One of those questions we romance authors get asked is how we come up with our ideas. Those of us who write the racy stuff are often questioned as to whether we "do research." Well, I can only reply that it's all pretty much a matter of imagination, and some of us are just born with more active ones. I learned just how independent and wild my own imagination is a few weeks back, when I had an unusual dream.

There was a guy in this dream, and his name was Jeff Eisen.

I have never known anyone by that name. Eisen makes me think of Rich, the ESPN guy. I've known a couple of Jeffs, I guess, but I have no idea why my brain made such a point of my knowing this fellow's name. I admit that when I got up, I Google-Imaged "Jeff Eisen," wondering if something supernatural was afoot and I'd find a photo of the guy I dreamt about.

I didn't. The Jeff Eisen in my dream was in his mid-20s (yes, young enough to be my offspring), blond and blue eyed-and boyishly handsome. He worked at a McDonalds, supposedly, although while the dream partially took place there, Jeff didn't do any work and also wore a very snappy suit rather than a burger-flipper outfit. From the dialogue in this dream, it was obvious the guy had a 140+ IQ; he was eloquent and well read, and at one point brought out a college lit paper he'd written that was brilliant. (I learned his full name from the paper; up till then he was just "Jeff.") He also had a rapier wit and an immense vocabulary. I am putty in the hands of a guy like this.

But the quality that really made him magnetic was his self-confidence. I've never met a man in real life who was so totally cocksure, and that term is a perfect fit for Jeff Eisen. I got a strong sense he was attracted to me, but more than that, I was certain he knew how interested I was in him. For some reason that was really a turn-on.

Jeff was something of a modern version of the villain of my new book, except for the fact that he seemed to be a good guy. (Of course, villains will do that from time to time.) The point is, this fellow that my imagination concocted, utterly without my volitional control, comes from the same place that turns out my more deliberately invented erotic heroes. I suppose Jeff Eisen would likewise have to be considered "my invention," but you know how dreams are...they sure can seem to have their own independent reality. (Hence my feeling that Mr. Eisen had to exist somewhere in real life.)

I couldn't help but think about Jeff all the following day, and off and on since. Did he really care for me, or was he just trying to get me in bed, knowing he was exactly my type? Was he for real, or was it just a game?

Huh?-- was he for real? Well, of course not! And yet my imagination was troubled with these questions just as if the man was an actual acquaintance...just as if I didn't have the power to make him into anything I wanted him to be.

It's interesting. You see, half the fun of writing spicy romance fiction is that the author truly doesn't feel she controls the characters, including the sexy male ones. It's that autonomy, that mystery that makes these guys sexy even to the very females who "think them up." They are often cocksure, rather than (pardon the term) "author-whipped."

This dream just drove that point home to me. Every now and then I have one like this, that stays with me, and ever after I'm wondering if one day I'll actually run into the guy on the street. In fact, I recall having a dream like that in junior high school, and I can still recall what the boy looked like. Forty years later, it would be hard to recognize him all grown up, but I'm still sort of looking.

So, you ask the erotic romance author, do I get my ideas from the bedroom? Yeah, in a way....

Diana Laurence is the author of the Soulful Sex
anthologies of erotic romance fiction, and will release her new book Bloodchained
in September (www.bloodchained.com).
Diana's works are published by Living Beyond Reality Press (www.livingbeyondreality.com.)
Visit her at www.dianalaurence.com
or enjoy her blog at www.eroticawithsoul.blogspot.com.