Women Dogging Themselves

A Reader’s Question: 

            My girlfriend and I have been going back and forth on a debate.   She says if you’re fast with the “ass”, then that keeps your “new man” from going somewhere else (if you knew her age you would scream!  Lol!)

            I have a different opinion.  I feel you should stimulate the “mind”, as well as the “behind”.  By this I mean sex can wait until you get to know that person.  Ultimately, that man will respect you more in the end.

            I won’t lie.  I’ve had “jump offs” in the past.  But on the real, if you are truly feeling a person, I just think it’s best to get to know the mental, before getting to the physical.  Ok Dedan. Bring it.  What do you think?

My Advice:

            Hey what’s up?  It’s great to get a question from another one of my favorite readers.

            You need to talk to your friend because she’s trippin’ if she thinks that giving it up to a man quickly, is going to keep him around.  That’s actually the fastest way for him to move onto his next conquest.

            Over the years I’ve given this same advice many times, but here it is again for anyone who may have missed it.  When a man meets a woman, he immediately puts her into one of two categories: wifey potential or jump off.  The woman determines how the man classifies her.  No man is going to respect a woman who doesn’t respect herself.  If a woman gives it up easily, then what the heck makes you think the guy is going to seriously consider bringing that woman home to meet his mom?  In the back of his mind, he’s going to be wondering how many other guys hit it that quickly.

            Now, if the woman presents herself in a respectful way, then the guy has no choice but to respect her.  If sex is all he’s after, and he sees that he’s not going to get it quickly, then he’ll move on to someone else.  If he sticks around, that’s proof that he’s truly interested in you.

            A woman giving it up too soon just makes it easier for men to move onto the next woman, who is just as easy.  The unfortunate thing is that many women wonder why they get dogged. The fact of the matter is that men don’t dog women.  Women dog themselves.

            Hopefully, I’ve shed some light on this subject for you.

Dedan Tolbert

Award-winning author, advice columnist &
host of “The Dedan Tolbert Show”

Listen live weeknights at 9:00pm EST exclusively on
The TB&D Enterprises Radio Network
 
For more information, visit, DedanTolbert.com
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Post 2

CHAM’s WORD

“The bigger your head is, the easier it is for your balance to be lost.” –CHAM’s Word

WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?  RON(ITA) O’NEAL?

By CHAMSIL

The year was 2009.  January 2009 to be exact.  SOUNDNOFF Poetical Showcases, a spoken word show that I host with Author, Samara King, had premiered a mere two months prior and we were well on our way to making some noise with the new show.  As we always have done with every show, we conferenced to discuss show format, sequencing, themes, and most importantly, featured guests.  It was at that moment that bells and whistles sounded in my brain with so much force that I swore it left my ears ringing, temporarily.  I had a fantastic idea, however, I must rewind the clock in order to put this topic into its proper perspective.

About five years prior, I was fully submerged in the Spoken Word scene in my hometown of Kalamazoo, Michigan.  So, on a special evening at a place that I will call, “The Slam Spot,” a guest was scheduled to come in from out of town to bless the crowd with some hot spoken word.  I was excited that a “powerhouse” was going to be gracing the stage with their presence, and I looked forward to seeing and flexing some skills in the presence of who I will call, “Ronita O’Neal.”  Well, since Ronita was a special guest, no slam competition was scheduled, so all was left was open mic.  So, that was what I did.  Ronita was gazing upon me from the front row.  I fared well during the open mic, then patiently waited for Ronita to hit the stage.  Man, she hit the stage with such a fervor that the vicinity was incinerated.  I was thoroughly impressed and amazed by the pieces that she performed.  Real talk.  I even supported her by buying one of her spoken word CD’s.  She even autographed it with the following words, “Never Stop Writing.”  I did exactly that.  Great words to live by, indeed.

So, fast-forward the clock to early 2009.  I informed Samara that I had someone in mind that would be great to feature and let her know that I would reach out in order to see if she was interested in participating.  This was THREE WHOLE MONTHS in advance!  I crafted a nice, professional email message via MySpace to Ronita, refreshing her memory on how/when we met, how she had been influential in my spoken word pursuits and strenghtening my writing, and how our show would love to feature her and for her to let me know her thoughts on my proposition as soon as her schedule would permit.

