Virginia Allen
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.
The road not taken by Robert Frost.
It is easy and safe to take the road most traveled on, the path is laid out for you and the road signs are clearly in place. All you have to do is follow it. But then ask yourself, am I truly living if I follow that beaten path? Do you often wonder about the things you might have learned or seen if you took the road less traveled? This last year these questions played over and over in my head, do I keep following the easy familiar road and keep doing the things I know, without ever learning something new, or do I travel back, and take the road less traveled on and explore a whole new world and learn many new things?
Curiousty is a powerful force. After many sleepless nights, I decided that What if was not going to dictate the rest of my life. I think, ultimatly, not making a choice because you are scared to what it might lead is detrimental to personal growth. Hence, I decided to put my work out in the open and see to what the road now taken, leads to.
I am an avid reader, I love the works of Hardy, Austen, Marquez, Rowling, Tolkien, French, Angelou, and Roddenberry. But taking the road least taken means getting out of my comfort zone and challenge myself to write and publish something entirely different from what I know and love, and monster erotica fits that description perfectly. .
The genre came into existence in 1872 when Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu wrote and published Carmila, the very first sexually themed vampire gothic novella. Le Fanu wrote in the tradition of Edgar Allan Poe the father of gothic novels. The genre became further popularized when Bram Stoker wrote and published Dracula. Oscar Wilde flipped the genre around with his Portret of Dorian Gray where sexual repression, hedonism, and glut created the monster instead of an outside force. Although the sexual overtures in both Dracula and Carmila are present they are very subtle and give the reader much room for interpretation. The picture of Dorian Gray was/is far less subtle and challenged Victorian puritanism, the prevailing morality at the time quite openly.
Monster erotica in its recent incarnation takes it even further. Filled with explicit sex scenes that often border on, or are straight up non-consensual at the beginning, with the protagonist quickly developing Stockholm Syndrom as the story progresses. At the end the protagonist has usually fallen for her/his monster and they live happily ever after.
The overarching theme that almost all monster erotic novels have in common is that in the end, the monsters aren't that monstrous. Books within the genre frequently offer comedic situations and do not take themselves to seriously.
I have written one, and are currently working on two more books within this genre. The first book Enticed by Bigfoot has been recently published on Amazon and pretty much fits the standard mold of the genre. Two young women go on a camping trip and one of them gets kidnapped by Bigfoot. You can find a link to the book at the bottom of this page. My second novella tells the story of a parapsychologist with a gif for the supernatural who finally gets to prove the paranormal is real when she is asked to free a trapped spirit. The final book I have written takes on a wild ride with a recently married couple who get kidnapped by aliens who need their help to save the Universe from an all-out intergalactic war. You can find a link to both books at the bottom of this page.
Next to writing, I enjoy horse riding, hiking, playing with my dog Brody and a good glass of wine with my husband in our backyard. I hope to write many more stories and post about them on my website.
