In this post, I’m going to address in my own special way one of the recurring problems of a writer’s life. Many of us find that while we’re in a writing phase, we can’t seem to read. It’s not just about time, it’s about attention.

For what it’s worth, I’m going to argue that you gotta. Ignore me at your peril, but then, listen to me at your peril. Do what works for you, because when it comes right down to it, I don’t know shit.

All I’m trying to do is remind you — or maybe remind myself — why you sat down in that stupid chair to begin with. We all began writing because at some point writing something down seemed like a better idea than doing the dishes or emptying the litter box. Locked up in the problems of fiction, it’s way too easy to forget why it ever did.

Anyway, here’s the story:

Recently, while lost in a finger-gallop reverie in the virtual pages of my newest tender romance between a half-clothed young socialite and the crew of the HMS Bon Vivant, I realized something strange and wonderful.

All my recent first-drafts evince a familiar narrative rhythm — one I was completely unaware of during the writing of a considerable number of words.

The novels open with a conversation or interpersonal conflict that leads to an action sequence for which there’s clearly backstory that the reader doesn’t know, so that the resounding “WTF?” in the reader’s mind both intrigues them and troubles them.

The novel then proceeds to a chapter of backstory from the perspective of a single character, which tells you part of why the action sequence in Chapter 1 matters and what in the hell the characters were talking about.

Following that, there’s another conversation and another action sequence that both illuminates the events of Chapter 1, but you still don’t quite know WTF is going on.

You as the reader are more illuminated after the subsequent round of backstory, again from another character’s perspective — often a different character than the first backstory.

So on and so on — through about six or eight chapters, until roughly the midpoint of the book. After that, the narrative proceeds more or less unchecked as a series of conversations and actions sequences, to an ending that’s either a suckerpunch or a bitch-slap, depending.

Let me say here that structuring novels has always bothered me. I don’t do it naturally, which is why I’ve been more successful writing short stories. But as I wrote this round of longer works — about five of them since June — it all came to me as easily as a Cleveland drama teacher who’s mistaken me for Robert Mitchum. And for a time, I didn’t have the faintest idea why it was suddenly so natural.

Then I picked up a Jim Thompson novel, my tenth in a few months, and I realized I was aping  Thompson’s formulaic structure.

James Meyers Thompson, 1906-1977,  in case you don’t know your tough-guy literature, was one of the codifiers of redneck noir, and more importantly of the overall hard-boiled esthetic in the postwar crime thriller — and here I’m talking really hard-boiled, not the saxophone-drenched diaries of some trenchcoat-wearing wisecracker who handwashes his delicates and jots his crime scene notes in a cute little spiral notebook with unicorn appliqués and a glue-glitter “Detective Jake Fist’s Notebook” on the cover, and dots the I’s in “high-velocity impact splatter” with little pink hearts.

Jim Thompson, much like Hitchcock and Cornell Woolrich, raised misanthropy in the thriller to a high art — but, most importantly, Thompson was a consummate plotter. His books pound the pavement (or West Texas alkali dust) so tight and fast Raymond Chandler curls up in his grave and weeps, “Uncle.”

Many of Thompson’s short, to-the-point suckerpunch thrillers follow exactly the structure I mention above — some don’t, sure, but the commercial crime novels he sat down and cranked out while slamming down liquor in the ’50s and ’60s all follow a similar pattern. Thompson sure as hell didn’t invent it — really, the structure’s pretty standard. But you tend not to see it quite as evidently nowadays in category crime fiction, which today is thoroughly dominated by 400-page P.I. books and lawyers from Sausalito. With the stripped-down, 60,000-word structure in 12 or 15 or 20 chapters, it’s easier to see the moving parts.

And as far as I’m concerned, the structure works.

I don’t mean it works from a writer’s perspective — who gives a shit about writers? I mean it works for the reader. Remember them? That is to say, it works for me — I love reading it. Add to that predictable an enveloping sense of atmosphere, vivid characters, wonderful narrative language and an ear for dialect, and I’m as happy as a pig in shit as long as no one tries to talk to me while I’m reading.

With Thompson, specifically, he can stuff my peepers with an endless parade of corrupt Texas oilmen, L.A. grifters, slowly-coming-unhinged small-town sheriffs and St. Louis bellboys plotting the perfect murder of a corrupt politician’s cocaine-addled wife; I’ll always be convinced I’m reading a new book, even though I’m actually reading the same damn book over and over again.

That’s probably why I read about ten of Thompson’s novels in couple months — immediately before I started writing in exactly that structure, without even really meaning to do it.

Having found the style fantastically satisfying as a reader, I started pumping it out as a writer despite the fact that at the moment I’m not writing anything even remotely resembling crime novels. The supremely satisfying framework imprinted itself so thoroughly on me that I utilized it without even knowing it — after years of not quite “getting” novel structure.

What’s the point? You are what you eat. You have to read to write. If you are writing novels, you need to read novels; if you are writing short stories, you need to read short stories; if you are writing deconstructive poetry in Georgian — well, you get the point. And you need to read a lot of it, because the structural conventions of the genre you work in need to seem so completely natural to you that you can not only make it your own but make it your own without even knowing you’re doing it.

For years I have been telling people they need to write to write — and there ain’t a damn thing wrong with that assertion, either. But you also have to know what a work of art feels like to be able to do it with a depth of instinct that allows you to make it your own.

I should say that I’ve been somewhat inaccurate for the sake of clarity above; you actually don’t need to read obsessively in the genre or genre you’re writing in. You need to read in the genre(s) you’re most influenced by. In the same way that I”m influenced by Jim Thompson in writing erotica (an improbable marriage if ever there was one), you might be influenced by Robert A. Heinlein in writing gay werewolf romances.