One week goes by.  No response.  Two weeks go by.  Still no response.  I check the status of my message.  It relayed “Read.”  BUNK!  Many months go by, including the “imfamous” show in question.  STILL no word.  I mean, if she didn’t want to do it.  Say it!  If we were little peons beneath the ground that her big feet pounced upon…say it!  Hell…SAY ANYTHING!  At the end of the day, it’s all about professionalism.  I would’ve expected her to demonstrate that.  Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case.  Maybe my expectations were too high.  Nah…I doubt it.   Undaunted, we kept if moving and had great shows, regardless of involvement, or lack thereof, from “Ronita.”

So, Ronita…in closing…you’re lame is f@ck!

That’s my word.

–CHAMSIL

Formula for Writing a 25K Erotic Romance

By Sable Grey

Most of us who start out writing novel length romances have kind of a hard time switching over to write shorter erotic romance.  I certainly did.  But as I learned how to trim the story and eliminate the fat, I came up with a formula for writing 25,000 word erotic romances and hopefully it will help other writers who want to cash in on the digital erotic romance market.

Before we look at the formula, what is erotic romance?  For me, erotic romance is nothing more than a romance story with explicit love scenes.  It’s the kind of story that readers who like a little more heat with their romance will want to buy.  I approach every book with three things in mind:

1. Who are the characters?
2. What is the story?
3. How many sex scenes can I fit in without messing up who the characters are and what the story is about?

The first two are fairly easy, but the third is why I developed a formula.  As someone who writes novel length, I was accustomed to just allowing the relationship and tension develop over several chapters before writing a love scene.  However, it becomes much more difficult when you are writing a twenty five thousand word story.  By having a formula, a basic outline, to fit the story into, things get much easier.

Each chapter is 5K and there are 5 Chapters.  This makes it easier to set up my writing schedule and goals.  This way, I can set myself up to write 5K a day and have a first draft finished in a week.

So week one, I fill out my formula and plot my story, doing whatever research I need before I start writing.  Week two, I write hard and fast and finish the first draft.  Week three, I revise and rewrite, polishing up my story.  Week four, I submit my finished book to a publisher.

The Formula

• Chapter One:  Introduce characters and story
• Chapter Two: Advance the plot, first love scene
• Chapter Three: Advance conflict, second love scene
• Chapter Four:  Black Moment
• Chapter Five: Resolution and a happily ever after

Let’s break it down.  I’ve made up a western story to fit into this formula as an example of how this works.

Chapter One:  James is an ex-outlaw gone gambler who has just been caught cheating when playing cards with a lawman, has taken the money, and is making a run for it.  He hops the first stage he sees which happens to be the one carrying Molly, a mail order bride, from St. Louis to Denver where she will meet her new husband.  They don’t get far before James sees that the lawman is fast catching up with him so he holds up the stage, steals two horses and the woman.  At gunpoint she goes with him and they set off across the plains.

Okay so I’ve established the plot, the conflict, and have introduced the characters and their individual stories.

On to second chapter where James goes off the main road and they take up camp.  She asks why he won’t just give the money back but James tells her he wants to buy some land with it…he’s been saving for it.  James promises her that he’ll take her to the town, now that he’s escaped and let her go.  The next morning they ride into town only to find that the lawman has already been through.  They part ways but Molly finds out that the law thinks she’s the outlaw’s partner in crime.  She hears people talking about hanging and sets off after James, catching up with him by nightfall, demanding he turn himself in and clear her name because no man will marry her if she’s thought to be a criminal.  They are attracted to one another so really hot outlaw sex scene follows.

Great, plot advancement accomplished and first love scene is out of the way. Now I’m ready for Chapter Three.  But how in hell do I advance the conflict now?

Point of view switch to the lawman.  Carter isn’t going to be had by this poker player.  One, because it makes him look bad, and, two, because James is the illegitimate son his wife had with her lover twenty seven years ago.  When she gave birth, she died and while Carter killed the lover, the very sight of James reminds him of his loss.  Carter realizes that they are no longer on James’ trail and circles back.  Scene change, back to James and Molly and James is taking her to one of the old hideouts he used back in his outlaw days for a second love scene.  Before they get it on, he talks about the gang he was in and how he got out of the gang by turning them over to the law.  Then follow with a really good love scene.

