DeeCee wrote and asked me to help her find a book, but in doing so made me ponder the presence of piercings in romance novels:
I read an erotic book awhile back (1-3 years, I think) that featured a hero with a tongue piercing. I remember absolutely nothing about it, but that and that it was contemporary. On a side note, do you know of many romance books featuring tongue piercings? I can’t find many when I do an amazon or a google search.
Aside from the erotica novel DeeCee is looking for, with the dude who has a tongue piercing, there aren’t many novels that I can recall which specifically mention piercings. In Gleason’s Gardella series, the source of all the Venator’s power is a piercing ring with a cross made of silver which women wear in their navels and the dudes wear in their nipples (ow) and I remember thinking, “Whoa, that’s interestingly risky. Nipple rings in an historical novel? Dude.”
But contemporaries? I haven’t read any contemporary novels that mentioned piercings outright, erotica or otherwise. Tattoos are becoming more common in romance novels, but piercings aside from ears? That’s somewhat rare. I wonder why that is, because in my own experience, I know plenty of people who have tiny nose studs, lip rings, belly rings, and multiple ear piercings as well. Anyone got any books they’d recommend which feature piercings?
Not that it helps at the moment, but my current WIP features a pierced/tattooed hero. I’m excited about it. *g* Hopefully it’ll see the light of day. 🙂
Just a quick caveat for those who want to test the erotic possibilities of body piercings, either in writing or in real life:
I was recently told by someone “in the know” about a real-life m/m pairing that ended in the emergency room when the tongue piercing of the first party became inextricably entangled with the genital piercing of the second party.
It’s all fun and games until somebody loses a… well, you know.
I have so totally read a lot of erotica showcasing pierced individuals. 🙂 I’ve had a rummage through my gay erotica ebook collection for you all.
There’s a series by Willa Okati. Starting with In the Strangest Places.
Also Laney Cairo – Bad Case of Loving You. (excellent book)
Toybox: Piercing edited by M Rode. (short stories – I’ve not read this one but have enjoyed some of the others in the “Toy Box” series)
Switched by Sean Michael. (m/m and m/m, fantasy erotica)
Secrets, Skin and Leather – Sean Michael.
Gemini – Chris Owen. (“twincest”)
Keep You – Cindy Rosenthal. (a little on the dark side)
Indeed. Compare the tattooing of domestic livestock with ownership reference numbers (like ear-tagging or branding; slaves were also sometimes branded, and not only in Classical Antiquity). Tattooing people for reference purposes also has some very, very grim 20thC associations.
I am fairly implacably opposed to physical mutilation of both animals and humans, but don’t mind me. I do have pierced ears, but I had that done when young and thoughtless. 😀
Hmmm…thank you all for the recommendations. Some of them I recognize, but the book is still elusive.
I just remember loving that the author had the hero with a tongue piercing. I remember that he was big on tats as well.
That can definitely happen. When I had my tongue piercing done, the piercer warned to be careful with other piercings. My bff had her tongue done as well, and less than 2 weeks later had to go to the emergency room b/c her boyfriend’s row of prince albert piercings had gotten caught on her’s. Pain was abundant.
This is slightly OT, but AGTigress, I was wondering where you came across the facts you cite on piercing/tattooing in the ancient world? Any books I should read? I’m just curious about the subject.
The only piercings in fiction I’ve come across have already been mentioned—the vis bulla, Sandtiger in Jennifer Roberson’s books, Seth in Wicked Lovely. . . I tend to read more fantasy than erotic stuff, I guess. But all the books I’ve mentioned were great!
Jake and Tor from Bareback and Natural Disasters (M/M) also had genital piercing (their form of wedding rings)
And Bent by Sean Michael also has multiple piercings and tats. (M/M and bdsm)
Straight romances are far less likely to have body piercing or tats. I can’t think of any that include anything other than ears.
Kimberly, I’m afraid I can’t give you straightforward, individual references. I have been a professional Classical archaeologist and museum curator for over 45 years, so some of my comments above are simply things that I have gleaned from many different sources, both ancient and modern, and have known for a long time. It is not a subject that I have studied specifically, though I have worked and published on the wider topic of Graeco-Roman erotic art.
Because of the recent (last 25 years or so) increasing popularity of tattooing and piercing, I am sure there are many books now (and websites, I assume) about the history of these practices, though I suspect that many of them lack academic rigour.
Sorry I can’t be more helpful. 🙁
Gemma already suggested Toyboax: Piercing. I’m one of the authors.
Toybox: Sounds has one of my stories with the same characters, who are both multiply pierced.
I write a lot of pierced characters in my stuff. Of my own:
Nikolai has a couple of pierced characters. The sequel has our anti-hero getting pierced as well. (futuristic)
“Paying Forfeits,” and “Singing up the Moon” both have a character with a nipple ring.
