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Erotic fiction writing panel's outline: Informative!
15 years ago
General
Plot: Not simply a series of events, but a chain reaction, with one event leading to the next. There must be a visible relationship between events for the reader to swallow the story. No 'Jack and Jill met at the supermarket. Jack and Jill exchanged a couple sentences, then went to Cuba for an orgy.'
The author imbues the story with meaning through the selection of detail.
Conflict is an integral part of conventional plots, and it needn't be absent from erotic fiction. Where in a mundane story, the hero's son might be kidnapped, in erotic fiction perhaps the protagonist is kept after work. That delay will build the sexual tension, which might mean a more satisfying experience when the couple finally gets together...or if impatience gets the better of either of them, they might direct their energies elsewhere.
Spot the moment of maximum tension and hold it for as long as possible. Or as John D. MacDonald put it: “Freeze the action and shoot him later.” In the context of erotic writing, the climax (literally) would seem to be the moment of maximum tension. But really, the climax is (again literally) the release of tension. Also, the apogee of tension may not be anywhere near the orgasm. What if it's in that moment before Sam works up the nerve to ask Suzy out? Or when Sam crosses Suzy's threshold and starts heading towards the bedroom? When is the hamster wheel spinning the fastest? Where is the most vital juncture in the story?
Characters: Characters drive the plot.
Though the writer should know everything about her character, she should present her knowledge of the characters indirectly, through dialogue and action. Still, sometimes a summary of a character’s traits needs to be given. For example, for characters who play the supporting cast in a story, direct description of the character’s traits keeps the story from slowing down.
A useful exercise is to make a list of your character's traits. Not just physical things, but habits, likes, dislikes, significant childhood events, family life, past relationships, political views, work history, etc. Even if you only use a fraction of that information directly in a story, it all influences what your character does and says.
Don't fall into the Phantom Menace trap where the protagonist isn't clear. Ask yourself 'whose story is this?'
Audience: Are you writing to men? Women? Both? You have to keep in mind that men and women are different. No, really. What appeals to men isn't necessarily going to satisfy women, and what thrills women may leave men impatient. In broad and possibly offensive terms, men prefer visual stimulation and are easier to please when it comes to sex scenes. Women enjoy extensive and detailed sex scenes, but want more than that: a relationship, an interesting situation, and an emotional connection between characters as well as a physical one.
Be original. Yes, it's difficult to be original when so many things have been thought of and exploited, but don't be lazy and head for 'Her cute roommate,' 'Pizza delivery guy,' or 'Pick-up at a bar' unless there's a twist. And no, the girlfriend joining in with the protagonist and roommate is no longer a twist.
Realize you're writing wish fulfillment for people. This is even more true for the furry community than for conventional erotic writers. We're not only writing about situations that seldom/never happen, but the participants are impossible. Vanilla sex is the cup-o-tea for many, but even that can be spiced up to captivate your reader and set their fantasy life aflame. Having a throw-down in the back of a club? Add some spectators. Maybe even some cameras, and flavor the sexual experience with fear over who will see those images and videos. Screwing an aquarium's whale trainer in the locker room? Maybe dry-humping through her soaked wetsuit would be more interesting.
Be detailed. An erotic fiction reader wants every juicy detail, not just a summary of what happened. Don't take this to an extreme and describe nose-hairs. Keep in mind that you aren't just describing what your characters are doing, you're describing what they are experiencing.
Depending on the point of view you're using, you can provide plenty of information to titillate your readers beyond what's seen or what registers physically. What is he/she feeling? How is one lover making her needs known to her partner? Are her signals received? Are they ignored? Maybe she wants her needs to be subsumed by her partner's.
If I could tell you in one word what makes for a captivating erotic story, it's IMAGERY. You want your reader to see in their mind what you do, taste what you taste, hear what you hear, etc. Don't neglect scent and sound! It's very easy to forget about them, but without them a scene is flat and incomplete. Think about those little details that you tend to forget immediately after the real-life event. How the bedsheets went from a smooth, crisp plain to hills and dunes of fabric afterwards. How his mouth tasted like Aquafresh. How her fingernails dug into his buttocks, leaving little crescent-moon dents. How her labial piercing left a metallic tang on his tongue.
