Interview with Do Not Disturb: Hotel Sex Stories contributor Thomas Roche

How did you come up with the idea for your story in Do Not Disturb?

If I were astonishingly wealthy (and socially irresponsible) I would not maintain a residence. I would not have a mansion or an estate or a top-floor loft; I would stay in hotels, a new one every few weeks. I like mobility, anonymity, and the ripe possibility that comes from extreme isolation. Maintaining an apartment has always been a chore to me, and I would just as soon get rid of almost everything I own and wander from city to city writing pulp novels on an old Underwood. I am sure it would get old pretty quickly, but that’s what a fantasy is for; it doesn’t have to get old.

My story “A Room at the Grand” just grew naturally from my fascination with this. But it’s also about liking semi-anonymous sex, not to mention sex work. I’m not sure what’s up with that, but, you know, it’s a thing.

Were you inspired by any particular hotels?

In this story, I believe I was imagining the Sheraton Palace in San Francisco, though there’s no real parallel. I could also imagine the story happening in the Westin-St. Francis, which I love for many reasons, but probably first and foremost because part of The Caine Mutiny novel takes place there (when it was just The St. Francis).

Is there a part of a hotel that you think is the sexiest?

The guest rooms, of course, but hotel bars have a certain tawdry charm — borderline sleazy even in the nicest of hotels. I have always wondered about people who go drink at hotel bars when they’re not staying there. It’s necessary in smaller cities, probably, because there are fewer options for watering holes. But it still seems bizarrely blatant, like going to a smorgasbord of married people away from home with big beds to sleep in and nobody to sleep there with.

What’s been your favorite hotel experience (x-rated or not)?

I used to organize meetings across the country, so I’ve had quite a few hotel experiences and I don’t know that I could pick a very favorite. But three meta-experiences stand out. First, when I was younger I traveled across the South and Southwest with a girlfriend I was amazingly hot for, and I believe it was the first time I’d ever stayed in motels without older persons in attendance — it was amazing, I couldn’t keep my hands off her for 10 days. Another time when I was living in Los Angeles I came up for Folsom and stayed at the Pickwick in San Francisco, an amazing old hotel where part of The Maltese Falcon was filmed. I was very into photography at the time, so a large parade of unbelievably hot friends and hired models spent the week making their way through my hotel room. Things got fairly dirty — maybe not as dirty as one might have hoped; there were bibles involved, as there always seem to be when I take naked pictures in a hotel. And last but far from least, I once spent a very steamy weekend with a lovely hot female writer friend in the exceedingly sleazy Travelodge on Vermont and Sunset. That was a memorable time.

What do you think a hotel needs to make it a “sexy hotel?”

Beds.

A hot tub with no line of sight to the night manager also certainly doesn’t hurt.

Is there a specific hotel you’ve stayed in which you recommend, and/or a hotel you want to stay in, and why?

I’ve literally stayed in hundreds of hotels and motels over the years. The ones I like best are the old classy elegant ones like SF’s Pickwick, St. Francis and Sheraton Palace; also amazing in SF are the Ritz-Carlton, the Mark Hopkins, and the Fairmont. The Colony Hotel and Cabana Club in Delray Beach, Florida is wonderful. The Brown Palace in Denver is gorgeous, despite its unfortunate name.

Nice hotels offend my proletarian sensibilities on some level, but what can I say? I’m a bourgeois whore. But I also like the other end of the hotel experience. There’s a sleazy hotel in San Francisco on Geary, I believe called the Union Square, that I stayed at for some weeks while relocating, and took dirty pictures in. I also have an affinity for truly downscale anonymous sleazy motels on the highway, especially in the South and Midwest – nothing is sexier than a road trip.

What’s next for you?

I have actually moved a bit away from erotica and am working a lengthy series of contemporary fantasy stories, hopefully soon to be the Cannery Row/Yoknapatawpha County/Lake Wobegon of Lovecraftian occult-cryptozoology-UFO-werewolf-vampire-conspiracy theory fiction. There are erotic elements in most of my new pieces as well, however, and though they mostly couldn’t be called erotica and several of my recent erotic stories do fit in to this world. If you check out the fiction section at my site www.thomasroche.com you’ll see a story or two that reflect this direction. I wouldn’t call it a new direction, as I’ve been writing fantasy professionally off and on since 1989, but my mythology has recently started to developed of its own accord, usually while I’m sleeping.

