An Appreciative message, Some News and Some Blogs to Visit

Many thanks go out to all of you that had been kind enough to e-mail me with congratulatory messages, feedback, encouragement and such kind comments. In many ways I have been more nervous about publishing volume 2 than I was over publishing volume 1 and so the positive feedback I've received so far has come as quite a relief, particularly as it differs in style to some degree. In particular my thanks go out to the kind soul that rated it six stars out of a possible six on Lulu -seeing that meant so much to me I can't tell you and particularly so soon after its release.

There is still a bit of work to be done before I put it on general release as it were ie get an ISBN assigned to it and release it through Amazon etc. For starters I'm going to include certain groups of keywords as footnotes on the chapter title pages to help Google find it. If any of you were wondering; the reason for the ridiculously long title and subtitle as it appears on Lulu is for the same reason, to make it more visible to Lulu’s search engine which looks for keywords within book titles rather than within their pages. The reason for all of this is that volume 1 is damn near invisible on Amazon and Google. Even I find difficulty in finding it - and I know what I'm looking for! I guess what really needs to happen is for someone to review it or for it to get noticed and for folks to chat about it on some of the message boards.

Then there is the cover; as I said before, I'm not happy with it as it stands. The present cover is purely temporary but I intend to redesign it by removing the female figure and perhaps having a straitjacket suggestively draped over the bed with the cane laid across it.

I still and suffering from a rather tiresome and protracted chest infection but it didn't stop me from enjoying a day out in Cambridge on Saturday with the significant other and having a good few pints too many at the Spaniards Inn, Hampstead, yesterday afternoon. Today I shall be, in a moment, be nipping off down to Camden Town to meet up with an old school friend for a celebratory pint or two by the Regent's canal (A pub called The Ice House). But despite my celebratory mood nevertheless I have decided that today shall at least in part be the first working day dedicated to developing the upcoming volume 3 and also the small volume that will link volume 2 with volume 3 and that I have spoken about before. In the pub this afternoon I'm hoping to get composed the book description for volume 2 to go on the Lulu Page. At the moment it consists of a very slightly altered version of the book description I wrote for volume 1, copied and pasted in as a stopgap. This is not quite the trivial task it sounds as it has to put over a something of the storyline and of the spirit of the book but within a very few words - ie it has to be concise and to the point and that is something of an art in itself.

By publishing a short volume that fits between volumes 2 and 3 - and that both ties up and embellish is some loose ends from volume 2 and details more of the events that led up to the storyline presented in volume 1, particularly as pertaining to how Lavinia Vitesse came to find herself incarcerated in the institution - I will be able to approach the storytelling element of volume 3 in a more traditional linear manner rather than incorporating the flashbacks and back stories that run throughout volumes 1 and two. I will also be able to lavish more detail on such things as the uniform that Lavinia was made to wear at home before coming to the experimental psychology unit and the therapy she had been undergoing at the hands of her aunt’s psychotherapist acquaintance. To do have really have done these areas the justice they deserve in the present work would have meant volume 2 ballooning well past 300 pages in length, and possibly closer to 400.

As for volume 3, well there is obviously going to be a complete change of scene - a far more domestic backdrop. You have to imagine a sheltered little private world embedded within an isolated country home, existing in today's world but totally steeped to the tiniest degree in the Victorian world - a world of strict governesses and children's nannies; of stifling regimes, petty rules, drab, stiff-collared, confining childish school uniforms, and spirit crushing discipline; of drills and forced exercise and PE in tight leotards urged on by the cane, the switch, the tawse and even the birch. To this end I have made a modest start this morning in researching some sources of inspiration - and in so doing, as always it seems, I became somewhat sidetracked, but even that has been worthwhile as I have uncovered a few more interesting blogs that the more exploratory minded of you might wish to visit.

The first is a French language blog and then a sort of pictures called ‘jpcolorgallery’ (as always just click to visit or see the blog list in the sidebar)

Another nice spanking / discipline blog can be found at ‘MARQE'S Study’ (well worth a visit - again, just click the title or look for the blog in the sidebar blog list).

Fighting the corner on behalf of the more consensual approach to discipline we have ‘The Art of Authority’

Then there is ‘About Spanking’ (click on either of the pictures above to visit)

Finally, I came across ‘Výprasky, prísna výchova a disciplína’ I have absolutely no idea what language this is in (please someone let me know) but with inspiring pics like the one on the right here it can’t be bad! I think I would have little doubt about placing her in my employ if I was the owner of some private institution for young ladies and looking for a suitable governess or schoolmistress to curb the livelier spirits amongst them. With her smartly cut high coloured starched blouse, no-nonsense tie and tight skirt can you just imagine what would happen if she were placed in control and given free rein over a small group of teenage girls, kept under lock and key and safely beyond the prying gaze of the general public and free from any possibility of interference from government officials and busybody social workers and the like?

