But Enough About Me!

I asked Victoria Janssen, author of several steamy erotic novels, how she does it.

By it, of course, I mean writing explicit sex. I can't. All of my books/series include prominent love stories and/or sexual encounters because those are so much a part of human life (and because I can be a bit of a romantic) but I do not write explicit sex (more like PG rated with perhaps an occasional R rating tossed in) not because I don't like it or object to it but because, I suppose, I feel too self conscious to manage it (something she addresses in her post).

What follows is her guest post, on the occasion of the release of her new novel, The Duke and the Pirate Queen.


Writing Explicitly

by Victoria Janssen



I think there are several keys to writing good explicit sex scenes. The first is to give up any pretense of hiding yourself. You can't hide from the reader, and you most especially can't hide from yourself.

By the way, it doesn't matter if you've never done the thing you're writing about and never intend to do it. What matters is what you think and feel about the action you're depicting. Writing, in some ways, works on the brain directly. Your feelings, through the medium of your style and voice, are being transmitted towards the reader. If your feelings aren't essentially honest, it's a lot harder for the reader to connect emotionally with what she's reading.

A way to honesty is finding empathy for what you're writing. A few times, I've written a sex scene about something I've never experienced and did not find appealing. So I asked someone who DID like the activity what it was she liked about it, and why. Given an additional point of view to work from, I was then able to consider what my characters might like, and not like, from the inside, and thus find a place of emotional honesty to work from.

Another key to writing sex scenes is the same as in writing any other type of scene; you have to pay attention to your prose. I also think you have to pay EXTRA attention, since some readers read sex scenes more closely and often than others! The attention-paying doesn't have to happen in your first draft. Some writers, including me, sometimes find it easier to write out the first draft in a state of semi-trance, as another route to access emotional honesty.

In revisions, though, I think it's more important in sex scenes than any others to pay attention to details. Simple things like repeating the same word over and over can throw a reader out of the scene. You can't let a sex scene drag, and you can't let it be predictable. After the initial draft, you might have to go back and add in a few more unexpected twists, of plot or characterization or dialogue. I always refine and polish the vocabulary I use, to make sure it's not only evocative but appropriate to the characters, the story's mood, and any thematic ideas I might have. Originality is always good, to one degree or another (it depends on your aims). And I make sure to look for unintentional double entendres. Those come up (heh) more often than you would think!

I feel the editing process is essential to avoid going over the top with a sex scene. It's especially good if you can wait a while, then read again what you've written.

Finally, I think you have to know your characters. Sometimes I know before I start the scene how that character would act in a sexual situation; sometimes I figure it out as I go along, from a mingling of intuition about the character and the needs of the story. The important thing to remember is that this scene isn't about you. It's about your characters. Weirdly, I think your own emotional honesty is required to know your characters properly.

Demonstrating women's sexuality through writing erotica, to a public audience, verifies the existence of female sexuality (woman as actor rather than than object) and helps bring female sexuality into public discourse. My emotional honesty thus not only validates women in general, it validates me as well.

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General blub:

The Duke and the Pirate Queen is set in the same world as The Duchess, Her Maid, The Groom & Their Lover and features characters who appeared in that novel, Duke Maxime and Captain Imena Leung. Captain Leung is forced to abduct Duke Maxime, who is her employer, to thwart an assassination plot against him. He wants her. She wants him. Unfortunately, issues of birth, rank, and their own pasts are in conflict with their desires. And then there are the pirates, the storm, the hostile islanders…not to mention the sharks.

Excerpt:

Imena slid into one of the smaller pools, across from Maxime. The stone bench beneath the water was slippery, and she had to brace herself with her toes. A moment later, she realized she'd braced herself against Maxime's leg.

"I am sorry!" she said, splashing as she hitched herself higher on the bench.

Maxime laughed. He reached out and snagged her arm, drawing her to sit next to him. "If you sit here, you can see the new sculptures."

Imena eyed him and tried not to grin. "Your Grace, are you trying to seduce me?"

"Only a little," he said, and slung his arm over her shoulders. "Have pity," he said. "I've had a difficult day, too." He leered in a patently false way, and she laughed. Perhaps it would be all right. She could indulge, just a little, and harm nothing.

"Just this once, I will sit with you," she said, and settled back against him. A velvety thrill chased over her skin as their bodies met. She shifted so their shoulders overlapped. His muscular bulk was as solid and comforting as it looked; the hair on his chest was softer than she'd expected. She wanted to rub herself against him, all over, just for the sensual pleasure of it, a reaction she didn't even have to Sanji, who'd been her lover for many months.

Such a pity Maxime was a duke, a pity for her and for him. She, at least, could flee the men her parents had chosen for her. She didn't think Maxime would elude his king's choices for very long. His arm tightened around her shoulders. It was more difficult to fight her body's desire when she was this close to him. She slid lower in the water and rested her cheek on his firm pectoral, her nose tantalizingly close to his nipple. He smelled of cedar-scented soap. She could lick him with no effort at all, if she wanted.

Maxime said, "You're not dozing off, are you? You haven't admired the sculptures. Over there, in the grotto."

Imena looked. The grotto had been hollowed out of the bathing chamber's far corner to reveal stalactites; they'd been embedded with crystals that glowed softly in the lamp light. The new sculptures were small glass octopuses in every color of the rainbow, attached in different positions as if they swam among a forest of stone.

"It's lovely," she said.

"I'm glad you like it," he said. He rubbed his hand over her upper arm. "Captain Leung, what if you married me?"

Imena laughed. "That's the worst possible solution to both our problems. I would be a terrible liability to you."

"Not necessarily," Maxime said. He leaned a fraction to the side and kissed her ear, then the bare sensitive skin above it; the touch resonated down to her toes. Imena shivered and thought about edging away, but her body didn't want to move. His nearness sang along her nerves. He said, "You have many valuable qualities. I also have many admirable traits that I would like you to consider."

"Such as?"

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