And as always I continue to teach at San Francisco Sex Information. I do that twice a year, and appear to be a lifer there.

And here’s an excerpt from “A Room at the Grand” – read the rest in Do Not Disturb: Hotel Sex Stories.

The elevator bonged cheerfully; he exited, turned left, found room 1423 with the deadbolt shot to hold the door ajar. He pushed in and shut the door behind him.

The room was big enough to have a small entryway, but it was not a suite; there was no sitting area for him to cross before he saw her stretched on the bed, gloriously lit by bedside lamps and looking every bit the whore he was about to pay for.

“Hi,” she said with a smile in her voice. “I’m Ali. Are you Scott?”

He opened his mouth to say “Yeah,” but forgot the word somewhere halfway between his freshly polished wingtips and his inexpertly knotted necktie. It was not an easy word to forget, but he did it, his eyes surging from Ali’s black stiletto all the way up the immaculate curve of one leg in its sheer black stocking, the calf turned just so to reveal the seam accentuating its shape, the thighs slightly spread to show the smooth flesh where black lace hitched to garters. There, his eyes and his brain fought a battle, because devouring Ali’s legs had been so unspeakably pleasant that he almost didn’t want to move on to the rest of her. He did, though, taking in the tiny slip of see-through fabricæthinner than the stockings, if anything–that formed her thong, then moving on to her glorious hips framed by her garter belt in addition to her tattoos, and her breasts crammed into an impossibly tight push-up bra that had her spilling out everywhere and looking like a D-cup at the very least.

Then there was her hair, cascading everywhere on the expensive white pillowcases. It was freshly blackæit had been going chocolate-sepia the last few weeks–and her candy-apple-red lipstick made her lips stand out in the waterfall of black hair and pale, glorious face, face, face.

“You look…you’re gorgeous,” he murmured. “You’re, uh, much hotter than your picture.”

Her face brightened, the smile on her red mouth managing to look gullibly pleased and cynically lascivious. “Awww,” she said. “What a wonderful thing to say, Scott. You’re very cute yourself. Very much my type.” Her voice was equal parts flirtation/seduction and I-am-blowing-smoke-up-your-ass. Something about that made him get hard immediately, which he had already been well on his way to.

Interview with Do Not Disturb: Hotel Sex Stories contributor Gwen Masters

Today’s contributor Q&A is with erotica writer Gwen Masters, whose story in the book is called “Memphis.”

How did you come up with the idea for your story in Do Not Disturb?

Okay, so here’s confession time…when that story was first written, I was spending a lot of time in a certain hotel in Memphis with a certain man. After each of our encounters, I wrote a story for him. There were dozens of them by the time we were through, and “Memphis” was one of the first.

Were you inspired by any particular hotels?

I’ve always found hotels inspiring, because I see them as a blank canvas of sorts. The room is anonymous, the guy behind the desk will probably never remember your name, and hell — you don’t even have to use your real name if you pay in cash, do you? Behind those doors, anything is possible, and nobody has to know.

I also love the story of the room. You know there has to be a multitude of stories for that space. Everything about it begs for attention — who read the Bible in the drawer? Who left that note on the paper that you found under the bed? Those fingerprints on the window, up near the top…how did they get there? Even the last channel the television was on…I love the mystery of every little thing about the hotel room, and I like leaving a little something behind of my own. I’ve been known to write messages on postcards and slip them into drawers.

Is there a part of a hotel that you think is the sexiest?

You know those rooms at the very back of the hallway, where you turn a corner and find the vending machines and the ice? I’ve always found that so incredibly hot. Between the roar of the ice machine and the hum of all the other machines plugged in back there, you can’t hear each other speak. There are all sorts of little corners where you can work some sexual magic — and you could get caught! If you’ve never had sex beside that vibrating ice machine, you must put it on your to-do list.

What’s been your favorite hotel experience (x-rated or not)?

Waking up after a long night of making love, the windows open and the sunlight spilling over me — and he wasn’t there. But there was a tray filled with pastries, a glass of milk and a glass of orange juice, a long-stemmed rose and the paper, with a note telling me to read and eat and sleep in…that he would be back in a bit. There was something so sweet about knowing I had nowhere to be, no one would bother me, and my only duty in life at that moment was to read the paper and wait on my lover. It was a beautiful day.

