March 2012

It’s time… Best Women’s Erotica 2012 is on shelves both virtual and actual, and it’s getting rave reviews. Starting now I’m looking for the best erotic short stories written by women for the 2013 edition of the leading series for explicit women’s lit: Best Women’s Erotica 2013.

I’ll update this post with a link to the official listing on Erotica Readers and Writers Association. It’s a tight deadline, so I’m going to post the call now. Read the entire specs after the jump. I’m so excited! Tell all your writer friends, send me your hottest erotica… Or tell me about something super arousing you’ve read in the past year so I can go find it for the book.

Call For Submissions

Best Women’s Erotica 2013
Editor: Violet Blue
Publisher: Cleis Press
Deadline: July 1st, 2012

Please note: Publisher has final right of refusal on all submissions. Payment is upon publication, plus 2 copies of the book; pub date is November 2012.

Best Women’s Erotica is a legendary and groundbreaking yearly series, and is the best-selling women’s erotica collection, period. Every year BWE raises the bar for explicit erotica written by and for women, penned by the most exciting female authors, from around the world.

This edition (BWE 2013) is selected and edited by Violet Blue (tinynibbles.com, @violetblue). In this edition, we are looking for fictional stories that seek to push the boundaries of female sexuality, present realistic fantasies and situations, and break taboos. The sex acts depicted must be explicit and realistic in detail.

A strong focus on character, predicament, and compelling situations is desired ‘ smart, literate erotic fiction. The desired orientation within the main sexual element of the stories is primarily heterosexual, yet bisexuality and lesbian encounters are also encouraged. The primary focus of sexual activity must be on the female experience; female pleasure is the main element. A playful, clever approach is welcome, as are intense scenarios.

[SATISFY your CURIOSITY and CONTINUE READING…]

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When you got dressed today, did you know you were celebrating National Cleavage Day? Or is every day National Cleavage Day for you? If you’ve got buttons and breasts, you may want to unfasten one of the former; if you appreciate the latter, take a moment to consider the delight that cleavage brings into the lives of people everywhere. National Cleavage Day occurs in April each year, at least theoretically since 2002; 2012 is the first year it happens to land on Walpurgisnacht. (Happy Walpurgisnacht, by the way.)

• See also: 50 Photos of Christina Hendricks In Honor of National Cleavage Day
• More busty goodness: Eye Candy: Busting Out

Created in 2002 in South Africa, National Cleavage Day is placed in April to, as a frequently cleavage-baring friend of mine once put it, “let the sisters out to breathe” after a lengthy winter of being packed away in impossibly snug sweaters and stretchy thermal turtlenecks.

Is National Cleavage Day a “real” holiday? Well…y’know, when it comes to holidays I vote for applying the old strip-club patron’s adage: “If I can see ‘em, they’re real.” But the truth is that holidays suffer from the same real/fake split that breasts in porn do. So National Cleavage Day a commerce-driven augmentation to the natural calendar, or was it born this way? Yes and no: it’s a Hallmarkesque invention, not unlike my other favorite holiday, Secretary’s Day. But Hallmark didn’t have a damned thing to do with this one. It appears to be a creation of the South African Wonderbra brand and some Johannesburg radio station, possibly in collaboration with Cosmopolitan magazine (presumably the South African edition). The Wikipedia entry on the topic is bizarrely garbled, but keeps coming back to this whole South African thing.

Okay, well…having admired a bit of South African cleavage in my day, I would be more than tickled to think of this merely as South African Cleavage day, but there’s cleavage everywhere (hopefully). The holiday is trending on Twitter and getting press in markets as far afield as India, Atlanta, and London, where it also inspired a street-side cleavage stroll. But as if to drive home the fact that it’s a commerce-based holidays, the London Cleavage Walk was not just a grassroots event in which boobs were bared as a spontaneously empowering exercise. It promoted a store opening for boutique chain Ann Summers.

I like to think National Cleavage Day can be like any other commerce-based holiday… even, say, Christmas. The Grinch could steal all the push-up bras in the world, and when it comes to cleavage, there would still be plenty of Whos in Whoville.

Remember the true spirit of National Cleavage Day, people. It shouldn’t be about the sale of spendy lingerie. It should be about…cleavage. So let’s join hands and sing, shall we?

Image: Christina Hendricks, via Buzzfeed.

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This video is terrific! Naked Ambition (above) is directed by Chris Palmer and centers on a porn director whose ambition is to make commercials. Talk about wanting to pimp yourself out… I love that the video parodies the now-classic trope: a porn director that takes himself too seriously as a film artist. That’s pretty much every porn director, ever, by the way. Palmer’s obsessed art school reject director incorporates iconic British ad references into his visions, using techniques and slogans such as Heineken’s ‘Refreshes the parts others can’t reach’, John Smith’s ‘Ave it’ and ‘It’s a bit of an animal’ from Peperami into porn scenes. Naked Ambition is executed brilliantly, has a subtle Jean Tinguely reference at the end, and if you go frame by frame in spots you’ll definitely get a few more lulz out of it.

What’s got advertising and film blogs talking about this is that the video is actually a call for director entries from Saatchi & Saatchi London – for the annual Saatchi & Saatchi New Directors’ Showcase 2012 as part of the always-packed annual Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. Incidentally, Spike Jonze was one of the directors to come out of the Showcase… And Saatchi & Saatchi is pretty much the leading – and largest – creative agency in the world. (via Adrants)

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