin again."

xoxo,

Stephanie M. Wytovich

Madam XXX

THE ABC'S OF BROTHEL

Welcome to the ... Peepshow?

The MADHOUSE is temporarily playing host to Madam XXX, and as we speak, my muses are spending some time getting to know one another. If you haven’t met them, please, allow me a moment to make some introductions:

·         Hysteria is my muse of madness. She was born in the asylum and her job is to handle the sick, the weak, the used. As she was my first, she’ll always be dear to me. Plus, she’d kill me if I didn’t say that. You can find her here.

·         Mourning is my muse of memory, of sadness. She was born in the cemetery and her job is to help those who are attached to the dead, who can’t move on. She sought me out when I needed her, and I wear her locket around my neck every day to remind myself of her presence. You can find her here.

·         The Angel is my third muse, but she’s currently being exorcised and won’t be back around until early next year. She’s my muse of redemption, of imperfection. She was born out of heartbreak, and her job is to heal, to learn to forgive. She’ll be with her sisters soon and you can look for her here.

This brings me to Madam XXX, who I’m very excited to acquaint you with. Madam XXX is my muse of masochism, my mistress of pain. She runs the brothel in my head, and does so with a steady hand. I met her a few weeks ago and we’ve been chatting ever since, sharing juicy stories like girlfriends often do. And it’s quite interesting because much like Hysteria walks with her patients, Madam XXX comes with her girls. And the gossip! Oy. The mouths on some of these ladies! I’ve been blushing ever since!

So I’ve decided to soften the horror, up the ante with eroticism. Together, the Madam and I have finished the A, B, C’s of our current project, and since you’ve all been so lovely, I figured I’d prepare a little peepshow for you. Something to wet your lips with! So here’s a sneak peek at the TOC, the titles of the first 15 poems inside my collection, BROTHEL. Enjoy!

Table of Contents:

 

1.      Action Shot

2.      Adult Play

3.      Amoral

4.      Appetite

5.      Automatic Woman

6.      Besotted

7.      Blind Obedience

8.      Branded

9.      Brothel

10.  Burlesque

11.  Carnal Charisma

12.  Casanova

13.  Cherry Blossom

14.  Clitorial

15.  Courtship

Now behave.

Or don’t.

Either way, I expect to see you back here.

Whips and Chains,

Stephanie M. Wyovich

COVER REVEAL: Blood of the Daxas by Larry Ivkovich

The Madhouse would like to give a warm welcome to author and friend, Larry Ivkovich. Larry's book Blood of the Daxas will launch in eBook form on November 6th, followed by a print launch on December 6th that will take place at Rickert and Beagle Books.  Hope to see you all there!

Summary:

Ravaged by war with the Perliox Animists, the Imperium's Congregate of Mages has been disrupted, its member's magic-wielding powers sorely weakened.

In order to restore those powers in full to her order, Meralandra, Priestess-Mage of Set Pomonar, must command a "technological" skyship in order to harpoon a dragon and harvest its blood.

In a land being overtaken by the new "magics" of science and mechanization, Meralandra forms a team of extraordinarily-powered misfits and criminals in order to accomplish her mission.

But Wyverna, the last adult dragon in the world of men, has other ideas. Her only hope to escape with her two hatchlings into the Land of Everlasting Summer is to outrun the pursuing skyships. If she can't do that, then she must destroy them before they destroy her and her brood. Or all is lost.
 

Author Bio:

Larry Ivkovich is a former IT professional with a BFA degree in fine art from West Virginia University. He is the author of several science fiction, fantasy and horror short stories and novellas, published online and in various print publications and anthologies including M-Brane SF, Afterburn SF, Penumbra, Twisted Cat Tales, Abaculus III, Raw Terror, Triangulations, Shelter of Daylight and SQ Magazine. He has also been a finalist in the L. Ron Hubbard’s Writers of the Future contest and was the 2010 recipient of the CZP/Rannu Fund Award for fiction. His debut urban fantasy novel, THE SIXTH PRECEPT, is available from IFWG Publishing, Amazon.com and Barnesandnoble.com. His fantasy novel, BLOOD OF THE DAXAS, will be published in 2014 by Assent Publishing. He is a member the writing/critique group, the Pittsburgh Worldrights, and lives in Coraopolis, PA with his wife Martha and cats Trixie and Milo.

Check out Larry's blog here and his website here.