A message from Camille Langtry: A New Book and More

Dear readers,

First and foremost, I’d like to apologise for the lack of new content and my (inexcusable) neglect of this wonderful blog. There are several reasons for this, ranging from “real life” (AKA laziness) to a shortage of original ideas.

In my defence, though, I’ve spent some of my newly freed-up time writing longer transformation fiction again, and I now have a backlog of finished, nearly finished, and half-baked stories.

If you’ve read my earlier novellas and stories posted here, you’ll know my favourite themes and tropes: realistic social and cultural downgrades, being stuck as someone you’re impersonating, and role-swapping. Lady-to-maid stories fit neatly into these categories, but there are other ways to explore these themes, too.

My upcoming novel, Living As Her: Becoming the Woman She Invented, does just that. Its premise is unusual and has nothing to do with ladies or maids, as the blurb explains:

Mara Voss has spent thirty years being overlooked. Then she meets Julian Ashcombe — shipping heir, beautiful, attentive, interested in her as no one has ever been. There is only one difficulty. Julian loves trans women. And Mara is not one.

So she tells him she is.

What begins as a costume — a borrowed word, a prop pill bottle, a performance assembled from forums and late nights — hardens, step by irreversible step, into something she cannot take off. To be what she has claimed, and safe from the one examination that would end everything, she goes further than she ever imagined she would. By the time she understands the cost — to her body, to the women who took her in as a sister, to the one friend who still remembers the girl she used to be — the lie is no longer something she tells. It is her passport, her reflection, the word the whole world reaches for without a second thought.

Unsparing and mesmerising, Living as Her is a novel about desire, performance, and the terrible patience of a trap that closes one quiet door at a time — and about what is left of a person when the self she invented is the only self anyone will ever believe.

Of all the books I’ve published, this one is probably closest to Act Your Age. It’s heavy on medical detail, the “stuck” element is psychologically devastating, and the story is quite bleak, with no one to root for (though no clear villains, either).

It’s definitely not for everyone, but if you enjoy long-form transformation fiction that emphasises social and cultural change, you may find it interesting.

I’ll share the link to the book as soon as it’s available, which should be sometime in the next couple of weeks.

No spoilers just yet, but after Living as Her, I intend to publish two lady-to-maid novels: one based on the idea explored on this blog, and another built around a completely new premise. I also plan to post substantial portions of both novels here on the blog in due course.

Watch this space!