What do you think a hotel needs to make it a “sexy hotel?”

A concierge who gives you that wink that says he knows what you’re up to and he didn’t see a thing, thank you very much. A certain “hush” that comes with opulence — the kind of muted sound that always reminds me of thick carpets, glistening chandeliers and complimentary martinis in the lobby.

Is there a specific hotel you’ve stayed in which you recommend, and/or a hotel you want to stay in, and why?

The Peabody Hotel in Memphis is simply stunning. The MGM Grand ranks up there, too.

What’s next for you?

On the writing side, I’m writing a few short stories for Black Lace anthologies. I’ve just started on another erotic novel, but I’m taking my time with it. I’m very busy with my freelance business right now.

On the hotel side, which one is next?

Very soon…Hotel California!

And here’s an excerpt from “Memphis” – read the rest in Do Not Disturb: Hotel Sex Stories.

What?” I was whispering and not sure why, as frozen as the ice chips the shrimp rested on. My eyes met his brown ones over his tilted wineglass, and he smiled at me.

“We’re hiding from what we already know.” He said it with absolute certainty.

I dropped my shrimp fork with a clatter of silver on china. Neither of us noticed.

Is that how it starts? How affairs begin? With a gesture or a word that suddenly turns an old friend into a lover, crying out above you in a rented bed somewhere on the edge of nowhere? Does it always drop out of the blue and explode, fragmenting your life? And then plant itself inside you and grow into beauty, into memories and smiles, building you into something stronger than you were?

For me, with my married lover, there’s a bounce in my step that everyone notices but can’t explain. It comes from pulling up beside a sports car parked outside of a hotel, in a town you’ve never visited before, and going through an open door with the DO NOT DISTURB sign already in place. It comes from there being no time for words before you’re rushed into a dimly lit room and surrounded by his arms, his voice, and his desire. You both collapse onto the bed that has become a refuge.

He’s married. I knew that as I walked out of the restaurant and slid into the passenger seat of his sports car. I heard her name in my head as he drove, one hand on the wheel and one hand on my thigh. I saw her in my head as the hotel room door closed behind us. I listened to her laughing with him as he pressed me back against that door and kissed me. I felt the guilt as I kissed him back, but I wanted him more than I wanted to heed the conscience that was shaking its head in shame.

Interview with Do Not Disturb: Hotel Sex Stories contributor Amanda Earl

This is the first in a series of author interviews with the contributors to Do Not Disturb: Hotel Sex Stories. Stay tuned for more!

How did you come up with the idea for your story “Welcome to the Aphrodisiac Hotel” in Do Not Disturb: Hotel Sex Stories?

I love hotel lobby bars; whenever I’m in one I always eavesdrop on conversations. I find it fascinating that they are meeting places for strangers, there for conferences or other gatherings.

Were you inspired by any particular hotels?

In Ottawa, there’s a hotel downtown, which is part of the Westin Hotel chain and is attached to a large mall, the Rideau Centre and a conference centre. It has a great lobby bar with a fantastic view of a famous landmark hotel, the Chauteau Laurier.

Is there a part of a hotel that you think is the sexiest?

The lobby as in my story, but also the elevator. Lots of possibilities for play there, especially if you have a room on the top floor of a tall building.

What’s been your favorite hotel experience (x-rated or not)?

I once had a threesome at the Westin with my husband and a man I’d met on line. We all fucked in the big bed. I sucked my husband’s cock while the other guy did me doggy style. We had a view of the Canadian Parliament Buildings. It was both arousing and inspiring.

What do you think a hotel needs to make it a “sexy hotel?”

I hate to sound obsessive, but it needs a really good lobby bar for clandestine encounters and hook ups with strangers. The Ritz Carlton in Montreal has a very sexy lobby bar with good snacks and great martinis. It also has a tea room for more delicate assignations.

Is there a specific hotel you’ve stayed in which you recommend, and/or a hotel you want to stay in, and why?

Isn’t there a hotel in New York that will send up sex toys to your room? That would be fun. I also recommend the Mirror Lake Inn in Lake Placid New York. Some of the rooms that are not part of the main building have spiral staircases and fireplaces. Then after your wild sexual escapades you can go take a walk around the beautiful lake.

