I’m very pro-sex, obviously. I write erotica. The one thing I hate is when people ask me what I write, and I say erotica, I could almost say along with them, “like 50 shades of Grey?”

And I want to scream no, nothing like that. I want to celebrate consent culture. Even though Kevin meets Matt while Matt is engaged in sex-work, I’d still like to think that the book is pro-sex and pro-consent culture. After dabbling in fanfic for almost a decade I understand the desire for dubious consent because playing with fire is hot, but not obtaining your partner’s enthusiastic consent before engaging in sexual acts is no grounds to actually build a relationship with.

Abuse does more than just hurt. It can destroy the sense of safety and trust that everyone needs to be able to become a productive member of society, including sex-work if consensual. Abuse can leave a hole in someone’s soul that dangerous habits like drugs, alcohol or dangerous habits can almost, but never completely fill. No foreign substance could ever completely fill that hole. The person has to figure out for themselves that they are worthy of love and can trust on their own, independent of the acts of other people. As much as it is a love story between Matt and Kevin and a platonic love story between Matt and Kevin, there’s also a side story where Matt figures out what he needs, and allows himself to be whole.

Matt learning to trust Kevin is as important as Matt learning to like Kevin. It was love at first sight, but falling in love is the easiest part to a relationship. Relationships take serious work to maintain for both parties.

As bad as the headmaster is to Matt in real life, both of them entered into the relationship with clear expectations as to what would, and wouldn’t happen. It may not be as sexy as smouldering looks, but trying to get a person to do something that is on their ‘hard no’ list. Getting a person to do something they did not want to do from the onset is the very definition of not sexy.

Matt and Kevin do not have penetrative sex until the very end of the book because it takes that long for Matt to trust Kevin. In the Fae language, one of the kinds of love you can have for a person is synonymous with trust.

If you want to know more about consent culture, here are some good places to start, and related links:

Laci Green, Consent 101 – what it says, a Youtube video.

Consent culture from the Pervocracy – what an ideal consent culture would look like.

enthusiastic, willing, unwilling, coerced – different models of consent culture at The Dirty Normal

Elodie Under Glass gust-posts at Captain Awkward on how to romance

consentculture.com for everything and the kitchen sink

 

To celebrate the release of my new book Changeling, I’m going to be posting related links on Tuesdays and cut scenes on Thursdays for the next month. Changeling is a m/m paranormal erotica novel about Matt, who sells sex to keep himself and his little brother together. When Matt discovers Kevin, the john he’s rapidly falling for, is a Prince of the Fae, the questions start piling up. But most importantly, why does Kevin keep acting like it’s Matt who will leave, when it’s Matt who’s the broken one?