Sex?

[Ophiucha]

I think it may become a forum in-joke after this.

And yes, same, particularly if you are interested in writing something with an LGBTQ+ angle. Everyone is free to shoot me a PM or an email if you have my address. I've read my fair share of erotica, and before I started doing editing for a bit of money on the side, I used to just critique people's fanfiction - 99% of which was an elaborate excuse for a sex scene. It shouldn't feel too weird to share; when it comes to literature, a sex scene really is just any other scene, just with a few more words you're probably not using much in the rest of the book.

Here's a video of Charles Dance (Tywin Lannister, for the GOT fans) reading 50 Shades of Grey. Just for a laugh.

I sometimes think sex is throwing a bone to the "stereotypical nerds", the ones that read comic books, never seen female naked, and worked on computers, before computers were normal. I think alot of people outside the genre, still think fantasy genre are made up of these people, thus they feel they have to include the grat. sex scene or at least show the hot female MC topless, if not regularly dressed up in tight revealing leather or plate armor.

Sometimes it definitely reads like that. In feminist circles, we often use the term 'male gaze'. You can usually tell who the target audience for a piece of titillating material was based on where the focus is and how they are described. I often find that when it's written for the nerdy male audience, you have a really odd kind of mixed-message female lead, who walks around barely clothed and maybe even acts a little flirty yet becomes embarrassed and virginal the second she's behind closed doors. I'm not sure why men find that appealing (or why other men presume men find that appealing), but I've definitely noticed it in a lot of sex scenes written in the sort of 'Conan the Barbarian'-style fantasy novels.

 

[Kit]

I often find that when it's written for the nerdy male audience, you have a really odd kind of mixed-message female lead, who walks around barely clothed and maybe even acts a little flirty yet becomes embarrassed and virginal the second she's behind closed doors. I'm not sure why men find that appealing (or why other men presume men find that appealing), but I've definitely noticed it in a lot of sex scenes written in the sort of 'Conan the Barbarian'-style fantasy novels.

Because the hot, flirty woman is the fantasy..... but when it gets down to action time, that demographic wants to feel like the male is the experienced, confident, in-charge party.

 

[Zero Angel]

That idea is also related to this: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madonna–whore_complex

Twisted slightly though, but it's there. I always referred to it as the "ambivalence of sluts" before I found out there was a term related to it.

 

[Mindfire]

I think it may become a forum in-joke after this.

And yes, same, particularly if you are interested in writing something with an LGBTQ+ angle. Everyone is free to shoot me a PM or an email if you have my address. I've read my fair share of erotica, and before I started doing editing for a bit of money on the side, I used to just critique people's fanfiction - 99% of which was an elaborate excuse for a sex scene. It shouldn't feel too weird to share; when it comes to literature, a sex scene really is just any other scene, just with a few more words you're probably not using much in the rest of the book.

Here's a video of Charles Dance (Tywin Lannister, for the GOT fans) reading 50 Shades of Grey. Just for a laugh.

Sometimes it definitely reads like that. In feminist circles, we often use the term 'male gaze'. You can usually tell who the target audience for a piece of titillating material was based on where the focus is and how they are described. I often find that when it's written for the nerdy male audience, you have a really odd kind of mixed-message female lead, who walks around barely clothed and maybe even acts a little flirty yet becomes embarrassed and virginal the second she's behind closed doors. I'm not sure why men find that appealing (or why other men presume men find that appealing), but I've definitely noticed it in a lot of sex scenes written in the sort of 'Conan the Barbarian'-style fantasy novels.

The reason is not complicated. The target demographic (stereotypical dungeon nerd) wants to fantasize about the kind of woman he has zero chance with (super hot) and what's more he wants to feel desired and appreciated (flirty). But behind closed doors, his insecurities kick in and he doesn't want to feel dominated or emasculated (well... usually *shiver*), so the seductive woman suddenly becomes super innocent, allowing the loser to be manly and in charge. Japan takes this trope up to eleven sometimes.

 

[Feo Takahari]

The reason is not complicated. The target demographic (stereotypical dungeon nerd) wants to fantasize about the kind of woman he has zero chance with (super hot) and what's more he wants to feel desired and appreciated (flirty). But behind closed doors, his insecurities kick in and he doesn't want to feel dominated or emasculated (well... usually *shiver*), so the seductive woman suddenly becomes super innocent, allowing the loser to be manly and in charge. Japan takes this trope up to eleven sometimes.

See also: tsundere. ("She likes you, she just doesn't know how to say it!")

To be fair, I sometimes read romance manga for girls, and though the patterns can be very different, you still see love interests who're portrayed as very desirable paired up with protagonists who're portrayed as very average. Wish fulfillment comes in all shapes and sizes.

 

[Ophiucha]

It could be an age thing, in general. With manga, since you mentioned it, I find a lot of shoujo ('girl's') romance series have the 'average' girl and the ridiculously attractive, aloof guy. Not unlike the inspiration for 50 Shades of Grey, though I think Twilight is a touch more unhealthy... and in that, they don't have sex until the wedding night. But in josei ('woman's') romance, I find they are usually on more even grounds in terms of attractiveness and socio-economic level. We don't have such hard lines when it comes to separating our fantasy in America, particularly since 'YA' is a relatively new genre (nothing published in Amazing Stories back in the day would have had that distinction, though much of it was read by teenage boys), so it's hard to say that the attitudes towards sex/women are different as the audience grows since the audience is more ill-defined, but I wouldn't be surprised if that is true.

But then, the West seems a bit more strict about sex being exclusively adult. YA novels that feature sex scenes often cause a bit of controversy (not fantasy, but the author John Green has complained about this before on his blog/YouTube channel). Holly Black, who writes YA urban fantasy, definitely has some dissenters because of her sexual material and the language the characters use (they cuss a lot).

 

[Feo Takahari]

Holly Black . . . I tried reading Tithe once. It's kind of awful, and I never finished it, but there were only two sexual references I can recall.

In the first, the protagonist thumbed through a pile of manga owned by a male acquaintance, and discovered it was gay porn. There was only one sentence describing the sex.

In the second, said acquaintance "got inside the cloak" of a handsome elf. The protagonist only found out about this after the fact. All she learned about it was that the elf hurt him a bit.

In neither case did it get very explicit--I wouldn't even say there was a "sex scene". Unless there was something later, I don't think there was really much to complain about, unless folks didn't like that gay characters existed.

(Though I do remember there being a lot of profanity . . .)

 

[Ophiucha]

I think the second one, I want to say Valiant, had a healthy dose of sex. The scene I remember had the main character and her friend using glamours on each other so that they looked like the other's respective love interest and then had sex (I think the girl's love interest was also a troll, so there's a bit of squick there). I don't think it was super explicit, it wasn't getting into the nitty gritty, but it was a lot more physical than emotional in terms of the description.

 

[Zero Angel]

Totally used fasterskatory in another thread +1 :biggrin:

 

[AVCortez]

There is a fair bit of sexual content in my work but I avoid writing explicit scenes. It's unavoidable in a story about adults, I think. But, as the saying goes: sex sells .