A pretty awesome write up.
Sex In Novels: Helpful Opinions
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TheAdventurer thank you 
I just hope itās helpful to people. I remember how nerve-wracking it was to write my first scene, and wished I wouldāve known then what I do now
Sara_Wilcox Thanks for the resources and the advice. My first ever adult scene is coming up (writing I mean), and I've been so anxious about it. I feel like a voyeur when I try to write it and I just end up embarassed. I think it's time to visit the corn hub for some inspiration.
melonbread I wish you luck in your endeavors
Just remember to determine if you are writing a ālove sceneā or a āsmut sceneā first. Then you can refine the criteria of your āresearchā. If youāre writing a smut scene, then ācorn hubā would be a decent āresourceā.
If youāre going more for a ālove sceneā, I suggest r-rated movies and books(so long as you are of age for all of this!). They are more tuned in to the emotional expressions and connections displayed during sex. Porn is more... primal, I guess? Most, anyways. There is romantic stuff out there too, but I donāt think Iād trust their āactingā to communicate the connection required. But again, that is a personal opinion
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On point no 2.
There (is) an outrageous number of (ways) to write or describe the word or act..
Just pointing out some typos to fix since it's great seeing you help others.
Sara_Wilcox This is really well written. :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:
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Rule number zero for romance writers: don't toss a sex scene just for the sake of having a 'spicy' thing for your pre-teen readers fan themselves (tip: they often don't pay). It's just like watching GoT on HBO then out of the blue and unnecessarily for the plot, naked people acting lewd are tossed before your eyes.
Female readers won't read your novel more because it has a lot of sex scenes. They will keep reading your novel if the sex scene occurs as a consequence of the plot. They are interested in the consequences of said sex innuendo, too.
I'd like to reinforce the difference of perception between males and females regarding sex in the media. Everyone said it a LOT, like, too much, but some inexperienced female authors go after conventional porn to learn how to describe a sex scene. But, thing is, describing too visually won't make a female reader connect with the scene. Most probably, will turn her away.
Gals usually don't care that much for the visuals of sex, as men do. We don't usually care for 'bouncy t--ies while she's gyrating cowboy-style like a Yo Gi Yo's Bey Blade', or 'she sucked his ginormous veiny prec--ed c--* mushroom like a baby elephant'. Go for the feelings and sensations.
And, not all men should be acting the same in bed. Give him some personality. It's okay to make him cuddly, or even vanilla. Not all men are grabbing hair werewolves, foreplay licking masters, thrusting experts D'Artagnans, or having a sexual repertoire of Marquis de Sade. And it's perfectly okay. You can still love them as a role model of sexy man.
Who said that: a woman that knows and reads it a lot. And it's just a reinforcement of what Sara_Wilcox said. It's not only her opinion.
Grand_Void_Daoist stickied the discussion.
Gonna pin this, I'm pretty sure a lot of authors would find this helpful.
That's pretty amazing write up and helpful resources...
I beg to differ, so reading or watching or performing the act isn't necessarily going to make an author write a decent scene. Some may have done all that and still struggle, everyone has their strengths and weaknesses when it comes to writing things like that
Shiny_Shirogane thank you very much for pointing those out I corrected them
Grand_Void_Daoist thank you! I was hoping it would
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AriaKang I both agree and disagree with you. Itās true that some just canāt write sex scenes. Just like some can write them flawlessly, with little effort. Like all things: the more you research and experience, the better you can translate it to paper. I donāt necessarily mean doing the actual act, but simple exposure to the wide world of physical contact can be inspiring/motivating/etc..
Writing is just like anything else: the more you research and practice writing the scene, the better it will turn out. Personally, I usually re-read paragraph by paragraph, then the whole chapter to make sure it flows right. Editing is your second best friend(next to a thesaurus).
I personally think that if one works hard enough on their craft, anyone can make a wonderful story. It all depends on the effort you put into it. Again this is all personal opinion
SrtaA I totally agree with you on almost everything you said(your descriptions
). Everything except females not particularly liking heavy descriptions; I think that comes down to how the scene is portrayed. Most of my readers are female or non-specific, and I have Extremely descriptive scenes in my book(no ābaby elephantā type descriptions though). But the two main characters are heavily devoted to each other. I add passionate terms and/or endearments to accentuate their connection, and use sex as a kind of cement to the building blocks of their relationship.