What’s next for you?

In the spring, I have a story called “Ghost Swinger” coming out in the on line anthology Swing! put out by Logical Lust and edited by Jolie du Pre. Another story, “the Juice Extractors” will appear in the Ultimate Art of Erotica, 2009, published by Crystal Dreams. I believe that book will be out by the summer. I also blog over at my erotica blog: amanderotica.blogspot.com.

And here’s a little sneak peak at Amanda’s story, “Welcome to the Aphrodisiac Hotel,” which opens Do Not Disturb, but do be sure to get the book to read the whole thing.

I’ve always had a thing for hotel lobby bars. They act as a buffer between business and pleasure. Sometimes business is pleasure. I shiver with desire in the shadow of a group of bankers or politicians sipping their scotch, the scent of money and power folded into every crease of their navy blue suits. Do these men have mistresses or escorts waiting for them in their luxury suites? Maybe a bellboy will kneel for them after he takes their luggage up to their rooms, for a little money in his palm. Or perhaps basking in the afterglow of a strategic win is all they need, sitting in this bar, nursing their drinks. They never seem in any hurry to leave.

These establishments have their own sets of rules–check your morality at the door along with your suitcase. When you visit a hotel lobby bar, anything can happen. What I like about them is their illicitness, the fact that they are just steps away from elevators that carry clandestine lovers up to hotel beds where so many other people have fucked or cried or indulged in decadent room service dinners. Or maybe it’s their transitory nature…places where strangers pass in the night for one brief encounter that could change their lives forever–or at least for right now.

The woman sitting at the wrought iron and marble table for two near the window and sipping a dry martini with two olives is a sales rep, most likely for a pharmaceutical company. There are numerous drug sales reps in hotel lobby bars at any given moment.

I notice her the moment she walks in. I muse over whether she’s a blatant or merely accidental exhibitionist.

Lillian Ann Slugocki: The story behind the story

:Do Not Disturb: Hotel Sex Stories contributor Lillian Ann Slugocki gives the story behind her story, “The St. John’s Hotel, 1890,” on her blog:

I wrote about a frontier woman in a frontier town. It could be any wind swept horizon, anytime one hundred years ago. I like the myth of the self sufficient woman of the wild wild west. Annie Oakley, she got her gun and now you don’t f**k with her. I like the calico skirts and the bonnets, the boots, the wild untameable hair. Her husband died some time ago and now she lives alone on the ranch. She goes into town a couple of times a month for supplies and to have high tea with her BFF at The St. John Hotel. The year is 1890.

Of course she meets a man. A stranger with a long scar on his handsome face. He’s dangerous, in fact he’s a killer. It’s a revision of the Blue Beard story. Girl meets monster and falls in love. The monster kills her, add her to his museum of murdered women. In my version she has combustive sex with him in a tawdry hotel room. He ignites all cylinders. Damn, if she doesn’t find herelf on fire. A forty year old widow with a sunburned face screwing her brains out. She can’t get enough of him.

When the ghost of his last lover appears to her one night, however, and reveals his secret, she escapes out the window, and lives to tell her tale. She’s old now. She still longs for him. She remembers what he did to her body. But she’s older and wiser. She knows better. Better to be alive than enshrined in a mausoleum of beautiful dead women. So its a ghost story, a love story, and a twist on an old favorite story.

Unusual hotel rooms: underwater hotel and erotic suite

Examiner.com has some interesting hotel rooms covered, including:

Hydropolis Underwater Hotel, Dubai

Alright, so it isn’t completed yet, but it’s safe to assume that this 220-suite underwater hotel will have an unrivaled sensual vibe. The hotel’s bubble-shaped suites will feature clear glass comprising both the sleeping areas’ walls and each room’s bathtub. Admit it—the idea of a dolphin pausing to watch you make out is kind of sexy.

Palms Hotel Erotic Suite, Las Vegas

Like you didn’t know a Las Vegas hotel would be in the mix. From the sexy shadow dancer projection wall to the steamy metal Show Shower with a stripper pole and fogged windows, anything goes in this incredible Palms Hotel suite. But it’s the incredible 8-foot round rotating bed (with mirrored ceiling, of course) that really makes you feel like you’re in your very own high budget porn. The Palms charges a $1 per day phone fee. Oh, and a $4,000 per night room charge.

