I guess we’ll find out today.
That having been said, I am not going to do as seen before and lead with the title “sex” and then not talk about it.
So about sex.
Ever since my debut novel, The Trust, was published, I’ve been getting a lot of questions about the sex scenes. And when I say a lot, I mean literally every other person I talk to asks me about the topic.
The main question I get about it is how do I write sex scenes.
The easy answer is, I don’t.
When writing The Trust there were several points in the storyline that ended in the bedroom. It was clear the sexual tension was building between the characters to a point of needing resolution (careful and deliberate word choice there).
The first time this happened it occurred between the main character and his paralegal. During the build up it was clear there was an attraction between them. The main character did not act on it for a number of reasons – he was coming off of a life changing prior relationship, he was the woman’s employer, she was younger and he didn’t want to think automatically that she was interested in the older man to name a few. Finally however, he explored what many have described as the obvious and ended up alone with her.
The outcome of this encounter was critical to the rest of the book, but I won’t provide any spoilers.
There was another character with whom the main character became romantically attracted and the topic of sex became more of an issue to their relationship. Since these two characters are going to be together through at least one more book, I was careful in how their first intimate encounter occurred (and how later intimate moments were handled.)
According to some I was perhaps too careful.
However, as to writing an actual sex scene, I tried a vast number of different approaches. Oh my, the results. Some were comical, some disastrous and some just down right bad.
In the end, I adopted a different approach. I’ve decided I shouldn’t write sex scenes with particulars – particularly since I frequently write in first person. To handle the scene effectively I think I would have had to change to a different point of view, that or make it entirely about the main character and I can’t see that working with her persona.
Rather than taking an approach where the graphic description prevailed, I chose to build up the tension between the characters to set the stage for what would happen behind closed doors and let the reader fill in the gaps with their own imagination.
This works for me. It may work for you, it may not. There are a lot of writers out there who can craft a spellbinding passage that leaves one shuttering – however, that isn’t me. As I have said time and time again – if it works don’t fix it and for me this works and is how I’ll approach the in the future.
Oh, and if you’ve made it this far I would love it if you would consider buying my book!