For this thread I decided to focus more on the authorās ability to translate what kind of scene they were going for, rather than the actual content because everyone still needs to write/be inspired/research/etc.. their own way. Iām dyslexic on top of a lot of other issues, so I learn and identify things differently. I could never write how I do without the sources to properly word myself. And thatās most likely the reason behind those hilarious descriptions you mentioned. Personally I think most write like that because they didnāt know what type of scene to portray to begin with, so they go with only āpornographicā descriptions.
I left the link and mentioned the discord server to help authors figure out how find their own words/style/etc.. But the first thing they need to determine before anything is what type of scene theyāre going for. Knowing that will help them narrow down not only the type of research they need to do, but also what kinds of questions they should be asking themselves while researching.
Example: for a āLove Sceneā, romantic media is ideal. Even flipping open a thesaurus and looking at the words and their definitions related to the word āloveā or ādevotedā can give authors a head start on their wordage and scene layout.
For a āSmut Sceneā, which to me is a sex scene with either minimal emotional connection, or.. darker emotions involved; porn is good research. Cold and calculating characters tend to be more involved in these types of scenes(like the main villain, the main character before his love Epiphany, etc..). The actors in porn donāt normally have an emotional connection to the other(unless itās a romantic erotica), so their movements wouldāve akin to an emotionless coupling. So long as the author remembers to incorporate the connection, or lack there of, into the scene(maybe the sex leads to a budding connection? Maybe it confirms their characters lack of feelings for the other? Etc..).
Sorry for the rant Just wanted to elaborate a bit more, but I loved your comments and thoughts
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Sara_Wilcox Was it a rant? No problem, polite disagreement is the patron of useful discussions. 
I mentioned 'Gals don't like it' because it's a statistical thing. Of course, there are exceptions. Like everything else in life. So I think my post wasn't invalidated by your personal experience or style. It's not only me saying it, the behavioral scientists said it before me. We all have our idiosyncrasies, but I was talking about the majority.
The kind of people who will find your thread useful are exactly the ones who are ruining their sex scenes because they don't know how to dose or to describe what they see in their mind. Or they don't even see it in their mind, which is a BIG problem. The ones perfectly okay with how they are writing their sex scenes will just shrug (or laugh), so any advice here is not for people who know exactly what they are doing...
As you said, there are basic problems (as I remember, not exactly your words):
- not conveying the intended mood because The author is using the wrong/weak words.
- repeating words or phrases thus making it boring as hell
- turning the sex act into something mechanical (I call it 'the pistoning effect') and lacking emotion
- doing it all wrong because you don't know how it really is, didn't do your homework, went against physics/anatomy/common sense (like, male-male sex, it's a whole different thing and some inexperienced BL authors do forget it needs lube to be enjoyable...).
There are more, but you gave excellent tips for every of them.
But, at least to me, the most important thing is what you said more than one time in your comments: sometimes they don't know what they wish. They don't feel the scene. They turn one thing into another.
So I reason this way: Hm, so you don't know what you want with this sex scene, but you want to insert one all the same? WHY?! HELL, WHY?! (note that it is a rant 
)
If it doesn't occur to you as a consequence of something, sprouting naturally, in a way you can imagine the whys and the hows, why do you need to insert a sex scene?
And that's the problem in many (not all, but many) Webnovel romances. Too many crap sex scenes because authors feel they need to push a sex scene when they don't really need one in the first place. Just to earn traction. MATURE CONTENT - The magic words on the top of the synopsis (by the way, something frowned upon by WN editors).
By the way, I've read the source you mentioned long ago and used to have it pinned in my favorites bar. It's a good source with lots of useful tips and words. 
I don't remember any other so good.
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SrtaA I totally agree with you Your post wasnāt invalid at all. Your points were spot on. I love how you broke down and simplified the main points, and backed it with data too I also love exchanges of the mind like this, and appreciate your opinion and feedback. I just meant that heavily described sex scenes can be appealing to women as long as the emotional investment is established and/or expressed during the scene.
I really loved your comment about how the mature content warning should NOT being at the top of the synopsis also. Too many books do it, in my opinion. Even some of the top ranked books(I donāt get why the editors donāt say something to the authors about it, if they want all the other authors not to do the same). Thank you for the stimulating conversation
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Sara_Wilcox the editors said it more than once, but since there's no type of punishment, people just disregard it.
Wolfick 12 inches long! so specific :joy:
Sara_Wilcox Loved reading this. Made me think over the scenes I done. I think I done okay on them. I was also very embarrassed when i found out my god mother was reading it!! :joy: