MaryBeth: We're baaaaaack!

DeDe: That's right - here we are!

MaryBeth: I'm MaryBeth, the sitemaster for ChristianErotic.com, and it's my pleasure to be invited to interview the Queen of Christian Erotica, DeDe O'Connor.

DeDe: [rolling eyes] Here we go again... You know that now you've even got my husband calling me that.

MaryBeth: Oh, come on - roll with it!

DeDe: [shaking head and sighing] Let's talk about the Pompeii.

MaryBeth: Love to, after all, that's why we're here. The new book is The Marriage Bed 2: Christian Erotica from the Pompeii Hotel, and I'm delighted to have been given an advance copy.

DeDe: And?

MaryBeth: And it was great - wonderfully fun and erotic!

DeDe: Ah, thank you so much.

MaryBeth: So let's start at the beginning. How did this book come together?

DeDe: Well, first of all, the stories in this anthology all take place in Las Vegas. My hubby and I have been there numerous times, and we love the city. We're not big gamblers, but there are great restaurants and extravagant shows there. It seemed like the perfect place to set a collection of erotic tales.

MaryBeth: Tell us about the Pompeii Resort Hotel and Casino where all the stories take place.

DeDe: Okay, so I needed a place to set the collection, and you have to be careful about using real locations. There are many wonderful resort hotels in Vegas, but if I said something to offend the owners, or they didn't want to be connected with erotica, it could turn into a huge mess. I therefore set out to create a place that doesn't exist, but sounds like it could... a resort hotel on the caliber of all the others in town.

MaryBeth: So it's all from your imagination?

DeDe: It's an amalgam of many of the places that my husband and I have visited over the years. The problem was that I needed a theme for the hotel, and I didn't want one that could ever be an actual hotel. "The Pompeii" was perfect - the ancient city was a wild place until a volcano destroyed it. Since around two thousand people died, I don't think that anyone would construct a resort hotel around that theme.

MaryBeth: What kind of detail did you put into the design of The Pompeii?

DeDe: Once I got the theme pinned down, I started creating the nightclubs, the restaurants, the casino, even the pool. Before I started writing the stories, I knew the hotel well enough that I could close my eyes and walk through it in my head.

MaryBeth: Wow. That's cool. I had another question that I made a note of when I was reading the book. In your foreword, you have a disclaimer not to try anything in the book without doing your own research. That wasn't in your last book - what gives?

DeDe: Well, I take the reader to a few extreme places in this book, and with anything new you need to understand what you're doing, and keep safety in mind. Safety first!

MaryBeth: I've read the book, but for those who haven't, give us an example.

DeDe: Okay - one that leaps to mind is some wax play that takes place in a particular story. Wax play is using heated wax to cause a slight burning sensation on the skin. Before I go on let me point out that I'm not a doctor, nor am I a trained sex instructor. This is not medical or professional advice.

MaryBeth: Disclaimer, disclaimer, disclaimer.

DeDe: Exactly. Anyway, it's not terribly hard to do and apparently can be quite a turn-on when done safely and correctly. The people who are into it know what kind of candles to use to produce the least amount of heat, they know the height to drip it from to allow it to cool some before it hits the skin, where it's okay to drip it, and more importantly, where it's not. Also, you allow only single drops to hit the skin - you never pour! Anyway, those wanting to play with that need to do their up-front research.

MaryBeth: I've got to admit, that was quite an erotic scene. It was one of my favorite stories.

DeDe: Thanks. There are other things as well, though. Any anal play has safety and hygienic considerations, so people should do their research. Even oral-vaginal contact can have issues - just look at all of the human papillomavirus issues. HPV is certainly a consideration. Anyway, my advice is to play safe and consult an expert, not a fiction writer.

MaryBeth: Safety first.

DeDe: Yep, safety first.

MaryBeth: Okay, switching gears, I noticed that some of the sex in this book takes place in adventurous locations. Is that on purpose?

DeDe: Oh, the answer is a definite "yes." One of the things about erotica is that it isn't just about body parts being inserted into body parts. It's about making love in places and in ways that you wouldn't get to do in real life.

MaryBeth: Like on the roof of a hotel?

