Funny, charming Nicola Cameron took sometime out of her busy writing schedule to talk to me over a somewhat erratic FaceTime chat. The first part of our conversation illuminates her writing process, her challenges as an erotica author, and a little bit of background on the woman behind the "Olympic Cove" series, "Two to Tango" and "Trickster".
So I’m here with Nicola Cameron, very excited to be starting this little adventure in technology today. How are you doing today Nicola?
I’m dandy, Lilith, how are you doing?
Pretty Good.
Awesome.
So first I was going to start with a little bit of a get to know you, so I’ve got three questions.
Okay.
Do you have any tattoos?
Umm…I have not found anything that I like or hold important enough to permanently embed in my skin. Yet.
Alright.
Yet. I say yet. The day is still young. You never know. So.
And what did you have for lunch today?
Um what did I have. A sliced chicken breast with Marie’s creamy caesar salad dressing.
And what are you reading right now?
What am I reading right now? Um, I am re-reading The Lightening Thief by Rick Riordan because I am working on a super secret project.
Ah. Okay. I read that book. I liked it.
Yeah, the books are good.
Okay. So your first erotic romance was published in December of 2012, that was the Vanilla Free Christmas Anthology, the Manlove Edition. How did you first find Evernight and why did you decide to submit to them?
I had been thinking about doing erotic romance for some time. I started out as, and I still am, a science fiction writer. And I’ve been doing that professionally since 1995, but I’ve always enjoyed writing about sex and I had been really reigning myself in with the science fiction work because, there’s… it’s grown up over the years, it’s much more adult now, but you still can’t really get explicit. And I had seen a number of people on Facebook talking about Evernight and then I saw their call for the anthology and I thought, oh! Heck, that kind of looks interesting, let’s go check that out. And when I read it I thought: Alright, this is in my wheelhouse. I can do this. So I kind of sat down and brainstormed the story behind “Tied With a Bow” wrote it, and much to my shock, they bought it and that was my start.
Excellent. And then you are an Evernight Exclusive author, taking a look at your website, what keeps you coming back to Evernight?
They are extremely professional. They are very open with their bookkeeping, and their bookkeeping is transparent. I like the way that they handle their writers. I like the way that we get feedback and we actually get to edit, well not edit but, we get to tell them if we don’t like a cover, okay we don’t like this element, and they will go back and change it. And it’s not like you just: Oh, by the way, this is your cover! Good luck. And go… but but… he’s blond! And my character isn’t blond! What are you doing? Also, frankly, I’ve made a very nice amount of money with them so far, so I figure I will stick with a horse that works well for me.
Well. And then you have said that you really enjoy combining sci fi and erotic romance, what do you think draws you to that fusion of genre?
Umm. Science fiction, for the longest time, especially when it started out was considered to be very much a boy’s own clubhouse, and you know, girls were icky. Girl cooties. No no no, you don’ want that. As it has grown over the decades it has become much more open and accepting of sexuality and much more open and accepting of, you know, different gender orientations, gender fluidity, things like that, and I like the ability to play with my characters in a setting that is not restricted to contemporary times. I like being able to write about aliens, or fairies, or as I’m doing in the Olympic Cove Series, Greek gods, mermen, selkies. I like being able to pull in all these disparate mythological or imaginary elements and build a story around it. It’s just very satisfying to me, because I’ve always been, very much a believer of there are things out there that, that do I know what they are? No, but you look up at the sky and you look at all those stars and you think we can not be the only planet in the entire bloody universe that has life on it. There is life out there somewhere and I like writing about it and if they like getting it on with each other, so much the better.
And can you walk us through your writing process?
Usually I will come up with a story concept first. I get ideas all the time. I mean most writers, it’s funny I’ve talked to them and they’ll say, they’ll have other people come up to them and say oh well I’ve got this great idea you should write it and then they just turn around and say I have too many of my own as it is and… no go away please, go write it yourself. So I’ll come up with a concept and I’ll play around with it, sometimes its not going to work, it’s an idea, but there’s really no plot behind it. And you know, those I’ll stick in the file sometimes, somewhere, because they may come in handy in the future. But if I get an idea that actually has plot behind it I’ll sit down and I’ll outline. Now outlining is really something I’ve really actually only started doing as an erotic romance writer because as a science fiction writer I primarily wrote short stories. You don’t really need an outline for a short story, but the longer works I’ve been doing as Nicola, you really do need an outline. So, I outline, and then I start trying to fill out the chapters according to the outline and, sometimes I’ll hop around, because I know some people will say, well you start at the beginning and you work all the way to the end and that’s not going to work for everyone. I mean, the important thing is you have to get words on the page. And no matter what you have to do to get the words on the page if you hop around, if you stay in the outline, that’s fine. If you start at the beginning and work your way to the end, that’s fine. If you write the ending first and work your way back, whatever gets the words down, that’s totally cool. So, that’s one of the things I’ve really found helpful about having an outline is it allows me to bop around.
