Let's Talk About Sex

In romance novels, of course.

I have to admit, I take it practically as a given that a romance novel includes "on-screen" sex. While I realize there are readers (and writers, of course) who prefer their characters "get a room" when the moment comes, I am definitely not one of them. Part of what makes a romance satisfying for me is being in the characters' heads at the most intimate moments in their relationship. And there is no more intimate moment, no moment more demanding of trust, mutual respect, and caring, than sex.

As it happens, I don't believe in casual sex. Or, put another way, I don't think sex is ever truly casual. Certainly, good sex isn't.

Oh, I'm sure there are folks out there who would disagree with me just as I disagree with the "no public displays of affection in my romance novel, please" contingent, but it's my proposition that physically and emotionally satisfying sex can only happen between people who can completely give themselves up to one another, foregoing ego and inhibition in the pursuit of mutual pleasure. Love isn't required, but I believe affection is, and people who hook up in a bar or at a party for a one-night stand can't possibly care about each other, however hot they may be to get into one another's pants.

My point here isn't to bust on folks who believe in and enjoy casual sex, though. It's to explain why onstage, explicit, hot sex is an essential element of a romance novel for me: it demonstrates how deeply the hero and heroine care about each other, even if they haven't realized it themselves yet. I want to be there, feeling what they're feeling. It's the ultimate "show."

Now, don't get me wrong: the hero and heroine don't have to fall in bed with each other either early or often for me to find a romance satisfying. Nor do the love scenes have to go on for pages and pages. Some of the best, hottest love scenes I've ever read were only a page or two in length. Loretta Chase is a master of this. Two of my critique partners, J and Lacey, also write hot, short love scenes, but since neither of them are published, you can't read them yet. As their critique partner, I'm one of the few, the proud, and the lucky!

The best romances, in my opinion, build sexual tension for quite a while before the characters finally give into their desires. If the payoff happens before the level of emotional connection between the hero and heroine justifies it, the love scene will fall flat. I've read a few romances where the author deftly managed to create a believable and satisfying love scene between characters who scarcely know one another (e.g., Mary Balogh's Slightly Wicked and Lisa Kleypas' Devil in Winter), but by and large, it's difficult to do well enough that it works for me as a reader.

I find it even harder to do as a writer: it took me eight chapters to get to the first kiss in my WIP and another eleven after that to get to something you could reasonably call sex (and it's not even consummation!). After the nineteenth chapter, things get hot and heavy fairly fast and frequently, but I simply couldn't bring these characters to fall into bed with each other before their emotions caught up with their physical attraction.

Of course, it doesn't help that I find love scenes exceptionally difficult to write. Not because I am shy about them, but because it takes immense effort on my part to describe what is going on in my characters' heads and bodies without resorting to hackneyed, worn-out cliche. (You may remember that I never met a cliche I didn't like. It's true. Which makes it even harder to avoid them in love scenes!)

All of this musing is appropo of the fact that I have just reached the point in my story where my hero and heroine are about to do the horizontal hula for the first time. They've had some previous sexual encounters, but they have so far not achieved the whole enchilada. And, as usual, I'm hella intimidated by the prospect. Because I know it is the ultimate show and I want to get it just right.

So, what about you? Do you like your romance novels hot and steamy or a bit more oblique? Do you think the trend in the industry--which has unquestionably been toward hotter and steamier in recent years--will continue or will the sweet, traditional romance come back into fashion? And do you even understand the distinction between romance, erotic romance, erotica, and romantica?