This week I have published my third completed novel; Love Life of a Naked Girl.
As you probably know (or have guessed from the title), Love Life… is a sequel to my debut novel, Best Friends with a Naked Girl, and tells the story of the further adventures of the main characters of that book, Becky (who is an exhibitionist and nudist) and Lisa (her childhood best friend, who is very definitely not).
I will try not to include any spoilers from Love Life… in this blog but there may be some small ones for Best Friends… so if you haven’t read that yet you may want to wait.
When I wrote Best Friends… (BF), I never intended there to be any further stories about Becky and Lisa. That’s why the story has a definite, happy ending. I didn’t want to leave readers feeling like there was something they weren’t getting and, indeed, you can read BF and have a full and complete story, with “to be continued” or sequel hook cliffhangers.
But as the novel began to get readers, I had a few people ask me, when was I going to write a sequel? It was nice to hear that people had enjoyed the book and liked the characters enough to want to spend more time with them. I still wasn’t sure a sequel would work but perhaps it was worth giving it a try.
One of the challenges I had was thinking up things for the characters to do. BF is a bit of a trip through various public nudity or CFNF (clothed female/nude female) scenarios; the convenience store, Becky at home with Lisa, Becky exploring more public exhibitionism, the naturist camping trip and the streaking at the regular campsite; then the cinema, the party, the library streak and finally the train and the parade. The plot progresses and the characters grow, but they always have something to do in keeping with the CFNF/public nudity theme.
The sequel is different. While there is still a plenty of CFNF/CMNF content, there is a lot less public nudity and a lot more focus on Becky as a nudist. Becky’s relationship with nudity is complicated, but I reasoned that if she got more freedom to be as she likes and live as she chooses, she would understandably become more interested in nudism as a lifestyle. She still identifies as an exhibitionist but she strips off in public a lot less; most of her naked time is either at home or in situations where her nudity is allowed or required.
If BF had a theme, it was finding your soulmate and falling in love with a person when they allow you to see them as they really are. As soon as Becky bares her body and soul to Lisa, she is smitten; even though she is previously straight and has known Becky since childhood, Becky’s complete honesty and her new confidence in her true self, even more than Becky’s physical attractiveness, causes her to fall for her. And when she is honest about her own feelings with herself and with Becky, Becky reciprocates.
Love Life… has a different theme and I won’t say too much for fear of spoiling the book, but it’s about being allowed to be yourself, to own your identity, especially as a woman; but it’s also about how others will take that identity and try to control it and shape you into something you don’t want to be. It’s about fighting for that freedom, and about how those who truly love you give you space to be yourself – but that you also need to give them the same.
I hope people will enjoy it as much, maybe even more, than BF. It was fun to write, and I hope it will be fun to read too.
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