Polish your dialogue. All the imagery in the world won't be enough to pull your reader back in after clumsy dialogue ruins their immersion. “Sandy, I just gotta fuck you. Now.” That's for desperate teenagers, (and if you're writing a desperate teenager, then it could be appropriate) but your audience wants to be pampered by the best and that includes honeyed tongues. “Sandy, you pert little confection. My mouth is watering just looking at you.” “The slightest hint of your scent...and I'm lost to you. Sweep me away in your tide, draw me down into your depths.” It's not Shakespeare by any stretch, but it's better than 'You got a purdy mouth.' Don't go too far in the other direction though. If my partner started spouting poetry at me while we made love, my response would be 'if you have the breath to do that, you're not doing this right.'
Use ‘said’ to carry dialogue. Sid Fleischman calls ‘said’, “the invisible word.” You'll probably be tempted to break it up with 'inferred,' 'muttered' and so forth because 'said-said-said' starts to look like a problem. Resist that temptation.
Don’t allow your fictional characters to speak in sentences. Unless you want them to sound fictional. If this doesn't make sense, walk somewhere right now, sit near some people, and listen to them talk. How often is anything they say a complete sentence?
Use erotic, descriptive language in the non-erotic portions of the story to maintain the undercurrent of sensuality. The car doesn't idle, it purrrs. Those butter-soft leather seats don't simply support your buttocks, they cup them. There's no polka on the radio, it's a deep pulse-matching techno pounding that lets the subwoofer make you quiver.
There are so many kinks you may want to work into your stories that it would be pointless to try and address them individually. Try to be consistent. If she isn't into spanking, she probably won't be into whipping, nipple-torture, or citric-acid-inversed-eyelid-basting. If she's been open-minded enough to try other things, a sudden and outright refusal to try something else is suspicious at the very least.
Don't automatically make your lovers perfect, physically or otherwise. That isn't to say they shouldn't be beautiful, but beauty can come from personality and attitude more than how someone looks.
A word on word-choice. This is something that can easily squick a reader. If you refer to a woman's breasts as cans, the reader is going to assume you're a truck driver. If your character refers to breasts as cans, he should BE a truck driver. Or a rough'n tough Brooklyn native, I guess. When writing descriptive text, use more neutral words. Breasts instead of tits. Penis instead of schlong. While using penis and vagina may seem clinical, that impression can be negated by mixing in other synonyms.
Your story's tone will also dictate what words you should use. If it's a gritty, sloppy fuck you're going for than cruder terms like tits, prick, and taint will come across as appropriate. If it's a couple exploring each other on their honeymoon, 'sweater kittens' and 'throbbing fuck-stick' aren't going to be a good match. Invent your own euphemisms to suit the mood and situation. Don't be afraid to experiment with the language. It's your story, after all.
And speaking of it being your story, there's one last rule to remember.
If something works, forget about the rule that says it shouldn’t.
A few cliches to avoid.
Men and women always cum at the same time during sex.
Women cum about 20 times from straight missionary fucking.
When one person wants some kind of non-standard sexual behavior, everybody else agrees.
Anal sex requires very little preparation time. Even the first time.
Premature ejaculation? Never!
If you have a hangup over a particular sex act, you'll get over it once you try it (no matter how perverted it is).
Every woman, no matter what age, has perfectly trimmed or shaved pubic hair.
Any description of a female must include specific bra and cup size, hair color, and either "full" or "pouty" lips somewhere or another. Precise waist measurements are optional, but common.
Men who know women's bra sizes from outside their dresses.
Long hair never gets in the way.
No one ever gets sore or cramped.
A man who discovers that the attractive woman who has been giving him a blowjob is really a guy will admit that he was a latent homosexual anyway.
If Harry Kim and Tom Paris are in the same room together alone for more then three sentences then they will start having sex with each other.
All aliens have genitalia that corresponds to human normals.
More here, http://www.modemac.com/cliches.html
Some extra ones more relevant to furry writing:
Murr is the new yiff. Use it sparingly if you use it at all.
No one ever smells like wet fur.
All furries have cocks at least seven inches long, and cum like a horse.
All participants in furry erotica are between 16 and 25 years old.
Despite being anthropomorphized animals, furries can barely smell better than humans. No signals are exchanged either positive or negative, and everyone's odor is best described as 'musky.'
Static electricity is never a problem, no matter how briskly fur is rubbed on fur or skin.
Allergies are never a problem.
Cold-blooded species are just as energetic and randy as the mammals.
Inter-species mating will always produce a hybrid child.