There’s a fairly lengthy piercing scene in “Color of Magic/Color of Money.” (contemporary/paranormal)
Piercings are not ahistorical. Nipple rings were very much in vogue in the Victorian era. mothers would generally pierce their daughters when they started to blossom.
And I see a LOT of body-mod in the gay community, especially at Pride, where all the men are walking around shirtless. Nipples started coming into vogue in the 80s and drifted to the straights. I know guys with septum rings and tongue barbells and snakebites and you name it.
my word: straight24…uh, Not EVEN.
There are a couple of Blazes by Cindi Myers about siblings who own a tattoo shop (Do Me Right is the sister’s story, Good, Bad…Better is the brother’s). I don’t remember if either had piercings, but I remember liking both stories quite a bit.
I haven’t finished reading all the comments but I just gotta say…ya’ll are causing me to speculate about oral sex and tongue piercings. Huh…never thought about that one before.
And there’s a space regency subgenre? C’mon, y’all made that one up!
On a slightly related note: this 40 something person had her first interview last year with a young person with a pierced eyebrow. Did my best not to stare…have conventional pierced ears myself.
I loved Lora Leigh’s Dangerous Games and was thrilled to see a hero with a penis piercing! Very edgy.
To blow my own horn: my hero in Out of Control has a tat and the heroine a navel ring. One of my heroes in an as yet unpubbed book has a pierced foreskin (it’s a sign of his royalty). All of my heroes have at least a tat and my heroines usually do too. I think they’re erotic as hell!!!
OT, but personally, I have 4 tats, with plans for at least 2 more and have a nipple, navel, and ears pierced.
smartmensabitch: Not made up, JL Langley’s My Fair Captain is actually a fair read (ha, I made a punny!). I wasn’t sure it would be, it all sounded a bit odd but I took a chance and ended up really liking it. Space regency, who’d have thunk it?
spaminator word: looked84 Dear god I hope not!
This is one of those “Real Life impinging on what I find romantic and/or erotic” things, but my son was told he should avoid tongue piercing because it would endanger his health. He was born with a congenital heart defect and had three major surgeries by the time he was 3. He will be 23 next week and has been told over the years he can do pretty much whatever he wants to do, but tongue piercings were definitely on the Don’t Do Ever list. Unlike the ears or the nipples or navel, the tongue is an organ, and the likelihood of infection in the mouth is much higher than those piercings on the outside of the body. So every time I read of a character in a book or see someone in RL, I cringe. I know that this is my issue, but it’s definitely not something I can ignore.
OTOH, another son has a number of tattoos, so I’ve come to appreciate those. One of the most beautiful photos I’ve ever seen was on a pamphlet from the American Museum of Natural History in New York. They had an exhibit on body adornment, and the photo is of a Japanese rickshaw driver holding his baby. All you can see is his torso, but it is entirely covered with tattoos that look like a classical Japanese painting of waves and fish (evidently it was a tradition for rickshaw drivers to get tattoos). The contrast of his beautiful artistically enhanced skin with the infant’s smooth glowing baby skin is lovely. Plus the man had a nipple ring—don’t know if those were traditional too.
I have a Loose Id multiple-m tale coming up in which one of the m’s has “hafada” or scrotal piercings. (Don’t squirm too much. It’s only the skin that’s pierced. Yeah, I can hear guys saying, “Only?”)
BTW, nipple piercings on men can be damned HAWT. Depends on the chest, of course. (I have characters coming up with those, too.) Check out the interwebs if you don’t believe me! 😉
Another vote for My Fair Captain; the Prince Albert took me by surprise, but in a good way. Gay Regency in space…hee! And I agree, it was a pretty decent book compared to some of the other m/m romance/erotica crapola out there.
One other point about Roman culture, if anyone is interested: circumcision was also a mutilation associated with ‘foreign barbarians’, and ‘decircumcision’ surgery to restore the semblance of a prepuce was available.
I can recommend A Hell of a Yarn as a lovely story with assorted piercings.
(It’s m/m, and if stories featuring real people squick you, it’s also a pop fandom AU. However, as it’s an AU, it’s also pretty much self-contained and you don’t need to know anything about the source to enjoy it.)
(My captcha is ‘looking18’. Ha! I wish 🙂
I agree with that. Most young women who get them really do NOT take good care of them. They end up rejecting (duh, its a surface piercing, it isn’t like piercing your ears! you silly girls!) or being really gross. I’ve seen some horrifying pictures on bme and ack, its just scary.
I only have one “weird” piercing, and that is my septum. I got it almost 2 years ago (when I was 19). I really have never read a romance novel where either the male or female lead has a septum ring. Where is the septum love?
