My Book is Finally Published

Well, ladies and gents, I am extremely proud to announce that my very first collection of erotic, short stories has finally been published! I decided to call it My Sweet Degradation - a title well and truly stolen from one of my most popular tales - as each story explores the physical thrill in being forced to submit to the will of another.

Chimera Books - the publishing company I have been working for - pride themselves on offering adult literature centred around the ‘damsel-in-distress' scenario, and I have made sure to adhere to their philosophy throughout. Those of you who have experience of my writing will know that BDSM in a ‘PVC, whips-n-chains' kind of a way is not really my thing. I have always enjoyed writing stories involving a certain degree of control and surrender, however - be it mental or physical - and those are the stories you will find in My Sweet Degradation.

Now, I feel obliged to warn those of you who have been kind enough to support me over the years that a large portion of My Sweet Degradation is made up of writing you will already recognise. I say ‘recognise' as opposed to ‘know' because those stories I have included in the collection that have already been published here, have been so heavily edited, reworked and added-to that beyond their central theme, they are almost entirely new pieces of writing. I assure you, however, the end result is far superior to the older versions. I had thought about using so far unread stories only, but there are several here that I am particularly proud of and would now like to offer to a wider readership. Should My Sweet Degradation prove to be a success, then there are already plans for a follow up, which will obviously be made up of entirely new material. What previously published writing I have included in the book will now only be available as excerpts here as it would be a pretty poor move for me professionally if I was to continue to give them away for free. As the book will only cost £7.99 to buy (I'm not sure what the international prices are), however, and is even cheaper in eBook format, I am sure that my writing will remain easily available for all of you out there.

Oh! And I've changed my name too! Not drastically, but I have moved over from Jonathan Philips to J Phillips. I've done this for two reasons: firstly, it always annoyed me that I began my writing career with the single ‘L' Philips - it was a spur of the moment decision when signing up to a certain website - and I have long wished that I had gone for the more traditional double-L right from the start. Also, I have dropped the Jonathan in favour of the single initial ‘J' as I don't want to prejudice new readers' enjoyment of my writing by making the sex of their author immediately obvious. Of course, you boys and girls already know that I am a twenty-stone, lesbian trucker from Glasgow, but perhaps there are new readers out there who would rather picture me in some other way, and who on earth could blame them? I think, if I had to choose, my favourite perspective to write from is the first-person-female perspective and so perhaps knowledge of my real gender might put one or two readers off. Anyway, it's stylistic vanity and nothing you lovely people should worry yourselves over.

So there you have it. It's a huge cliché, but my book would never have happened had it not been for the support and encouragement of you, my readers. I plan to submit new stories here over the coming months, but things are hectic as hell for me at the moment and so I think we are looking at early autumn before I get anything worthwhile done. Perhaps I will finally try to master the ‘quickie', maybe I will finish off one of the countless stories I have littering my hard drive, I even have a growing urge to write some kind of gothic-erotic story, but I just don't know what will come first. I am always open to suggestions so do feel free to drop me story ideas. Whatever happens, I promise to let you all know very soon. Until then, wish me luck and please go buy a copy of My Sweet Degradation, it would make such a lovely Christmas present for Grandma.

Jonathan