Despite shedding nearly all other instinct-driven behaviors, canids and felids will always bite their mate's scruff during climax.
Exercises:
Write a reflection or short fictional piece about this woman. Where is she? What year is it? What is she thinking? Try this in the form of an interior monologue.
Remember 'Show, don't tell.'
The girl was sad.
The boy was angry.
The dog was hungry.
http://www.sexinfo101.com/sexualpositions.shtml - Animated!
http://male101.com/synonyms.html
http://www.sex-lexis.com/Sex-Dictionary/erotic
http://www.darkerotica.net/EroticThesaurus.html
http://absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?s=27c297eaf99b687ddd8ff90d5983b6e8&t=154304
http://www.suite101.com/reference/writing_erotica
The author imbues the story with meaning through the selection of detail.
Conflict is an integral part of conventional plots, and it needn't be absent from erotic fiction. Where in a mundane story, the hero's son might be kidnapped, in erotic fiction perhaps the protagonist is kept after work. That delay will build the sexual tension, which might mean a more satisfying experience when the couple finally gets together...or if impatience gets the better of either of them, they might direct their energies elsewhere.
Spot the moment of maximum tension and hold it for as long as possible. Or as John D. MacDonald put it: “Freeze the action and shoot him later.” In the context of erotic writing, the climax (literally) would seem to be the moment of maximum tension. But really, the climax is (again literally) the release of tension. Also, the apogee of tension may not be anywhere near the orgasm. What if it's in that moment before Sam works up the nerve to ask Suzy out? Or when Sam crosses Suzy's threshold and starts heading towards the bedroom? When is the hamster wheel spinning the fastest? Where is the most vital juncture in the story?
Characters: Characters drive the plot.
Though the writer should know everything about her character, she should present her knowledge of the characters indirectly, through dialogue and action. Still, sometimes a summary of a character’s traits needs to be given. For example, for characters who play the supporting cast in a story, direct description of the character’s traits keeps the story from slowing down.
A useful exercise is to make a list of your character's traits. Not just physical things, but habits, likes, dislikes, significant childhood events, family life, past relationships, political views, work history, etc. Even if you only use a fraction of that information directly in a story, it all influences what your character does and says.
Don't fall into the Phantom Menace trap where the protagonist isn't clear. Ask yourself 'whose story is this?'
Audience: Are you writing to men? Women? Both? You have to keep in mind that men and women are different. No, really. What appeals to men isn't necessarily going to satisfy women, and what thrills women may leave men impatient. In broad and possibly offensive terms, men prefer visual stimulation and are easier to please when it comes to sex scenes. Women enjoy extensive and detailed sex scenes, but want more than that: a relationship, an interesting situation, and an emotional connection between characters as well as a physical one.
Be original. Yes, it's difficult to be original when so many things have been thought of and exploited, but don't be lazy and head for 'Her cute roommate,' 'Pizza delivery guy,' or 'Pick-up at a bar' unless there's a twist. And no, the girlfriend joining in with the protagonist and roommate is no longer a twist.
Realize you're writing wish fulfillment for people. This is even more true for the furry community than for conventional erotic writers. We're not only writing about situations that seldom/never happen, but the participants are impossible. Vanilla sex is the cup-o-tea for many, but even that can be spiced up to captivate your reader and set their fantasy life aflame. Having a throw-down in the back of a club? Add some spectators. Maybe even some cameras, and flavor the sexual experience with fear over who will see those images and videos. Screwing an aquarium's whale trainer in the locker room? Maybe dry-humping through her soaked wetsuit would be more interesting.
Be detailed. An erotic fiction reader wants every juicy detail, not just a summary of what happened. Don't take this to an extreme and describe nose-hairs. Keep in mind that you aren't just describing what your characters are doing, you're describing what they are experiencing.
Depending on the point of view you're using, you can provide plenty of information to titillate your readers beyond what's seen or what registers physically. What is he/she feeling? How is one lover making her needs known to her partner? Are her signals received? Are they ignored? Maybe she wants her needs to be subsumed by her partner's.
If I could tell you in one word what makes for a captivating erotic story, it's IMAGERY. You want your reader to see in their mind what you do, taste what you taste, hear what you hear, etc. Don't neglect scent and sound! It's very easy to forget about them, but without them a scene is flat and incomplete. Think about those little details that you tend to forget immediately after the real-life event. How the bedsheets went from a smooth, crisp plain to hills and dunes of fabric afterwards. How his mouth tasted like Aquafresh. How her fingernails dug into his buttocks, leaving little crescent-moon dents. How her labial piercing left a metallic tang on his tongue.