I would love to see more male characters with facial piercings. I don’t care about the tongue piercings too much, but why not something nifty like an eyebrow ring, a septum ring, or a labret? All of those are so freaking sexy on a guy I swoon just thinking about them.
And on the subject of tattoos – usually guys have something on their arm or something small and “tough man.” Where are the big giant pieces that take up space? What about women with lots of ink? That seems to be one thing that is really weird in our culture – its normal for a woman to get a tramp stamp or butterflies, but there are never women who have more than some crappy cutesy thing. Rawr.
Okay, must stop typing now, I could go on and on about this stuff, lol.
For those who are intrigued by the idea of Regency in Space, you have to read the Liaden Universe books by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller (http://www.korval.com/liad.htm). No piercings or tats, though, but really great stuff. 🙂
O_o I’ve never met a straight dude with a tongue piercing. Trufax. I don’t think I would believe the hero of romance novel was straight if his tongue was pierced, either. His name could be Straighty McNotgay and I would still have difficulty believing his heterosexuality.
Can I give a medical perspective…? Beyond that of the pain and infection issues…
Although body piercings may be a fashionable form of self-expression; in medical, and especially psychiatric circles, body piercings are widely regarded to equate to sexual promiscuity (more risks, more partners, etc).
Personally, I’m not a fan. Professionally, I’ve had to extract quite a manky few…
You might not be running in the same crowd as the pierced folk then, lol. An ex of mine had a pierced tongue and he was definitely not gay.
Shae said:
What’s a ‘tramp stamp’?
I have frequently seen young women with enormous and elaborate tattoos; literally just this morning I saw one who had one leg covered with polychrome designs (lots of green and yellow as well as black, blue and red) from ankle to knee (probably hadn’t got round to getting her left leg done yet), both arms completely covered with designs, some random motifs on her midriff and upper belly, which, of course, were on public view, and a gigantic, hideous red rose above each breast. No doubt there was more under what clothing she had deigned to put on. I agree that such a degree of coverage is still fairly unusual, but even single visible motifs – the roses and butterflies and other ‘girly’ images – are now far more likely to be 4 inches across than one inch. At least, that’s the case here in London.
I am also very struck by the ‘it’s normal’ statement in the quotation from Shae’s post above, because I have no doubt it is true, and this is such a revolution from even thirty years ago that it is remarkable. Both tattooing and piercing have been around a long time even in our cultures, but they used to be a minority taste with some rather complex, occasionally contradictory, social symbolism. In any case, they were often hidden in normal everyday life, personal secrets to be revealed only to intimates, within a private circle. I can even understand the appeal of that.
As they approach the point, today, where they are the norm, chosen by the majority, the average, the members of the common herd, and are placed on open view to every passer-by, I wonder if there will be a backlash in the future, in which the total absence of tribal mutilations will mark out those who want to show individuality and independence of mind?
I guess I’m just too practical. I’ve occasionally thought of getting a small tat in an inconspicuous place, just for me. But for some of this stuff, including the large tats and piercings, I look at these kids (and usually it is kids though not always) and think, “and what will that look like when she’s 60 and fluffy and saggy…”
Not to mention what a PA would look like on a wrinkled, baggy 70 year old…
Eeeuwww.
I’m being kind of mean, but basically (pulling this from bmezine.com’s wiki) – “Tramp Stamp” is a derogatory term for lower back tattoos on women. The term originally applied to lower quality, often flash based designs (simple tribal work, butterflies, kanji, and so on) that were displayed seemingly to attract attention to partial nudity and to emphasize sexual availability, but the term can also be used to apply to all lower back tattoos that ride on the pant-line. – (click here for the page).
I see a lot of gorgeous large tattoos in real life, but never see them in books. Its a shame.
Ooh, I love the idea of that. I’d say that would be so far in the future, but it’d be interesting to read. It kind of reminds me of a YA series by Scott Westerfeld (Uglies) where everyone has plastic surgery and in certain cities its cool or trendy to look like you haven’t had all that work done.
Also – apologies to anyone sick of reading comments by me, I love this kind of stuff so I can’t help but speak up. 😀
eaeaea: I think psychiatry probably needs to update its perspective just a bit. I think it’s more common than we know, because a lot of it is so hidden. But then, I’m not in the ER, extracting strange things from weird places, so what do I know.
AgTigress: A “tramp stamp” is the tattoo women get (guilty) in the small of their back. Apocryphally, supposedly prostitutes used to tattoo themselves or be tattooed there to indicate their profession. Some of us just think it’s a sexy place to be tattooed.
And my tattoos aren’t there to look good. They’re to mark certain points in my life in indelible ways (my first child, my personal philosophy, my sexuality) and I have never for a single instant regretted any of them. I’m not worried about what they’ll look like when I’m seventy, because they’ll be a part of me, like my wrinkles and age spots, and will show what a fabulous life I’ve led.
