So my test readers say I need more sex. Hrm.

WebKat · Post by **WebKat** » 19 Jun 2012, 12:31

Hi everyone,

So I've finished the first draft of my novel (actually about a year ago)... it's a vampire genre novel about a dancer (topless dancer) in Tucson, AZ who is turned into a vampire by a friend/bodyguard (who she didn't know was a vampire) as the only means to save her life. She must now deal with adjusting to her new life (she's married and has a 3 year old daughter), deal with bringing the man who attacked her to justice, and cope with her increasingly confused feelings for the vampire who made her (she is still very much in love with her husband...)

Anyway, there are several points in the book where she has sex, but mostly it's all the lead-up, then a cut to waking up in a tangle the next morning or whatever, leaving the actual "business of getting down to business" up to the reader's imagination.

So I had my sisters-in-law (both of them) and a couple of other people read it, and there is a consensus that the audience who reads that type of book will expect more sex. Spelled out on the page.

So I need advice... I don't want the sex to come across sounding all cheesy and Penthouse Forumish... nor do I want it to be clinical... I refuse to refer to his throbbing manhood or her quivering dewdrop or any such nonsense... haha... but on the other hand, I really don't know how to write a sex scene.

Tips, anyone? Good reference sites/other references?

Maud Fitch · Post by **Maud Fitch** » 22 Jun 2012, 18:15

If you don't want to write sex scenes, don't write sex scenes. I've just finished reading three books in The Spellman Family series by Lisa Lutz and although everyone in the family is a PI - they own the agency - there's nothing sexual to make the reader squirm, blush or get hot under the collar. My point is that if you are inserting this type of scene under duress, it will look like an add-on. Lutz admits that there won't be any murders either, so just be yourself.

Try reading erotica or some well-known authors books on writing techniques.
And there's a writers website with a YouTube clip http://marieforleo.com/2011/03/erotic-fiction-writer/

Hourglass · Post by **Hourglass** » 24 Jun 2012, 18:24

I read a lot of vampire novels and honestly, I wish there were more books that led up to it and then cut away. I have gotten to the point where I just skim the sex scenes in an effort to get back to the story. Just like I don't need a detailed description of the character taking a crap, I don't need a detailed scene of sex either. I'm adult, I'm quite aware of which slot goes into which.

I don't mind one or two, well done, sex scenes. But it seems if a lot of authors think they need to have the characters falling into bed and having nearly chapter long, extremely detailed sex every time the characters come within ten feet of each other. Too often it comes off as feeling like filler. Like they didn't have enough words with the actual story to make a novel, so they shoveled a hundred or so pages of sex into the book. I would love to see a vamp story that could build a relationship between two characters and stand on its own without having to fill half the book with sex to make it work.

WebKat · Post by **WebKat** » 04 Jul 2012, 12:01

Sorry for my late return to the subject--we moved out of our house and it was a huge amount of work and between work and packing and getting rid of things and truck loading and cleaning... there wasn't time for anything else.

So I will never write a novel that is packed with sex scenes, but I do agree with them that I should have at least one or two tasteful and not too long or... gynecological... sex scenes in the novel. thanks for the link--I'll check it out. Any other tips/advice would be most appreciated. And I will also have more time to come back to the thread now that we're out of our house!

Hourglass · Post by **Hourglass** » 04 Jul 2012, 12:24

I think that sounds like a good plan.

bluefoxicy · Post by **bluefoxicy** » 06 Jul 2012, 12:57

WebKat wrote: So I had my sisters-in-law (both of them) and a couple of other people read it, and there is a consensus that the audience who reads that type of book will expect more sex. Spelled out on the page.

So I need advice... I don't want the sex to come across sounding all cheesy and Penthouse Forumish... nor do I want it to be clinical... I refuse to refer to his throbbing manhood or her quivering dewdrop or any such nonsense... haha... but on the other hand, I really don't know how to write a sex scene.

Tips, anyone? Good reference sites/other references?

Typical. Women want to read about sex.

I have two pieces of advice on writing erotic scenes; the consideration of if you should bother is separate, you asked how and not if.

The first is prose. You want a prose that lends itself to a varied tone. If your prose is professional but not stuffy and clinical, it will still sound stuffy and clinical dealing with sex. Think about if Sanderson tried to write a sex scene in The Way of Kings... the prose seems flowing and casual in an epic fantasy, but if he didn't shift it any during an erotic scene it would suddenly be inappropriately dry. Fortunately, Sanderson gets by without writing much of any erotica--I find this refreshing, he manages to do so without escaping the issue of sex and thus without escaping realism (there's a lot of references to sex and whores in Mistborn and Stormlight, but no penetration or groping or the like).

