Wow! My date with Phillip is accruing hits with amazing speed. I guess you can read it as a stand alone, and some people must have at least opened it with that in mind because too many people have opened it to have just been those who've read the earlier chapters.

Also, the last blog, Thoughts on Femdom, got a huge number of hits.

Maybe it's just the title.

And how did it end up in a discussion of Janis Joplin?

I first thought I would wait a day or two before posting the next chapter. I figured folks would need some time to digest dinner. =) But I think some momentum has been generated and that I should just let the serious readers plunge ahead. I think this chapter should remove any doubt about whether or not Michael/Sara is a wimp of the kind who might be tricked into submission, like VT's husbands (BTW, if you've never read Jack and Jill, which I believe was her first, you should seek it out - It's the prototype for the stories that have followed but it's rather more raw and passionate).

If you want to understand what this story is about, read what Geoff writes in response to individual chapters and blog posts. IMO, he's got it nailed, and far better than I could have myself. It's amazing what fresh eyes can see.

Here are some samples

"IMO 'Symphony' is primarily about the stresses a deep relationship suffers when one partner finds it necessary to change who they are. Or, perhaps more accurately, to assert who they've always been but suppressed. Right through the story the reader is never really sure what the outcome might be. Both sides in the relationship make mistakes. Kelly Ann explores the mistakes and the responses to them. The final answer always remains in doubt."

Or this

"It isn't fluff; it isn't one-handed fiction; it isn't, except in a very loose way, fem-dom. It is a love story; it is a description of the struggles and compromises two people have to negotiate in order for their relationship to work. . ."

"The whole point of fiction is to describe change. For that reason alone it's unwise to judge a complete story on the strength of a few line in an early chapter. Change is all. It's just how the change affects the characters that remains in doubt until the end. Isn't that how it should be?"

Yes that is how it should be and that is what I intended. Still, I flew too close to the femdom sun and for some my wings seem to have melted and their interest plunged into the sea. I hope that garbled metaphor makes sense.

I guess I better post the next chapter in my continuing quest to establish this on the dry land of serious fiction, although it is surrounded by a sea of femdom.

Whatever.