‘Her Neighbor’s Pleasure’ coming soon!

Finally, my new novelette, ‘Her Neighbor’s Pleasure’, is almost ready! It is currently with my editor and, PG, should be peeking its little head out into the world next month.

I’m so excited!

In case you haven’t seen my story summary on the front page, the book is about:

HNP cover image 3.12.15Esther is a rabbi’s daughter, a rabbi’s wife, a teacher, and the mother of three young children. She is also more than a little fascinated by the young married couple who live in the apartment across from hers. When, late one night, she accidentally witnesses her neighbors having sex, Esther’s life is turned upside down. Hit by a sudden and inescapable sexual awakening, Esther must navigate the chaos that pursues her marriage, her husband and, most of all, herself.

If that sounds like fun, please make sure you are on my mailing list so that I can let you know as soon as it is available.

I’ve developed a real love of my central characters, Esther and Sholem, and so I’m thrilled to be able to share their story with you soon.

Hope you all had a Chanukah sameach! I, for one, will not be making any more latkes for a while!

Shosha 🙂

Hold on to your panties: Adam Arotti has arrived

Orthodox erotica is only getting better. You’ve met Jayde Blumenthal and now it’s time to meet Adam Arotti – author of forbidden Orthodox and biblical erotica.

Adam’s soon to publish and I’ve been fortunate enough to have a sneak preview of some of his stuff – it’s hot.

We’re all looking forward to him unveiling his stories, but in the meantime take a look at the opening salvo on his new website

Hey 🙂

This is nude for me, so please bare with me as I figure everything out.  No, those weren’t typos; they were just my fairly lame attempt at introductory humor with a bit of the flavor that you can expect from my website.

For generations, society has seen sexuality as a force that needs to be suppressed, or even better – repressed, before it even blossoms.  And there are legitimate and fair reasons for that.  Sexuality has unbelievable power; as an orgasm grips our entire body, so does sexuality permeate – and sometimes control – almost every area of our existence.

Tragically, however, we often tend to try to contain forces that we view as too powerful to control, rather than finding a way to harness or guide the power.  If sexuality was a horse, the Christians would try to shoot the horse; and the Jews would lock it up in a beautiful palace, exclaiming how beautiful the horse is, but never letting it out for a wild run.

As a Jew, my approach to sexuality begins with the Torah.  Yet, I have found that, when it comes to sexuality, the Torah-mores of today are not necessarily reflective of the Torah-mores of yore.  Today, we try to present versions of our Patriarchs and Matriarchs that are decidedly asexual; as though those legendary lions could not possibly have squandered their divine energy on something so base as sexuality – and it would behoove us to follow in their too-lofty-to-be-sexy footsteps.  Those few unavoidably sexual episodes in the Torah are either skipped entirely, or quickly glossed over as if they were the introduction to a boring blog.

To me, however, a close examination of our biblical forebears (with the help of a bit of creative license) reveals a different picture; one in which the lives of our models and Jewish archetypes were robustly erotic and sensual, and far more accessible to us than many would have us believe.  In the coming weeks and months, I hope to share with you some of my erotic writing, in which I will endeavor to bring to hot and erotic life some of Torah’s more spicy stories.

However, some of my pieces decidedly take advantage of the sexual taboo created by our sexually-repressed environment.  Everything sexual is even hotter when it is forbidden, when it goes counter to the prevailing culture, and Jewish Orthodoxy accommodates this dynamic by providing many forbidden areas.  And so I will also be publishing some forbidden Jewish erotica, set within the very stern Orthodox sub-culture, which is populated by devout – yet nonetheless extremely erotic and sexy – rule-breakers.

To be candid, I am a bit more hesitant when it comes to these, as I am sensitive to the Jewish people’s role as a light unto the nations, and have no desire to make a Chillul Hashem by suggesting that the Jewish people are anything less than holy.  At the same time, Jewish people have fantasies too; and, well, I’ve written some of them down, and I’m wondering if it would be selfish to keep them to myself!

So please stay tuned!

You definitely need to watch out for Adam. In the meantime, keep up with him at www.adamarotti.wordpress.com/

Talking about the sex lives of religious Jews

Let’s talk about frum sex…

If you follow me on Twitter you might remember just how excited I got about a new podcast called ‘The Joy of Text‘. The monthly podcast features New York-based sexual health therapist Dr Bat Sheva Marcus – who entered my universe in the past month (via the New York Times) and now she is constantly flashing on my radar – and Rabbi Dov Linzer who is Rosh HaYeshiva of Yeshivat Chovevei in Riverdale, New York. The podcast, moderated by Ramie Smith, is sponsored by the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance (JOFA) and Dr Marcus, Rabbi Linzer and Ms Smith seem to be coming from a progressive Orthodox perspective – not a lot of chumras going on here!

The point of all this is that I am a quite simply delighted that the dialogue about sex in the Orthodox Jewish community appears to be opening up. I’ll admit that most of the conversation is happening in the more liberal edges of the religious world (Modern Orthodox/Religious Zionist), but at least it’s happening. I am optimistic about a ripple effect. Who knows? Maybe one day these conversations will eventually reach to the furthest, blackest corners of the community.

So, here are the first two episodes of the ‘Joy of Text‘ if you would like to listen for yourself. The first I found full of interesting and useful information. The conversation was lengthy and in-depth and covered a good amount of material. I listened while preparing for a large Shabbat meal and by the end of the program I found myself hoping my husband would be home soon (!). (Unfortunately, as of writing this, the first episode does not seem to be enabled to be embedded, so here is the link again for you to listen.)

The second podcast was interesting but disappointingly short – although the discussion on condom use in pre-marital sex surprised me. I hope their usual practice will be to have longer programs. Perhaps we can all help by sending in questions for them to consider and discuss. I’ve started drawing up my list already…

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/190203229″ params=”color=ff5500″ width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

Coincidently, you can also WATCH a Huffington Post Live interview from this week with Dr Marcus, Rabbi Linzer and Dr David Ribner (Chairman of the Sex Therapy Training Program at Bar-Ilan University and co-author of ‘The Newlywed Guide to Physical Intimacy‘) for a segment entitled: ‘Deep Dive: Ooohhh G-d! Orthodox Jewish Sex‘:

It seems you don’t have to be Jewish to want to talk about frum sex.

If you are visiting my website and reading this post then it’s probably no secret to you that there’s lots to talk (and think) about in the realm of kosher sex.

I can’t wait for the conversation to evolve…