In Chapter Four I must have a black moment, where things look they can never work out.  What is the worst that could possibly happen?

One of the outlaws that James turned in is in the hideout and after the love scene comes out and shoots at James.  But it’s just not big enough for a black moment so I’ll have to push it over the top.  James instinctively ducks out of the way but in doing so, without meaning to, allows the bullet to hit Molly instead.  James knocks the gun from the outlaw’s hand.  At the sound of gunfire, Carter is rushing to the scene; meanwhile, James and the other outlaw are facing off.  They start fighting.  James gets the upper hand but the outlaw gets to his gun, turns, points, and James is suddenly shoved to the side.  Two gunshots ring out and as the outlaw falls dead, James turns and finds Carter was shot too in the stomach.  He dies saving James.  Molly will die too unless he can get her to a physician so he picks her up and carries her out of there.  The outlaw had obviously gotten rid of the horses, so he sets off on foot with Molly bleeding in his arms.

Now that’s a great black moment.

Chapter Five starts with James standing at a fresh grave.  He puts flowers down.  Then Molly walks up and adds her own flowers to Carter’s grave.  They walk back to the room in the hotel in town and I can work in a third love scene here – when it’s over there is a knock at the door – because I do like to throw in one last small curve ball before the happily ever after.  James gets up and it’s the man that Molly was supposed to meet in Denver standing there.  He’s not very happy because he’s paid for a bride and now he’s out the money and the woman.  James, despite Molly’s protests, gives the man the money out of land savings to settle the deal.  After he’s gone, James tells Molly that they’ll just have to work hard to get the money back and buy the land together if she’ll have him.  She says she will.

And now I have the resolution and an outline for a twenty five thousand word western erotic romance.  I started in the middle of the action, had a horse chase, and have a good fight scene that ends with someone dying. Action, Adventure, Hot sex, Romance, the hero does something heroic, and a happily ever after.  I’ve well developed characters, a solid story, and three love scenes that do not mess up the story or who the characters are.

Sable Grey has been a published author since 2004, a cover artist who works in both electronic and print formats, and is a literary agent with her own company, Sable Grey, LLC.  She is also one of the owners of Cobblestone Press, an online publisher of erotic romance since 2006.  Visit her website at http://www.sablegrey.net

“Oh no, nobody in that story is me?” Have you ever heard yourself answering that way when someone ask you “Which one of you characters is you?”

Why do we say that? Why do we lie like that as writers? Why can’t we just admit that every person we create is us to a certain degree? If it because we don’t know?

Well if you are a writer that doesn’t realize that, think about this for a moment: As we go through our day, are month, our year our live, we accumulate stories—now on that I can almost feel your heads nodding. But think about this, we also accumulate characters.

Now the funny thing about that fact is that while we do this we are not simply writing what we saw (e.g., he had dirty hair, green eyes, or a smooth way about him) no, we are interpolating (not to be confused with interpreting) how that person affected us. WE are deliberately adding to that person’s real self piece of us through that person’s interaction with us or our reaction to him… so in affect… we are becoming that person to an extent.

When we create a rich full character that makes a reader respond, we are taken that minimal about of information gathered from a superficial observation or a limited contact (or years of information if we are brave enough to write about a real person) and have translated their actions through the use of our own senses and put them then on the page for other’s to share and take away their own interpretation of that person.

In the end, just like the children’s game, by the time several people have read our books, our characters become so far removed from that ‘man on the train’ or ‘woman in the store’ or ‘our sister’ ‘cousin’ etc., that we are hardly ever nailed to the wall for slander or libel but instead are asked… was that character you? This is because at the core of every character is your perception of them.

At the root of every man woman and child is your idea of why they are who they are… and thus, this makes every character we write a little bit of us. Don’t shy away from the question. Answer it proudly—oh yes, that was me, and so was this character that that one over there and this one right here… they are all little bits me and my mind at work. I designed a world for you with people I wanted you to meet. I thought you’d enjoy meeting them as much as I did when I met them the first time.

Heat up your winter nights with McGriff’s newest novel
- BLOOD RELATIONS -
The much anticipated sequel to the best seller OBSESSION 101!
“Roman is back and he’s ‘madder’ than ever!”
www.michellemcgriff.com

By Shon Bacon

How many of you guys know about NaNoWriMo? It stands for National Novel Writing Month [http://nanowrimo.org], and it’s held every November. During the month, you are to write 50,000 words toward a new project.

