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sex in story

Writing Great Sex

by | September 13, 2015 | | 2 Comments

What makes a really great sex scene?

Many authors will tell you it’s description—all the senses, touch, taste, feel, smell, sight, hearing. But it isn’t. The secret to great sex writing—are you ready? Wait for it… the secret to great sex writing is…

Emotion.

That’s it. Make your reader feel. That’s all you need to do.

How, you ask? Here are a few guidelines. 

THEY’RE ALIVE!

Your characters are alive and they are not the sum of their parts. They aren’t measurements or hair color or penis size. I’ve done sex scenes without mentioning any of the above. Don’t ask, “What would my character do in this situation?” Let them act. Let them decide. Let them speak. Let them feel. Especially let them feel.

GET TURNED ON

If you’re bored writing a sex scene, your readers will be bored. If you’re turned on, your reader will be turned on. The emotion you are feeling will be conveyed on paper. It’s a natural law of the writer universe. (This applies to any scene, not just sex ones, by the way. If it moves you to tears, it will move the reader as well).

DON’T STOP

If you’re turned on during a sex scene, really getting into it, your fingers flying over the keyboard, unless the house is on fire or we’re under nuclear attack, DON’T STOP. Never, ever stop in the middle of a sex scene. (This rule also applies well to actual sex). You will lose your momentum, and it won’t be the same when you come back to it. Your mood will have shifted, and the reader will feel it.

LUST

Human beings want. Our entire culture and economy is based on desire. We lust after the things we want. We dream about them. We fantasize about them. We want. And we want. And we want some more. Our bodies and our brains are hardwired for desire. We don’t just eat once and then we’re done. We don’t just have one orgasm and then it’s all over. We continue to crave what we want. Our emotions rule us, especially when it comes to sex. They’re naturally going to rule your sex scene, too. We don’t insert tab A into slot B because we’re following a blueprint manual. There’s a reason behind our physical responses, and that reason is always, always tied to emotion. Remember that. Use it.

Desire is what makes the sex hot. Make your readers wait for it. Foreplay begins with seduction, not with sex acts. It begins with eye contact. Flirting. Innuendo. It progresses, but slowly. Tease your readers. Tease yourself. Draw it out. Make it a long, slow burn. The best orgasms are the ones we wait a long time for. It’s no different when writing sex than it is doing it, really.

DON’T BE AFRAID

Don’t be afraid of the sex. Don’t be afraid of the fluids, the flesh, the human expression of our bodies. It is what it is. Some writers will tell you not to ever speak of bodily fluids. They’re above all that messy stuff. Thankfully, erotica and erotic romance have come a long way, baby. We can use the words cock and pussy now, and I would encourage you to do so. I wouldn’t suggest using the medical terms, however (i.e. penis and vagina) or euphemisms like “member” or “sheath.” Cock and Pussy are good. Think of them like peas and carrots. They go together. A few (and I mean a FEW) other words can work for a little variety. Prick or dick for example. Or cunt. No, don’t be afraid of the words we use during sex. It’s okay to talk dirty. “Please,” or “Now,” or “Suck me,” or “Lick me,” or “Harder. There. More.” These are words we’ve all spoken (I hope!) They naturally arouse. That’s a good thing. I’m not afraid of cum – I’m not even afraid of spelling it “wrong.” You shouldn’t be either.

THE GRAND FINALE

Once you reach the point of no return, you’ve built up to the sex, you’ve teased your readers (and your poor characters) enough, now it’s time to give them what they want. This is not the time to skimp. You can’t gloss over the orgasm. (Or orgasmS). We all (hopefully!) know what an orgasm feels like. Description doesn’t have to be technical here. There are spasms and contractions, there is throbbing and trembling, gasps, moans—the combinations are endless. You can and should include those, but don’t be afraid to move into the realm of metaphor. Sex can be like flying. It can be like falling. It can be like dying. This is the culmination of everything, the point you’ve been waiting for, working toward. Let your imagination go as wild as you would during an actual orgasm. Let yourself free.

DEFYING THE LAWS OF PHYSICS AND OTHER MISHAPS

On a practical note – your characters shouldn’t defy the laws of physics. Women cannot take twelve inches of hot man meat down their throats. An average vagina is only eight inches deep. 44DD breasts cannot defy gravity. And if you’re using any of the above descriptions in your sex scenes, you need a basic writing course, not a primer on sex scenes. Also, don’t let your character’s clothes go missing. She can’t be wearing pantyhose one second and be taking it from behind the next. The clothes have to come off and be accounted for somehow. Trust me, your readers will notice if they aren’t.




