Sunday Brunch 7/7/2013

TODAY'S SPECIAL SUNDAY BRUNCH GUEST

IS AUTHOR LIV HONEYWELL!

First and foremost, it is a pleasure to have you here.  Welcome to Harper’s Sunday Brunch Spotlight!

 Thanks so much, Harper. I’m very happy to be here :).

So, can you tell us what makes Liv Honeywell tick?  What got you started on the path to becoming an author?

I started writing way back in 1998, really just for me at first. That was when I first discovered the BDSM lifestyle, and I wrote to discover what I might like to try. Then I plucked up the courage to show some of my stories to friends and they liked them too.

I didn’t think to do anything with the stories at all until last year when a very good friend read them and wanted to know why on earth I hadn’t sent them off to try and get them published. I thought about it and then sent off Imagine to Silver Moon Books and they accepted it within a couple of days!

I have so many stories I want to write, I don’t think I’m ever going to have time for them all! :)

What are you currently working on?  Would you care to share a snippet?

I’ve just finished writing The Journal, the first in the Her Master’s Voice series co-authored with Domitri Xavier which is out on 12^th July, and I’ve already started working on Shreds, the next one in the series. Shreds is still mostly in note form at the moment so I can’t give you a snippet from that, but here’s a little from The Journal.

Without warning he grabbed the front of my dress and tore it open all the way to my waist, revealing my bare breasts to his gaze. He paused for a second and then began to spank my breasts hard, over and over again; sometimes catching my nipples, sometimes not. The pain was excruciating and I wanted to cover my breasts and protect myself. It was a struggle to hold my hands away, but I knew I daren’t risk any more of his anger and I clasped them behind my back.

He grabbed my hair, close to the scalp and threw me from side to side like a rag doll. Several times I almost fell but he simply grabbed my hair again to steady me. I wanted to scream, I wanted to yell; perhaps I even thought to beg him to stop but the gag held me silent. Then he threw me to the floor as if I was nothing. I lay still; feeling brought low and degraded, as if I were a worthless bundle of rags.

It was not over yet. Again he spoke and this time my blood ran cold.

"Get out. Get out of the apartment and stand in the street,” he yelled.

I scrambled to my feet hoping I had misheard, hoping that he wasn’t really going to throw me out.

“I'm not done with you," he said, and I breathed a huge sigh of relief. I didn’t care what else he did at that point. I didn’t care at all, just as long as he still wanted me.

I reached the front door and hesitated on the step suddenly remembering that my dress was torn and my breasts exposed for anyone to see. I glanced onto the drive, wondering how I could ever have thought that the humiliation might be over but he kicked me onto the path, pushing me further down the driveway towards his car. He opened the trunk.

"Get in," he said icily."Get the fuck in."

I hurried to obey, settling myself into the uncomfortable boot of the car. He slammed the hatch down hard. Shivering and shaken to my core, I heard the engine start and the car moved off...

Do you include some of your own personal experiences in your books or do you prefer to use your imagination?

Now that would be telling ;).

No, honestly, the stories come from various places - from a scenario that I have tried or just a single phrase that someone says or an idea that I’d like to try. It can be anything really that sparks an idea. After that I do refer to my own experiences to make things realistic. I look at how I would feel in that situation, what I would be thinking, and, though the characters are not me and some of them are nothing like me, I do put myself in that situation and try to feel what the character would feel to be able to write it.

I think I work like that because I’ve done some acting and that’s how I approach playing a character.

Why BDSM?  What made you choose this genre over others?

I’m a sub in real life, so I write (mostly) what I like to read. It had to be BDSM really, though I do have some perfectly vanilla chick lit ideas too – again it’s what I like to read.

Do you have a specific process or a ritual you go through when sitting down to write?

I write a lot of random notes and dialogue. I tend to have no idea at first what they are for or what story they will go with. Then something starts me off, and I find myself either coming up with a character or a few paragraphs and the story builds from there. Then I look at the random notes I’ve made, some of which are years old, and realize that of course that sentence here or that little joke there is the perfect bit that absolutely must go in the story I’m working on and it was meant to all along.

That probably sounds a bit ‘woo woo’ but it works for me.

Then I tend to add more bits and more characters, do an awful lot of notes and manage somehow to come up with a plot. I don’t force myself to write in order and often find I’ve written the end first.