INSTITUTIONALISED Volume 2 Now on LULU (at last!)... I'm Knackered!

I've still got the 'sniffles' but I have managed to get INSTITUTIONALISED Volume 2 up on LULU (Click cover to link). In the end I had to take out a chunk which I couldn't really do justice to in the time I had available but that will still work as a flashback in volume 3 wherein I will have more space to include all of the unfinished sections of writing (some parts dating back over two years) that I would otherwise have had to leave out. As it was, volume 2 was getting unwieldy (over 300 pages at one point) and I have loads of fresh ideas that I would like to pursue and to do so requires a change of scene - as much as I like the whole institutional - reform school - asylum thing.

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For the time being volume 2 will only be on LULU for download - there are bound to be some typos that have gotten through (I am dyslexic, don't forget) and the cover is up for a redesign (I no longer like the present effort and consider it a temporary stopgap). The thing is; it is difficult and expensive to make revisions after an ISBN has been assigned so for the time being I'm holding back from making it available through Amazon, Waterstones et al until such a time as I'm absolutely satisfied with it (volume 1 had 11 revisions in the end). In fact I found a typo just a few moments ago but it is only a misplaced hyphen so although I have corrected my copy I have not bothered to upload the correction to LULU - it's daybreak here in Londinium and I haven't been to bed yet. I have also yet to post up a proper book description on LULU (I've just recycled the one from volume 1 for the time being) and I haven't had time yet to create a proper preview (because I'm going to bed). It is actually really quite hard to find on LULU via a straight forward search at the moment - but then, I have only just this minute (quite literally) uploaded the thing and it probably takes LULU's search-engine a while to get going. Obviously it will not appear in a google search at all at present - a situation that will remain until I am totally happy and have registered the ISBN (but it is hugely cheaper to electronically download these things anyway rather than buy a physical copy through a bookshop, because of their enormous markup).

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One other thing - I have used an illuminated letter at the start of each chapter (in the hope of creating something of a Gothic feel - just a little bit of fun and frivolity) but it pushes up the file size so if anyone has any difficulty downloading please let me know and I'll upload the plain version. I am also think of quite quickly (for me that is) putting out a shortish followup / adendum to fill in the gaps and tie up loose ends before working on volume 3 per se - that would allow me to change scene entirely to a more domestic setting without having to worry over flashback scenes (at least in terms of flashbacks to the institution). What do you think? I actually really feel quite nervous at the moment to be honest with you, despite the positive response I got from volume 1 - volume 2 is a different beast in some ways and I'm a little worried that it all got a bit too ambitious (so please be gentle with me - I don't feel well).

Night - night...ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

Yet More Proofreading, a Cough and a Spanking (blog)

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Induced Image Dysmorphism and Other Wonders

Sorry for sparsity of updates of late but 'yours truly' is buried deep in final proofreading at present. But I am still in connect by email with various folk who have contributed their ideas and what have you in the past and one of these kind people recently sent me a link to a story that I found so intriguing that I damn near lost a whole days proofreading due to the fact that I just couldn't 'put it down' so to speak. And of course I then went on to work my way through a lot of the other tales presented on the same site. Not all turned out to be my thing but I have to urge you to read the tale that got the ball rolling “Rest and Relaxation” (click to go to the story page and then look for the story title. the author is definitely ‘evil’ and is herself the inspiration for the dominant character: Dr Evelyn Benedict. There story touches on many of my favorites: Leg-braces (the use of which you will encounter in the upcoming INSTITUTIONALISED volume 2), humiliation, mind control, corsets, catheters, sensory deprivation, dependence, immobilization. The use of a drug similar to botox and in a way that has been discussed on this site in the past is featured at one point and I have to say that the writing is excellent, give or take the odd typo - even though I generally don't go for first person accounts, I loved this one. The site is called Evil Dolly.com and you can find a link to the main page in the sidebar 'useful resources' list over on the right some place. If you like psychological manipulation I can also recommend you read 'Workout Girl' on the same site, wherein a girl is deliberately addicted to exercising to a pathological extent and encouraged to develop what amounts to a body dysmorphism condition - whereby no matter how slim and toned she becomes she is convinced that she still looks fat and becomes more and more obsessed with exercise regimes and diet to the exclusion of all else (very, debilitating)... see y'all soon with a proper post.

