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Mini-Muse Monday-Open or Closed Door Sex Scenes?Â
Today’s mini-muse is about your thoughts on sex scenes. How much should be on the page, and when does the door shut? Does it ever? Do you care?Â
My books range from sweet, nothing on the page beyond a kiss or two, to what’s considered sensual.Â
For an anthology I’m a part of, Once Upon a True Love’s Kiss, which releases in January 2016, we wanted to be very sure our readers knew exactly what they were getting. Personally, I don’t like surprises between the pages, and I want to know up front what the book contains. I don’t read erotica, so for me a rating of four is pushing what I’d read or write.Â
We’re putting this disclaimer in the front page matter as well as including it in the anthology’s description on all the venues.Â
For the purpose of this anthology the following ratings apply:
One Kiss-Stories will either not have consummated love scenes, or subtly sexy undetailed scenes behind a closed bedroom door. You’re not invited inside. Sorry.
Two Kisses-Stories are more sensual than sweet with some love scenes that are more sensual than graphic. You might blush, but you won’t need a fan.
Three Kisses-Stories are sexier and bolder with more explicit love scenes and the language used to describe them may be more graphic. A fan and a cool beverage might be in order, but you won’t experience everything. *Wink*
Four Kisses–Stories have frequent, graphic love scenes with explicit language. Be prepared to blush and stand in front of the air conditioner, a tall, iced drink in hand. Clothing is optional.
Five Kisses–Stories have frequent graphic, descriptive love scenes and/or contain subject matter some readers may find objectionable. Blushing guaranteed, and you might learn a thing or two or three. But never fear, we won’t tattle if you don’t.Â
Have you ever not finished a book because of the sexual content, or been disappointed it didn’t contain more?Â
I usually skip the explicit scenes and seldom buy that author again. I believe in closed doors. There are a few — very few authors- I will buy and ignore the sex scenes. The scenes are usually not frequent and are not overly anatomical. If one can’t imagine what happens in bed, one shouldn’t be educated by romance novels where the experience is so over the top that it is a rare man who can reach that standard on a daily basis. One usually has to go home from the honeymoon.
LOL, I love that Nancy. Poor man would be exhausted if he had to perform like that for a lifetime.
I don’t stop buying an author but I skim explicit scenes rather frequently.
I do if they are to crude or graphic. I don’t mind well written ones that are more about expressing love than the act itself.
Thanks, Collette. May I speak frankly? I don’t like sex scenes. Because they offend me? No. Because they bore me.
Let’s face it, there are only so many things two people can do in bed (or wherever). And we’ve all read these scenes again and again and again.
The only possible variations mean getting kinky. Which I don’t read, but by now I imagine they’re getting pretty stale too. So what’s left?
But wait, there’s more. Even if some imaginative writer comes up with sex scenes that seem fresh and exciting without getting gross or ridiculous, I’d still have a problem if they take up lots of wordage. Which, given the nature of the subject, they almost certainly would.
When an author focuses on sex scenes, she sends the message, intentionally or not, that all this couple has going for it is sex. True, there are couples both real and fictional who go through a phase like this. But in a romance novel they’d better get past it before this reader losses interest. And yes, there are books I’ve shut for good because the author failed to do so.
IMHO, what goes on in the characters’ hearts and minds is far more interesting and meaningful than what happens down south. And lends itself to far greater variation. It holds more literary possibilities. It touches the hearts and stays in the minds of many (albeit not all) readers.
And if a writer wants to make a romance sexier, that’s where she should focus.
The plot has to carry the story for me. I don’t mind an intimate scene, if it comes late in the book and it’s not vulgar.
We only have open door scenes if it moves the plot along. A close friend skipped such a scene in one of our books and later asked what was being talked about. The character had found out how to change minds during the sex scene. I (Donald) just closed a book at about 20 percent because of the repeated scenes that didn’t have anything to do with the characters getting to know each other as they already did. Sex scenes can add but they can detract from the story.
Great point, Donald. I, too, believe the sex, if there is any, has to contribute to the plot.
