Thanks for the great comments and suggestions. I hadn't even considered the implications of WWII, but will probably have the husband working in an executive or managerial position in a vital industry. I do have the wife leaving on business trips occasionally, so she will probably have some sort of administrative or technical job...perhaps a contract administrator for the War Department, but at this point I haven't described what either one does. I don't really want this to be a historical novel, nor do I want it set in a totally alternate reality...but in a time and place when the enslavement of others (particularly females) is, if not totally encouraged, at least accepted.


I do have the wife initially being a bit of a lush, and there is one drunken scene where she becomes violently angry with our slave girl. This, however, becomes a turning point in both their lives, as the wife comes out of rehab quite normal, and the slave's life changes for the better as a result of it.

As far as the slave girl's birth and early years, the setting will be rural, in a farming community. The family owns a farm, but their real money comes from raising, training and selling slaves. I haven't decided yet whether this will be commonly known, or known only to a select community of those involved in the slave trade. Probably the latter. Not all the slaves will be female...with the manual labor needed in farming, there will be a relatively small group of males as well, though they will be on the periphery of the story line.

The principal character will be caucasian...so much easier to change hair color that way, and don't you thing the various brands and tattoos she'll eventually get will be that much more visible? And, yes...her first set of owners give her to the young man to whom she was wet nurse, as a birthday gift...probably when he is a young teenager and she in her early 30's.

At this point, there is a very minor link to my earlier work, in that she does spend some time at the same island facility where Tulsa had all her major modifications. However, in this case, the body work is much less severe, and she leaves looking quite normal and much younger than she did upon arrival. Basically, she gets a full body makeover, much like what you'd see on Extreme Makeover on television.

So far, there really isn't a whole lot of explicit sex, though it is certainly inferred quite a bit. I'm not real hot on describing that sort of action, being a strong believer in allowing the reader to imagine for himself or herself what is going on. As a matter of fact, I'm having a very difficult time right now trying to write the segment regarding the loss of her virginity. So, I'm bypassing that for now and will get back to it eventually.

Thanks again, and any other suggestions or comments you might have would certainly be appreciated.