Drip, Drip, Drip - Just an Idea

I'd been working hard, of course, on proofreading volume 2 and it is coming on in leaps and bounds now, although I must admit that I spent the majority of yesterday in a pub in Enfield working on an idea I came up with some time ago for INSTITUTIONALISED volume 2 . I just thought it would be fun to share it with you and see what feedback I get. Basically it is a scene in which a girl has been repeatedly refusing to fully take part in her one-to-one sessions with the psychotherapist. While she insists on this policy of non-compliance she is being kept in an isolated room in between sessions. As, for reasons I won't go into here, she is in plaster casts, she is generally confined to bed and is on a drip-feed. She is thoroughly restrained while in her hospital bed, the worry being that she might twist her back and neck (which may or may not have been injured in an accident previously) a broad webbing strap runs across her forehead to restrain her head and protect her neck while she sleeps (there is also a neck brace involved). The strap has a three centimetre diameter circular hole in its centre - nothing that sinister so far you may think.
The tube from her drip feed hangs across the head of her bed and of course naturally sags in the centre at the point where a coupling connects together two lengths of tubing to extend the run over to the cannula in her wrist on the opposite side. It is in the centre of that deeply sagging section, just above her forehead where the drip first begins to form, the liquid dribbling along the tubing from one of the joints, the golden, viscous heavy oily fluid gathering and growing and stretching until…until…it falls, icy stabbing cold and splashing down dead centre on her pretty little forehead, straight through that conveniently placed opening in the head restraint strap…over and over again.
Of course talking without permission is not allowed and complaining of the fault, having been finally driven to distraction, to one of the nurses that share shifts and sit silently reading by her bed side, only gets her bent across the bed for a few strokes of the cane…then the drip feed is refilled and it all starts again…deprived of sleep she is taken once every 24 hrs to the therapists office and if not yet convinced to co operate? well, then its straight back to bed…drip, drip, drip…

Another Blog to Check - While I Get on With Volume 2 / 3

Hi peeps: If you always enjoyed the stories they used to have in those old classic Janus magazines of the past (as I did) and gloried in the artwork of Lynn Paula Russell (Paula Meadows, as was then) you could do far worse than visit Uncle Peter's Spanking Stories ( click, or see the sidebar blog list). By the way, the marvelous little Paula Russell drawing on the left I just couldn't resist - even though it didn't actually come from that particular site. it evokes a question that was broached in volume 1, is visited from an institutional perspective in volume 2 and will be dealt with in more detail in volume 3 - wherein a strict governess, steeped in Victorian mores to the point at which to her and her charges the modern world might as well not exist, brings to bear her own unique approach to the subject. That question is of course: within a strict disciplinary framework, should masturbation ever be allowed - and if not how should it be controlled or curtailed? Indeed, under certain circumstances, is there a case one could make for masturbation to be not only allowed but actively encouraged, perhaps seven enforced under strict supervision? Of course there are chastity belts and other such physically restrictive measures that could be applied (and were, historically). But with in a hospital / institution environment or even under the guidance of a suitably qualified and skilled governess, as I envisage, there is much scope to think about approaches to aversive tactics or the subtle use of association (perhaps through the provision of suitable books, magazines and images - the perusal of which might be enforced or left up to the young lady herself - or indeed, through psychologically therapeutic means such as guided imagery) to mould and sculpt her ideas and predilections. Well, what do you think? Any ideas out there?

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See y'all later when I've got a bit more done - Wicked Uncle Garth.

A New and Intriguing Story to Check Out

A very short posting today, no pics I'm afraid - not enough time to source 'em. I'm hard at work - chained to my desk (not literally - I'm the master here. That's why my significant other has her nice new white satin pinny to wear)....and no drinkies!. I just wanted to take this opportunity (I've awarded myself a tea break) to point you in the direction of an interesting straitjacket / asylum story presently unfolding and developing on http://greggerbits.tripod.com/stories.html (click to read chapter 1 ) the basic premise being that a young college woman who fails a psychiatric exam [is then] committed to a mental hospital for further testing. I love this idea and the avenues it opens up - especially if in truth there is little wrong with the subject to start with! I have always enjoyed mulling over the possibilities for exploitation of vulnerable young things inherent in the asylum / mental health system - particularly as pertains to those often less-than-entirely-ethical days of old when wives, awkward stepdaughters and heiresses could find they had stepped out of society based on little more than the word of a disgruntled stepmother or guardian or even a slighted suitor (And a greasing of a palm or two by silver). Anyway, why not explore the entire site while you are there - a lot of interesting links (very straitjacket / asylum orientated) and a lot of material regarding straitjackets in various media (films, TV etc). Incidentally, yours truly has been kindly thanked by the writer (thanks, for the mention) for having helped but in all honesty I can claim only to have read through, made one or two comments and offered-up a couple of ideas for the story's future development and direction.

While we are on the subject - inspired by the story mentioned above, I did a little searching around and came up with a couple of other little gems: A nice selection of free straitjacket photographs on http://www.straitjacketed.com/freepics.html (click site name - highlighted in blue - to view or see sidebar resource list) and a continuing story that I am sure you (and the writer I have just mentioned above) will just love. Entitled; The Job j and posted on the same site's free section, just click on the title to read the first chapter, then just follow the links to the subsequent sections...enjoy!

As for me? Its back to proofreading / editing INSTITUTIONALISED volume 2 / 3 (At this point, I'm still uncertain whether to split it into two volumes or not).