Shana Sturtz Brodsky (April 1980 – 11 September 2021), known to readers as Shoshanna Evers and later also as Shoshanna Gabriel, was an American author of contemporary and erotic romance—novels, novellas, and power-exchange fiction—as well as an editor and publisher of nonfiction about writing and self-publishing. She co-founded SelfPubBookCovers.com, widely described as the first site where authors could customize original pre-made book covers and download them instantly. In 2013 Amazon listed her among its “Most Popular Authors in Erotica”; in 2014 she appeared among “Most Popular Authors in Contemporary Romance” and “Most Popular Authors in Romance.” In March 2014 she became a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author with “The Man Who Holds the Whip,” her contribution to the dark-desire anthology MAKE ME: Twelve Tales of Dark Desire. For BDSM romance readers she remains a clear name in the early-2010s boom of collar-and-contract erotic romance sold through both New York houses and the Kindle gold rush.
Biography and Career Path
Evers first published in 2010 with Ellora’s Cave Publishing, the major digital-first erotic imprint of that era. She later wrote for Simon & Schuster while also self-publishing. Before full-time authorship she worked as a registered nurse under her married name—a professional past that sometimes surfaces in how reviewers described her emotional pacing. Critics called her the “Queen of the erotic novellas” and praised books that felt “emotional and gripping.” She produced dozens of erotic romance titles; Overheated and Enslaved (Book One of the Enslaved Trilogy) both hit Amazon Erotica bestseller lists. The nonfiction anthology she edited and contributed to, How To Write Hot Sex: Tips from Multi-Published Erotic Romance Authors, became a #1 Authorship, #1 Erotica Writing Reference, and #1 Romance Writing bestseller, plus a Writing Skills bestseller—proof that she sold craft advice as aggressively as she sold spanking plots.
Her short fiction and novellas appeared in Best Bondage Erotica 2012 and Best Bondage Erotica 2013, in the Penguin/Berkley Heat anthology Agony/Ecstasy, and in numerous Ellora’s Cave BDSM titles including Chastity Belt and Punishing the Art Thief. The Enslaved Trilogy—billionaire BDSM erotic romance—released from Simon & Schuster’s Pocket Star imprint in April–June 2013, followed by the dystopian post-apocalyptic erotic Pulse Trilogy (November 2013–March 2014). A New York native, she lived at the time of her death with her husband, their three children, and two dogs on a remote farm in northern Idaho. She died on 11 September 2021 at forty-one.
Major Series: Enslaved and Pulse
The Enslaved Trilogy is pure BDSM billionaire erotic romance for the Pocket Star digital wave:
- Enslaved (Book One) — April 2013, Simon & Schuster/Pocket Star
- Enamored (Book Two) — May 2013
- Enraptured (Book Three) — June 2013
The Pulse Trilogy shifts the same erotic intensity into post-apocalyptic dystopia:
- The Pulse (Book One) — November 2013
- The Escape (Book Two) — January 2014
- The Thrust (Book Three) — March 2014
Together the six books map her commercial peak: power-exchange romance packaged for mass ebook consumption, then survival-world erotic stakes under the same house imprint. A mainstream contemporary title, The Tycoon’s Convenient Bride…And Baby (Entangled/Indulgence), was listed among her projects as not yet released in the career summaries that circulated while she was publishing at full speed.
Anthologies, Bondage Shorts, and Dominatrix Fantasy
Evers’s bibliography is dense with Cleis Press and multi-author dark romance packages. Highlights include:
- MAKE ME: Twelve Tales of Dark Desire — “The Man Who Holds the Whip” (March 2014); #16 New York Times ebook list (23 March 2014), #48 USA Today (9 March 2014)
- Cleis anthologies: Smokin’ Hot Firemen (“Falling Ashes,” July 2013); Baby Got Back (“Body Heat,” August 2013); The Big Book of Orgasm (“Forced Orgasms,” September 2013); Can’t Get Enough (“Blake Eats Out,” June 2014); Cowboy Heat (“Drop Two Tears in a Bucket,” March 2014)
- Beauty and the Beast: An Erotic Re-Imagining (February 2014)
- Best Bondage Erotica 2013 — “Plastic Wrap” (Cleis)
- Best Bondage Erotica 2012 — “Melting Ice” (Cleis)
- Agony/Ecstasy — “The Wooden Pony” (Penguin/Berkley Heat, 2012)
- Felt Tips — “Tape,” charity anthology edited by Tiffany Reisz (2012)
- Dominatrix Fantasy set: Spanked, Denied, and Collared (self-published 2012; paperback hit Amazon Erotica bestseller lists)
- Earlier Ellora’s Cave and self-pub titles: Overheated (2011; 20K+ copies sold), Snowed In with the Tycoon, Bedhead, Chastity Belt, Hollywood Spank, Taste of Candy, Bound to Be Naughty (trade paperback gathering Punishing the Art Thief, Chastity Belt, Hollywood Spank), Ginger Snap, Held Captive by the Cavemen, and the standalone expansion of The Man Who Holds the Whip
Nonfiction craft books include How To Write Hot Sex (2011) and How We Do It (And How You Can Too) (2013), the latter reaching Amazon’s Business Writing bestseller territory and Kobo publishing lists. Skin Deep (Ellora’s Cave, 2012) collected Bedhead in print beside Desiree Holt and Lynne Connolly.
Why Evers Matters for Power-Exchange Romance
Shoshanna Evers wrote at the moment when BDSM romance left the specialty cave and flooded mainstream ebook storefronts—Pocket Star trilogies, Cleis bondage annuals, Domme fantasy novellas, and “how to write hot sex” manuals aimed at authors who wanted to sell the same heat. Whip imagery, chastity, art-thief punishment, wooden-pony bondage, forced-orgasm anthology slots, and billionaire enslavement plots were not side hobbies; they were the product line. SelfPubBookCovers.com extended that entrepreneurial streak into infrastructure for other indie authors. Her death in 2021 closed a career that had already locked her name into early-2010s erotic-romance history. For adult readers mapping kink literature beyond pure literary SM, Evers is the commercial middle path: emotional novellas, explicit power exchange, and Amazon-era bestseller mechanics wrapped around the collar.
