Do you use a pen name? If yes (or no), why?

I do use a pen name.  That allows me to separate my public and private lives as well as control who has access to what parts of my life.  That’s a huge bonus to me and to my family.  Even if I were writing completely vanilla non-sex related Literary Fiction, I believe I would use one to keep my writing separate from my rather conservative day job.

Are you actively involved in BDSM? If so how do you identify yourself? Dom(me)/sub? Top/bottom? Switch?

I met my husband when I threw myself at his feet in an online Gorean Paga Tavern.  We are by no means as hardcore as most though.   Real life has a way of getting in the way of that, but we’ve settled into what works for us.  I don’t spend a lot of time worrying about identity and titles, and you’ll notice that my characters have no interest in that either.  In my Sensual Submission books, there are a few times where the topic comes up and the character brushes it off.  Their theory (and mine) is as long as everyone is consenting and doing what they enjoy, it isn’t necessary to split hairs between words like sub, slave, bottom or what have you and their corresponding counterparts.      

At what point did you decide you wanted to write BDSM/kinky-themed erotica?

I have to give a lot of credit to Nanowrimo.org.  They’re a group that promotes the concept that you should stop dreaming about writing a novel and just get down to it and do it.  I sat down and wrote my first during November 2010.  That book may never get published since it needs a full re-write to make it work properly, but it showed me that I could actually complete a novel and that I could write something that told a pretty good sexy story.