Too tempting...

As you know if you've ever spent time on this blog, I love all things 19th Century. I grew into my spanko kink in the days before the internet and it was vintage erotica that opened the door to self-discovery.
All those gloomy Gothic country houses with their stern guardians and strict, no-nonsense governesses... And, of course, lots of forbidden sexual activity.
You rarely come across 21st Century imagery that gets anywhere near capturing the laced-in passion of it all. I love the work of artists from the time like Lewis Bald, but when photographers and videographers have a go at creating a 19th Century scenario it's usually a disaster. So, I was thrilled to see that Dreams of Spanking have ventured again into Victorian/Edwardian country - because they do it so well.

I'm so busy at the moment with real world writing that I try very hard to be good and to keep away from reading spanko-world blogs - I can waste whole days blog-hopping. But I have to share my enthusiasm for 'The Edwardian Governess'.
I really do LOVE the costumes - they are so convincing. For me, there is something so incredibly sexy about a reddened bot peeping out from virgin-white old-style bloomers.
Actually, I think of them as drawers rather than bloomers. Not sure what the difference is, but my pair were 'lost in action' recently and I really could do with finding replacements.
And doesn't Pandora make a scarily strict governess. She has such a presence on the screen.

Situation vacant

She's young, nervous and impressionable in most Victorian novels, sadistic and sensual in classic erotica like 'The English Governess' while today an image search for the g-word is st likely to come up with pictures of a woman with a whip in something shiny and black.
I have the whole governess thing on my mind again at the moment because I'm working on a sequel to 'A Week in the Country' and one of the characters who carries over to the new novel is Miss Harwood, the governess. Looking at her again I was struck that she doesn't have much depth as a character compared with most of the others - she lacks a 'back story'.
So, I need to give her an earlier life. But there's so much myth-making around the role of the Victorian governess that it's hard to get an idea of who real governesses were. These ads from the late 1840s throw some light on it: governesses, housekeepers and companions were clearly betwixt and between, as my granny would have put it. 
In a household the governess was a step ahead of the servant class and a good step behind her employer - not one or the other. The women in the ads are clearly well educated and are selling their skills as being an ideal femininity - they detail their knowledge of drawing, dancing, music and ornamental needlework (no mention of maths, of course). 

They are young middle-class girls, but seem to have modest ambitions. For example, when Rose at Mrs Walpole's touches on pay she's only asking for a "moderate salary". 
Which means that my Harriet is rather a long way from this 1840s reality. She's older, ambitious and a great deal more self-possessed, so I need to invent a journey that will get her from a meek teen looking for a moderate wage to a cane-wielding 40-something who won't take crap from anybody. Interesting.

PS And, of course, the Times job ads make no mention of that most important accomplishment for any governess who makes an appearance in erotic fiction - her understanding of domestic discipline. Maybe that was just a given...

Write stuff

Hurrah, I'm writing again. After months getting bogged down with my World War Two novel I've decided to put it to one side and go back to where I'm most comfortable - the Victorian country house.

I've decided to get some of the characters from 'A Week in the Country' out of retirement and let them play again. And it's fun. Here's a paragraph or two of the three or four pages I wrote today on a train (it feels really wicked writing spanko fiction on public transport...)

“I'm so sorry, mam. So very sorry. It won't happen again…”

“Good. Glad to hear it," Flick said."That'll be all…”

“You must be so disappointed…”

“A little, Edna. But these things happen,” Flick replied, distractedly. “You can run along now…”

She turned away from the maid and went to the window. Cook seemed to be preparing some sort of fish dish and the cooking smell had begun to reach the Day Room.

As Flick opened the window she noticed Charles crossing the drive some distance of the house. The dogs were at his heels and he had his gun under his arm.

Turning, she was confronted by Edna's big bottom. While Flick had been at the window the housemaid had turned around, bent over and pulled skirt and petticoats up over her head.

Her drawers could barely contain the generous curves of Edna's bum and her quim and bumhole pushed out shamelessly. It really was getting a bit tiresome, Flick thought to herself.

“I know it's what I deserve, mam…” Edna's voice was muffled, but quite firm. The maid knew what she wanted and, when the mood was on her, was dogged in her pursuit of it.

