The eBook erotica craze didn’t begin with the bestselling book Fifty Shades of Grey. With respect to eBook erotica, there were writers, mostly women, writing erotic stories to be later sold on the internet, way before Fifty Shades of Grey came anywhere near the mainstream. In fact, women writing erotica began way before the Internet. Just google Anais Nin.

The present trend is all thanks to the amazing Amazon Kindle, which allows indie writers anywhere in the world to self-publish and sell their eBooks online. Without technology, there would be no medium for these women to do so. Today, writing an eBook to be sold via Amazon Kindle seems to have turned into a livelihood for many (some earn thousands a month or more!).

Amazon began by targeting writers who lacked the clout to earn a publisher’s precious time. But it’s not just indie writers who benefited from the ante; erotica writers jumped on the bandwagon — and they too sold! Alright, they didn’t sell exactly like a regular thriller would, but they sold from $2-4 dollars which isn’t bad considering the low costs to entry.

(Note: Amazon occasionally gives away free erotic books on special days –eBooks that otherwise sell for $2).

So who’s reading eBook erotica? Is it people bored by their jobs or marriages, and in search of some “quickie excitement” via smut books? If so, can we blame them? If reading a short erotic story spares them hundreds in therapy, then why not? Or has reading sex become the panacea for being short of money or being in debt? After all, erotica eBooks are better than popping Valium –what’s more, they give livelihood to erotic writers (most erotica writers earn an average of $1,700-2,000 a month!)

Does writing smut taint a professional writer’s repute or does it enhance it? If writers choose to make a living writing erotica, I feel it’s their right to do so just as much as it’s the reader’s right to acquire them. Besdies, if it helps women make a living during a recession, why not? Or perhaps the recession has nothing to do with it –considering how many millions Fifty Shades of Grey has earned.

Confirmed: Universal Pictures and Focus Features just purchased the film rights to the novel for $5 million.

Technology can not only make you a living; it can make you a millionaire. Pure luck or enterprise?