RG’s 15 Rules for Writing Sex Scenes

Because, strangely enough, there are 2 #13s. Clearly I’m not superstitious!

http://storify.com/remittancegirl/rg-s-15-rules-for-writing-sex-scenes

And before you consider me a smug bitch, I can assure you, I’ve broken every one of these, to my everlasting embarrassment. If you can think of any others please feel free to add them below.


Comments

19 responses to “RG’s 15 Rules for Writing Sex Scenes”

  1. Rule #10. I saw your discussion on the twitter timeline with Gracie. Though simultaneous orgasms can happen as I’ve had my few, they are indeed a rare occasion and I completely agree on what you said to Gracie about thinking about the majority of readers who have never achieved that experience in their sex life. It reminds me of things that make me feel inadequate or turn me off when reading erotica. Like when the women are complete sex bombs and unreal to me. Physical characteristics are over the top and she has orgasms as easily as breathing and many over and over. Or when women are described as leaking faucets with their arousal dripping down their legs or soaking their panties. Perhaps these are my own hang ups, but reading erotica like that ends up not turning me on at all. I end up being the inadequate reader who can’t connect.

    1. Oh, yes! Leaky faucet syndrome. That’s a very good one!

      1. Leaky faucet, that’s me! It sure happened to me sometimes! (but only when really horny)

  2. All good advice. Especially number 15.

    On another note, I’ve just tagged you in the ‘My Next Big Thing’ chain that’s going around. I got it from Vanessa Wu and having answered the 10 questions have to pass them on to 5 other writers. If you want to take it up (or maybe you’ve already had it from someone else?) the questions are the same ones I answered in my blog post – http://deliciouslydeviant.wordpress.com/2012/12/05/fulanis-next-big-thing/

    -F

    1. Thank you for the invite. I just don’t like to blog that way about my books. I make a post, people know where to find my books. I kinda leave it at that. But I happen to know that D.L. King has a new anthology coming out very soon! I’m not in it, but it sounds very good. ๐Ÿ˜€

  3. LMAO at the last one ๐Ÿ™‚

    And, you know – I like the runway lights metaphor. It makes sense!

    1. Yes, it does make sense, but it is a very ‘writerly’ description. One of those incidents where you pat yourself on the back for its originality but has little value to the reader, who just feels freaked out about landing in a plane.

      Personally, I find air turbulence incredibly erotic. But I have to remind myself that most people hate it.

      There are darlings well worth killing.

  4. Guilty of heavy machinery euphemisms, only because I’m a fan of tools, power drills, and carpentry.

    I know , I know…never again.

    Great list,

    eden

  5. *pulls the deep-sea-diving-backhoe out of my faucet-like twat and find myself jet-propelling through the warm sea air*

    1. bwahahahaha!

  6. Ms T. Garden Avatar
    Ms T. Garden

    I’m so glad that I logged on to FB to catch the link for this. You were already one of my favorite authors and now I place your brain next to Monocle’s for being absolutely yummy. I wonder if I have a zombie filled erotic novel lurking in my own head somewhere…

  7. One that I kind of learned the hard way, to paraphrase Mama’s advice when you were getting ready to go live on your own for the first time, “Never go grocery shopping when you’re hungry” (never mind stoned, obviously).
    I think the same applies here, although YMMV, but it’s rarely a good idea to write a sex scene (or, in fact decide to put one in [said the actress to the bishop]) when you’re particularly horny.
    Kind of like, you know, just because YOU are gagging for some action at that moment, doesn’t necessarily mean that your characters are.
    :Q

  8. First, you delight me. Second, I want to try that runway lights thing. It feels like an irresistible thing to try.

  9. I might have to give up writing….like Wyeth up there. *Grins n winks*

  10. Words to live by, and to frequently violate, no doubt.

    Mick

  11. luluwrites Avatar
    luluwrites

    As a reader, rather than a writer, I would also add – avoid “breakage” euphemisms. I get so tired of reading about a woman “shattering” or “fracturing”. We aren’t that fragile. That said, I went thru a phase of listening to every cheesy Stephanie Laurens audiobook I could get my hands on, because her heroines “shattered” at least 4 or 5 times in every book and I loved hearing the narrator – Simon Prebble – in his very correct, very baritone, very English voice pronounce “…and … then … she … shattttttttttttered.” I spent so much effort listening for that single phrase I couldn’t tell you what the books were actually about if my life depended on it.

  12. I completely agree with Mina’s comment about orgasms. One of the many things I HATED about 50 Shades was that Anna was banging them out all over the place and at the tweak of a nipple etc… Total nonsense and made me cross. For young woman reading that book it sets a totally unrealistic ideal of female orgasms and my suspicion would be leads to them ‘faking’ it in order to meet that ideal.

    Orgasms are wonderful things but in my opinion they should not always be the goal, sexual interaction and the stuff that turns us on is way more complicated then just orgasms. Sex without orgasms can be just as fucking awesome and hot as sex with orgasms. I guess what I am trying to say is writing erotica should not always work towards the ‘money shot’.

    Mollyxxx

  13. The first piece of erotic fiction I ever read described the male ejaculation thusly.

    “He came all over her face!” *squirt*

    *squirtsquirtsquirt*

    This being the sum total of said person’s capacity to describe ejaculate or the action whereby it gets deposited. I think the squirt-to-paragraph ratio was about five to one.

    I was forced to wonder if that sort of thing was normal and expected and if so, if I could get into erotica or erotic role-playing as reducing myself to a giggling babble is not exactly arousing.

    Though you can guess where that ended up by the forums I run.

    I’ve never been capable of using the word ‘squirt’ in any remotely sexual context. I don’t think it’s a flaw, really.

  14. #16: don’t use the words “her (or his) sex” when describing genitalia.

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