Polish your dialogue. All the imagery in the world won't be enough to pull your reader back in after clumsy dialogue ruins their immersion. “Sandy, I just gotta fuck you. Now.” That's for desperate teenagers, (and if you're writing a desperate teenager, then it could be appropriate) but your audience wants to be pampered by the best and that includes honeyed tongues. “Sandy, you pert little confection. My mouth is watering just looking at you.” “The slightest hint of your scent...and I'm lost to you. Sweep me away in your tide, draw me down into your depths.” It's not Shakespeare by any stretch, but it's better than 'You got a purdy mouth.' Don't go too far in the other direction though. If my partner started spouting poetry at me while we made love, my response would be 'if you have the breath to do that, you're not doing this right.'
Use ‘said’ to carry dialogue. Sid Fleischman calls ‘said’, “the invisible word.” You'll probably be tempted to break it up with 'inferred,' 'muttered' and so forth because 'said-said-said' starts to look like a problem. Resist that temptation.
Don’t allow your fictional characters to speak in sentences. Unless you want them to sound fictional. If this doesn't make sense, walk somewhere right now, sit near some people, and listen to them talk. How often is anything they say a complete sentence?
Use erotic, descriptive language in the non-erotic portions of the story to maintain the undercurrent of sensuality. The car doesn't idle, it purrrs. Those butter-soft leather seats don't simply support your buttocks, they cup them. There's no polka on the radio, it's a deep pulse-matching techno pounding that lets the subwoofer make you quiver.
There are so many kinks you may want to work into your stories that it would be pointless to try and address them individually. Try to be consistent. If she isn't into spanking, she probably won't be into whipping, nipple-torture, or citric-acid-inversed-eyelid-basting. If she's been open-minded enough to try other things, a sudden and outright refusal to try something else is suspicious at the very least.
Don't automatically make your lovers perfect, physically or otherwise. That isn't to say they shouldn't be beautiful, but beauty can come from personality and attitude more than how someone looks.
A word on word-choice. This is something that can easily squick a reader. If you refer to a woman's breasts as cans, the reader is going to assume you're a truck driver. If your character refers to breasts as cans, he should BE a truck driver. Or a rough'n tough Brooklyn native, I guess. When writing descriptive text, use more neutral words. Breasts instead of tits. Penis instead of schlong. While using penis and vagina may seem clinical, that impression can be negated by mixing in other synonyms.
Your story's tone will also dictate what words you should use. If it's a gritty, sloppy fuck you're going for than cruder terms like tits, prick, and taint will come across as appropriate. If it's a couple exploring each other on their honeymoon, 'sweater kittens' and 'throbbing fuck-stick' aren't going to be a good match. Invent your own euphemisms to suit the mood and situation. Don't be afraid to experiment with the language. It's your story, after all.
And speaking of it being your story, there's one last rule to remember.
If something works, forget about the rule that says it shouldn’t.
A few cliches to avoid.
Men and women always cum at the same time during sex.
Women cum about 20 times from straight missionary fucking.
When one person wants some kind of non-standard sexual behavior, everybody else agrees.
Anal sex requires very little preparation time. Even the first time.
Premature ejaculation? Never!
If you have a hangup over a particular sex act, you'll get over it once you try it (no matter how perverted it is).
Every woman, no matter what age, has perfectly trimmed or shaved pubic hair.
Any description of a female must include specific bra and cup size, hair color, and either "full" or "pouty" lips somewhere or another. Precise waist measurements are optional, but common.
Men who know women's bra sizes from outside their dresses.
Long hair never gets in the way.
No one ever gets sore or cramped.
A man who discovers that the attractive woman who has been giving him a blowjob is really a guy will admit that he was a latent homosexual anyway.
If Harry Kim and Tom Paris are in the same room together alone for more then three sentences then they will start having sex with each other.
All aliens have genitalia that corresponds to human normals.
More here, http://www.modemac.com/cliches.html
Some extra ones more relevant to furry writing:
Murr is the new yiff. Use it sparingly if you use it at all.
No one ever smells like wet fur.
All furries have cocks at least seven inches long, and cum like a horse.
All participants in furry erotica are between 16 and 25 years old.
