Author/Book Spotlight Sophie's Secret by Chloe Thurlow

Title: Sophie's Secret

Author: Chloe Thurlow 

Genre: Contemporary Erotic 

Pages: 50

ASIN: B0099HZSNY

Source: Amazon

Published: January 2013

Author's Website: www.chloethurlow.com

Goodreads Blurb: 

When Sophie Price catches her boyfriend Jake in bed with the infamous Aisha Cummings, she realizes that 1: she's fed up with Jake anyway, and 2: when it comes to the game of sex, she's still at the starting gate. 

After a night at the kinky nightclub 'Pink', Sophie sets out on an erotic mission that takes her from the coolly decadent to a full-blown orgy and way out into the wilds of BDSM. On her journey, Sophie discovers how to 'let go' and just 'be', and learns an incredible secret that will change her life forever. 

I write erotic novels. Some of my friends call the work pornographic, which is both inaccurate and a bit of a put down. I will define the difference by describing two pictures:

#1: a naked, blue-eyed blonde holding her breasts and staring wantonly into the void.

#2: a girl in a laced corset and towering heels leaving an elegant room.

The pornographic shot is calculated to stimulate a sexual response. The erotic image provokes intrigue and mystery.

Perhaps the porn shot will motivate a desire to masturbate, never fully satisfactory; while the erotic photograph creates a feeling of mystery: what is the girl walking away from – and where is she going? Why the chic corset and lack of panties? The porn shot is a complete picture. The erotic shot is a single frame from an unfinished story.

Good erotic writing, like all good literature, must make readers want to know what is going to happen next, and provide an outcome that is what they expect, but not in the way they expect it. Erotica requires surprise, fantasy, subtext. When a man asks a woman in a bar if she would like a drink, if she responds: 'How much did you pay for your house?' – we have a new set up, a tangent; this woman is interesting. Is she a hooker, a gold digger, a real estate agent, or she just having fun? We don't know and want to find out.

Porn tends to be 'on the nose,' characters "tell" the reader what's happening. Better confuse than be obvious. Describing a woman as 'beautiful with long legs and big breasts,' devalues the reader's own imagination. Say: 'Every woman in the bar turned her head as she entered' shows the reader that this is a real beauty. Note that I say 'every woman.' Men always look; women are more discerning.

Romance is about love, where the natural consequence of sex is reproduction. Erotica is about sex as an unexplored facet of our humanity, a dark glass in which we dimly see our reflection, a quest for sexual identity. Masks and costume are useful tools in erotic sex because, while hidden, you are more open to be yourself.

These are the themes explored in Sophie's Secret, which has been seen by some as a lesbian story, although it was not conceived that way. It opens with Sophie Price catching her boyfriend Jake in bed with her rival, Aisha Cummings. Sophie instantly realizes that 1: she's fed up with Jake anyway, and 2: when it comes to the game of sex, she's still at the starting line.

It just so happens that Sophie has been turned away from a lesbian club named 'Pink' because, unlike her two friends who took her there, she doesn't appear to belong. Determined to find out what goes on in that mysterious basement in the backstreets of Soho, Sophie sets out on an erotic odyssey that takes her from the coolly decadent to a full-blown orgy and way out into the wild winds of BDSM.

Good erotica needs subplots, a mingling of themes, a touch of philosophy. Sophie is broke and will have to work her way through college, missing out on the chance to reach her full potential – sexually, perhaps, but intellectually for certain. As soon as she lets go of her fears, the other worries disappear and she become fully herself. That's Sophie's secret.

In association with DreamZ of Dragons, Sophie's Secret is FREE at Amazon from May 22, 2013 through May 26, 2013.