Bethany’s Comments (group member since Dec 01, 2015)

Bethany’s comments from the Circlet Backlist Read-Along group.

Now that the month is half over, I suppose it’s time for me to get started on actually reading this month’s Read Along title, yeah?


But first, here’s what I know (or what I think I know) about What Lies Beneath: if I recall correctly, I think I might’ve actually typeset this book for pdf? But that doesn’t mean I’ve actually read it. In fact, I make every effort to not actually read whatever I’m typesetting because once I start reading, I stop paying attention to formatting. (And trust me, nobody wants that in the typesetting process.)


I definitely know that Annabeth Leong has a story in this anthology, which is great because Annabeth is quality, both as a writer and as a human being. (Lowkey plugging my own editorial projects time: Annabeth has a wonderfully hilarious, hot, and romantic story in Like a Circlet Editor. I know I’m obviously super biased but in my opinion, her story, alone, is worth the entire ebook price.) And I thiiiiiiink she might’ve read from her What Lies Beneath story at #porncamp a few years back. (Am I remembering right, Annabeth?)


And more recently, I was the one that posted on the Circlet website about the return of #CBRA, which means I read the What Lies Beneath blurb describing what kinds of ghosts, demons, and other horror/fantasy beings we’ll be reading about. So, I am pretty damn PUMPED to get to it!

This post is one space to talk about What Lies Beneath: Erotic Horror before you’ve read it. Please, remember to keep your replies spoiler free!

This post is a place to talk about What Lies Beneath: Erotic Horror in its entirety once you have read it!

My apologies to everyone for the ridiculously long delay but I'm pleased to finally announce that the Circlet Backlist Read Along is back from the dead! And fittingly enough, the selection chosen from the previous poll is an anthology of erotic horror: What Lies Beneath.

Circlet's website will be updated with the news of May 2016's #CBRA selection tomorrow-- but as the Goodreads Group has been the most active participants in the read along project, you folks get a head start. As always, you can participate in the conversation here in the Goodreads Group or on Twitter and Tumblr using the hashtag #CBRA. And now we've begun a Facebook Group as well. At the end of the month, I'll be rounding up highlights from #CBRA conversations across various social media platforms in a single post for Circlet's website.

After missing out on February (entirely my bad, sorry guys!) we now have a poll on Circlet.com for choosing which title to read in March. To make the list of choices a bit more manageable and to contrast against reading the very first Circlet book ever published, I narrowed down the choices to backlist titles published more recently (specifically 2014). You can check out the poll HERE (along with a storify recap of the awesome convos about Telepaths Don't Need Safewords).

That all said, I'd love to have more participant input in selecting titles for the Read Along in the future. What ideas do you folks have regarding how we choose future books to read?

I've now read "Heart's Desire" (over a month later but shh, let's ignore how late this is... please?) and I must confess it wasn't my favorite in this collection. I liked it, don't get me wrong. It has some seriously compelling sensory descriptions in the erotica that elevate the quality of the writing across the board. ("He did not even open his eyes now, trying to melt into the pain." is one line in particular that stuck with me as just especially gorgeous.) But as much as I love straight up beautiful writing, I was just hoping for more plot/conflict in this one.

In the introduction of this collection, Cecilia mentioned how her writing has grown in the years since "Telepaths Don't Need Safewords". And while I have no idea what order any of these stories were actually written in, I feel like "Heart's Desire" does show the beginnings of the more recognizably Cecilia Tan style than the other two stories. And by "recognizably Cecilia Tan style" I mean the elegant secret sauce that is the way she writes sex beautifully and sensually, while still keeping the heat of the actual sex acts and her commitment to characterization such that the psychological and emotional responses feel real. Beyond that, Cecilia writes a broad spectrum of different types of characters across such different genres that her work won't ever be pigeonholed into a single brand. Which is one of the reasons I'm such a fan, personally. I know I will never be bored with anything she writes. I recently finished her latest contemporary erotic bdsm romance release, Taking The Lead (which I super duper loved, for the record) and I feel like "Heart's Desire" definitely has more in common with Cecilia's more recent works (that I've read) than "Telepaths Don't Need Safewords" and "Cat Scratch Fever".

And ultimately, one of the most unexpectedly rewarding things about reading Telepaths Don't Need Safewords in this Read Along is seeing the evolution of style. I'm looking forward to continuing to watch that evolution in Cecilia's other works and seeing how other Circlet authors' writing styles have emerged over time.

I've now read "Cat Scratch Fever" and (surprise, surprise, I know) I LOVED it!

Having edited Circlet's Like An Animal (a werewolf themed anthology), Alpha by Molly Maddox (a novella featuring a human/werewolf couple in the zombie apocalypse), and TammyJo's Beyond the Softness of his Fur (a bdsm trilogy/omnibus featuring a femdom human and her anthropomorphic fox pet in a dystopian society), I have a well-documented fondness for shifter/furry/anthropomorphic animal erotica. Clearly, this story was going to be right up my alley.

Bonus enjoyment points for me: unreliable narrator! I loved that Calidare is a lord who strikes fear into the hearts of his men, yet still seems to seek validation from the reader in his narration. ("There is something erotic about the feeling of fur, admit it.") And once he is bitten, there is all that fantastic tension with his fever and mental state. It made me think of the descents into madness in Poe or Lovecraft... only hot, rather than creepy. A descent into sexiness, if you will.

