Tag: scenes

How to Write Sex Scenes

robertmcloughlinWriting Advice

Sex must be mixed with tears, laughter, words, promises, jealousy, envy, travel, new faces, stories, dreams, fantasies, music, dancing and wine.       Anáis Nin

In my draft novel The Spa Resort there are several scenes involving romance, from enticing glances, to fully immersed lovemaking. Sometimes the characters fail clumsily. In other scenes they are seductive successes. As I wrote them I wondered what people would think. Would they be offended? Would they want the ‘juicy stuff’? Would innuendo be good enough? What kind of language should I use to describe these scenes? What if members of my family, friends, or neighbors read them? Would I feel embarrassed, be called sexist? Would I have to give my Boy Scout badges back?

So I thought I’d put a summary together of how other authors go about writing sex scenes. The spectrum is as varied as romance itself. On one end, there are gratuitous sex scenes put in just to titillate the reader. Just like in many of today’s movies where there has to be some nudity, a car chase, an explosion, and a fight. A scene where two people find themselves unexpectedly near a bed and feel compelled to rip each other’s clothes off then touch, lick, squeeze, and generally mimic a game of twister on that bed. Then there is the opposite side, obligatory (by genre) sex scenes where two people have met and over 20 chapters fallen in love despite themselves. Where their relationship naturally culminates in a passionate love scene, finally, often behind doors closed to the reader. (more…)

Scene Transitions in Novels

robertmcloughlinWriting Advice

In the first draft of my novel, ‘The Spa Resort’, I presently have 42 chapters and 190 scenes. I may not make any changes to the number of chapters. But as I edit, I definitely will be dropping or combining many of the existing scenes to something more digestible to the reader. In my editing, I will be going over each transition from one scene to the next to ensure that they flow seamlessly and are clear to the reader.

Did you ever read a book that had no chapters? It ends up ominously looking like one whole long chapter. Chapters are just another manner of creating a scene break. It’s the author’s choice whether or not they use them, or just write scene breaks into an ongoing story. Most authors though, utilize both chapters, and scene breaks to manage the flow of their novel. Personally, I prefer a book with chapters. It gives the reader a place for a bathroom break if nothing else. Individual scenes could be as short as a single sentence. Though in most novels, scenes run on average between 750 words all the way up to 5,000 words. You should be careful that your scenes don’t end up being interchangeable, or if nothing much changes from one scene to the next.

There are many reasons to end a scene and begin a new one:  (more…)