Despite being anthropomorphized animals, furries can barely smell better than humans. No signals are exchanged either positive or negative, and everyone's odor is best described as 'musky.'
Static electricity is never a problem, no matter how briskly fur is rubbed on fur or skin.
Allergies are never a problem.
Cold-blooded species are just as energetic and randy as the mammals.
Inter-species mating will always produce a hybrid child.
Despite shedding nearly all other instinct-driven behaviors, canids and felids will always bite their mate's scruff during climax.
Exercises:
Write a reflection or short fictional piece about this woman. Where is she? What year is it? What is she thinking? Try this in the form of an interior monologue.
Remember 'Show, don't tell.'
The girl was sad.
The boy was angry.
The dog was hungry.
http://www.sexinfo101.com/sexualpositions.shtml - Animated!
http://male101.com/synonyms.html
http://www.sex-lexis.com/Sex-Dictionary/erotic
http://www.darkerotica.net/EroticThesaurus.html
http://absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?s=27c297eaf99b687ddd8ff90d5983b6e8&t=154304
http://www.suite101.com/reference/writing_erotica
2 things if you don't mind some critique:
Personally I am starting to trend against show don't tell. Sometimes it's better to simply tell, if the character sees it that way (depends on the vernacular being used, the narrative style) or if pace dictates that stopping to fully describe something would slow the reader down. Showing should become maximum when there is a need for tension or heightening of awareness in the story or character; telling should become maximum when there is a need for speed and the scene is somewhat anecdotal (as per narrative style). Sometimes the reader will do a better job with a 'tell' than the writer can accomplish with 'show.'
For example, an emotion like anger: if a character walks into a room, it might get tedious to describe the furrows on the other character's face, their harsh tone of voice, the tapping of their foot; whereas something like 'I walked into the room and saw george. The man was pissed off about something. "Where's the money, Frank? Where's the god damned money?"'; or the sad girl; "We passed the village on our way to the front, and I noticed a little girl on the side of the road, totally alone amongst the bombed out craters and dead horses. She looked sad.' The hungry dog: "Butch was hungry. I tried to pet him to ease the pain and wished I could apologize for the lack of money I had to buy his kibble."
One of the things I've never seen addressed with writing is how to effectively write descriptions. Things like order of importance, order of sensation (Lightning before thunder), how many and what kind of details need to be written and likewise what should be left to the reader to fill in the gaps. There must be some psychology behind descriptions: what do we really notice first, what combination or string of sentences will set up a description most effectively? Start with the details and end with overall shape (size, form, etc.) or start with overall impression and fill in details?
Otherwise i really agree with said said said, laughed at some of the furry cliches. I'm not sure I agree about dialogue; I've always been taught that dialogue in stories is just going to be unrealistic for the grace of being readable, and sometimes people do talk in full sentences in the right setting. But in erotic fiction it seems like terse and half sentences always elevate the tension and pace and make sense for scenes involving exertion, excitement and nervousness. Nothing quite sets the mood like a character's nervous half-sentences and anticipatory stammering.
If I attended cons I'd definitely go to your panel. Good luck!
When you're dealing with non-sentients, it's going to be rough to have them show rather than tell something like hunger, barring some convenient foil like a food bowl they can nudge.
As for descriptions, sure, you can start with the most prominent feature but it doesn't necessarily have to be something physical. If their voice is heard before their character is visible, that's a bit different and interesting. Smelling someone before you see them sounds gross, but it could just be a pervasive perfume...perhaps daubed upon someone waiting in a darkened bedroom. Ooh la la! ;K) As for what details to fill in? It depends on your audience. If you tell them you're an anthro wolf, there are some things an experienced furry are going to take as given. You have pointed ears, you have big teeth, you have a long-ish tail. They may also assume you have digitigrade legs, non-retractable claws, and whiskers. But tell your average person you're an 'anthro wolf' and they will have no idea what you're talking about. When I describe my own character, I have the advantage of saying basically 'You know black panthers? Picture one 20 feet long, with some silver facial markings.'
The panel was fairly well received, though I really only managed to fill 30 minutes. Not enough people brought writing materials to do the exercises I'd typed up, so once it became clear we'd just devolve into chatting, some people left. Overall though, positive experience. I got a lot of laughs, and managed not to blush myself into oblivion.
.. And I admit, I now WANT to do a story where someone turns on the radio, hoping for a soothing, or soulful, song.. and gets polka, but I like stuff like that. =P