Although, it is funny, when I get to the end a lot of times it’ll turn out that something I’ve written ahead of myself in the story, I’ll get to that point and be like “I can’t use this. Okay. Nevermind. Put that in the cut file”. So I work on the story, get it finished, put it to one side so I can work on something else, and it kind of lets my brain, you know, that way when I stop to edit, I’m looking at it as an editor and not a writer. And I’ve been doing this long enough that I’ve actually gotten good at shutting off the writer side of the brain and looking at it as someone else’s work and I need to cut it into pieces and make it actually sellable, you know. And so that’s basically what I do. I do that I have a couple beta readers who are really solid and give me good feedback. I’ll send the stuff off to them, incorporate their comments, and then it gets submitted. And that’s pretty much the whole process.
Okay. And what do you think your biggest challenge is as an erotica author?
I tend to write male/ male romance and one of my biggest challenges is making sure that my characters are male. Uh, I read and in fact I think we’ve talked about this at one point before on Facebook, I’ve read how a lot of gay men are not too terribly thrilled about the idea of women writing male/male erotica because their attitude is: you’re not a guy and you’re writing this as well, there’s a guy and then there’s a chick with a dick and we find this fetishizing and offensive. And, my best friend is gay, I have a great… ugh, now this sounds (sarcastic voice)“oh, well, I have gay friends” But I have friends of all gender preferences and my attitude is, human sexuality is a spectrum. Where ever you fall on it, that’s fine. If you’re gay, if you’re straight, if you’re A, if you’re bi, or you know, gray. Whatever. Totally cool. When I write my characters, however, I want them, to be male. Okay. I don’t want to be writing chicks with dicks. I will go and talk to my best friend and say okay, is this what he would say to his boyfriend, you know, would two guys talk like this? My goal is to write a story that A) Is entertaining and B) is true to the characters. I don’t want to come up with unrealistic or offensive characters. That is my big goal whenever I write a male erotic romance. You know, I want my best friend to be able to pick this up and be able to say “Oh! I may do this this weekend.”
Alright. Great answer.
Pretty Good.
Awesome.
So first I was going to start with a little bit of a get to know you, so I’ve got three questions.
Okay.
Do you have any tattoos?
Umm…I have not found anything that I like or hold important enough to permanently embed in my skin. Yet.
Alright.
Yet. I say yet. The day is still young. You never know. So.
And what did you have for lunch today?
Um what did I have. A sliced chicken breast with Marie’s creamy caesar salad dressing.
And what are you reading right now?
What am I reading right now? Um, I am re-reading The Lightening Thief by Rick Riordan because I am working on a super secret project.
Ah. Okay. I read that book. I liked it.
Yeah, the books are good.
Okay. So your first erotic romance was published in December of 2012, that was the Vanilla Free Christmas Anthology, the Manlove Edition. How did you first find Evernight and why did you decide to submit to them?
I had been thinking about doing erotic romance for some time. I started out as, and I still am, a science fiction writer. And I’ve been doing that professionally since 1995, but I’ve always enjoyed writing about sex and I had been really reigning myself in with the science fiction work because, there’s… it’s grown up over the years, it’s much more adult now, but you still can’t really get explicit. And I had seen a number of people on Facebook talking about Evernight and then I saw their call for the anthology and I thought, oh! Heck, that kind of looks interesting, let’s go check that out. And when I read it I thought: Alright, this is in my wheelhouse. I can do this. So I kind of sat down and brainstormed the story behind “Tied With a Bow” wrote it, and much to my shock, they bought it and that was my start.
Excellent. And then you are an Evernight Exclusive author, taking a look at your website, what keeps you coming back to Evernight?
They are extremely professional. They are very open with their bookkeeping, and their bookkeeping is transparent. I like the way that they handle their writers. I like the way that we get feedback and we actually get to edit, well not edit but, we get to tell them if we don’t like a cover, okay we don’t like this element, and they will go back and change it. And it’s not like you just: Oh, by the way, this is your cover! Good luck. And go… but but… he’s blond! And my character isn’t blond! What are you doing? Also, frankly, I’ve made a very nice amount of money with them so far, so I figure I will stick with a horse that works well for me.