Selena Kitt
Erotic Fiction You Won’t Forget
www.selenakitt.com
LATEST RELEASE: Step Beast and Highland Wolf Pact Boxed Set

Saying it Out Loud

by | June 30, 2014 | | 9 Comments

By K D Grace

I had a professor in Uni who taught English
Lit, and much to my chagrin, he focused on poetry. Much to my surprise, I ended
up loving the class, but then forgetting just what poetry does for the soul
after the course was finished.  I’ll
admit to penning a bit of doggerel and quite a bit of angsty verse in my teen
years, but for the most part, I consider myself a poetery Philistine. Sorry Ashley Lister J

Fortunately for me, I do write filth fairly
well, so no poetry required. Then I got invited to my first

poetry slam in
London. I went because I had been invited by my good friend and fabulous poet, Mel Jones. I stayed until the
last poem was performed because I was totally and completely enthralled. Since
then I’ve attended several poetry slams including Ernesto
Sarezale’s Velvet Tongue
Erotic Literary Soiree, and I’m always, every single time, riveted.

While I’m not convinced that I should write
or perform poetry – I shiver at the thought, what I am convinced of is the
power that comes from reading a story out loud. Poetry, at least to me, is
story distilled to its absolute essence. It’s the vodka of the literary world
to fiction’s beer.

I’ve always read everything I write out
loud during the final edit because giving voice to what’s written on the page makes
it real, gives it power, and makes me aware of the weak links that don’t flow
with the cadence of spoken language. I’m often asked if it matters if what I
write can be easily read out loud, but I think it’s essential in story. The
original storytellers, the ones who kept the oral histories of their people,
the ones who were entrusted with the magic, the lineage, the mythology and the
essence spoke their stories out loud, maybe around a campfire, maybe in the
temple, maybe in a cave where artists painted their stories on the walls. Speaking
the story out loud gives it dimension, gives it breath and shape and power.

I’ve been thinking about the power of the
spoken word ever since the reading slam in Scarborough at Smut by the Sea. Yes, I read, but
more importantly, I sat and listened to fifteen other people read. We were only
allowed five minutes, so each reader had to distilled down their reading to the
essence of what they wanted the listener to take away.

I love reading slams for that very reason.
I love being able to take the message in aurally and visually, as I watch the
reader/writer interacting with their work. Here is what I discovered; in those
five minute segments, the sex and the heat of the sex the reader shared with
the audience had way less to do with how much I remembered of their reading,
how much I sat on the edge of my seat holding my breath during their reading,
than the story woven around that sex.

I remember Jacqueline Brocker’s chocolate eclairs
because I could close my eyes and taste the richness of them, the guilty
pleasure of them, the phallic shape of them, the luscious crème filling. I
remember JanineAshbless’ vampires because I could almost feel the sting of the thorns of
those red roses biting into cleavage, drawing little beads of blood.  Breathe, K D! Breathe!

The cadence of words spoken in English is
hypnotic – ambic pentameter that feels almost like a heartbeat. (trying not to
show my poetic ignorance again. Please forgive) The listener can feel it down
deep in the belly. We live and breathe and move and share our stories in that
rhythm.  

That the rhythm is hypnotic means it can
just as easily relax us into a meditative state, put us to sleep, send our mind
off wondering as it can excite and invigorate us. It’s when story is woven in
with that hypnotic rhythm that our whole body sits up and takes notice. We
experience a good story with far more than just our eyes on the page. A good
story is visceral, and the more senses it touches, the more powerfully we
experience it and remember it and long for more of it.

‘Sticks and stones may break my bones but
words can never hurt me.’ SOO NOT TRUE! Words have power! Lots and lots of
power. And words spoken out loud have even more power. I think it’s really easy
for writers to forget that, and a reading slam or a poetry slam can bring that
fact home in a very real way. The rhythm of the spoken word can easily enough
put us to sleep. That’s true. But the

rhythm of the story boiled down to its
essence, read out loud can inspire, excite, stimulate and change us. I remember
the story read out loud, and I want more of it. That sex is a part of that
story makes the sex more visceral and more arousing.

Reading out loud has always been a test for
me. If I read my sex scenes out loud and the story doesn’t demand them, require
them, use them, need them, then they don’t belong. Reading out loud exposes the
true essence of the story in a way that nothing else can do, and hearing other
people read their stories out loud is a very intimate experience for the
reader/author and the listener. The sharing of stories out loud links us back
to roots older than written language, back to the roots of story itself, forged
in the experiences and the myths of our ancestors. We writers share those roots
in a powerful way, and it’s good to be reminded of our role as the Keepers of
Story by clearing our throats, opening our mouths and giving our story voice.