DeDe: Exactly - that would never happen in real life, but it's fun to read about and imagine. Kind of like how my husband reads Tom Clancy... hubby's never going to get a call from the CIA to go save the country, but he loves reading the stories, and I'm sure that he projects himself into that role.

MaryBeth: You went in some interesting directions in this book. I'm thinking of the boat-nightclub and the magic show, to name a couple.

DeDe: [laughs] True, but I never stepped out of my personal boundaries for writing erotica.

MaryBeth: I'll give you that one, but the nightclub story had me wondering for a moment.

DeDe: Good. I love surprising my readers.

MaryBeth: Well, you did. But I loved it! There are a couple of stories that you didn't give a firm explanation for - I'm thinking of the magician story and the Area 51 story.

DeDe: For me, the magician story has always been resolved in my mind, and given my boundaries for Christian Erotica, you have to know the real answer. When I see a magic trick on TV, though, I know that it's just an illusion... but I don't want to know how it works, because that's more fun. And the Area 51 story just has a fun little twist thrown in that you can make of what you will, but it doesn't affect the story one way or the other. Okay, next topic - we're getting a little inside now, and it may not be all that interesting to people who haven't read the book yet.

MaryBeth: Fair enough. You mentioned your boundaries earlier, and I notice that you're still staying within them in this book.

DeDe: Absolutely. I lay them out in the Frequently Asked Questions page of my website, so folks can see them there. So far I haven't seen any reason to deviate from them.

MaryBeth: Have you gotten any feedback one way or the other about them?

DeDe: Not really. I tell people if you can call a vagina a pussy and a penis a cock, you'll be okay with my writing.

MaryBeth: [laughs] You have to call them something, right?

DeDe: Exactly. There's not a lot of Christian erotica out there that fits within my boundaries, but I read the ones that I'm comfortable with. Every now and then I'll run across an author who doesn't want to use anything but clinical terms for body parts, and it just feels forced and awkward as I'm reading it. I did see one that made me laugh the other day: "va-jay-jay."

MaryBeth: Okay, that one's interesting. Are you going to use it?

DeDe: No, but it did make me smile. I think that throwing that in the middle of a lovemaking session would break the mood because it's a little too campy. I liked it, though. The important thing to me is that if you like one of my stories, you'll hopefully like the rest. If you get into one book, you'll get into the others.

MaryBeth: Is there a lot of Christian erotica out there?

DeDe: Not nearly as much as secular erotica. And I do think that there's some bait-and-switch going on. I think that some authors are taking their secular erotica, giving it a title that includes the words "Christian erotica," and selling it as-is. I read a story a while back that was sold as Christian erotica, but it was about a woman going to jail and getting sexually used by all the guards.

MaryBeth: Ugh! Not for me.

DeDe: Me either. I mean, me judging that author would be like someone judging me for using the labels "cock" and "pussy," so all that I can say is to please use Amazon's "look inside the book" feature before buying. But the most important thing for my erotica is consistency. Like I said before, if you like one DeDe O'Connor book, you'll hopefully like another.

MaryBeth: Speaking of which, what do you have coming up?

DeDe: I'm kind of excited about The Marriage Bed 3 book - it's a novella called The Challenge.

MaryBeth: Sounds intriguing... if I promise to do another interview, can I get a preview?

DeDe: That would be my pleasure, when it's ready, anyway. I've finished the book, and the publisher has it in the editing process. After that I'll get it back, put half of the commas that they removed back in, and it should be about ready to go.

MaryBeth: You've always said that you fight over commas the most.

DeDe: Absolutely. When I read my manuscript, I want to add intentional pauses where I think that they add something to the story. If you find commas in grammatically inappropriate places, don't blame my publisher, blame me.

MaryBeth: Very good, then. Everyone check out The Marriage Bed 2: Christian Erotica from the Pompeii Hotel. There's a link to the amazon listing at the bottom of the page. We'll also also be looking forward to your third book, The Marriage Bed 3: The Challenge.

DeDe: As always, MaryBeth, thanks so much for spending the time with me today; you're always fun to hang with. And to all my fans, thank you SO MUCH for reading!

Click on the book cover to check out DeDe's book The Marriage Bed 2: Christian Erotica from the Pompeii Hotel!

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