And having seen a PA on a number of old guys, they look great, too. It’s all in how you wear it and how you use it and how much a part of you it’s become. If you feel uncomfortable with it, you’re going to look like a dork, even if you look like Brad Pitt.
Tara Janzen has a hero that’s tatted all up his back, and a heroine with a lightning bolt tattoo down her body in her “Crazy” series.
Tats and piercings don’t to much for me IRL but I like how they are used in some books to give a character an edge.
I have to say that it suprises me that alot of people…
1. don’t see a lot of straight men with tongue piercings…maybe b/c its a younger generation thing (but i am 28 and know quite a few guys that have them—-who are all white collar so maybe you wouldnt notice?!?)
2. dont know what a “tramp stamp” is…or maybe its just the term? I have one….that i got when i was 20….tattoo on my lower back (along with a few other ones that i can hide).
I am also in the medical field but i think for the most part if you are clean and have good hygiene there normally isnt a problem with piercings unless something unusual occurs (like the above mentioned). My best friend works as an ER nurse and we swap stories a lot. SHe doesnt come across too many piercing incidents. Its more insertion incidents if you get my drift.
I loved my belly button ring and never had the first problem with it. It’s gone now because I’m pregnant, but I’m hoping once everything is somewhat back in its proper place (haHA! wishful thinking!), I can wear it again. My belly looks so weird and naked without it. Of course it looks weird anyway, having reached gargantuan proportions.
The heroine in my debut (Unleashed, April ‘09, Samhain) has one. She did it to celebrate her divorce. 🙂
I’ve promised myself a second tattoo when I sell my first book.
Yes! I got mine after accomplishing something very…extraordinary that I thought I could never do.
The heroine of my book (coming out in October!) has a “tramp stamp” and she poses nude for a painting.
The hero of a different book (long shoved back in my hard drive) has a full-color back tattoo of a western-type fire-breathing dragon. The flames wrap around one arm to his elbow and the tail wraps around the opposite leg to his knee.
This is a fabulous site: Inked Inc. (very Flash heavy site, totally safe for work otherwise), about tattooed professionals. I’m going to pose, when we can connect our schedules.
Thanks to those who defined ‘tramp stamp’ for me. Naturally I am very familiar with lower-back tattoos: one sees them everywhere, frequently revealed by very low and skin-tight nether garments, but I didn’t know the term. Of course, ‘tramp’ has a different meaning in British English, and even though I understand the American definition, I simply didn’t make the connection. In earlier generations, a visible tattoo of any kind on a female tended to be associated with ladies of easy virtue: visible markers of that kind had associations with those who were outside the mainstream of society.
This underlines my point about the future, now that these practices are evidently becoming mainstream, at least in North America and parts of Europe. The urge to be different, to stand out in some way, is quite a natural one, so once the skin-patterns and metal hardware are universal, some other indicators will be found. Especially if skin markings were to become compulsory, imposed by an authoritarian government. This may not be quite as improbable as you might think. Tattooed numbers, implanted bar-coded microchips, things that identify an individual permanently, whether they wish it or not, would have a strong appeal to some administrations, and would be justified by their usefulness in fighting crime and terrorism. Fingerprinting has been with us a long time: iris scans and DNA databases are rising stars of the movement to have every individual numbered and docketed. The moment when every newborn babe is officially tattooed with its permanent, lifelong identity number may not be far away…
😉 😀
Or, the straight folk.
Dude, I’m 28, too. I just apparently only know gay people, LOL.
Sarah, thank you for the link to Inked Inc – a most interesting and well planned site. Considering the time and expense (and, presumably, discomfort) that extensive tattoos must represent, why do you think the general artistic standard is so mediocre? The very best have a kind of naive folk-art charm, like flower-painted furniture, but a high proportion are, to my eyes, fairly ugly patterns in themselves, and often remarkably banal. There was only one design – a monochrome one – shown in that gallery of pictures that I thought had some intrinsic artistic merit, but in my view, it would still have looked better somewhere other than on a bloke’s arm!
🙂
I think in some ways the backlash has already started – to wit, the term “tramp stamp.”
AgTigress, well, it’s all in your perspective, I guess. I’m not personally a big fan of “typical” tattoo design, and I’ve seen a lot of these tattoos elsewhere, so a lot of them are definitely stock images. (Mine are not, FWIW.) But I think Marissa’s and Sarah’s tattoos were beautiful on Inked Inc.
There are some stunning tattoos out there. I really think it’s a generational thing. So I don’t think we’re really going to agree! 😉
Not just generational, though that is one important element that affects perceptions. Taste in graphic design and art is also very variable and personal. So, no, I’m afraid we won’t agree! On the other hand, people have a perfect right to bedizen themselves with coloured ink or metal rings and studs, if it gives them pleasure.
🙂