Well. And then you have said that you really enjoy combining sci fi and erotic romance, what do you think draws you to that fusion of genre?
Umm. Science fiction, for the longest time, especially when it started out was considered to be very much a boy’s own clubhouse, and you know, girls were icky. Girl cooties. No no no, you don’ want that. As it has grown over the decades it has become much more open and accepting of sexuality and much more open and accepting of, you know, different gender orientations, gender fluidity, things like that, and I like the ability to play with my characters in a setting that is not restricted to contemporary times. I like being able to write about aliens, or fairies, or as I’m doing in the Olympic Cove Series, Greek gods, mermen, selkies. I like being able to pull in all these disparate mythological or imaginary elements and build a story around it. It’s just very satisfying to me, because I’ve always been, very much a believer of there are things out there that, that do I know what they are? No, but you look up at the sky and you look at all those stars and you think we can not be the only planet in the entire bloody universe that has life on it. There is life out there somewhere and I like writing about it and if they like getting it on with each other, so much the better.
And can you walk us through your writing process?
Usually I will come up with a story concept first. I get ideas all the time. I mean most writers, it’s funny I’ve talked to them and they’ll say, they’ll have other people come up to them and say oh well I’ve got this great idea you should write it and then they just turn around and say I have too many of my own as it is and… no go away please, go write it yourself. So I’ll come up with a concept and I’ll play around with it, sometimes its not going to work, it’s an idea, but there’s really no plot behind it. And you know, those I’ll stick in the file sometimes, somewhere, because they may come in handy in the future. But if I get an idea that actually has plot behind it I’ll sit down and I’ll outline. Now outlining is really something I’ve really actually only started doing as an erotic romance writer because as a science fiction writer I primarily wrote short stories. You don’t really need an outline for a short story, but the longer works I’ve been doing as Nicola, you really do need an outline. So, I outline, and then I start trying to fill out the chapters according to the outline and, sometimes I’ll hop around, because I know some people will say, well you start at the beginning and you work all the way to the end and that’s not going to work for everyone. I mean, the important thing is you have to get words on the page. And no matter what you have to do to get the words on the page if you hop around, if you stay in the outline, that’s fine. If you start at the beginning and work your way to the end, that’s fine. If you write the ending first and work your way back, whatever gets the words down, that’s totally cool. So, that’s one of the things I’ve really found helpful about having an outline is it allows me to bop around.
Although, it is funny, when I get to the end a lot of times it’ll turn out that something I’ve written ahead of myself in the story, I’ll get to that point and be like “I can’t use this. Okay. Nevermind. Put that in the cut file”. So I work on the story, get it finished, put it to one side so I can work on something else, and it kind of lets my brain, you know, that way when I stop to edit, I’m looking at it as an editor and not a writer. And I’ve been doing this long enough that I’ve actually gotten good at shutting off the writer side of the brain and looking at it as someone else’s work and I need to cut it into pieces and make it actually sellable, you know. And so that’s basically what I do. I do that I have a couple beta readers who are really solid and give me good feedback. I’ll send the stuff off to them, incorporate their comments, and then it gets submitted. And that’s pretty much the whole process.
Okay. And what do you think your biggest challenge is as an erotica author?
I tend to write male/ male romance and one of my biggest challenges is making sure that my characters are male. Uh, I read and in fact I think we’ve talked about this at one point before on Facebook, I’ve read how a lot of gay men are not too terribly thrilled about the idea of women writing male/male erotica because their attitude is: you’re not a guy and you’re writing this as well, there’s a guy and then there’s a chick with a dick and we find this fetishizing and offensive. And, my best friend is gay, I have a great… ugh, now this sounds (sarcastic voice)“oh, well, I have gay friends” But I have friends of all gender preferences and my attitude is, human sexuality is a spectrum. Where ever you fall on it, that’s fine. If you’re gay, if you’re straight, if you’re A, if you’re bi, or you know, gray. Whatever. Totally cool. When I write my characters, however, I want them, to be male. Okay. I don’t want to be writing chicks with dicks. I will go and talk to my best friend and say okay, is this what he would say to his boyfriend, you know, would two guys talk like this? My goal is to write a story that A) Is entertaining and B) is true to the characters. I don’t want to come up with unrealistic or offensive characters. That is my big goal whenever I write a male erotic romance. You know, I want my best friend to be able to pick this up and be able to say “Oh! I may do this this weekend.”
Alright. Great answer.