The second is to read something and get a take-away from it. Sierra Dean's novels have some particularly boring sex in them (she's all about the foreplay and penetration; apparently oral and anal sex haven't been discovered in New York City yet), but she writes the erotica with appropriate emotion and prose. I hate her prose in the rest of the book, and I'd honestly prefer less graphic vampire-werewolf sex (it's boring but I'm quite alright with not having to sit through a bunch of throat-stuffing blow jobs and people getting ... creative). Age of Misrule (Chadbourne) had somewhat less well written scenes--and more disturbing; can we just stick to the novel?

WebKat · Post by **WebKat** » 07 Jul 2012, 12:23

Thanks for the tips--and yes I'm asking how and not if. I am only going to put in one, maybe two actual sex scenes, so I don't think it's going to be too bad.

Does anyone know of any well-written sex scenes that are available to read online that I can use as sort of "research"?

Maud Fitch · Post by **Maud Fitch** » 08 Jul 2012, 02:25

Why not visit your public library? If you can't go in person, check their catalogue online. They offer free e-book downloads. In case you didn't know, librarians are opposed to censorship and if they can't supply the actual books, they can give you a list of relevant titles and sources. If you are going to write it, you have to face up to it!

WebKat · Post by **WebKat** » 08 Jul 2012, 11:36

Right, the library would be good, but I am in the NH boonies for the rest of the summer, so I doubt the tiny library here would have anything (we're in the middle of moving). When I get to Atlanta, that would be the time to check the library. So suggestions for online stuff or downloadable stuff (even if it's pay--as long as it isn't super expensive it's ok) would be great, and for the future, suggestions for good dead-tree books would also be good. I don't want to dive in blind, largely because there is so much out there and I know that like everything else in life, 95% of it is going to be crap, so knowing which ones are good so I can seek them out would be really handy.

Even if you don't know a book or story title, if you know an author who you think writes good sex scenes I can do the rest of the research just knowing a name to look for...

I know Anne Rice (under that other name of hers) wrote some really powerful but really kinky and strange erotica back in the day. I read it and it was the kind of stuff that you find yourself sort of surprised that it turns you on, because it's not stuff you'd ever even CONSIDER doing yourself... but yet reading it is erotic... while I enjoyed reading those books, I don't want to write really kinky, strange stuff... I want to write about sex between two married people who are open minded and a bit adventurous about sex, but not kinky or into BDSM, etc... they're just into good sex.

Jean Auel wrote a lot of sex in her Clan of the Cave Bear series, but I always found it really stupid-sounding... all that "quivering mound" and other euphamisms... it just seemed really flowery and like it was trying to both hide what it was about and at the same time overdescribe it... hard for me to explain why I didn't like it, but I didn't... I found it boring, too, rather than erotic.

So that is a little background of my personal taste on the matter, for a couple of authors. I seem to remember that Charlaine Harris wrote some decent sex in some of her books, but I'd have to go look through them again (and unfortunately I have them only in Kindle format, which is hard to "thumb through" if you know what I mean)... so with that in mind, does anyone have any suggestions/recommendations?

lanscot · Post by **lanscot** » 19 Jul 2012, 03:11

Try reading erotica or some well-known authors books on writing techniques.

Hourglass · Post by **Hourglass** » 19 Jul 2012, 09:41

So write it in the style Anne Rice (under the other name) would write it only without the kinky parts. You don't have to include kinky to emulate her style.

WebKat · Post by **WebKat** » 19 Jul 2012, 10:09

lanscot wrote:Try reading erotica or some well-known authors books on writing techniques.

That's what I'm trying to do, but I don't know who the good authors are. That's why I'm asking for recommendations.

-- 19 Jul 2012, 10:11 --

Hourglass wrote:So write it in the style Anne Rice (under the other name) would write it only without the kinky parts. You don't have to include kinky to emulate her style.

Well I don't want to copy anyone's style... I more want to get a feel for how a well-written sex scene flows... what types of details are included and what is left to the imagination... how much time is typically spent on foreplay/emotions & thoughts/"the act"/the afterglow, etc... and what terminology is used that doesn't sound either rude or cheesy or overly "poetic" ("her delicate honey-mound quivered at his touch"...gag)