Mazel Tov! The more unlikely your influences, the more likely you can bring a new voice to a given genre, to which — assuming you learn to do it well, or well enough — your readers will say “Thank you, Ma’am and/or Sir, may I have another?”

Now, please don’t take that as an engraved invitation from me (like you need one?) to write “A multigenerational epic fantasy inspired by The Daily Show.” Wacky ideas are one thing. But as a cynical son of a bitch who has heard — seriously — just about every undercooked idea possible come out of writers’ mouths, nothing’s more tedious than writers who intentionally look for improbable concepts in order to impress you with how “original” they are (Hot Tub Time Machine, anyone?), I’m telling you to keep your self-satisfied precocious inventiveness down to a dull roar and leave the truly contrived mash-ups to people with absolutely bloody well nothing of their own to say. The point is not to blow people’s minds with your half-assed ideas, but to blow their minds with the vividness, genuineness and personal flavor of your writing.

You want to give readers That Barton Fink Feeling, for the simple reason that if you don’t, no one else can. How do you do that? You give them what you love — what you really love, not just what you pat yourself on the back for having come up with a sentence-long summary for.

What I’m trying to get at here is that a writer must find what books he or she enjoys reading — or, preferably, LOVES reading with a passion that makes her or him sacrifice sleep and risk life and limb to squeeze in a few extra pages while walking down the street.

I discovered that in spades this year. I spent a decade or more of being sort of lukewarm on all the fiction I read. Therefore, I didn’t read nearly as much of it as I should have. Then I started reading fiction aggressively, and I realized that the experience of reading a book that blows you away is what all this ludicrous self-torture is about.

You do have to write to write — that fact is as unassailable as the meaning of the word is being, well, “is.”

But you are what you eat — so go read something that reminds you why you ever sat your ass down in that stupid chair to begin with.

“When I hear his steps outside my door I lie down on my bed, open my legs and think of England.” – Lady Alice Hillingdon, 1912

Poor Lady Hillingdon. Methinks she and her partner just weren’t doing it right.

Too often I think this frigid mindset about sex persists today, particularly in fiction. Certainly, some people believe that sex is like venereal disease — you know it exists, may even have personal knowledge of it, but never, ever talk about it in polite company, and certainly not with humor.

In my opinion, sex is not something to be hidden under the cover of darkness and talked about in whispers. It is a natural function, one that should be experienced with joy, and celebrated in both life and fiction.

As far as quality of life goes, sex and laughter tie for the top spot on my list of must-haves for a couple of reasons. Both can give greater dimension and intimacy to a relationship, and let’s face it — both make you feel good. Or at least, they should for most of us (I believe Lady Alice got the fuzzy end of the lollipop on that one).

Why on earth wouldn’t I want this same dynamic combination in the romantic fiction I read and write?

My characters almost always laugh with and at each other and the world around them. Their relationships are forged with sarcastic one-liners, with witty banter, and even a couple of pratfalls now and then. They tend to laugh often — even in bed.

Yes, I admit it. I’ve broken the cardinal rule of writing sex scenes more than once and had my characters chuckle between the sheets. Hey…art imitates life, and I freely confess I’ve had some of my best laughs in bed.

It’s my contention that humor, done correctly and with the right timing, can be the world’s most effective, cheapest, and least messy lube. Humor can break the tension; giving readers (and characters) a much need respite from the build-up of intense emotions. It can be a catalyst for the shedding of inhibitions between characters. Most importantly, it can hammer home a sense of reality to the scene that can strengthen a reader’s connection with the characters.

In far too many of today’s movies and books, sex scenes are either all about the physical act, or just too damn serious. In real life, sex is often full of fumbles and near misses, of bumping noses, clacking teeth, and noggins smacking the headboard. It’s full of interruptions, from phone calls to kids barging in, to pets wanting attention at the most inopportune moments. Showing these all-too-human foibles periodically in sex scenes can strike a resonant chord with readers, reminding them of some of the more awkward, intimate moments of their own lives.

In other words, humor can give characters life.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. “But Kiernan, won’t sticking humor smack dab in the middle of a sex scene throw the reader out of the moment?”

The answer is, probably.

I’m not being contrary. When I talk about writing humor into a sex scene, I don’t mean stopping the characters mid-coitus to have one or the other jump up and smash a watermelon with a mallet. I certainly don’t mean having one partner stop drilling the other to do a stand-up routine. That would be just…wrong. Timing is the key. A little gentle humor, a quick chuckle between partners before things get hot and heavy, can go a long way.

Unless, of course, you want the sex scene to end. Coitus interruptus is tried and true method of building sexual tension, and humor is a great way to do it.

Humor after sex is particularly effective. It can show an easy camaraderie between long-time partners, or discomfort between almost-strangers, and it’s especially useful in providing post-hot-and-sweaty-coital tension relief for the reader.

What type of humor you use is an individual choice. I think most writers create characters that appeal to them physically, and the brand of humor written into a story should be no different. Writing humor that you don’t enjoy personally would probably fall flat. My humor is often of the sarcastic variety, although I’ve been known to throw in a little physical humor if I believe it fits with both the story and the characters. Basically, if it makes you laugh, go for it.

To the Alice Hillingdons of the world: lighten up. You might just loosen up enough to find out what the rest of the world already knows — that good sex can put a smile on your face.

