Publishers find erotica is good for business

"It was commando publishing," Chen says. "And the authors were very happy to be aligned with a major publishing house." Avon plans two anthologies for June entitled, "Parlor Games" and "If This Bed Could Talk." Each book will have an initial print run of 40,000 to 50,000 copies.

One of the first authors on the new Avon Red label is Liz Maverick. Maverick's story, "Agent Provocateur," is in Avon Red's first anthology. It's an urban, semi-futuristic story about a woman named Vienna who is trying to get out of prison and a death sentence, as well as away from the men who have purchased her at a strange auction.

Maverick thinks that since men have always had outlets for their erotic fantasies, such as movies and magazines, women are finally coming around to creating their own.

"I think 'Sex and the City' had a large part of it," she says. "For a lot of 20- and 30-something women, we would watch the show and see these women talk about sex and make it fun. Then we would call our girl friends and talk about the show. I think it opened a lot of things up."

Especially words. The language of erotica is different from traditional romance novels and key to its genre. Instead of euphemisms, erotica uses much more graphic language.

Maverick says that she doesn't shy away from explicit language. She says that when writing erotica and erotic romance, there are certain words that just fit the mood.

"You want it to be sexy," Maverick says. "Sometimes, flowery language doesn't fit as well as a good expletive."

Beth Bingham, a buyer at Borders Group, says that they started carrying erotica and erotic romances in 2004 when they took on the titles from Ellora's Cave. They have since added the Avon Red and Harlequin erotica lines.

"It came from customer interest," she says. "Customers would come in and specifically ask for it. It's now a growth category in our romance department."

Chen acknowledges that no matter who puts out the book, be it a mainstream publisher or a print on demand, there will always be some sort of stigma about writing romance and women's fiction.

"For some reason, it's considered unintelligent to read these books," she says. Yet according to the Romance Writers of America, the romance genre brings in $1.2 billion dollars a year, and just over 50 percent of all popular mass-market fiction are paperbacks.

"I think there are a lot of closeted romance readers out there," Chen says.

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