Why I Write And What

This essay is my contribution to the:

2024 What I Wrote And Why (WIWAW) Event

— — —

WHY I WRITE AND WHAT

by Emily Miller

— — —

INTRODUCTION

Back in the olden days, when I used to frequent the Author's Hangout, my friend StillStunned posted a thread entitled: What I wrote and why: Fairytale of New York. I can recall applauding the idea at the time; I even contributed a little by coining the WIWAW acronym.

Since then, I have written four WIWAWs:

1. 01/19/2024 -- The Writing of A Hard Day's Night
2. 02/28/2024 -- The Writing Of - A Family Ritual
3. 04/10/2024 -- The Writing of RolloJTomasi and
4. 07/12/2024 -- WIWAW - Through the Watching Glass

For my fifth WIWAW, I'm not going to dissect a particular story. Instead, I aim to cover why I started writing and why I have kept at it for nearly two years. This is maybe not 100% in the spirit of WIWAW, but I believe that some other authors have taken a similar approach.

— — —

GENESIS

I've told elements of this story before, as part of other works, or in forum posts. Here it's really just the writing aspect that I wanted to focus on.

So, let's start with reading. I've always been an avid reader. Some of my favorite authors include: Steinbeck, Conrad, Fitzgerald, Poe, Greene, Orwell, Le Carre. I had a childhood addiction to Tolkien, but I'm kinda over it now. I can recall reading Jules Verne and looking up the locations and the more complicated words. I like other sci-fi, including Clarke, Bradbury, Wells, and -- at the lighter end of the spectrum -- Douglas Adams, who I was introduced to by friends when studying in London. Also at the lighter and, I've read every Sherlock Holmes story multiple times, and adore Lewis Carroll.

I love words. Learning new ones. Linking them together in interesting and beautiful ways. When an author comes up with a gem of a phrase, I read and re-read it. This leaks into a fondness for wordplay, puns, ambiguous meanings, even Limericks. I like to read clever use of language.

So, I guess you could say I had a good foundation. But, I never excelled at creative writing. I'm science girl at heart. Creative writing was not even anything I had tried to do since leaving college. I didn't write anything novel in grad school, or in my early years of employment. Of course I wrote technical documents and tried to write them well, but stories? Not so much.

Part of this was being intimidated by the skill of my favorite authors. I could never hope to emulate them. But a bigger part was never having any ideas what to write about. I didn't feel that I had anything useful to contribute.

What changed for me, was leaving grad school, and moving state to start my current job. It wasn't like I had much of a choice, as COVID had put an end to the PhD. I had only just started. The move meant leaving behind an active and varied sex life, and a close group of friends.

At first, I worked remotely (they still wanted new hires to be in the vicinity of the office, anticipating a return), which didn't help my feelings of isolation. I was lonely, I was sexually frustrated, and I had demons from college that I had never exorcised. My attempts to contact like minded people didn't go so well. I guess, back then, my tastes weren't exactly mainstream. Equally, I'm a big nerd, shy, and somewhat socially awkward. Undateable, right?

So I ended up leaning way too heavily on visual porn. That got a little old, and I transitioned to reading porn. Which led me to Literotica. I had time on my hands, especially at weekends. So, my latent love of literature (did I mention I'm a whore for alliteration?) came to the fore.

When it came to writing about sex, I had real-life experiences to draw on. And so I started to try to compose things, initially semi-autobiographical stories, which felt like a bit of a safety blanket. Although I wrote quite a few pure strokers, at under 2,000 words, I'm surprised that even my initial, ultra-naïve short stories still contain elements of emotion and character motivation, right from day one.

I found that I enjoyed writing. As I got more comfortable in my own skin, I began to flex my creative muscles. At first I borrowed real life scenarios as a backdrop to invented tales. Later, I began to write entirely novel stories, while still obviously relying on my own experiences for little details, particularly around sex scenes.

Even right at the beginning, a few people liked what I wrote and were kind enough to say so. That was encouraging.

— — —

METAMORPHOSIS

Then a few things changed radically. I had a life event that kicked me (with help from my best friend) into finally dealing with my historical trauma. I began to make some IRL and on-line friends; good people. And -- probably decisively -- I started dating my boyfriend; the only guy I had dated after many years of girl-girl relationships.

Basically, I grew up a bit, I found love, and -- with the help of therapy -- I got my shit together. My boyfriend was supportive of my writing (one of many things I felt that I had to fess up about) and -- in my newly stable state -- I began to write about a wider range of experiences. My therapist even suggested I write as therapy, though I never told her exactly in which genre I wrote 😊.

This became reflected in more mature writing subjects. The sex never disappeared, but the motivations for it became more complex and more -- well -- human.

And so, here we are [on the raggedy edge -- can't ever resist that 😬] an acknowledged writer of stroke stories, now penning tales with intricate plots, realized characters, and believable motivations. And blow jobs, lots of blow jobs.

Sometimes, nowadays, I get so carried away with the story, that I forget about sex scenes. Look at any number of my recent stories. They might start out with hot couplings, or the promise of them, but then they deteriorate into existential musings on the human condition, or the influence of AI on future society. Whether that's progress or not, I'll leave for you to decide.

— — —

THE INFINITE VARIETY

Why I started writing, check. Now a bit about what I write. First of all, I'm a flibbertigibbet, I write all sorts of things. Sixty thousand word, science fiction meets tentacle porn trilogies. Thirty thousand word neo-noir novellas. Supernatural sexiness. Greek tragedies. Humor and satire. And the last three all in just my Angels & Demons series! I also write some stories rooted in real life, nowadays, I've even turned my hand to slow-burn.

This breadth of writing is also reflected in the categories I write for and the kinks I feature. It's a smorgasbord ranging from, sweet lesbian romance, to hardcore BDSM (often also lesbian). From anal, to uniforms, to exhibitionist, to femdom, to water-sports, to gang bangs. I suppose I don't like being tied down [pause for irony] to one type of story, or one type of sex.

I mostly write first person present, first person past and third person past. I have both male and female narrators, both reliable and not so much. A friend paid me the compliment of saying that they never knew what to expect when opening my latest story. I like it that way.

I think some of this lack of focus is due to simply having a lot of ideas. But some of it is also that I am easily bored, and always looking for the next thing. In general, I think variety is good. It makes it easier to challenge myself and to avoid the trap of churning out endless minor tweaks on an established theme.

The downside is of course confused readers, who love one story, only to close the next before the end of page one, their heads sadly shaking.

— — —

PERSEVERANCE

So, that's how I started writing erotica, and a bit about what types of things I write about, why did I keep on writing? Well, some of it is sheer stubbornness. Some of it is my non-mainstream neural wiring, which can lead to a streak of obsessiveness. Some of it is that my therapist was right, being an author can bring catharsis. But mostly it's two other things.

First, is genuine pleasure in writing. In stringing words together in a way that seems good to me. Feeling that I have created something new. A character, a plot, a line of dialog.

Second is the feedback that I get, or at least the majority of it. Feedback that people saw a little of themselves in a character, or their lives reflected in a plot development. Feedback that someone's reality had been recognized. Best of all -- and most rarely -- feedback that your words have changed how someone behaves for the better. Yes, sometimes even porn can do that. It's happened to me.

On top of the above, is the -- frankly immodest -- realization that I'm not so bad at this. More importantly, that I'm slowly getting better. I'm kinda goals-focused, and writing allows me to set myself challenges. I like that aspect.

I'll close on that note. Maybe try a few of my stories, perhaps you'll see what others see in them. I hope -- at the very least -- that they will provide some brief entertainment. If they do, then my efforts have been worthwhile.

THE END