Other writers get it, of course: romance writers live in rosy castles and have crinoline dreams; science fiction authors are pasty-faced nerds with more love for science than humanity; horror pros keep bodies in their basement for research.
It’s natural for people to think that because you write smut … well, it’s pretty obvious that they think: thin, greasy mustaches, seedy domains, hacks, perverts – the clichés pop immediately to mind. But what’s really interesting is that this isn’t the toughest of occupational hazards for the erotica writer. After all, life is full of surprises: the romance author is a cynical young guy, the science fiction writer can’t balance his checkbook, the horror fan loves Fred Astaire movies, and the erotica writer is just doing a job.
Who cares what other people think: it’s what’s inside you that counts – and what’s inside erotica can be very unusual, sometimes almost traumatic.
The romance writer might fall in love with one of his or her characters, science fiction writers might be endlessly frustrated that they’re living in the past and not the future they love, and horror writers might look at the world through a serial killer’s eyes, but smut writers deal with very loaded stuff every time they pick up their metaphorical pens. Sex is powerful: it lives in the deepest parts of us, lurking in the brainstem right up there with climbing in the trees. It’s also very unpredictable. Sex isn’t intellectual; changing our sexual selves is like trying to change left or right-handedness. Despite what hysterical fundamentalists believe, sexual orientation isn’t something that can be cured – don’t even bother to try. In short, sex is the atomic bomb of the psyche.
When you write smut, you have to be prepared to be surprised. When anyone sits down to write fiction, they casually flip through their lives, loves, and experience to fill in the blanks. This character is white, this character is black, this character is straight, gay, tall, short, fat, thin, nasty, sweet … this character is (fill in the blank). When you write stories with a sexual focus, those choices can sometimes reveal deep sexual feelings – feelings that can emerge in unexpected ways.
One of the big decisions erotica writers have to face is a professional one: write what you like and what you know, or try to write about other orientations or practices. Stick to familiar territory and your market is very limited – but even if you stick to your own sexual neighborhood, you still can be in for some surprises. Write the same kind of story, even if it’s as broad as your orientation with no queer or S/M overtones, enough times and something is bound to emerge. Maybe it’s the location, the description of the characters, the sex act itself – something is going to pop up. A memory will emerge, a revelation of a certain sexual peculiarity will dawn on you – and you’ll find yourself staring at a blank page, shivering.
I’ve known writers who’ve found themselves unexpectedly aroused by a story that’s taken a dark, even horrifyingly sexual turn – or straight writers getting turned on by writing gay porno, and vice versa. I’ve had the experience myself, getting honestly disturbed by a story I’d been writing. While I definitely encourage writers to try new and unique approaches to writing, I also warn them about these surprises – they’re part of the game for being an erotica writer.
What to do about it? Like anything psychological, there isn’t a cure-all technique. But why should you try and cure it? It’s part of you. Maybe it’s something small, maybe something indicative of a larger issue, but it’s still part of who you are. Personally, I try to really look at what pops up, and how it makes me feel. Is it frightening, the emotions that came up during the writing of that one story, or is it a theme that I hadn’t been aware of? An editor of mine pointed out that a lot of my stories take place at dusk or dawn, between day and night. When I heard this, I was shocked and angry that I’d subconsciously used the same device over and over again, but then I realized that for me it was also a way of using a curtain between our walking-around selves and our sexual selves. Another friend of mine recently realized that most of his characters have a certain color hair and eyes. Not the end of the world, certainly, but still exposing something laying deep in the mind.
When the discoveries are more shocking, one thing I try and remember is what I call the horror hazard. Horror writers have the same visceral reaction to their work: thinking too much about how much blood a decapitation would generate, or the sound a hatchet would make cutting off a limb. It doesn’t mean they want to try it, but the images are too real … too vivid. Writers, remember, use their imaginations, and imaginations are made of jumbled experience and rearranged thoughts. It doesn’t mean that the wish is father to the action, it just means that you’ve managed to impress your own consciousness with your skill as a storyteller. You’ve surprised your own mind.
Good or bad, it is simply an unusual discovery or an indication of something deeper, something disturbing, and these things happen. Whether you decide to let it bother you, use it for self-exploration, or smile at the fact that your writing managed to arouse yourself – it is up to you. The best advice I can give is to remember two little things when it does happen: like anything to do with sex, you are not alone. We all have had our similar moments, the same fears and disturbing thoughts. The other is that you’re a writer, remember: a teller of stories, a professional liar. Your life, your dreams, your thoughts are fodder for your work, and that sometimes using the stuff that might scare you or make you uncomfortable is the best thing. In other words, when things are uncomfortable, try exploring further: write it out and see where it goes.
That’s an occupational hazard, but it can also be the greatest reward.

Not that my name means much to anyone except me (and it hardly does me) I do think a quick introduction is in order. More to see my credits listed then to impress, I am a freelancer in this writing thang we do, having been published in small press, major market, anthos and on-line; penning blogs, essays, SEO webcopy (more on that in a bit), produced one-acts (so off off Broadway they have been produced in northern NJ where I live), short fiction, reviews and interviews, 800# pre-recorded scripts and my weekly column SEX FILES at a website to be named later. I also have a music show on Radiodentata and am an ASCAP licensed songwriter, having played in the US and abroad.

So that’s me, for good or bad.

The main gist, point, fol-de-rol and fiddle dee dee of what I will present here we be the ins and outs of SEO (that’s search engine optimization) in the sex writing field, where it fits in and how and why to do it. Since I write everything from P.R. for clients, to product descriptions, interviews and even short gonzo pieces, and almost all of it needs to have some sort of SEO compliance, I might be in a position to give some tips, advice or at least answer questions about this voodoo that we do.

The thing I have come to see (and I’m sure you have also) is how all bets are off these days. The table lists constantly. One day one type of doing something is the only way, and by the end of the week the rules change. As seems to happen more and more, the Net allows for so much freedom while at the same time opening doors to ways of thinking and working that are seen as innovative on a Monday but grow obsolete by Friday. What I will be on about here is ways of writing more dictated by trends and market-place rules then your own little style and way of writing that makes you you. And while in all my writing I endeavor to find my own voice, I do find I am implementing so many new paradigms as the days go on that sometimes make my head spin.

