I’m finally ready to start re-releasing Parasexual.
This post is to basically explain what it is, why I’m doing this, and what to expect.
WHAT IT IS
You can find the seeds that would eventually become Parasexual in Paranormal Passions.
When I very first started writing as Misty Vixen, I had a pretty simple idea. I wrote serial erotica, mostly six-episode ‘seasons’. My first idea was Hellcats, so, Sci-Fi. I quickly had another idea, Wanderlust, so, Fantasy. I figured switching back and forth between the two genres would make the most sense. After doing this for a while, I figured it was time to throw a couple more genres into the mix. Post-Apocalyptic, because I love that, and also Paranormal Romance, because it was popular.
Paranormal Passions wasn’t my first crack at slice-of-life, technically, but it felt like it. Probably because it was modern. I wrote it and it did okay, a little underwhelming to be honest, but almost everything I wrote back then was like that. I wrapped it up in about nine months and that was that. It sat in my head for about a year. Around that time, I had made my transition into writing full-length novels instead of short story episodes. It occurred to me that Paranormal Passions might deserve another swing, and so instead of doing a rewrite, I began work on a series of novels set in the same world.
When I wrote it, I was still in my erotica mindset. I still thought that every chapter needed a sex scene. So, the end result was five novels, a novella, and some short stories that were about half slice-of-life romance narrative and half sex scenes. It did decently, for what it was, but still not very great.
That’s its history.
At its core, Parasexual is a contemporary slice-of-life paranormal romance harem with an emphasis on sex. It’s about a regular twenty-something human who is nobody special, on his way to nowhere special. His best friend is a hot werewolf babe and once she asks him out and to go on a road trip with her to Thorne, a coastal metropolis home to tons of paranormals, his life (and sex life) opens up a great deal as they have adventures and meet a lot of interesting paranormal characters. (Most of them being very attractive women interested in fucking the protagonist).
It isn’t really the most traditional haremlit story, but it is ultimately about a man meeting, sleeping with, falling in love, and building a life with three hot paranormal ladies.
WHY I’M DOING THIS
For the sake of transparency: money. There’s other reasons. I want to give this series another chance to reach people who have never heard of it, or maybe have and passed on it the first time around but might really have liked it. I want to breathe new life into the series, even if only for a little while. But ultimately, I’m doing this because things have been happening over the past two or so years that are making me more nervous than usual. Which is saying something, given my anxiety problems.
I see re-releasing Parasexual as one thing I can do to help fortify my finances and, thus, my life. And, ideally, the lives of other people around me who might need help. If it works out, I’m going to re-release other titles, but only time will tell how this will all shake out.
WHAT TO EXPECT
One thing I’ve wanted to be clear about is that this is a re-release not a rewrite. The main reason I’m emphasizing that is because I really don’t want people to buy the new book expecting a full rewrite like what I did with A Warm Place or Our Own Way. So, here are the changes you can expect.
New covers. A long time ago, when I was looking for new cover artists, I reached out to one and we chatted for a bit, but ultimately I decided to go with someone else. Now that this opportunity came up, I got back in touch and decided to commission them. So all the new Parasexual covers come from them. (Here is their website for the curious.)
Edits & Touchups. As part of this process, I’m rereading the entire thing and editing it as I go. Some of these are literal corrections, some are rewriting sentences for one reason or another, and some are rewriting conversations or scenes to make more sense or make the story flow better.
New content. One of the big rules of re-releasing a novel (and to be clear, I am publishing this as a new title, not updating the old one. The original versions have been taken down) is that in order to justify doing so, at least 10% of the novel needs to be somehow changed. Mostly authors take this at the most literal level, in that they will add 10% more words to the count, and this makes sense to me. I went a little overboard for Parasexual 1 (I could’ve gotten away with adding about 4,500 new words but ended up adding 15,000 or so), but this likely won’t be the case for the others, as Parasexual 1 always felt short to me. So while there will be new content in every book, I wouldn’t expect new main characters or side plots. Basically new scenes, likely more slice-of-life or emotional scenes, as the series already has MORE than enough sex scenes.
I hope those of you who choose to read the new version of Parasexual enjoy doing so!