All about the do not disturb sign

A whole article about the history of the do not disturb sign, by David A. Keeps in the June 2005 issue of Travel & Leisure:

With the rise of boutique hotels in the nineties, even the most inconsequential items—notepads, laundry bags—bore the imprint of a brand-savvy graphic design team, and the Do Not Disturb sign went from dull to desirable again. It was the first W, in New York, that revived my itchy fingers. The property’s die-cut door hanger read Go Away, Please, communicating in no uncertain terms the core values of what hotels provide: privacy and anonymity for an increasingly stressed-out populace. “Everybody is looking for a way to say they’re not available,” says Ross Klein, senior vice president and chief marketing officer of W Hotels Worldwide.

Though it was recently retired, the Go Away sign lives on; Klein estimates that more than 10,000 of them checked out along with the luggage. W’s next model—When? Not Quite—debuts this summer. Klein ordered three times more than he needed, in anticipation of souvenir hunters. “We don’t consider it theft,” he says. “We believe the signs are being adopted into loving homes.”

As a foster parent for hotel paraphernalia, I welcome the return of this cultural artifact—whether it’s the embroidered pillows that hang from the knobs at Maryland’s Inn at Perry Cabin or the clever magnetic Do Not Disturb disc that sticks to the metal door at the Maritime in New York (yes, it’s on my refrigerator now). Others are as in-your-face as a subway ride: Manhattan’s Le Parker Meridien borrowed the quintessential New York phrase Fuhgettaboudit. Kimpton Hotels has developed unique messages for each of its properties, from the jazz-centric Allegro in Chicago (Composing a Classic) to Washington, D.C.’s Pop art–styled Helix (Too Fabulous to Be Disturbed).

The trendy Do Not Disturb sign can have its drawbacks, however, at least according to Jason Pomeranc, co-owner of Thompson Hotels, which encompasses New York’s 60 Thompson, the Hollywood Roosevelt, and the Sagamore in Miami Beach. The cardboard sign he created—which simply says Do Not Disturb—delighted two of his guests so much that they eschewed privacy, putting it in their suitcase instead of on their door. “I walked into a room I thought was empty, only to find the couple still in bed,” Pomeranc recalls.

Own your own W Hotel bed

I love, even though it’s beyond ridiculous, that you can buy a W Hotel bed to use at home. For the bargain price of $1,265! I haven’t bought a mattress in ages, but I really think I’d rather blow that kind of cash on several luxurious hotel nights, you know?

Sexy NYC Valentine’s Day hotel deals

If I had someone to share the room with, I’d totally book one of these!

Via New York Daily News, which has more NYC hotel deals:

All signs point to love with the Benjamin’s Star Struck package. Starting at $389 per night, it gives couples a luxury suite, a bottle of chilled Prosecco, rose-petal turndown service and two tickets to view cosmic constellations at the Hayden Planetarium. In addition, couples will receive a keepsake Swarovski crystal heart and a copy of “Love After Sex: Relationships by the Stars.” www.thebenjamin.com.

The Marmara Manhattan‘s Valentine’s Weekend package includes two nights’ accommodation in a one-bedroom suite, a dozen roses – plus rose petals on the bed – Champagne, chocolate-covered Turkish-delight candies and a Kama Sutra kit for adventurous couples looking to indulge their sensuous side. Priced at $699; www.marmara-manhattan.com.

Coincidentally, February happens to be Chocolate Lovers Month. To celebrate, 70 Park Avenue Hotel is bringing guests more than just chocolates on their pillows. How sweet is 15% off the best available rate for the entire month? What’s more, there are complimentary chocolate tastings, chocolate and wine pairings by Tumbador Chocolate and artisanal samplings by Divine Chocolate. Guests can also receive a free consultation with the in-house “romance sommelier,” who can set the perfect scene, from staging an over-the-top proposal in a quintessential New York setting to creating a romantic playlist for a guestroom. Rates start at $279 (use rate code CLM); www.70parkave.com.

Play out your friskiest fantasies at Affinia Hotels with the Naughty and Nice romance package. From $289, the one-night deal includes a split of Champagne, rose-petal turndown service, a romantic in-room movie, a box of handmade Jacques Torres chocolates and an Agent Provocateur strip-poker set; www.affinia.com.