If you did participate, then right about now, you’re probably sitting on several thousand words toward a story. CONGRATULATIONS! Even if you didn’t hit the 50k, congrats! Why? Because whatever you wrote in November are words you didn’t have before November!

For the last five years, including this year, I have participated an “won” NaNo, but this was the first year in which I didn’t come to November 1st with a well-detailed outline in hand and characters just eager to jump onto a page and cause trials and tribulations.

Now, I ride into December with words and not a clear sense of where to go now that I don’t have the constraints of 30 days to write, write, write.

Where do I go from here? Where should YOU go from here if you’re in the same boat?

BACK to the story. Sometimes, it’s a good idea to step away from the words you have written and think about the word “story.” There are components that are necessary to have a solid story – character, conflict, tension, obstacles, resolution, etc., and if we ask ourselves a couple of questions about “our” story, then we can look at a brief sketch of the entire story, from beginning to end. This will help us to come back the words we have and start revising and adding to them in order to finish a good draft.

So, what are the questions?  There are eight.

1) Who is your main character (MC)?

2) What does the MC want?

3) What’s the main conflict that keeps the MC from getting that want?

4) What’s the event/situation that sets the MC in motion to achieve the want?

5) What are the obstacles the MC encounters, keeping him/her from the want? (Obstacles should escalate, building tension)

6) What’s the event/situation that makes the MC go “All-or-Nothing” to win the want? (This is a moment in which there is no turning back)

7) Does the MC win or lose?

What’s the effect of the win or loss on the MC?

When I’m editing my clients’ works and I find holes or gaps in their stories, I have them develop an answer for each of these questions, and then we discuss what’s missing from the story and how to apply some of these answers to the revising of the story. The questions are asked in a traditional way, meaning they have a beginning, middle, ending flow to them. However, not all stories are traditional. Some start at the end and then show the reader how that ending came to be.

The point is most, if not all, stories touch upon each of these questions, so it benefits you as the writer to analyze your story, paying attention to these questions and editing your story accordingly.

At the end of the day, you’ll be able to develop what you have already written and then continue on more confidently as you pursue your story’s conclusion

He sounded wounded and in a lot of pain. “You okay ?” he asked, trying to divert his eyes to look at him but the road curved mercilessly.

Reggie had dug round the back pack that was still in the SUV and found the cell phone but here was no signal. “Yeah, yeah,” Reggie groaned. “Watch the road. I’m okay.”

“I’m scare d Reggie. I’m scared!” Junior confessed. This was no time to joke. There was no humor in this situation at all. “I know.” Twisting wheel suddenly Junior followed the quick turning road. “This doesn’t feel familiar. I think we’re lost! I think we’re lost!” Junior panicked.

“We can’t be Junior. There’s only one road.” “No there isn’t. You weren’t driving. There were little roads that veered off. I think we veered off!” “No we didn’t!” Reggie growled while attempting to sit up in the seat.

“Shit! I wish I could see,” Junior cried out, just as a car with blinding high beams headed straight at them. “Shit!” Junior screamed twisting the wheel sharply to miss the oncoming car. The twist of the wheel caused the large vehicle to head into the shallow soft shoulder. “Oh no! We’re stuck!” Junior panicked.

“Don’t panic,” Reggie said, trying to reach for him with the arm that still worked, but missed.

Junior was opening the door.

“Stay in here!” Reggie called.

Junior ran around to the front of the car.Reggie could see Junior’s wide eyes reflecting off the headlights like a deer frozen in fear from the horrible sight he was seeing.“What?” Reggie called, lowering the window.

“We’re so stuck mannn!” Junior lamented, slapping the sides of his head.

Reggie then opened the door, dragging himself from the front seat and out of the car. He could see Junior’s eyes. They were covering him, noticing his leg dragging.

“My God Reggie, your leg…your leg is dead man. You’re dying man! Dude killed you!” Junior was freaking out.

“I’m not dying,” Reggie hedged. He didn’t know for sure if he was fact or not but now was not the time to throw Junior any deeper into already panicked state. “My shit is just sleep. I think Dude just shot me with a tranquilizer…like what he gave Julia before…”

Both boys suddenly thought about Julia at the same time. Regret caused them both to swallow thick lumps that formed in their throats. “I wish…” Reggie began.

