I think there is also a huge diffrence between male and female authors and audiences tough.

Your suggestions need to be accounted for from the start of the novel.

Especially for male authors, because you can't write an emotionally dead novel and suddenly expect to be writing a good love scene, and let's face it, we men shy away from emotionally descriptive novels, and the few who dont favor depression, self harm and angst genres.

In my opinion, if love scenes are on the planning for future chapters, with a male target audience, then the author needs to be more emotionally descriptive from the start.

If a novel is not emotionally descriptive from the start, it is better to intentionally keep sex to smut only because a love scene even if we'll written in an emotionally dead novel just doesn't work.

Likewise, the genre of the novel needs to be considered from the start. Take 'The Mech Touch' for example which is primarily scifi engineering and design oriented.

It does well mostly because there is more emotion in it than most such genres as part of the design processes, and whilst a fantastic read and having emotion from the start, it is better to insinuate that there was sex than write a sex scene there because a sex scene wouldn't fit in the story when there hasn't been a shred of romance within the first few hundred, and by now thousand chapters.

So Target Audience, Genre, and Emotional levels of the story need to be considered from the start, to even determine whether there should be sex in a story at all, and if yes, if a love scene is even remotely viable as an option over smut if the story has had no or little emotional charge thus far.

But that's just my opinion, which many may differ on, but I believe is worth sharing and considering for male authors.

PS. I'm being actively censored over this post and can no longer post on the forum:
[Media]https://i.imgur.com/M3E5GHO.png[/media]

    Hatake_Shirou I really like your line of thought, and agree with your general opinion. This is why I stress that writers need to figure out(if they want such a scene to begin with in their book), which type of scene they want before writing.

    As I stated in my first point on the original thread post; authors need to ask themselves questions while researching like:

    1. What kind of emotional connection do your characters have? Is it reciprocated? Etc..

    These questions cannot even be posed until the base of the story has been decided on/created/etc..

    I specifically made this thread about helping authors to get started on their intimate scenes because going any further into the development of their actual story lines starts to step on the creative toes of others.

    Personal opinion:

    Writing is a beautiful art form to me. I wouldn’t tell an artist how to paint, or what colors to use, but I’m happy to tell them what kinds of brushes will help create certain types of lines, patterns, etc..

    I’m not here to tell people how to write their novels(and I know you’re not either😁), I’m just suggesting how to get started creating an intimate scene; whether it be smut or love. Where to find the resources, and what questions they should be asking to find their own words.

    I talk about how the scenes should connect and flow, but I don’t like to actually go into too much detail about it. Not saying you are or anything like that, and I understand your point(generally speaking), about males having a harder time writing love scenes. But I didn’t want this to be gender-specific in any way because everyone struggles sometimes(even I do, which is why I LOVE the thesaurus link I posted above).

    Plus, I’ve read/seen books, movies, TV shows, etc.. Where the MC starts out less emotional, but the addition/introduction of a FC later opens the character(s) up to development. It all depends on the writer’s vision.

    Thank you for your thoughts and opinions though! Please know that they are Greatly appreciated as it gives those reading this thread food for thought as they develop their stories. I appreciate your input☮️❤️😁

      5 days later

      Sara_Wilcox My novel is basically a romance novel but with a slice of life and more focused on the journey of the characters than the destination of it. So, even though the novel is written from the perspective of the main female character, I see it to be descriptive of the feelings that each character shows when interacting with the MC. Basically, the novel is focused on feelings and thoughts that's why when creating such scenes, I focus more on the five senses. Like, how does their body feels, what do they smell? I tend to give more detail to the sensual aspects than the act itself because I honestly believe that it's more captivating to have that than describing the act.

        Here's an opinion from someone who cannot stand romance in novels just for how I feel and others who are similar to me might feel.

        I understand that many novels have romance even when they are not a romance novel. More often than not if it is written well enough (for example the romance isn't just "Oh you're the MC? I love you have my body!") I just deal with it and take it as building character for the MC and a side character who happens to be romantic with the MC. I might not enjoy it as much as other parts of the novel but I understand many readers are not like me and enjoy a little romance in their novels (I do not expect any author to write solely for me and only write things that I enjoy.)

        For romance that is not written well, it can either sour my mood about the novel, but I enjoy the novel enough to slog through it and wait for it to be over so I can get back to enjoying the novel. And sometimes if it is written so horrible it can make me drop the novel entirely (many novels that start great and then devolve into no personality harems with the female characters fall into this category for me. I understand lots of readers love harems and some don't even care if the female characters have good personality because the more people the MC can have sex with the better.)