Where do you find your inspiration for your plots?  Do you have any tricks of the trade you would care to share? 

For The Journal, Domitri had the idea, and he led the whole story. He wrote his bit from the Master’s perspective and sent it to me, and I wrote my reaction to it as a sub. It was very intense writing like that, and it was a challenge as I had no idea where the story was going, but then that is just as it would be if it was a real scene. As a sub, I really would have no idea what was coming next, and I think that made it very realistic.

Part way through writing the story, I realized that Domitri had written a poem a while back describing some of the scenarios in the book, and I suggested that we print the poem to start the story off. That led to the idea for the series as he has more poems, all of which would make a great story, so we came up with the Her Master’s Voice series. All the stories will start with a short poem and continue wherever His Boss… I mean, His Domliness decides from there ;).

As for tricks of the trade, we read the story aloud to make sure it flows well. That helped a great deal with the editing. We didn’t edit much as we went along, just got the first draft down and then edited by reading aloud.

To make myself write if I’m really stuck, I get the scene fixed in my head that I need to finish, and then I open Write or Die (www.writeordie.com) and keep going, no matter how awful the writing is, until I have a first draft of that scene. Something about the software really helps me get past my inner editor and get something down on the page; and I often find I come up with things I just would never have thought of if I’d tried to slog away on Word without the software. I polish up the result a bit and keep going scene by scene until I’ve got a full first draft, then I edit properly.

I also find writing during NaNoWriMo works for me because I like the shared goal and the community, and I love watching my words remaining count down over the month.

What is the oddest place/situation where an idea for a book/plot has come to you?

Probably at the gym. Someone complimented me on losing weigh,t and a whole scene and a character popped fully formed into my mind, just from that sentence.

What makes a book stand out and perk your interest?

A really good blurb, especially one describing a great story with an intriguing reason to read on, and a good dollop of humour.

We all have our favorite authors.  Can you share some of yours and tell us why you like them?

I love Rosanna Leo, Kay Jaybee, Natasha Knight, Renee Rose and Justine Elyot in the erotica genre. They all come up with wonderful, engaging plots and characters. There are so many more I really want to read but haven’t had a chance yet – Tara Rose, Cassandre Dayne, Natasha Blackthorne… I really could go on. I love reading and my TBR pile is enormous!

Away from erotica, I like Jill Mansell, Catherine Alliott and Christina Jones. I’m a sucker for a warm and funny romantic comedy with a happy ending, and they deliver those so well.

We all have a pet peeve, care to share yours?

I’m pretty easy going really but rudeness and bad manners do annoy me. Apart from that, I absolutely hate cliffhangers at the end of books. If I know it has a cliffhanger, I won’t buy it.

When you’re not writing, what are the things you enjoy doing to relax?

I think the obvious one is reading. I do such a lot of that. I love spending time with my friends, going to the cinema and restaurants, baking, sewing and cooking. I love strolling on the beach and don’t get to do that nearly enough.

Thank you so much for joining me here today, Liv.  I know my followers will enjoy this spotlight as much as I have conducting it.  Good luck on all your future endeavors.

Thank you, Harper, and thank you for having me. I’ve really enjoyed answering your questions :).

 

More About Liv Honeywell 

When not writing about delicious, hot male dominants and the female subs who love them, I’m usually doing something craft-like, reading, baking, eating the results of said baking, and attempting to satisfy the demands of His High and Mighty Dominance (the cat!). My first story, Imagine, was published with Silver Moon Books last year and Coming, Ready or Not is my first solo book. The Journal, co-written with Domitri Xavier, is out on 12^th July.

Places you can find Liv online

Facebook Author Page
Her Blog/Website
Twitter or @LivHoneywell
Amazon Author Page

Liv's Current Release

Meet Will and Abby. An ordinary couple that you wouldn’t give a second glance at if they were walking down the street. Except they share a wonderful secret and bond as they explore their Master/slave relationship.

This is a loving couple, full of good humour, but nothing in any relationship is perfect and sometimes things go wrong. Even the strongest will in the world can't always obey and with that comes consequences...

Three vignettes, The Edge, Bad Girl, and Breathless focus on control. Can Abby be taken to the edge of pleasure and not cross over? She wants to obey and to hold on. But can she? And what will happen to her if she can't?

Holding on has never felt so good...

Purchase Links for Coming, Ready or Not!

Amazon US
Amazon UK