Junior nodded, knowingly. “Me too,” Junior chimed in. Just then the car with the lights was headed back. They could see it from far away.

Junior ran around to the driver’s side and snatched open the door, quickly grabbing the cell phone from off the seat where they had been waiting to get a signal. He stood in the road waving it back and forth, knowing the reflection from the face of it would appear strobe-like—at least it work for the bus drivers back home. The car approached quickly seemingly headed towards them.

Heat up your winter nights with McGriff’s newest novel

- BLOOD RELATIONS -
The much anticipated sequel to the best seller OBSESSION 101!
“Roman is back and he’s ‘madder’ than ever!”
www.michelle mcgriff.com

Character Development Workshop – The Twelve Step Program for Avoiding Personality Disorder

By Sable Grey

Developing characters before writing may seem like a waste of time.  I know what you are thinking.  Sable, I just want to write. But being a published author isn’t just about thinking up a good story.  Sable, I just want readers to read my stories. No – not just because if that’s all you wanted you would just write your stories and offer them for free on your site.  You want to be published so readers will buy your stories and you get paid for them.  And to do that, writers must work on their craft.  Character development is part of that craft.

As a publisher, for me, one of the most irritating things to see is a manuscript that introduces two characters, and then midway through the story the characters become split personality behaving in ways that were not already established as part of who they were.  A heroine who is a go getter, no nonsense partner in a law firm that she fought to build from the ground up will not be the damsel in distress weeping in the corner when someone tries to blackmail her for money.  She also won’t be the woman who lets the hero tell her what is good for her.  By developing a character fully, the author knows the heroine and won’t make the mistake of allowing her to develop a personality disorder midway through, ruining the chance of publication.

I am starting with the heroine because many times authors are so excited about their Hugh Jackman look-alike hero that the heroine ends up being a two dimensional character – with obvious personality disorders as a result.   But the heroine is the most important character in a romance novel. Because more than 95% of romance readers are women, she is the character that the reader will most likely relate to first and who the reader will care about most in the story.  However, this process should be done for heroine AND hero.

While every author is different in how they go about developing their heroine, this is my step by step procedure for developing the leading ladies of my own books.

1. Name and physical description.  Not so much for the reader but for me to get a clear picture of the woman in my head.  So let’s name our heroine Eve.
2. Character Goals.  Every person has goals.  What are your heroine’s goals?  Does she want to start her own business?  Buy a house?  Go on a vacation and get away from a psychotic ex husband?
3. What is her motivation?  Now this is different than personal goals.  If your heroine wants to start her own business, her motivation might be to reach success so she will never have to worry about how to pay the light bill again.  The Goals are the “what”, and the motivation is the “why”.
4. What past events cause inner conflict?  She grew up in a poor household with a mother that was not allowed to work and a controlling father who told his children that nobody loves those who have nothing.  Due to depression, her mother killed herself when she was only nine.
5. What are the effects of that conflict on the heroine’s personality and life?  She married a man much like her father right out of college.  Divorced and is now a workaholic who has no time for relationships.  She is untrusting of men and looks down on women who are not as independent as she is.
6. What are her worst fears?  Unless she is a successful businesswoman she has no worth and no one will ever love her.  Yeah, deep huh?  How about this to boot, she is scared that if she doesn’t succeed it will mean she is weak like she perceives her mother was?
7. How are her fears faced in the story?  (For the hero, what must he do that is heroic when facing those fears?) Psychotic ex husband sets her new business on fire and burns down all her dreams.  He’s stalking her down and wants her dead – she’s placed in a victim situation.
8. What lesson(s) is she supposed to learn by the end of the story?  That it’s doesn’t mean she’s weak to need someone.
9. What obstacles MUST your heroine go through in the story in order for her to learn her lesson(s)?

Okay so now we have a character that readers will care about.  It’s a pretty good start.  But characters to be believable can’t be just black or white. Let’s add a little shading.

