I think I have the character sketch for my novel Following in the Dark.

She’s like my friend from Berkeley who's very delicate, very smart, and very erudite. This friend of mine is so funny. She calls Gaia Books in Berkeley "Pussy Books". Crude phrase yes, but when she says it, it doesn't crude it sounds classy and quaint. The character is also an incurable romantic. She reads all those old dusty novels from earlier times and dreams of men who punish. I have to make her a lapsed catholic who attended catholic school and goes to church for the high holy days, and of course for classical music concerts. This woman prayed for stigmata to appear on her wrists as a child because she wanted to suffer like Christ. She also fantasized about being a nun from the 1700’s so she could flagellate herself for her bad thoughts.

Religion and self punishment are intertwined in a twisted way in her mind. How else could an oddly religious woman allow herself to be in a sado-masochistic relationship and enjoy herself in a secret evil way? The conflict, tension in the story would how she reconciles herself, her religion, her beliefs with her fantasies of being punished. I'm liking the Following in the Dark title more and more because it's reminds me of the ancient catachombs thta exist under some catholic churches in Europe. Who knows what secrets dwell in those catachombs? It's start to sound very Freudian isn't it? I like to think it's more Aristotle with a whip, getting yourself out of your dark cave of guilt and punishment and into the light where you find more guilt and punishment only this time you're aware and not blind. There is a difference, I think.