“The cane's on the table, mam,” she said. "Can you see it... are you there..." Oh dear God, thought Flick, how bored I am of all this Lady of the Manor business. 

PS To mark the moment I've decided to offer downloads of 'A Week in the Country' for the next month at a special price. Follow this link to its Amazon page.

Horse play

When is a horse not a horse? That is the question. Or the question that comes out of the book I’ve just been reading.
Let me explain. Our family visit has ended and one of our visitors left a book behind, which I’ve been reading it. It’s detective fiction, which I don’t usually go for, but I’ve really got into this one.
It’s called ‘Shadow of the Serpent’ by David Ashton. What I like best is that it’s set in Victorian Edinburgh, which is making me want to go back to writing about my ‘A Month in the Country’ characters.
Anyway, here’s the thing. All of the sudden the action moves to an upmarket brothel run by a woman called Jean. Among the ‘menu’ of experiences  on offer is a dominatrix in the cellar.
David Ashton writes: "Jean had spent a fortune on that cellar, the high point of which had been the purchase of the Berkley Horse. The apparatus had been shipped from London and arrived shrouded in thick white canvas like apiece of sculpture…"
The cellar was also kitted out with a range of flogging implements including "an array of canes which ranged from thin and pliant to thick and thunderous". Jean is called to deal with a customer who has a complaint about the thoroughness of the treatment he is getting from the house dominatrix, Francine.
Jean puts her straight. ‘"The client’s desires are paramount. Give him what he wants. Here I’ll make a start for ye.’ So saying, she took a thin birch rod from where it had been soaking in water to keep it green and pliant, then brought it down with considerable force on the man’s buttocks. There was a indrawn breath in response, and a thin smear of blood showed where the blow had landed.’
So, a little startle and then the story moves on. But it left me wondering what a Berkley Horse could be...
A bit of searching online sort of answers the question. But also poses another others. I’d imagined something like the vaulting horse we used to have in school and that’s how it looks here.
But then elsewhere it’s more like an A-frame shape, like an artist’s easel. Some confusion, but I did like reading about Mrs Theresa Berkley, who sounds a great character; I’m thinking that a sequel to ‘A Month’ needs to have its own Mrs Berkley and her horse, too.

So, was there a real Berkley Horse? Apparently there was and it was named after it's creator. Or I guess she didn't actually get handy with the saw, but she had it created to her spec.

One article I came across says Mrs.Berkley became famous for her invention "a multi-functional device which combined the delights of being a spanking bench with several other erotic functions". Apparently she made a fortune estimated at £15,000 during the eight years running her Establishment in central London.

Personally, being tied to furniture isn't my thing so I'm quite happy to be left wondering about the horse's shape and form. But I'm rather fascinated by Mrs B herself.

There's an interesting essay on women like Theresa at a site called the Flagellation Sourcesheet. It quotes Henry Ashbee's 'Index of Forbidden Books', which was written in the late Nineteenth Century, saying: "Mrs Theresa Berkley, of No 28 Charlotte Street, Portland Place; she was a perfect mistress of her art, understood how to satisfy her clients, and was, moreover, a thorough woman of business, for she amassed during her career a considerable sum of money."

I find myself wanting to know much more about Mrs Berkley. How did she get into such a specialised line of business? What sort of background did she come from? Was flagellation purely business, or was she mixing business with pleasure?

The Sourcesheet essay throws up one intriguing detail. It says that after Theresa's death her brother, who had been a missionary in Australia, arrived in England. He was in a position to inherit his wealthy sister's estate, but "when he learned the source from which the property she had left him had been derived, he renounced all claim".

Apparently, in his absene her estate went to her doctor, including old letters. They including some "from the highest personages, male and female, in the land". Clearly, Theresa wasn'#t a girl from the slums (given that her brother was a clergyman) and she provided a service to a nicer class of bottom. 

Last, but not least. I wanted to find an image to post as a parting though so I googled for 'victorian' and 'dominatrix'. It offers up a very wide and varied selection of images, but given issues of copyright I didn't feel comfortable posting any - instead I'll leave you with a series of links to look at, if you care to.