1. What is something your heroine is responsible for that has nothing to do with her goals or motivation?  So Eve, despite her struggle to prove her father wrong, goes to the old folks home to visit him every Sunday.  She talks to him about her work but never receives acknowledgement for her success because he’s not all there in his head.  And just to soften her up a bit more, Eve has a cat named CrissCross who sits in her lap while she works at her computer after she comes home.
2. Habits help make characters individuals.  A problem that many authors have is giving the same habits to all their characters.  A lot of winking back and forth at one another when they say something clever or everyone in the story can raise one eyebrow.  It becomes very silly after awhile.  Each character should have individual habits.  What are your heroine’s?  And remember not to give the same habits to another character.
3. Dialogue – this is one of my own pet peeves.  “Hey let’s go to car.” And the hero responds, “Hey that’s a good idea.”  If everyone in the manuscript sounds like the same person when the dialogue is read aloud, the characters have not been developed. What does your character sound like?  Are there certain phrases she uses often?  And remember, that people from certain different places have little phrases of their own that are fun to build your character with.

While this twelve step way of developing a character is not a full worksheet, it is a good start to use when plotting the story and working in the character’s actions and reactions to the plot and can eliminate those pesky personality disorder mistakes.

ABOUT SABLE GREY

Sable Grey has been a published author since 2004, a cover artist who works in both electronic and print formats, and is a literary agent with her own company, Sable Grey, LLC.  She is also one of the owners of Cobblestone Press, an online publisher of erotic romance since 2006.  Visit her website at http://www.sablegrey.net

Where should Authors be at?

FACEBOOK OR TWITTER

At press time, there were 250 million people on Facebook and 22.5 million people on Twitter. Based on the numbers alone, Facebook should trump Twitter. It’s interesting to note that Twitter has grown a staggering 1,382 percent since 2008. However, at least in the media, Twitter appears to be the winning social networking medium. MSNBC, CNN and Fox constantly reference their tweets from followers. Twitter account holders Oprah (@Oprah), M.C. Hammer (@McHammer), P. Diddy (@iamdiddy) and Shaquille O’Neal (@The_Real_Shaq) each have over one million followers on Twitter.

When I posed the question “Why do you love Twitter or Facebook?” to my followers, 70 percent of the respondents indicated a preference for Facebook.

Here are two of the Twitter responses:

1. @Free2Bee: “I enjoy both. It’s just that FB feels more personal, I only associate with those I know. Twitter allows me 2 follow people.”

2. @KayfromNJ: “Facebook is preferred by most of my friends. They love to post photos and update their wall. I love Twitter because you can receive quick updates of the people you follow, celebrities, new organizations, etc. It is short and quick. You can respond and sometimes get a response.”

When I posed the question to Dee Stewart (@deegospel) of DeeGospelPR.com, publicist and social media adviser, “Facebook vs. Twitter?” she responded, “Do not ignore either one. Wherever the people are you need to go there and engage them.”

It’s fairly easy to assume that Facebook is for people looking to reconnect with old friends and family members or find new friends online. Twitter helps you create conversations and grab ideas in 140 characters or less. Also, it allows you to update others, letting them know what you’re doing at any given moment.

So who wins the social networking battle royale?

It remains to be seen if Facebook or Twitter will be crowned king of social networking. But with the tools and applications being developed for both social networks, the real winner is US.  Because we can reach our audience using either.  My suggestion is use both Twitter and Facebook..L martin johnson pratt, martin@rollingout.com, twitter.com/iluvblackwomen, facebook.com/iluvblackwomen

They key to creating interesting realistic characters is to use what you have at hand. For many busy writers, we find the internet to be our windows to the outdoors. We read our current, national, local, celebrity and odd news there. From these articles we can create colorful characters.

Characters for many fiction writers are a conglomeration of my ‘types’ of people the author has come in contact with. For fiction writers, we seek to stay pretty far from reality when gathering our ‘types’ in that we try not to simply take one person and perfectly remake them on paper. Often we take ‘parts’ of people on a bus to create on fascinating multifaceted character—on a train. Many of my readers have enjoyed my dimensional characters. Strangely enough… those characters seem to be secondary characters. I think it’s because for me as a writer, I tend to focus on the back story a little more than the actual main story—kind of like—sleight-of-hand. I want my readers to feel at home with the neighborhood, and so I draw up rich background characters.

As I write this blog, I will show my minds process on character creation, in the end I will have created a character that I can use in a book. I’ll show you my process for characters creation and how I make this technique work in my fiction writing

ABOUT

California transplant Michelle McGriff now writes using the lush green backdrop of the Great Northwest as her muse.