To this end I am ever learning. I don’t take everything to heart, some ideas or trends are simply too silly or don’t apply with what I do, but writing copy with a specific eye on SEO is different then penning the great American novel in your enviable style. And though I don’t start my fingers flying with the express purpose of stuffing keywords into every line nor am I even compelled to do so with every scribble, this way of thinking has crept into the work I do when I am hired to do the work this way.

Again, I really do hope I have something to offer here. I do not have a rarified view of what I do, of art in general. I think that anything you do with a passion is artful. If you have a desire to lift, topple and shift garbage from a garbage can, and this is a job you take pride and view as artful, then it is just as important as another guy or gal penning that great American novel. And maybe that’s what I’ll leave you with today. Nothing specific in the way of SEO writing or its ilk, but more an idea that whatever you do do, if you do do it well and want to do do it well, that you are approaching that thing you do ‘artfully’ and beyond paying attention to a certain number of keywords in your copy or fitting in the website name in a blog or article, maybe the most important aspect of anything you do is to always endeavor to do it with care, passion and some sort of artfulness.

 Then again, I’m new here, what the hell do I know? 

Plot Broken Down Part I

First things first! I’d like to welcome Ralph Greco Jr. and Debbie Riley Magnus to the team. The former I met last year at Cybernet Expo and was impressed with him as he grew into the writer he is now. He’ll be handling some basic Search Engine Optimization for writers while also covering the interview medium. And Deb is my publicist with whose help I’ve created this blog. She’s a marketing genius and an author. She’ll cover marketing for authors. Ralph will fill Dr. Peeler’s slot and Deb’s first post will follow Oceania’s next month.

Last time I had the blog we covered novel writing plot basics and how erotica/romance authors fit sex into their plot. To recap:

In EROTICA sex is the plot. The ONE event (depending on the story length) is that the characters have to end up in bed. This can be conflict driven.

And:

In EROTIC ROMANCE sex FORWARDS the plot.

Having said this, we now need to know how to plot quickly and effectively. The faster we can plot a story that sells, the faster we can write that story with less hassle. Before I continue, I will mention that like my mentor, this is the method that works for ME. You “may” have variations but at the end we’re talking about who gets quality books which readers want to read out faster and how to sell to publishers.

The first question I want to ask you is: When you’re creating your plot, where is your conflict going to happen? Will it be character based as in typical contemporary romances such as those found at eHarlequin. Their BLAZE line (which I am currently targeting) is aimed at relationship conflicts. Sure there’s the outer world to deal with and even in their grittier Nocturne Line where paranormal elements abound, the focus is on the actual character development.

If you’re writing Urban Fantasy, then our focus changes slightly to outside the character conflicts. Look at writers like Jeri Smith-Ready and Yasmine Galenorn, who write series books about worlds, not just characters. There is character development as each story progresses but the focus is on how that development will aid in the war against the BIG BAD ENEMY.

Then we need to ask if we’re blending erotic with any genres. If we are, then we have to account for that in our plot arc and character development arc.

The other elements we must deal with are story length and POV. We’ve covered POV. Who has the most to lose is who should have the POV control. Story length we’ll cover in our next post.

Sascha Illyvich

Write sex the tease by oceania
Last week Thomas Roche wrote about the tease and waiting too long for the money shot
this week i want to follow with
more on the tease!

have you ever listen to a writer tell you about the story they are writing?

Did you notice the levels of enthusiasm
that nervousness
that heady thrill that only comes from a powerful idea or really good sex!

But when it came to writing it out
You found it
staler than week old bread

Yes they hit all the plot points they told you about

Yes they described it in minute details
but it just died!

Not a pleasant experience was it

Well now imagine that the words flew off the page….

It was exciting
Sexy
And It Delivered
But when it was spoken
It died
and not just died but died and was left to rot
and it smelt bad!

Words on a page
will lay flatter than a transsexual before hormone injections
but spoken words flat without emotions will kill even the best words

so here’s the skinny
the reader has to go beyond reading
they have to go to the next level
they have to be a teller

Hence the name story teller

And as a story teller
They have an active role in
enunciation
and inflection
they have to keep in mind that when telling a story
reading a story out loud
regardless if it for a group or to record for distribution
is 2 parts writing
1 part performance art

I know many actors feed off an audience
I must admit it can be helpful
I mean if youre reading to an in tune group
Or just to 1 special person
It adds to the emotions you put behind the words

but what if there is no audience
what if it is just you and the microphone

that my darlings is when you read to the microphone
that inanimate object becomes your lover
and it helps that it is shaped like a large bulbous cock
lol
just the right shape to get you in the mood

I know you’re not sure you can read your work out loud
well you better get used to it
because one form of publicity is book readings
they have been going on since the beginning of time
and they are an excellent way to build a following of the 10000 fans you should be shooting for

still not sure
talk to Beth Wydle
this past weekend i went to an authors reading organized by this author of lesbian romance
it was great fun
several authors i have been following were there
they were battle ready
in costume
books and excerpts ready

they understood that reading out loud wasn’t just reading the words on the page
they knew in order to draw you into the characters and have you really grasp the story line
they had to put themselves
wholly in ever utterance

and they did
so here’s the challenge
now it’s your turn
why don’t you send me oceania @radiodentata your excerpts
I promise to be kind but fair in my critics

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Remember Mulder? Remember Scully? If you were too busy reading Proust, playing with blocks, studying Calculus, leading cheers, making touchdowns at Homecoming games or getting your face dunked in the toilet by bullies to watch the first four seasons of The X-Files, you missed the Happy Days of the paranormal detective genre; way to go, Genius. You also missed an onscreen example of the most fundamental misstep a series author can make — omission of the money shot.

Why do I bring up a TV show to discuss paranormal series fiction? I mention it first and foremost because the spunky spooky investigators exerting such influence on the romance and fantasy genres, and therefore on erotica, must shake their juju sticks at X-Files protagonists Spooky Mulder and Starbuck Scully.

The X-Files debuted the same year as that other early’90s paranormal-detective icon, Anita Blake, but an army of paranormal investigators preceded both properties — Scooby Doo, Kolchak The Night Stalker, and let’s not forget Carnacki the Ghost Finder and Seabury Quinn’s Jules de Grandin. A more immediate antecedent was Tanya Huff’s Toronto-based paranormal detective series that predated The X-Files by a couple of years.

But a weekly television show exerts cultural influence that novels quite simply cannot, so in terms of short-term zeitgeist The X-Files gets the nod that even Lovecraft cannot.

It doesn’t matter that the show was never the broader cultural phenomenon that most fans remember it being. The second season had a Nielsen rating that made it the seventy-first most popular show on television. Season 3? Fiftieth. The show wouldn’t peak until Season 5, when it was eleventh.

But does that matter? No, because big screaming nerds with samurai swords on their walls and ball-and-stick caffeine molecule Tramp Stamps are not the fickle lot that television executives or your Grandma Mabel are. The influence of The X-Files on “my generation,” whatever that means, was at the time incalculable, and far more incalculable now.

Call it a “cult phenomenon.” Call it “influential.” Call it “ahead of its time.” Call it late to the alien-vampire sex orgy in the Roswell Holiday Inn; the important fact is that the Mulder-Scully tease — that is to say, the promise of a bang — became the lengthy lap dance around which the mythology of The X-Files was wrapped. These two fantastically sexy FBI agents (it’s fantasy, right?) captured the fantasies of pervy nerds.

We didn’t tune in to find out whether this week the misunderstood video store clerk would turn out to be the Loch Ness Monster or the DMV employee was secretly a Were-Bigfoot. We tuned in to find out if the obviously bubbling cauldron of Mulder and Scully’s craving for each other would overcome the fact that it wasn’t even real cream cheese it was lite cream cheese.

Sure, we gave a fuck about aliens; yeah, yeah, right, vampires, whatever, but what kept us coming back from week to week was the chemistry between the leads and the faint hint that they just might “do it” — even though we knew they wouldn’t, except maybe in a tentacle-rape leathersex five-way with Krycek and Assistant Director Skinner in the copious fanfic that littered the dialup-era Internet and probably bumped AOL’s 1994-5 fiscal year revenues by at least 10%. (By the way, what’s more, the repeated allusions to Mulder’s not-ready-for-prime-time sexual interests — girlie mags, porn videos, autoerotic asphyxiation — established what most of us knew already: us alien-hunters? We’re deviated preverts. Deal with it).

But if the erotic chemistry between the leads, as I submit, kept me and my friends — who were, to a geek, pervy as shit — watching The X-Files, how much more important must the chemistry between your lead characters be today — not just to the paranormal investigator subgenre of the romance-fantasy-horror-detective-erotica axis, but to everything that requires sexual tension to be maintained throughout a wider story? If you are writing erotic romance, paranormal erotica, or just plain sexy paranormal fiction, how much more important is it to create intense chemistry between your characters today, when readers can, with the push of a button, seek out any level of sexual explicitness in their fiction — making a dissatisfying tease an even bigger piss-off?

That’s what we in the biz call a rhetorical question; it’s damned important, obviously, or I wouldn’t mention it. I’ll tell you why I bring this up, and why the romantic missteps and erotic disasters of The X-Files should matter to the paranormal series author: There was no money shot, if you’ll forgive the rather vivid metaphor. That is to say, as fans, We never got paid.

By this, I do not mean “Mulder and Scully never slept together.” That is not the problem in and of itself, and besides, I have this vague sense that they did, though I’m not sure I gave a crap by that point; was there a baby or something? Fuck if I remember.

Early in the history of the fandom (that’s dweebspeak for “people who like something”), X-Philes split into two opposing groups: the No Ro’s and the ‘Shippers. The former wanted Mulder and Scully to keep staring at each other blankly, and the latter wanted them to mash their lips together blankly.

All right, all right, to be fair, that’s not what the ‘Shippers wanted. They wanted Mulder and Scully to get together as a couple, the same way I wanted the Professor and Ginger to get together when I was five. The No Ro’s felt that such a tryst would ruin the chemistry. Certainly the series itself came down hard in favor of the No Ro’s for most of the show’s run, to the point where I (and many others) got sick of waiting. I think some deeply-embedded human mating instinct tells us that if you haven’t gotten together with someone in the first six years you’ve been dissecting alien bodies with them, maybe the chemistry isn’t as strong as you think. We can’t all be June Carter Cash.

The Mulder-Scully tease went on too long. Like all lap-dance victims, until about Season 6 I was sure I was going to get that stripper’s phone number — sure of it! The problem was that for the chemistry to be maintained, the two leads couldn’t get together — or so the conventional wisdom said.

So what does that mean for a writer of modern series fiction, particularly erotica and paranormal romance? Even in the most mainstream, non-erotic subgenres, sexuality and romance are critical parts of the formula. Should you listen to the No Ro’s? If your leads have sex, will they end up like Maddie and David — ruining the series?

If I were one of your characters, I would come alive and slap you for even considering it. Real characters fuck. Unless your characters are asexual, celibate or otherwise sexually unengaged — or unless the plot simply doesn’t call for romance or eroticism (in which case this site is probably not the best writing guide) sex should be a part of your characters’ lives whether you’re writing erotica or not.

A certain amount of will-they-or-won’t-they is built into the narrative formula; any story with an erotic or romantic component can benefit from it; it’s called suspense.

But your characters should be your friends, or at least your acquaintances. If I was your friend, and you kept cockblocking me the way The X-Files kept cockblocking Mulder and Scully, I’d stop being your friend. If you were an acquaintance and you kept cockblocking me, I’d probably call the cops, or at least close my blinds.

When people have sex, their lives don’t end. The conventional wisdom is sex-negative bullshit. In real life, the adventure — maddening, infuriating, gorgeous and terrifying — begins when you get together.

Whether your characters are dodging alien tractor beams or trying to entice their pagan werewolf pastor into a threesome with their half-ghoul landlady, you owe them the courtesy of trying to write about real relationships. You get one, two, maybe three books to lap-dance your reader. Then you gotta go home with them…or they’ll drive one block over to the ho stroll and go home with Torchwood.

Sometimes you sit down to write, and you can’t think of a thing. Or what you do think of is so obviously poor it isn’t worth pursuing. If you have a deadline, or even if you are just wanting to write something for your own amusement, this can be panic inducing. In the first case because you need the money, and in the second because being a writer (someone who is able to write) is part of your self definition. If you can’t write, you may wonder, how can you think of yourself as a writer?

The not-so technical term for this is, of course, writer’s block.

This is a phenomenon that seem to affect authors primarily, although it can also be a problem for artists of other types, particularly commercial artists working against deadlines.

It doesn’t seem to be a concern for members of the general population at all. After all, you never heard of “plumber’s block” or “soccer block” or “grocery shopping block” or even “management block”, did you?

Even the most productive writers are not immune. One of the jokes among science fiction writers in the late 1950s involved Robert Silverberg, author of mysteries, science fiction, non-fiction, erotica and much much more.  He could turn out a novel in three days and a short story in an afternoon, and turned out such a flood of copy that for a while he was more productive than Georges Simone or Isaac Asimov (look them up if you don’t know).

At one convention I overheard authors discussing his productivity (and income) enviously, particularly several suffering from writer’s block. “It’s not all fun and games for Bob,” one wit interjected. “He had writer’s block, too!” the man paused for effect. “Last Tuesday from 11 a.m. till noon!” We groaned.

Although that was a joke, Bob did suffer from writer’s block much later in his career, feeling written out. But, predictably, he recovered and turned out several dozen more books. (Worse, not only was he prodigal, he was good, winning many awards.)

I am not going to discuss here the causes of writer’s block. It has been written about  extensively by authors and by psychologists.

What I propose to offer are some suggestions for getting the words and ideas flowing again when you are all dried up creatively from writer’s block. In short, you don’t have to wait until your block mystically lifts to begin writing again. You can put an end to it yourself  and get back in the writing/word/thought-generating groove in a reasonably short time.

1) Do some routine housework, paperwork, or physical labor. Sometimes you can be trying to think of what to write so hard consciously that it blocks the words you are seeking from trying to emerge on their own from the unconscious. Doing routine tasks, even walking, that require you to put your focus on your body and something other than yourself, can clear the consicous of interfering concerns about writing, and allow the sentences and ideas you are seeking to enter your mind on their own.

2) Play music that stirs your emotions. Whether its rap, r&r, classical, show tunes, or whatever, listening to music that jazzes you helps to get your feelings flowing, and these feelings often begin to carry writing-type thoughts along with them. Such music stirrs the unconscious, the sea out of which creativity flows. It’s a right brain kind of thing.

3) Find an image, maybe a photograph in an adult magazine, that has turned you on sexually before;. Sit down at your keyboard and begin to describe the specific element that turn you on the most.  Before you are through, you will likely find that the ideas you needed for your own project are beginning to run through your head. (Hint, there are strong links in the brain between seeing and thinking.)

3b) Conversely, if you are stuck on a specific sex scene, pick an image of what people would be doing in that scene. Often, looking at a picture of people engaged in the sex act you are trying to describe will start you thinking about differences and similarities between the image and what your characters would be doing. Soon the scene will be writing itself in your head.

4) Find and read an erotic passage in a book or story that you remember as really turning you on when you read it before. Reading it can also start you thinking about similarities and differences; in this case about what you are reading versus how or what you would write. Also, reading a passage you find sexy will likely get you aroused and when one is aroused the chemicals that are released into the blood stream trigger the brain to start fantasizing about sex. All you have to do is write those fantasies down.

5) If you are having troble beginning a sentence, paragraph or scene, take a different approach, begin somewhere you would not normally begin. If you are describing a man and a woman making love. Rather than opening with a description of the couple, or a specific sex act, try thinking outside the box. Begin with a description of the sheen of her stockings, or the dimple on his butt cheeks. Ask yourself what you wouldn’t normally do, stand things on their head. That makes writing interesting again, and your brain can’t help dreaming up a few lines to go with the idea and soon you are writing easily again.

I will offer more suggestions for overcoming writers block in my next entry.

Characters are the heart and soul of any fiction, erotic or otherwise. You can have a great plot, vivid descriptions, and nuances up the wazzo, but if your characters act like sock puppets – spouting endless clichés, doing stupid things for stupid reasons, and in general acting nothing like real people – the reader’s disbelief is not suspended and the story doesn’t work.

So how do you breathe life into a character? In my experience as an editor, I can tell you that stiffness instantly shows in a poorly written character. What is stiffness? Well, some of the best examples I can think of aren’t in writing, but in movies or television. You’ve seen it: an actor or actress gives a bad performance, being stilled or monotone with no inflection. On the page, that shows up when a character thinks, does, or says something wooden, lifeless, or obviously forced to get the author’s point across.

I’ll let you in on a little secret. Do you know how to make a character live on the page? It’s kind of scary, which is why I suppose a lot of writers don’t do it, and it shows in their work. Are you ready? Are you REALLY ready? Honestly? Okay, here goes: look inward, my child.

Thank ewe, thank ewe; just put some money in the basket on the way out. What, you want more? Sheesh! Okay, kidding aside, my favorite way of adding depth and … well, call it character to a character is to get into yourself, your own emotional landscape, and your own history. Do you honestly look at someone and think: I would like to have sex with him or her? Nah, and if you do, I suggest immediate therapy. What really happens is much more primal and base. It’s like your subconscious takes over and snaps your head around, or you find yourself absently daydreaming, imagining what sex with them would be like. Your imagination runs wild.

Let’s say you’re straight: you don’t know what gay sex is like. Fine. But you do know what sex is like for you: the nervousness, the heady arousal, the way your mind races, your senses go rocketing, and so forth. The rest is just mechanics. The problem with this, and the main reason I feel why there are so many bad characters out there, is that it means exposing yourself on the page. Adding yourself (your feelings, emotions, and so forth) to a character is like a voodoo spell. Your fictional shade becomes connected to you. If the story gets rejected, it hits really hard. It’s like a part of you being turned down.

Still, I think it’s the way to go. But what if you’re describing someone who doesn’t share your experience? Let’s say they are in mortal danger, or in jail, or unstable; how the hell do you make that character real? What I do is close my eyes and put on that person, and walk a while in his or her shoes. Are they frightened? You know what fear is like. Angry? You know what being pissed off is like. What draws their attention? What are they looking for and why? These are not just plot points here, but perspective: how the character relates to the world and themselves. Even characters that are supposed to be disliked need this kind of thing, to make them look real as opposed to being soulless puppets there just to move the story.

Reality, of course, um, you know, er, can go a bit; no, a tad … or is it bit? Damned if I know, you know. Okay, my point is that too much reality, especially in dialogue, can be just as annoying as a wooden character. We all talk with a bunch of ums, ers, and ahs; adding that kind of thing, or vocally exact phrasing, might be real, but it also makes you want to throttle the speaker, not sympathize with them.

So, like a lot of things in writing, it’s a balancing act. On one side is having characters that act as well as Kevin Costner and on the other is having dialogue and characters whose reality makes them confusing and frustrating (think David Mamet).

As a writer, I hope that they liked this article I just wrote, M. Christian thought.

By Joey W. Hill

When Sascha asked if I’d do a blog on genre blending, it gave me a grin. Ten years ago, the term was “cross-genre”, and it was a publishing dead zone. I didn’t know that then. Everything I’ve written pretty much falls in the category of “genre blending”, since erotic romance began initially as a meeting of erotica with romance, and then took on additional components from there – contemporary, paranormal, historical, etc. However, a decade ago, when I was starting my writing career, I didn’t consciously say: “Hey, I’m going to blend genres in my writing, because I deeply crave rejection from mainstream publishing.” (lol)

I started with one thing – a desire to write the story that was in my head. I wrote the story my muse wanted me to tell. Starting out as a writer is a lot like getting married when you’re young – you have optimism and you’re not entirely set in your ways. You’re not looking at the mortgage – you’re focused on your dreams. I loved romance, but I wanted much stronger sex in it. So the result was an erotic romance with light bondage, set in a mall over the course of one day (Make Her Dreams Come True). I had no idea I’d blended genres until I took it out into the world to be slapped around relentlessly by cross-genre rejection (good thing I had a masochistic streak).

Fortunately, at that time a whole collective-unconscious craft thing was happening, where a lot of aspiring authors had the bug to write cross-genre work. The universe aligned us with the burgeoning field of e-publishing, which was keenly interested in this overlooked niche and reader demand. Now, ten years down the road, blended genre stories and e-publishing are both notable parts of the book world. In fact, much of that cross-genre work has become genres in their own right: paranormal romance, urban fantasy, erotic romance, etc. So now here’s this blog, discussing how best to blend eroticism with your romance genre—whether paranormal, contemporary or otherwise—as a positive, marketable thing. There goes that grin again…

So here we go. I tend to get wordy and ramble when I think about craft process, but I’ve managed to keep it under 2500 words, a miracle for me (grin). You’re welcome to ask questions about anything I missed, however, or give a different viewpoint in the comments – the wonderful thing about this business is there are a million ways to do it well, many of them yet to be discovered. This is just my approach.

Integration of erotica with romance – erotic romance

Any story, cross-genre or otherwise, has to pull us into it, make us feel that this could happen to us, answering some yearning in our hearts for that ultimate connection. That’s one of the big reasons people read love stories, and just because they want a sexual kick from them, doesn’t mean that can be overlooked. For so many years, all women were given was “erotica”, much of it dark, depressing, adulterous or flat out disturbing. Bringing together erotica with romance means that all the elements of a great romance have to be represented – great character development, pacing, intriguing setting, full sensory involvement, etc.

Make it character-driven – I write character-driven stories, which I think is very critical for an erotic romance of any type. No matter whether it’s contemporary, vampires, mermaids, historical, etc. the erotic love story between the main characters—how it starts, grows, matures, stumbles, etc—is my central story.

Plot cannot exist without the erotic and vice-versa – Making it character-driven does not mean everything else is window dressing. This is VERY important. Let me give you a concrete example of when that no-no happens. I’m sure we’ve all read an erotic romance with one of these two scenarios:

1. Every scene with the main characters is absorbing, hot, emotional…and each time the scene changes to the “plot”, it’s like someone slammed that door, and you actively think, “Oh crap, how long do I have to put up with this boring part before I get back to them again?”

2. The plot is worthy of a suspense master, but then someone flips a switch and suddenly you’re on the set of a bad porn movie. The main characters come to a screeching halt and say, “Hey, it’s three and a half pages into Chapter Three. We’re supposed to fuck like rabbits now. Let’s get that out of the way and then we’ll get back to the real story.”

Yep, excuse my language, but it’s that blatant. In both examples, the story is not well blended. You’re baking a cake without stirring all the ingredients together into a smooth, tasty batter that tempts you to eat it all even before you stick it in the oven. It looks like a gooey autopsy. It’s extremely clear which part of the story interested the author the least. That’s my own personal sanity check when I’m writing. I love the erotic romance/deep character-driven scenes, so if I find myself getting bored or rushing plot points, I know I’m not integrating enough of that into whatever portion of the story I’m writing. The erotic romance must be integrated with the rest of the story line so that one doesn’t really exist without the other.

Plot provides ample opportunity for sexual interaction AND emotional growth in the relationship.
You’re not blending the erotica with the romance if you’re overlooking that. How often do you read the book where the heroine ends up in a sex club, goes through a lot of physical gymnastics with the hero that yes, help her deal with her sexual inhibitions, but other than that there’s really no emotional growth? Still, somehow they end up in a happily-ever-after with the 2.5 kids, golden retriever, picket fence house and a love that never ends? Many of our romance readers are women who’ve experienced committed relationships, and all of us know that they need more than sex to end up as happily-ever-after. As Sascha said so well in his June 24 blog on creating plot: “in erotica, sex is the plot…in erotic romance, sex forwards the plot.” Erotic romance uses erotic interaction to further the relationship.

Integration of erotic romance with other genres
Not because I have this huge desire to pimp my own work, but I can more comfortably dissect it without offending anyone, so let me use some of my storylines as examples of integration of plot/relationship with eroticism in various genres. It will also confirm if I’m qualified to be writing this blog (laughter):

Contemporary erotic romance – For a lot of erotic romance writers, starting in the arena of contemporary is probably your easiest blend, because you can use a BDSM club setting, or the set up of a heroine’s cherished fantasy on the Internet, etc. It gets you comfortable before you move onto trickier blends. Hence, my original Nature of Desire series has a lot of heroes/heroines already Dominant or submissive-oriented, and start inside BDSM clubs. However, it doesn’t have to be clichéd. My muse gave me twists that intrigued me – an alpha cop who is a sexual submissive, or two Doms who fall for each other, etc. Now, if you’ve got it set inside a BDSM club, or are doing the heroine’s cherished fantasy thing, you still mostly have your feet in the erotica room. If you want to blend it, take it into the field of contemporary romance, you’re going to have to get it out of the club or the fantasy and test the relationship (sexually and emotionally) in the real world. That increases the emotional component and even better, brings your characters into your readers’ contemporary world, so they can empathize with the characters.

Paranormal erotic romance – My Vampire Queen series was motivated by my interest in the vampire-servant relationship. To my way of thinking, it practically begged to be explored as a hardcore Dominant/submissive sexual relationship. In my series, vampires form their closest relationships with their servants, even as they consider them their property to use sexually and are expected to share them with other vampires as part of political maneuverings in the vampire world. So there are the emotional, sexual and paranormal conflicts, all rolled into one.

My Daughters of Arianne series was billed as a sensual, borderline erotic paranormal romance series. In the first book, Mermaid’s Kiss, Jonah, a powerful angel, is severely wounded but is hiding not only from his enemies, the Dark Ones, but also his own kind. To heal, he therefore can’t use a magic that would attract a lot of notice. So, with the help of the mermaid who rescues him, he uses earth-based sex magic (which he calls Joining Magic), that must be applied at regular intervals during the healing process. It draws the two of them together intimately, makes more sense in the storyline, and is tied up in the magical plot line as they journey to heal his heart as well as his body.

That all sounds good, and though I loved this book, I was never entirely comfortable with the initial introduction of this erotic element. It felt somewhat contrived, not as well-integrated, enough that I had the irascible seawitch Mina make a joke about it to my heroine: “He had to use Joining Magic. It was the only thing that would work,” she mimicked. “Oh, that’s rich. If I had an anemone for every time I’d heard that one…”

In the subsequent books of the series, I wasn’t so uptight about it and didn’t try so hard. As such, the eroticism evolved in the paranormal setting far more naturally, to my way of thinking. In Witch’s Beauty, to balance the light and dark inside of her, the seawitch Mina discovers a mix of pain and pleasure eases that struggle. The angel David can help her out with that, because the angels of the Dark Legion are pretty virile and often use sex to ground themselves after battle.

Contemporary/paranormal/erotic romance – In If Wishes Were Horses, my hero runs an erotic paraphernalia shop, teaches Tantric classes, and is a Wiccan priest who regularly uses the Sacred Rite (sex magic) to channel the Great Lord. He is therefore uniquely set up to initiate our heroine, the new town sheriff, into an exploration of her own sensuality as they try to get to the bottom of a killing. However, that killing also has a magical/sexual component that further adds to the erotic quotient of the story.

That’s more than enough examples to give you the gist, but I wanted to show you a variety of possibilities.

Pacing - Final note for your blending is to watch your pacing. It’s like inching a tight lid off a box, where you have to take it up a little at a time on each side, until it all comes off at the same time. As a concluding example – in my book, Beloved Vampire – the hero is a vampire who’s grieved for 300 years. He rescues a sick human woman from a tomb by making her his full servant. He already has the sexual dominance, and she’s a natural submissive, so there’s going to be that issue gnawing at them, but she’s been tortured for five years by another vampire, and he’s spent 300 years mourning the Bedouin girl he handfasted. So the trust/relaxing of shields is going to happen proportionately at the same rate as the sexual interaction increases, and the vampire plot thickens, etc.

So recap of the mechanics – keep the character/relationship central to the story, make sure the plot and the erotic romance can’t exist without each other, test the relationship in real world settings (even if it’s a paranormal world), and watch your pacing for the emotional growth/development of your characters as you integrate erotica, romance and other genre elements.

Most importantly however—and this goes back to the original point—If you want to write a blended genre story, make sure your muse has given you one. It can’t be forced – it’s not like a game of chance where you draw two slips of paper out of a hat. “Today, I’ll write an…erotic romance, that’s also a….western! I’ll mash those two things together and see what happens.” The integration has to start in your head and heart—in your creative muse—first.