Filed under: Writing Craft, Influences, No Politics Just Alien Sex 

Let me start by saying this before anyone gets their panties in a twist: Abducted Love is not political. It's not woke. It's not a commentary on current events. It's about aliens who really, REALLY want to control humanity's future through our bloodlines. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, and sometimes a breeding program is just an excuse to write steamy sex.

That said, every story comes from somewhere, and mine came from the weirdest threesome of influences you could imagine.

The X-Files: Because Aliens Made Me Do It

Gen-X kids, where you at? Remember spending the 90s convinced the government was hiding aliens while simultaneously crushing on both Mulder AND Scully? Just me? Lies.

The X-Files gave me the mythology backbone of Abducted Love. Aliens experimenting on humans? Check. Secret breeding programs? Check. Government conspiracies? Check. Sexual tension you could cut with a scalpel? DOUBLE CHECK.

But where Chris Carter blue-balled us for nine seasons, I decided to ask the important question: What if the aliens weren't subtle about it? What if instead of mysterious abductions and missing time, they just straight-up said, "Hey, we need you to breed. Here's your compatible partner. The bedroom's that way. Chop chop."

The grey aliens in my book aren't hiding in the shadows. They're project managers with quotas to hit and zero time for human emotional complexity.

The Handmaid's Tale: Equal Opportunity Victimhood

Okay, deep breath. I KNOW mentioning this book makes people think I'm making a Statement. I'm not. What fascinated me about Atwood's dystopia wasn't the politics but the THEME: what happens when choice gets stripped away from reproduction?

Here's where I flipped the script: In Abducted Love, BOTH Jessie and Eric are victims. Neither of them signed up for this. Eric isn't some privileged commander getting his jollies: he's just as trapped, just as manipulated, just as violated by the situation.

They're two people forced together by circumstances beyond their control, trying to find humanity and connection in an inhuman situation. The power dynamic isn't male/female: it's human/alien. They're equals in their captivity, which makes their growing feelings way more interesting than "Stockholm Syndrome in Space."

Sophie's Choice: Because I'm Evil

If you haven't ugly-cried through this movie, first of all, what's wrong with you? Second, go watch it immediately.

The heart of Sophie's Choice is exactly that - an impossible decision between two things you love. At the climax of Abducted Love, Jessie faces her own version: freedom for herself, or staying with Eric who literally cannot leave. Door Number One: Resume your life, try to forget this happened, abandon the man you've grown to love. Door Number Two: Give up everything you've known for an uncertain future with someone you met under the worst possible circumstances.

No good answer. No villains to blame. Just the horrible weight of choosing between two different kinds of love - love for yourself and your autonomy, or love for another person.

(Don't worry, this is romance. I'm not THAT evil. But she doesn't know that when she's making the choice.)

The Beautiful Frankenstein Baby (*SPOILERS AHEAD*)

Somehow these three influences had a literary threesome and produced Abducted Love. It's got:

• Alien conspiracies (with just a third the government paranoia)
• Reproductive control (without the political preaching)
• Impossible choices (without the devastating ending)

Plus a lot of really creative alien anatomy scenarios that definitely weren't in ANY of the source material.

Look, I write escape fiction. But even escape fiction comes from somewhere. These three stories shaped how I thought about consent, choice, connection, and what happens when people find love in impossible circumstances.

I just added more orgasms and a happy ending. Because that's how I roll.