Rug Burns, Broken Dicks, and Monster Penises – Realistic Sex in Erotic Fiction

by | June 28, 2014 | | 5 Comments

Elizabeth Black writes in a wide variety of genres including erotica,
erotic romance, and dark fiction. She lives on the Massachusetts coast with her
husband, son, and four cats. Visit her web site, her Facebook page, and her Amazon Author Page.

—–

It seems to me that often enough in erotic romances, the sex
is not only unrealistic, it is something that is not humanly possible. Now that
anyone can upload erotic fiction to the internet and call themselves authors,
readers must separate the wheat from the chaff. And get a load of that chaff! There
is sex with Bigfoot who has a foot-long (or more) schlong. Alien sex. Perfectly
built doms who tie their subs up in such a way they should be laid out on a
stretcher and sent to a hospital. Anal sex that defies the laws of nature. Lack
of lube. Lack of foreplay. The list goes on.

Did you know that there are awards giving out for poorly
written sex? Here is an excerpt from the 2012 winner of the Bad Sex Awards,
Nancy Huston’s “Infrared”. 

No sooner have we settled onto the bed
and begun to remove each other’s clothes with the clumsy gestures of impatience
than I realise Kamal also knows about passivity — yes, he also knows how to
remain still, fully awake and attentive, and give himself up to me as a cello gives
itself up to a bow. Arching his back, he surrenders his face, shoulders, back
and buttocks, waiting for me to play them, and I do — I play them, play with
them. Most men are afraid to let go like this — whereas with a little finesse
the wonders of passivity can be tasted in even the most violent throes of
love-making.

In a delirium of restrained desire, I
weigh, stroke and lick Kamal’s balls, then take his penis in my hands, between
my breasts, into my mouth. He sits up, reaches for me and I allow him to
explore me in turn. He runs his tongue and lips over my breasts, the back of my
neck, my toes, my stomach, the countless treasures between my legs, oh the
sheer ecstasy of lips and tongues on genitals, either simultaneously or in
alternation, never will I tire of that silvery fluidity, my sex swimming in joy
like a fish in water, my self freed of both self and other, the quivering
sensation, the carnal pink palpitation that detaches you from all colour and
all flesh, making you see only stars, constellations, milky ways, propelling
you bodiless and soulless into undulating space where the undulating skies make
your non-body undulate …

And orgasm — the way a man’s face is
transformed by orgasm — oh it’s not true they all look alike, you have to be
either miserable and broke or furiously blasé and sarcastic to say they all
look alike — to me, every climax is unique.

My body hurt just reading some of that, especially the bit
about arching his back and surrendering his face, shoulders, back and buttocks.
I pictured a man having a seizure. “Violent throes of love-making” should
not lead to unintentional pain, right? Then there were the horrid similes and
all the undulations.

Why don’t these people ever suffer from injuries from their
passionate rolls in the hay? The most common injuries from sex play are most
likely vaginal tearing or breaking, back injury, penis breakage, yeast
infections, urinary tract infections, and foreign objects stuck where they
don’t belong. Richard Gere isn’t an internet meme for nothing, you know. Why
don’t lovers ever get carpet burn? Why don’t BDSM aficionados ever get chafed
wrists or ankles or sore joints from having their arms and legs pulled to the
limits the human body can tolerate? No, lovers are “transfixed” or
“propelled into undulating space”. No one ever needs Vix Vapo Rub
after an afternoon of hot, steaming fucking.

I speak from experience when I mention penis breakage. When
my husband and I were younger and much more stupid, we got into a hot bout of
sex play and… I broke his dick. I’ve never heard of this happening, but it’s
apparently much more common than you’d think. It was even covered on the
American TV medical drama Grey’s Anatomy.
Dr. Mark Sloan got into some heated passion with intern Lexie Grey resulting in
painful and embarrassing injury. The staff didn’t know the identity of the
“lucky” lady who did it so there was much guesswork going on.

When it happened to my husband, he heard a very loud snap, and then the pain began.
Thankfully, it didn’t require surgery. There was nothing to do but let it heal
itself. All was fine and good until it happened again a few years later. He
told a friend of his at his old job about it. That guy always gave me the
biggest smile whenever I saw him. I think he was jealous we were so into it,
although all of us could have done without the pain.

On a lighter note, I recall reading an excerpt from an
erotic romantic comedy that described a woman’s queef. It was meant to be
funny, but I just cringed. A queef is a pussy fart, in case you haven’t looked
at the Urban Dictionary lately.

Such sexual accidents, while realistic, don’t make for much
romance although in some cases a little realism would go a long way to make the
sex more believable. How about pink skin from the leather cuffs or an
average-sized penis? Why are so many alpha males built like an Angus bull? Yes, I know it’s about escapism, but still… What do
you think?

Hot Chilli Erotica

Hot Chilli Erotica

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