I am not overly crazy about sex scenes. If it moves the plot along, I won’t mind too much. It’s not that I am extremely prude or what, but more that I don’t think a very detailed sex scene is needed in a story. I think it’s more fun to let our imagination go wild. I cannot say I’ve never read erotica – I did, once or twice and since it always comes back to the same, it was enough for me. That said, I’m willing to give a chance to an author who mostly writes erotica if I can find a story that will have historical elements and a good plot to it and not only sex scenes after sex scenes. Not sure it makes sense but that’s how I feel.
What I hear, over and over, is that even readers who do prefer books with more sexual content, want the story to be the primary focus, not the sex.
Sex happens in real life–a lot–no matter the era, and in the throes of falling in love, it happens even more. I’m not fussy about more or fewer sex scenes (though, honestly, I like racier reads), but what I need is for the sex to be a natural part of the progression of the story. If a girl has never been kissed, seeing her climb up the hero’s virile body with her skirts up in the garden is entirely unnatural. If one of the characters was once traumatized, I need to feel that when he/she is becoming sexual. If one or the other has been badly injured, having them fall in lust over an arm splint and a lack of laudanum is just ridiculous. If two characters are just not the types that would ever think of discussing the events of their bedroom with anyone, as a reader, it makes me feel a bit uncomfortable to be given the information by a third-party narrator.
It’s a matter of taste, don’t you think? Some readers prefer more sexual content, and others want none. It’s perception too. I’ve had different readers call the same book sweet and sizzling.
Oh, it is a matter of taste, which is the truly glorious thing about all books, everywhere. 🙂
I was shocked to be tagged as “sensual content” in an early review of my holiday novella. I would have said PG-13 at best, for light petting. High school kids do (far) worse on primetime TV. When I write, I have a strange relationship with the bedroom door. By the time I close it, some readers will have seen more than they like, but it is not gratuitous (at least, not intentionally).
I just got a review for one of my sweet novellas and the reviewer said it wasn’t a clean read because there were swear words (hell, damn) and sexual thoughts!!
I very much doubt I will ever write a book that does not include swear words and sexual thoughts. My first mainstream historical used every curse word and epithet–racial, cultural, and otherwise–that might have existed among the criminal element in turn-of-the-century Brooklyn, New York. 😉 And I can’t help it. I like writing the occasional realistic sex scene. 🙂
It also bears consideration of the readers’ sensibilities, and reminds us, as authors, to be clear about what they are getting. I call for industry-standard heat ratings.
Oh! I fully support industry-standard heat ratings, especially as a reviewer!!
It’s funny though, that sometimes even industry standard is different. I had one reviewer call a book of mine sweet because there was no explicit genitalia language, but the book does have a consummated scene…doors open. Another reviewer called the same book erotica, which is most definitely is not.
whether or not is has the scenes doesn’t bother me with regard to reading it. if it’s a well-written story, I’ll finish the book.
The story is key, isn’t it?
I like a tasteful sex scene that reveals more about the characters. But not too many, especially if they’re gratuitous and don’t move the story forward, I find that boring. I don’t care for a lot of anatomical detail either.
Exactly!
I skip the really racy scees. Call me old-fashioned but I care about plot, character development, relativity of minor characters, setting, etc. I don’t read romances to get sex edclasses.
Me either. The sex has to deepen the plot and make me feel the love the characters have for each other.
I’m late, but I hope you’ll forgive me. I tend to skip over lengthy sex scenes. I don’t like crude language, and It might make me put down the book. In the novella I’m writing now I forgot to add a sex scene, so I’ll have to go back and change it.
I have a very tame intimate scene in my just finished novella. The door is open, but readers don’t get to see everything. In face, I don’t have consummated sex scenes in any of my novella’s though I don’t think you could call any of them “sweet.”
I do enjoy erotica as well as super sweet but it will become stale if I read to many of a particular “type” in a row, so I just try to make sure I mix it up. However I do not enjoy books that the only focus is sex and not characters and plot because if your not invested in the characters it just feels strange to read about their sex life lol.
It seems like there is a common theme; the writing and plot are paramount even in erotica.