New story

Hey all, I took some time off (okay ... a year) to finish my degree, but I'm back with a short release, "The New Submissive"! Available for Kindle and at Barnes & Noble, as well as on Kobo. I hope to not take so long with the next story...

Updates

I'm about 20,000 words into Morning Glories, and did some research on kinks I'm not as familiar with. I think I'm going to write a shorter book than Locked, more like 40k. And I would get more done if the weather wasn't so beautiful, leading to incidents like this:

Riley: -typing away at novella-
Friends: "Riley! Come to the beach with us!"
Riley: -looks at screen, looks at bathing suit- "Coming!"

At least I got to work on my tan.

Anyway, JA Konrath recently had Melinda DuChamp on his blog to talk about erotica. I read a few negative comments saying BDSM erotica is "mommy porn" and just a fad. And yeah, BDSM in literature is at an usual high point; it's the flavor of the moment and I don't expect it to stay that way forever. But it's hot because people can view it on ereaders with no one the wiser. Buy it from your Kindle and no one can tell you're a bondage lover from your computer.

But I really love this wave, because it makes me feel normal for once for liking bondage. I've showed The Locked Boy to several people, and they came back saying the sadomasochistic scenes were great. Maybe more people have secret, kinky fantasies than I realized.

New excerpt of Morning Glories

I am plotting The Locked Boy's sequel (tentatively titled Morning Glories) and sketching out some scenes. I posted one such scene on reddit for feedback (link is NSWF for explicit text): here.

I don't know when that book will be ready, mostly because I think I got burned out from writing Locked so fast. I don't want to do anywhere near that amount of editing again for at least a few months, so I'm going to put out a few short stories and work on promoting this book. Instead of, y'know, eating yogurt at my computer and checking the KDP sales obsessively.

Not that I would ever do such a thing.

Anyway, I learned that by clicking tags on Amazon erotica, I can search by category. Femdom, BDSM, cuckold, etc. That's pretty awesome, and really motivating to see other writers work within the same subjects. I like to think we're doing good work by promoting strong female characters...

Until next time,
Riley

The Locked Boy released!

I'm proud to announce the release of my first novel, a dark erotic romance called The Locked Boy. The cover was designed by Zara Black, and the red/white represents two-toned roses that the protagonist’s patron gives him as a gift.

It features erotic bondage, but there is so much more to the plot than that. There is love, treachery, tragedy … all that good stuff. Summary:

The year is 2080, and X, an 18-year-old orphan, indentures himself as an escort. His specialty is bondage, and he is rare in that he can take pain along with pleasure. But when a dangerous intrigue leaves his future uncertain, he is helped by a young woman who can tame his dark desires, and finds they will need each other to survive.


Available now:

Smashwords

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

Changes!

First off, welcome to my new blog. The old wordpress blog was tough for me to update. I know some people swear by wordpress, but I just couldn't get the hang of it. Blogger is more "click and done," which makes it easier to update the world on what I'm doing and get back to writing.

Secondly: with the impending release of my upcoming novel, I kind of want to re-shape and brand my image. When people see "Riley de Lis" I want them to say "Ohh, dark BDSM romance/erotica." If I write something else, I'll make another pen name for it. I just want to be consistent in what I write, and what my readers expect.

So I think I'm going to go back and edit some of my old titles, take some off sale and bundle the best-sellers. Improve the covers ... just general housekeeping stuff. It'll be a work in progress over the next few months.

For the blog: sadly, I will not be one of those people who updates every single day. I'll only update when I have something important to say. That means info on new releases, and random thoughts about writing, bondage, and music.