Virtual Blog Tour - Nara Malone's Snatch Me

A big welcome to fellow EC author, Nara Malone. She's joining us today to talk about the virtual world research she did for her latest release, Snatch Me. I've done some play in Second Life, so this will be a great read for anyone into virtual worlds and online gaming! Thanks for stopping by Nara!

PRIZE INFORMATION
Nara will be giving away a $10 Ellora’s Cave GC to one randomly drawn commenter during her virtual blog tour. So follow Nara on her tour and get a better chance at winning by commenting often.

When Romance Research Gets Too Hot To Handle…

I was hanging upside down by my ankles, caught in a rookie trap while three hunters dueled over me.

I explained when the winner cut me loose: "I'm not here for sex submission. I'm a writer, researching virtual role play."

He nodded and smiled. A leash snapped out, coiled around my neck. "No Anglais," he said.

Yep, that really happened. I was in a virtual role play world, doing research for my newest novel, Snatch Me, when I wound up in a situation that felt an awful lot like a scene from a novel.  I was in a world where all men were designated hunters and all females designated prey. I had to put on a special software tag that enabled the men to take me captive. That’s something a lot of people don’t know about these games. We’re not talking about rape play. You have to make deliberate choices to participate and even in the current situation the first thing a hunter will do is confirm that you want to stay with him, except when the pesky problem of a language barrier crops up:

What would you do if a giant, nearly-naked man hooked a leash around your neck? I took a giant step back. Yep, right into that same trap. Once again I was upside down, nose to nose with...not his nose.

Could it get worse? Yes.

I think he said this: "So, vous voulez choyer mon Popsicle."

I wasn’t sure what he wanted done to his Popsicle, but I could make a fair guess.

And yeah, that really happened too. I love virtual reality, but I am no wizard when it comes to getting around in cyber worlds. I can build a virtual world with trees and buildings and cozy little romantic corners where you can go hangout with your lover, secret spots where you can explore the more exotic flavors of love. I’ve recreated the setting for the Snatch Me novel in virtual reality and put it online for my readers to explore for free. But when it comes to walking a straight line through a virtual world without getting into trouble, I’m hopeless…

As soon as the hunter cut me down the second time, I dove through a hedge.

Bad move.

His horse was on the other side, and due to something called lag, I wound up with the horse attached to my head.  Unable to see where I was going I staggered forward and tumbled into the river.

You have to appreciate the complexities of virtual reality physics to understand how you can wind up with a horse stuck to your head. It has to do with horses being attachments you can wear and madly clicking with a mouse when you’re in a panic. Even though my captor didn’t understand English, he knew how to save me. I was thinking he’d be running the other way himself at that point. But he gallantly stuck with me.

He rescued me from the river and detached the horse from my head. He even supplied a change of clothing.

His mistake was turning his back on me while I put them on.

Mine was stealing his horse.

Unfortunately, his pet eagle was trained to fetch. There was just no escaping this guy.

Despite all the difficulties that can crop up, I believe in-person research is the way to go. You never know what you don’t know. You never know what kind of adventures can present themselves. My research adventures with the hunters were fun and the world was a primitive, pre-civilized setting. Snatch Me takes place in a post-civilized setting, the post-apocalyptic world of the Quarterz. And being much cooler and more skilled than I am, heroine Jolie’s adventures are go-up-in-smoke hot.

I hope you enjoyed this little introduction to the trials and tribulations of author life and to the world of capture role-play. If you’re wondering how things turned out with me that hunter. I could fill a book explaining, but I’m gonna wave my romance writer’s magic wand and pretend us a happy ending. After all, isn’t that why we all love romance novels?

~Nara Malone

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Blurb:  From the moment Jolie discovers the Quarterz, a virtual post-apocalyptic world for capture role-players, she can’t resist the challenge. She’s chosen a hard game, where sexual submission to a captor is expected, demanded, no quarter given. She uses the challenge to escape real life and feels a sense of kinship to a world like the Quarterz, a society too broken to fix.

Mack created the Quarterz and took a gamble when he secretly lured Jolie there. He suspects he and Jolie share sexual interests that neither can admit in person. Now he has to hope that time in the Quarterz can help Jolie cope as she struggles to rebuild her life. He has to stand back and allow her to find her way in a game where he’s not always the captor. But when the game is over, he’s determined to be the one who wins Jolie for real.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

By reading any further, you are stating that you are at least 18 years of age. If you are under the age of 18, it is necessary to exit this site.

An Excerpt From: SNATCH ME Copyright © NARA MALONE, 2011 All Rights Reserved, Ellora's Cave Publishing, Inc.

I’m hovering in the entrance to an alley. And yeah, I know there is trouble at the other end. An overturned police cruiser a few feet away is on fire, oily black smoke curls upward, fading into a blacker sky. The streetlamps here were broken so long ago there are no fragments of lens glass left under them. If those clues weren’t warning enough, No Escape is emblazoned in red spray paint across the gray cinderblock wall that marks the Quarterz entrance.
I know. I know. This is not a place girls should go alone. It’s not a place girls should go together. It’s no place for a young woman in a denim miniskirt, a translucent white tank top, no bra, no panties. But that’s what I am and that’s what I’m wearing.
Why?
I don’t know. Maybe because I’ve stopped caring. Maybe because when I’m standing here at the opening of this dark alley, that dead, empty feeling I’ve lived with these past months is washed away by a sizzle of nerves, a longing for the challenge of a fight, and a belief that I have a fair shot at winning.
I’m drawn to this place like a moth to a flame. I feel a kinship with the Quarterz—understand the hopelessness of being too broken to fix. I’ve spent three days arguing with myself, telling myself this is a bad idea, but I knew three days ago the sanest of my selves was outnumbered. I can’t be free from the pull of this place until I know why I want this. Until I’ve looked my darkest desires in the eye and walked through them.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Whether it's a shapeshifter romance exploring the primal power of the wild feminine, or BDSM romance where love digs into a character's shadows, Nara believes romance should open the door and push lovers into a new dimension: sexually, emotionally, and sometimes physically.
Nara Malone is an award winning novelist and poet. As a freelance journalist and writer, her feature profiles on women entrepreneurs and her romantic short stories have been published in newspapers, magazines, and digital publications.

Nara lives on a small farm in the shadow of the Blue Ridge Mountains. When she's not writing, she loves to run, hike, bike, and kayak. Every story she tells incorporates her love of animals, nature, and adventure.

You can contact her through Twitter, Face Book, or Yahoo mail. The user ID is nara_malone for all three.
Author Nara Malone - http://naramalone.com/
Snatch Me--Sex Bytes Exotika  - http://www.jasminejade.com/p-9476-snatch-me.aspx
Facebook:  http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Nara-Malone-Author-Page/145054222179718
Twitter:  https://twitter.com/#!/nara_malone