After a break from writing when at no time I switched of my thinking, I decided on a new approach. Maybe ease up on the BDSM themes which reside in all my books but instead focus more on love and romance with a very definite LGBT theme remaining. Petra Larson is having a rest in her Wiltshire cottage just on the edge of Salisbury Plain, that’s assuming her married partner Jen allows her any, or more likely it’ll be the other way around. As a writer, I often wondered what it would be like to win the lottery? Would it change my life? This made me think about those women who have little or no chance to change theirs, especially if they are in a controlling and abusive relationship.
I created Gabrielle or Gabi as she prefers to be called. She was in an abusive marriage where the beatings she suffered often meant she was off work while her visual injuries healed. Imagine one day a letter drops on her doormat - she has inherited a property in an idyllic location. She now has the means of escape and takes it. This opens a family secret, an aunt she never knew existed, why at the age of 35 didn’t she know, especially when her parents never felt it wise to tell her? She’ll never meet her aunt who took an even bigger secret to her grave and these secrets keep coming thick and fast when she arrives at her newly gained property on the south Cornish coastline.
There she meets an older woman Ruth, someone with an austere exterior. There is an immediate resentment towards a newcomer, as she has devoted her life towards caring for the vast estate which she has inherited. It is clear she cared for her aunt right up to her death. Any concerns are swept away with the arrival of Bethany, who is Ruth’s controlled and downtrodden daughter. As in all abusive relationships, the abuser doesn’t give up their control easily and it is only a matter of time before her husband turns up intent on taking over and punishing Gabi for her unannounced departure. This only serves to trigger a chain of events in which the property she now owns slowly, bit by big gives up its dark past and it’s deeply buried secrets.
Another family member arrives making four women in total and the simmering feud finally explodes in a feast of recriminations that are vented over an extraordinary dinner where everything is brought out in the open in withering detail. This clears the air and truth is finally allowed it’s freedom and in the final part of the book a reconciliation takes place which brings peace and harmony to a house renowned for is racy and notorious past.
As an author, I just sat back and watched four women tear each other apart, I took mental notes and wrote about it. I see writing this way. I never plan a book, like some journey where a destination exists – the end! I never know how my books end or even when. I just know. An artist wielding brushes and a pallet has to know too. Most great artists know when to stop and this prevent overworking the images they have created they know that activity so well. It even has a name, they know when to stop fiddling and I hope I got my timing right when I stopped working on Trelawny.
As I said earlier, I took a break from BDSM, but I didn’t stop writing explicitly. There are only certain concessions I’m prepared to make. I love writing about women expressing their love towards their own sex and I make no apologies for Gabi and Beth when then they FINALLY got it on! They went for it and I hope those who are more faint hearted forgive them. Don’t shoot the messenger, I can only write about what I saw and described.
Trelawny was a joy to write. I was told years ago to write about what you know. I know intimately the parts of Yorkshire, Petra, Dommy and Jen lived and loved, laughed and cried and sadly mourned too. Just as when they resided in Bristol and later Wiltshire. I know those places well. I also know those parts of Cornwall where Trelawny is located, south of St Austell, Charlestown, Bodmin more and it’s rocky unyielding coastline.
I can’t tell you how the book ended. Only that Gabi was thankful her aunt remembered her, in fact she never forgot her for a very important single reason you’ll have to read the book to find out. Equally Beth, who always saw herself as a peripheral figure becomes far more than that and is more deeply involved in Trelawny’s checkered history than she ever could imagine.
Where next…..I’ll let you know.
Anietta
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