“Look on Them I Dare Not!”

Back at Eroticon Live in May I was one of the readers for the closing erotica slam on the Sunday. When I took the microphone I explained to the audience that, despite urgings of several friends, I wasn’t going to read the explicit bits of a story (one that, incidentally will appear later this year in an anthology edited by the adorable Leonora Soloman).

This raised one comment that suggested it was ironic that I was hesitant to read mere words when the previous evening I’d happily had my buttocks on display and received a spanking in front of a room full of writers. It was a comment that baffled me for two reasons.

Firstly, I didn’t see any contradiction. My body simply is and, whilst I’m actually for the most part pretty happy with it, I don’t feel that anyone judging it is really a judgment on me. I’m not ashamed of the meatbag that is Charlie Forrest. Whereas my words, that’s something different. The words I trick myself into pouring onto the page, the honesty, bluntness, sheer unadulterated lust and greed and desire I express. That’s me, and that’s me in a way that I’m far more scared of being judged on, because then it means something, then it’s based on a real tangible aspect of me as a person.

The other thing that baffled me was that, despite not reading the explicit sex bits at the end, I did something that, even by my own logic, was a lot more daunting; I read the really hot bit. You see, this particular story is focused on the idea of humiliation and, in that regard, the absolute peak of it, the realisation of the narrator that they are in a very very bad place, comes right at the beginning.

So I guess I can stand in front of a room full of people and do the scary dangerous stuff; it just might not be what you expect.


Time to Shine

I think it’s fair to say that 2016 has been a pretty amazing and awesome year for me thus far in terms of my personal life and the new things I’ve had the chance to experience. Mingled with that is a colossal pile of poo going on in the wider world, which can lead to a strange feeling of disconnect. It reminds me a little of 2008 to 2009; a period in which, while the world’s economies staggered, I was making my first steps in my career and in the most financially stable position I’d ever been in.

The wider world can take a back seat for now, or rather, you can read better thoughts than mine on it elsewhere. But what I do want to share are two of this year’s highlights:

Firstly, as previously reported, the amazing intimate porn scene I shot with Zak is available NOW NOW NOW! And what’s more, the amazingly lovely Girl on The Net wrote some very kind words about her experience of seeing the afterglow and then the finished film.

The second thing I want to write about is a little more abstract, and a lot more personal. I’ve struggled for a long time with one of my biggest gender hangups; crying in front of others. I don’t consciously choose not to do this, it’s just something that doesn’t really happen for me, whether I want to or not. Except it would seem that sometimes it does happen. It’s hard to write about becauseĀ  I have to dance the invisible line of what I want to share and what’s just for me so I’ll keep it simple. I was in the woods, blindfolded and fastened to a tree while people, hands, pain happened. Threats were shouted and whispered, pressure points worked mercilessly and I ended up as a sobbing puddle of flesh on the floor. And it was glorious.

It was a feeling of being, just being. For once I wasn’t performing any kind of role, I wasn’t trying to be an acceptable version of me I was just me.

Afterwards some of the people who’d seen it happen were concerned, others told me it was incredibly hot. Most of the men who saw it, though, didn’t seem to know how to react. It was just a complete unknown, brains failing to fully comprehend what they’d seen. Nobody seemed to grasp quite how good it had been, how liberating and empowering it could be to be reduced to great hulking sobs.

But I understood, and I guess that’s what matters.



Charlie J Forrest