        When it comes to sex scenes in novels (again coming from someone who cannot stand romance) I much prefer the "fade to black" effect or the insinuation (like Hatake_Shirou said). Where the parties will start kissing or start being extremely touchy and then the author skips to them either waking up the next day or getting out of the bed and straightening their clothes or putting clothes on. I feel that when the act is being described that I am reading an erotic novel at that point and for me wanting to read an erotic novel versus wanting to read a novel for entertainment are two completely different moods.

        Just my thoughts (as someone who doesn't enjoy romance in novels at all. I saw the thread stickied and thought I'd chip in the conversation.) Hope all the authors keep on doing what they enjoy and that their readers continue to enjoy their works. :)

        Agbedorwu thank you very much for the sentiment😁 However, I will not post personal information like that on the forum for many reasons, but I do have a Facebook page and Discord. I feel it is VERY important for me to state and clarify with you that this is strictly for intellectual conversation.

        I stated in the original post, I am a married woman and mother. I apologize if I misunderstood your first post, but the way you have worded it makes me feel that stating my marital status is important. If you would Strictly like to talk as acquaintances and writers, then you may contact me via social media(same name and picture as here). Reply if this is acceptable. If not, no hard feelings.☮️❤️😁

          5 days later

          This was very well written :D
          I'm a very open person, so I like to write raw, if that makes sense. I'm rewriting a story I've had in my head for years and one of the thing I noticed there was too much in was the sex scenes. There's 3 of them at the moment and only one feels.... Connected. XD

          The aim of my story is that the main character likes the idea of sex and is normally surrounded by men (she's a mythical human siren XD) so she has a lot of flings and stuff. But I think I made the chapters too long or the feeling we're somewhat disjointed XD
          So reading this now, I'm glad I'm rewriting the story to make it more inclusive. I've had no real life experience with this yet, so I rely on my vivid imagination 🤣🤣
          Thank you for writing this little article as well :D

            Sara_Wilcox Regarding your comment about being narrow minded because I stated sex is for the marriage bed. All I see are novels about contract marriage or marriage for convenience the majority of the time. As I said it was my opinion only and I wasn't speaking for anyone else. However, I'm not narrow minded, far from it! I am tired of smut and sex, per se and if that makes me narrow minded and bigoted so be it!
            Children have been used to gratify sexual cravings of both men and women in our society. It has become a very casual and common thing, therefore, I feel justified in what I said. Overall, Sarah, my comment was a complaint about how today's society has literally sexed most of us out. I understand what you're saying but to call me narrow minded and bigoted is going a little too far just because I stated a distaste for the sexual perversion bombardment in our society today. Sex has become so glorified that very young girls (ages seven to nine) are having sex because that's all they see in movies, commercials, these books and there are very few authors writing about married love, waiting until marriage to have sex, etc. In my humble opinion, the condoning of premarital sex is the reason so many young girls are pregnant at an even earlier age today and massive abortions. I respected your opinion but you made it clear that I'm narrow minded and bigoted because I desire married sex without the very graphic details. If our society wasn't so perverted, I might agree with you but too much is happening in the world today to keep quiet about the sexual issues facing the young and impressionable boys and girls in 2021 and beyond!
            I'd like to add one other thing: influence. These stories influence those impressionable children to have sex. I'm just looking for something more than just sex. I like a good sex scene as well as anyone else but all I see in the majority of these stories is smut and yes you can feel molested after reading about someone being raped aggressively and descriptively. No offense, but there are only a few of us who truly would like a change!

                GWEN

                I absolutely agree with your point where you talking about sex glorification literally everywhere.
                We are bombarded with sex everywhere. Later in many young people, incl. depression, etc. and questions what's wrong with me, if sex does not bring me any pleasure. It is not said at all on television, in commercials, magazines that you have to mature and mature for everything. Also for writing beautifully about it.

                    Jo_J Thank you! You're a rare breed. There's so much confusion about sex and I don't believe I'm being narrow minded or bigoted because I don't agree with Sarah's reply to me.

                        GWEN

                        I wrote a traditional novel a few years ago - a romance, and according to critics, a psychological one. Those who have read say they are not missing sex scenes at all. If you want, you can write something valuable, without such scenes.
                        I just started to upload it on WN. I will see what kids will say here about it ;)

                          I wish you many happy readers!💕

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