Known to her family as the `best of storytellers’, Ms. McGriff spins intelligent, poignant, and touching yarns, with a poetic voice and writing that has become hers to keep, holding her readers captive from start to finish.

She excitedly became a part of the Kensington Publications, joining first Q-boro Books in 2005 and then Urban Soul in 2005. With this opportunity to shine, she hoped to entertain a new audience with her rule-breaking, cross-genre writing style that is sure to entertain the enlightened reader.

In 2006, she joined the ranks of Best Selling Author with her contribution of Secret Lovers and has held the status each year with entertaining reads.

While working towards her PhD in Organizational Management (which she will use as a corporate trainer / cultural competency workshop facilitator) Ms. McGriff is also working on a guidebook that will help business writers with visual communication in the workplace, as well as new fiction writers who want to realize their dreams while avoiding some of the pitfalls common to newcomers to the industry. As an advocate of self publishing, Ms. McGriff will focus much research on self publishing for new writers.

Am I Just His Jump Off?

A Reader’s Question:

I have a friend who randomly met this guy at a party.  My friend and this guy talked over the phone for a while before they decided to see each other a second time.  They decided to meet at his home to watch movies.  While she was there, they had sex.  Now just to remind you again, this is only the SECOND time my friend has seen this dude.  Well, after all this went down, this guy started trippin’ and telling my friend that they shouldn’t have ever had sex, and that they shouldn’t see each other again.  BUT in the same breath, he would change his mind, and tell her to come back over so that they can have sex again.  My friend decided to go back and have sex with this guy again.  Not surprisingly, the guy did the same thing again by telling her that they shouldn’t have sex.

What’s up with this situation?  Why can’t this dude make up his mind?  Do you think my friend made a big mistake by having sex with him in the first place?
My Advice:

I receive good questions every day, but I have actually been waiting for a question like this for a while.  Ladies, listen up, because I am about to school you on exactly how men think in these types of situations.  I previously broke down the different stages that men go through when dating; the dog stage, the player stage and the looking for love stage.  It sounds like this guy was either in the player or dog stage.  Most likely he’s in the dog stage.  It’s 100% obvious that the guy didn’t want anything more from your friend than sex.  If you’re not sure what a man’s intentions are towards you are, look out for certain signs, like he never wants to go out in public with you.  A good example would be, he always wants to just chill in the crib and “watch movies”.   If a man is really feeling you, he won’t have a problem taking you out every once in a while.  Another red flag is only calling you late at night after parties (booty call hours).  If you’ve never been invited to hang out with his friends, he isn’t feeling you.

Men rate women to their friends, and it’s often on a scale of 1-10.  That’s just what we do it, whether we admit it to you or not.  We’re not being disrespectful.  We just want to know how our friends view you.  Most men want, and often need, their friends’ approval of a female that they are going to take seriously.  If you’re not at least an 8 in their friends’ eyes, don’t expect the guy to be showing you off anytime soon.  This may seem harsh, but again, I’m just keeping it real.

I can’t be mad at the guy in this situation though.  These types of men are going to do whatever the woman lets him get away with.  If he calls her every Friday night at 2:45, after the club lets out (where he probably got 3 or 4 different numbers), and the girl decides to come over, that’s her stupidity.

No man is going to buy a cow he really doesn’t want, if he’s already getting the milk for free.  Some women have these one-night stands, and wonder why men aren’t trying to wife them up.  Let’s be real.  Men put women into three categories; wifey material, friend with benefits or jump off.  It’s that simple.  It’s up to the woman to dictate which category you allow yourself to be put into.  Some guys are going to be mad at me for this, but women need to stop giving it up so easily.  Have some respect for yourself, and maybe then, men will start respecting you.

Hopefully, I’ve shed some light on this subject for you.

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ABOUT

Dedan Tolbert is the award-winning author of best selling novel, “The Love We Had…” and critically acclaimed advice book, “Ask Dedan” Sex, Dating & Relationships-Vol I.

“The Dedan Tolbert Show” airs weeknights at 9pm on The TB&D Radio Network and can be heard live by logging onto his social network, DedansPlace.net or calling 646-200-0366.

Dedan can be contacted with questions and comments at askdedan@gmail.com or Dedansplace.net