Like Annabeth, I'm very curious about Calidare's world. (Lords and keeps and tunics! But also radios and Cat-people!) But just as with Mriah in "Telepaths Don't Need Safewords", I don't expect Calidare to explain the nuances of a world that is normal to him. I just want to know what's up with this: "Of course, said a small voice in my head, you've kept them all ignorant of your real reason for coming out here." This is that throwaway line about uprisings in "Telepaths Don't Need Safewords" all over again.

Come on, everybody! Let's all hop in the time machine to 1992 and ask past-Cecilia what's up with these things. (Sure, we could just ask present-Cecilia but then we wouldn't get a ride in a time machine so where's the fun in that?)

And speaking of fun: Nobilis Erotica Podcast has produced an audio version of "Cat Scratch Fever" over here. The podcast includes an author's note and a coupon code to get the Telepaths Don't Need Safewords ebook at 50% off from Circlet's website.

I am officially super jealous of both of you right now.

TammyJo wrote: "That is the same copy I have of the book!

Elizabeth wrote: "HI, all!

I'm Elizabeth Schechter, and I'm a Circlet writer. My first Circlet book was, in fact, Telepaths Don't Need Safewords! I think..."

I've now read "Telepaths Don't Need Safewords" (the story) and, of course, I enjoyed it!

I'm very curious about the world of the story. Are Mriah and Arshan the only telepaths we see? Or is the entire society made up of telepaths, with some kind of cultural taboo on reading other people's minds without permission or an established rapport? I feel like that would make sense. Obviously having access to each other's minds creates even more intimacy in Mriah and Arshan's relationship. But Mriah also tried (but failed) to read Gallen's mind when he attacked her so maybe telepathy needs to be open in a two-way connection in order to work in this world?

I do appreciate that there was no break in the narration in which Mriah explained all the particulars of the setting to the reader, as that would've felt totally unnatural. Clearly to Mriah, there is nothing out of the ordinary about how she and Arshan can read each other's minds and all of the whys and hows concering their telepathy isn't something she would've been thinking about during the events of the story. As a result, the whole thing felt more grounded in reality for it... but I still wanna knooooow! PLUS there was that "I think the civil unrest will resolve itself" line from Arshan. What civil unrest? I am such a sucker for fictional civil unrest, you guys!

Like Annabeth, I also felt like the characters shrugged off the ordeal of the final scene a bit too easily but I can, at least, wrap my head around Mriah's response in this instance. Her bond with Arshan is really well established throughout the story. It makes sense to me that she would reach out to him in such a way after that experience. But I do feel like the reader might've needed another emotional beat before jumping straight into Sexual Healing.

Both the introduction of my edition and Annabeth have acknowledged that Cecilia's writing style has grown since she first wrote this story. And having read some of her more recent work, I can also attest to that. But I really feel like the less polished writing style really works for this piece: it feels true to Mriah's characterization (she sure as hell isn't going to be concerned about style in relating the events of this story to the reader) and the blunt, matter-of-fact descriptions of the scenes is hot.

Okay, so here's what I know about Telepaths Don't Need Safewords before actually reading it for the first time:

* It has one of the most brilliant titles of all time.
* It's a collection of erotic SF bdsm.
* There is at least one other story set in the Telepaths Don't Need Safewords universe. (Maybe two? Yeah, guys. I work with the author just about every week and still, I'm not 100% sure. #AssistantFail.)
* Cecilia printed it as a chapbook at first, hand stapling each copy on the floor of her apartment.
* This book is literally the entire reason Circlet Press exists and is therefore largely responsible for my own career in publishing.

Frankly, I have a whole lot of feels about this book, considering I haven't ever read it before!

Hello, all! I'm Bethany. I've been an editor/administrative assistant with Circlet for seven years now and I have a confession to make: I haven't actually read every Circlet book. But I'd like to! That's one of the reasons I started this read along project. And then, of course, there are the Circlet books I HAVE read and loved. I've been wanting a way to share my excitement about those titles as a reader rather than as an employee of the publisher. I also want to foster discussions with Circlet's readers about our books, erotic sf/f, the writing and publishing processes, and any other old thing that may be relevant to our shared interests. But a structured book club on only one digital platform felt like it might be too restrictive for the very broad range of folks who read Circlet books-- so the Circlet Backlist Read Along was born!

I'll be starting my reading of our first Circlet book Telepaths Don't Need Safewords (which, incidentally is THE first Circlet book) tomorrow, January 1st (which, incidentally, is also my birthday). I'll be blogging about my progress in this group (over in the book discussions section), on my twitter (@bethanyzaiatz), and on my tumblr (http://zaiatzgeistbeth.tumblr.com)! Please, feel free to friend/follow me if you'd like! And join in on discussions of the book in this group and/or on social media using #CBRA so we can find and share your thoughts on Circlet.com!

Feel free to introduce yourself to the rest of the group here!

Have you already read the Circlet Backlist Read-Along's selection for January 2016? Good job! Here is the space where you can discuss the book in its entirety without spoiling anybody who doesn't want to be spoiled.

Confused? Never fear, your trusty Circlet Backlist Read-Along admin is here! ...Or at least, the space where you can direct any questions to the Group Admin is here.

For anyone who would like to talk about the Circlet Backlist Read-Along's selection for January 2016 before we/they start reading it, here is where those conversations can happen. (Just please remember to keep your replies spoiler-free!)