It seems that those two words conjure up thoughts of vampires,updos, scary ladies, chic ones and dressing-up.

Promises, promises

If it were a school project it would have 'SEE ME' scribbled on it in red. I'd be in some serious trouble... Some sweaty-palms, waiting-outside-the-study sort of trouble.

There'd be garbled excuses, promises to do better, maybe even tears. And then I'd wait for the verdict, knowing that whatever was coming was totally deserved.

But as it happens the excuses do hold water, honest. The fact is real world me is snowed under with work and other commitments, so the me that exists in the spankosphere is struggling to deliver on promises (that I make to myself).

So, A Week in the Country was written in a rush last autumn when 'real' work was slow. But I'm sad to say that the follow-up is stalled at about a quarter of the way written and that doesn't look like changing any time soon; poor Beryl is trapped in limbo somewhere around chapter 4 (ploughing fields, chasing nasty Nazis - and getting spanked). 

And I'd said to myself that I'd make fiction a regular Friday feature of this blog too, but again I've not found the time. Another black mark.
What can I do to make amends? Promise to be better at keeping promises, I suppose. In the meantime feel free to suggest suitable chastisement - it might help me keep my promise (to keep my promises...)

Leading man

I think I'm suffering from a crush, something that hasn't happened since Year 5. We went to see 'The Woman in Black' last night, which turned out to be suitably spooky though not quite as good as the stage play or Susan Hill's book.
But the sets, costumes and general feel of it all are fantastic. It's all so tight-laced and Edwardian - lots of highly-charged emotion that's only just being controlled.
Daniel Radcliffe is so good as the central character. He battles on manfully, but is so confused and vulnerable by it all. 

And he looks so good in the period costumes and is, frankly, really quite hot... He's certainly grown beyond Harry Potter.
In between the scary bits I found that the film was sometimes a little slow, and my mind wandered a bit. I found myself thinking how Eel Marsh House was the perfect setting for the very best sort of Victorian spanko drama - all dark corridors and small, confining rooms.

And what a great central character Daniel R would make in that spanking story. In 'A Week in the Country' I had the lead male be a spanker and a spankee - while enjoying neither role.
Daniel would be able to get the confusion and reluctance Charles Bunning feels as both top and bottom just right. Perhaps I should write a script and see if he'd be interested in a movie project.   

Shame and spanking

'Oh, the shame of it. Stripped bare and soundly spanked...' No, not me - stripped bare and soundly spanked sounds good to me - but my 1940s heroine Beryl.
Working on the Victorian novel 'A Week in the Country' I found shame turning up on a regular basis. It's very much part of the whole Victorian erotic sensibility, isn't it? 

Sort of 'as her bottom was bared she was overwhelmed by the shame of it and covered her face...' It seems to just right for all those disobedient maids, fearsome governesses and old-school squires.

But it seems less appropriate in a 1940s setting. Embarrassment, yes. Shame, no. I don't think Beryl's shameless, but she's a lot more matter of fact about sex, nudity and the rest. If she has to take it on the bare bottom she'll take it on the chin, if you see what I mean.

The finishing line

It's taken two months of blood, sweat and tears but I've done it. The starting point was a question: why can't I find the sort of erotic novel that I like to read? Lots out their, but they weren't hitting the right spot.
So, I decided to write and publish one of my own. I'm a writer by profession so I was comfortable about putting the words together; it was going to be a novella, but then just growing, ending up at around 58,000 words.
What I hadn't expected was how much fun it turned out to be. I really felt connected with my sparky, spanko heroine Flick and rather miss her now she's gone.
And playing around with the historical setting was fun too. Probably because I've been watching too much 'Downton Abbey' I was stuck into a 19th Century/early 20th Century frame of mind.
As it turned out I shifted things back a few decades and made Flick's story into a homage to all that great Victorian country house erotica. You know, 'Frank & I' and that sort of thing. 
What turned out to be difficult was the publishing process. Getting to grips with new software and not being able to ask advice from friends was frustrating (they'd have wanted to know why I was asking and I'm not brave enough to be out-and-open).
Anyway, it's done. I've sent Flick out into the world. Do have a look at the sample at Amazon - I'd love to hear what you think.