Yet We Sleep, We Dream has been my writerly obsession for the past two years. Now, in the aftermath of launch, I’m only just daring to move forward with my life without those quirky characters living in my head.

I no longer go to bed thinking of obsolete dishwashers on spaceships. Or wake up wondering why Damian treats Helena so badly. Sometimes I still question how sustainable it is to send people into space, but maybe in this fictional Shakespeare-inspired future, someone’s come up a solution for clean, renewable rocket fuel 🤞

Anyway, this excerpt is from the first serious on-page coupling in the novel. My challenge was to figure out how to weave in erotic tension without being so explicit. Not that there’s anything wrong with explicit, not at all. But Titania and Olek (my reimagined Lysander from the original Midsummer play) dally in that limnial space of waking dreams.

And, at least in my experience, sex in dreams is never what it seems.

He twirls a coloured oil-stick between his fingers, and licks his lips as he traverses her naked body. Eyes fixed on her, he reaches for his woody paper and begins to sketch. And what innocent eyes he has—so pure and trusting, so unaware he sits in the presence of a god-queen.

When he’s done, he beholds his colourful record: an elegant version of her likeness in full, interpreted by his senses and sinews. He smudges her pastelled hair with a red-stained finger. Titania kneels between his legs.

She tips his chin and surprises him with a kiss, giggling into his mouth at the boldness of it. She was supposed to be a hallucination, but now just look at that …

And look at him. He can’t resist. He’s hard the way men harden to her delicious invitation.

She brings his hand to her breast. In his incredulous gaze, she senses the song of his names: Olek. Oleksandr. Kovy. Ollie. Hey, man. Kiddo. It hums between the beats of his mortal heart, whistles in the blood that courses through him, warming him under her touch. Such modest names for a creature to call itself, especially when he’s not so modestly endowed.

“So real,” he murmurs, running red-stained thumbs across her taut nipples.

With his willingness, Titania undresses him for closer examination. He is indeed a specimen to adore. She lowers herself onto his lap, piercing herself upon him in the most exquisite way, her own chaos awakening inside her.

“Mm, so are you, it seems.” She picks up the oil-stick and runs her tongue across it. Then clasping it in his hands, she presses the tip to her chest. “Come, delightful mortal, let’s see how good you are.”

She raises and lowers herself on him, savouring the slide and stretch of him inside her and the pressure deep within. She undulates her hips, telling him with her sex the story of plasma and rock, tide and lightning, and a cradle of fire in which her world was nurtured.

A man possessed, Olek draws sanguineous marks across her skin while she fucks him. The oil stains pulse and glow and chant their vigour in a primal tongue. He teeters on the brink of chaos, held in stasis and lost to pleasure while slashing at Titania’s body. When at last she lets him climax, he drops the oil-stick and clutches her hips. His desperation is the true work of art.

Read the rest of Yet We Sleep, We Dream

When an alien dust contaminates the starship Athenia, the veil between realms begins to fray. Old gods of a long dead planet resume their own romantic bickering while ancient magic wreaks havoc across the ship. Grudges resurface, friends turn to enemies, unrequited love turns to passion — or does it? It's kinda hard to tell with everyone at each other's throats.

Gentles, perchance you wonder at this show; but wonder on, till truth make all things plain. Yet We Sleep, We Dream is a romantic space-fantasy inspired by Shakespeare's endearing hot mess, A Midsummer Night's Dream.

This novel is available in ebook and paperback from a bunch of retailers.

Rude can be good …

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