Take Me With You

01/30/2022

New review for Take Me With You calls it “thought provoking, openly s*xual, and brutally honest” ☺️

Take Me With You by Vanessa Carlisle is a bold story about race, identity, and struggle that centers on Kindred Powell, a woman of mixed race who has her own bout with racial tensions. After losing her mother to an illness and her father being unjustly incarcerated, Kindred has to face the world by....

08/26/2021

Sound on for water. This is a 25 second video of my feet playing in small waves.

My somatic practice is about returning, again and again, to the sensations of the present moment. Focusing on what I can sense, what I feel both inside and on the surface of my skin. Then seeing how far out I’m perceiving, via my eyes, ears, nose.

What are your sensations right now? When you notice them, do you want to change a few? Take a long breath through your nose, stretch your shoulders a bit?

Water is a quick mood change. It would take 5 min to go play in your sink or shower, splash on your face or feet. It can shift things internally just to take a small step toward moving differently in your familiar space.

These are my feet being happy, which supported the rest of my body having a mood lift. Sending you my support for your own! 💖🌴

08/07/2021

Do you ever ache for more vivid, sensual, lush writing to gush from you? All writers sometimes get stuck in a neck-up experience. This class is $25, takes about an hour, and is designed for anyone who has a writing project, wishes they had one, or maybe just likes my face. ☺️ Whether you are strictly an SM poster, a novelist, an academic, or someone just beginning to put your thoughts on paper, bringing your full body to the experience is an important practice.

I lead you in a few exercises that you can do at your own pace, as many times as you like, to more fully and vividly express sensations on the page.

Link in bio to connect more deeply with your senses and create richer, more meaningful written worlds.

Image is a brightly colored text flyer for the Writing With Your Whole Body course. For more info click the link in bio!

07/23/2021

Missed our convo on Weds? No worries. Hit the link in my bio or head over to for my dream conversation about my novel Take Me With You, out now!

Florie challenged me to explain character creation and writing about life experiences you haven’t had, all while offering me love for the work and laughter in the struggle. We talked about ALLL the juicy stuff and I promise there’s no spoilers. Just a truly joyful and thoughtful conversation about some characters I spent nearly ten years bringing to life. I hope you enjoy it!

🖤image shows two people, Florie and Vanessa, and the cover of the novel Take Me With You.

07/23/2021

Had some big belly laughs with Brad King while talking about trauma, because that's how it works best. : )

07/23/2021

Here's an incredible conversation with (Florie Johnson) about the book! We talk about the effects of incarceration, creating characters that have had life experience you haven't, and what it means to feel the rubble of your trauma under your skin.
https://www.instagram.com/tv/CRmZEfJnaje/?utm_medium=share_sheet

06/03/2021

This video is of me unboxing my first copies of my novel Take Me With You.

This book is dedicated to the Hookers Army, who held and supported me for the last 5 years of working, waiting, struggling to keep the faith that this was a piece of work that deserved a life beyond my PhD committee. Happy Anniversary to us!

I spent aka wh😮re’s day with that beloved community and want to remind anyone still reading that we are, every day, still fighting for space in this world where we are safe to be fully ourselves.

To my closeted s3x workers and everyone else navigating a relationship with the closet, with danger, with rejection, with all the BS, may you find deep safe solidarity and friendship amidst the difficulty. I love you, I treasure you, I wrote this for you.

❤️❤️❤️🖤🖤❤️❤️❤️

05/31/2021

https://frolic.media/i-finally-wrote-my-kinky-q***r-poly-love-story-and-you-can-too-by-vanessa-carlisle/

I am q***r. I am kinky. I am nonmonogamous. I am a s*x worker. My protagonist also holds these identities.

05/10/2021

I could write a book about writing this book! But instead I’ll invite you to join me in celebrating the June 1st release of my novel from Running Wild Press. Available for preorder now in my linktree.

Kindred’s life is marked by a secret. After her father’s unjust incarceration and her mother’s death from illness, Kindred moves from Los Angeles to New York in a desperate search for peace. There she finds her girlfriend Nautica, a career in s*x work, and a kinky boy toy named Griffin. But when her father goes missing from LA’s Skid Row, Kindred must drop everything to find him.

“Vanessa Carlisle illuminates the myriad lives of interconnnected people informed but never broken by the injustices of their race, gender, s*xuality, or class status. This is a book to read and share. Deft and powerful from beginning to end.” Dana Johnson, In the Not Quite Dark

“Take Me With You is at once an absorbing coming of age story and a sharp critique of the politics of the present. With deep humility and care, Carlisle brings us richly drawn characters who refuse easy categorization.” —Heather Berg, P**n Work: S*x, Labor, and Late Capitalism