Not the whole chicken: writing about sex

Erotica or porn:

“Erotica is using a feather; pornography is using the whole chicken.” — Isabel Allende

Crime writer Margot Kinberg says, “I’m no prude, but I’d rather use my imagination. I give credit to authors who can let me know what’s happening without going over all the details.”

Just as writers would not include every bite of every piece of food, every sip of wine, every napkin swipe when writing a dinner scene, they might not want to include every move, every sexual organ and every detail of arousal in a sex scene. Author Cheri Caddick puts it this way: “Sex scenes take place most wonderfully when we are inside the characters brains, not necessarily their ‘bits’!” Plus no writer wants to bore their reader with details.

But poet Alex Morgan asked, “How about half a chicken? Or maybe just a drumstick? A neck? I mean, you can’t get very far on a feather.”

Alex is right. You can’t get far on just a feather. Sometimes sex is necessary.

But should you include a sex scene? If you are not writing erotica, ask yourself: Does a sex scene fit? Does it give meaning to the characters, their story or their emotional development?

So, what exactly do you include?

This is what I know:

One reviewer commented that my novel In the Context of Love placed too much emphasis on sex. However, the story revolves around intimacy, and sex is naturally a part of that. The main character, Angelica, falls in love for the first time. Shortly after, she learns about her mother’s sexual assault, and this knowledge changes the way Angelica views intimacy moving forward in life.

Another reviewer agreed that the book contains “quite a bit” of sexual content, but said it made sense to her. She called it a combination of “flowery, crude and matter-of-fact,” and added, “That’s why I liked it. Because multiple experiences were described, with her boyfriend, husband and other partners, the author was mindful of the fact that sex is not just physical and it would have been so unrealistic if it was written the same way every time. Angelica with Joe in her teens is not the same Angelica with her husband in her 30’s.”

That was the point of the novel. Sex was not just physical for Angelica, and I tried not depict it that way. The focus stayed on the narrator’s emotional state.

When we need more

A scene in a novel I recently read definitely suffered from lack of description. In the preceding paragraph, the narrator describes her sister and a boy on the rocks near a beach. Her sister’s underwear seems to “glow in the moonlight.” Their lips are “almost touching.” The sister says she knows how to do “things.” Apparently they do more than kiss as “I watched from my hiding place above the rocks while they did what they did beneath them.” The narrator watches “just like people rubbernecking at a car crash, until it was over.”

I have a few questions about “they did what they did.” Were they standing? If not, how did they manage to have sex on rocks? A mere sentence or two might be needed, don’t you think? I understand the narrator is an adolescent observing, but surely she sees something, even if it only appears to be wrestling. It’s an important scene that has consequences.

5 tips on writing sex:

1. First decide whether a sex scene fits in your story, and how much need to be revealed.
2. Decide how detailed you need or want to be. Do you even need to define body parts?
3. Please spare us the cliched words. You know what they are. Manhood. Shaft. Love button. It’s also best to stay away from words you’d find in a diagram or medical book, like penis, testicles, clitoris….
4. Don’t use on-the-nose dialogue. “Oh god, oh god,” or “Pump harder, baby” are clichés. “Ow, stop that,” or “Why did you stop!” would at least be more interesting.
5. Let the lovers fumble or fail. She gets tangled tying to get her shirt off, his elbow smacks her nose, the dog won’t stop barking….

Writers Digest has several good articles on sex in fiction. Also check out Utne Reader’s How to Write a Sex Scene by Steve Almond.

I appreciate sexual tension, a bit of teasing, a nice buildup, but graphic details with screamed profanities, sliding, slapping or gushing yank me out of the scene. How about you? What spice level do you feel comfortable with?

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Thank you for visiting.

Linda K. Sienkiewicz is a writer, poet, and artist:
Multi-finalist award winning novel In the Context of Love
Picture book Gordy and the Ghost Crab
Latest poetry chapbook: Sleepwalker
BUY BOOKS: In the Context of Love | Gordy and the Ghost Crab | Sleepwalker

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