DE: For me, meeting in person is very important, it’s very different from meeting online, even Skyping. It’s much more personal and I get much more connection out of it, a stronger sense of support.

AK: So you two have a very connected writing process?

DE: Yes, we have had little in the way of arguments, and we tend to be easily in agreement. You know, we have somewhat different strengths and weaknesses and so we add that in, especially as we go through the editing process.

It’s been startlingly easy; it takes us between nine months and a year to do a book. The second edition of The Ethical Slut ran on forever, partly because some publishers were interested in it and then it never moved on. And we were just sitting there saying, you know, with no publicity whatsoever, we have sold an awful lot of these, the book is well known, it has a strong reputation online, so no, we’re not going to change the title.

AK: It certainly has been successful, and definitely online. Of course that’s something any author hopes for, but was that something you expected might happen, that the book would become a sort of standard text within this dialogue?

DE: I am just profoundly grateful. I spent a great deal of my life feeling like this completely isolated weirdo nut. It was not that hard to find people who shared my values, and wanted to build a life the way I wanted to build a life, but the outside world was very much against it, very judgmental, very difficult.

I’ll never forget the person who left my house saying “well … I hope you find the right man someday.” I was like “well thank heavens you’re leaving, because it’s obviously not you.”