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07-05-2006, 06:26 AM
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leaving things out of a novel
I'm wondering if it's okay to leave certain details out of a novel. I have two things that I've left out, and I'm not sure if they should be included or not, (more importantly, if agents and editors think they should be included). My main character gets engaged in the first chapter, but I didn't write any sex scenes for them. I didn't think it was important, since it's not a romance, but is it necessary to write sex? I have instances that allude to the fact that they do have sex, just so the reader doesn't think they have a June and Ward Cleaver sleeping arrangement, but it's only mentioned. The first chapter leaves off with my main characters boyfriend proposing, then in the next chapter she mentions something about spending the weekend in bed. Or I end a scene when she's leading him to the bedroom, and start a new one after they're done doing their business. I'm not uncomfortable writing a sex scene if need be, but it's just not important to the story, and I honestly don't want to waste the word count on it, unless, of course, it's something a reader would want in the story. So, I'm not sure if it's okay to leave out.
Another thing I've left out is a surgery scene. My main character is diagnosed with ovarian cancer halfway through the story, but the cancer is a means to an end in relation to the main plot, the story's main climax is not cancer, but it's a necessary part of the story. I spent two chapters dealing with my character finding out the news, the reaction of friends and family, and her own feeling during the process. I ended one scene where she tells the doctor that she wants the hysterectomy, and start the next one when she's in the recovery room after the procedure is finished. I didn't think it was important to include the details of the surgery, but I'm not sure if it's okay to leave that out. I felt that showing what the surgery means, after the fact, to all the characters, versus showing just the sugery fit better into the story. I just don't know if details like this should be left out for the sake of moving things along, or if it's something that the reader would like to see happen.
Any suggestions would be appreciated, thanks! :)
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http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/images/statusicon/post_old.gif 06-14-2006, 09:48 PM writeorwrong (http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/member.php?u=6875) vbmenu_register("postmenu_647305", true);
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Just my .02, but if it doesn't move the scene forward, I wouldn't include the detail. Many a good novel has not a single sex scene. But part of the reward of writing is the feeling you get when you have mastered-- or at least vastly improved-- a certain technique you've been subconsciously avoiding.
You've got an engaged couple, and a protag with a dx of cancer. You don't need to get blue with the sex, or sound like a chapter from Medline with the cancer, but I would think it would be hard to get around addressing those two issues.
So if the story requires certain types of scenes, practice writing those scenes until they sound right. (But don't get derailed doing it in the first draft, as I've been told, and now firmly believe! Getting frustrated spoils momentum).
I have a similar problem. My WIP has a violent scene. I'm not familiar with writing convincing dialogue, never done it before but because I feel it's integral in this case, I'm reading authors who do these scenes well and making note of the things that make them compelling. If the writing feels like a copout to you, it will to your readers.
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http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/images/statusicon/post_old.gif 06-14-2006, 09:49 PM Gillhoughly (http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/member.php?u=6219) vbmenu_register("postmenu_647308", true);
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Use what you need to tell your story and move it forward. Don't think of it as leaving things out.
When you're making chocolate cookies, you use what's needed: flour and chocolate and sugar, etc., but no one will miss it if you omit a cup of chopped chicken. Chopped chicken added where it's not needed is noticeable--but in a baaaad way! :tongue
Ask yourself if any action by the character, whether having sex or buying bread at a grocery is needed for your plot.
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unless, of course, it's something a reader would want in the story.
Whoa, right there! This is YOUR story and you should write it to please yourself, not some imaginary reader. Don't second guess what another person would like to see, write about what you want to see!
(Otherwise you will go nuts--I've been there!)
When I first started whacking away at a typewriter I tried to guess what an editor would like to read. Then what a reader would like to read. It just made me frustrated and the writing stopped.
Then the dawn came: "Gillhoughly--write something that YOU like to read."
And to mix a metaphor, the dam broke and I've been swept along in the flow ever since.
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Thank you both very much! I do have a fair amount of medical terminology, mainly coming from the doctor as she explains to the main character what her options are. The characters talked about the surgery both before and after, I just wasn't sure if it was necessary to include the actual surgery as well. I don't even know how to go about doing that while my main character is knocked out for the procedure, and she's the one I follow.
Thanks for the reminder that this my story Gillhoughly. It's always good to hear (see) that when I start fretting about this and that. I'm always worried that an agent will look at the story and think, "What, no sex? This is just rubbish!" (it sounds funny now that I've typed it out, but these really are things I worry about). :)
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http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/images/statusicon/post_old.gif 06-15-2006, 12:10 AM kpmcneil22 (http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/member.php?u=7102) vbmenu_register("postmenu_647552", true);
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I just finished reading a Pulitzer Prize novel (Empire Falls) and there weren't any sex scenes. Also, from what you said it doesn't sound like you have any need to describe the surgury itself.
Good luck!
Kevin
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http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/images/statusicon/post_old.gif 06-15-2006, 12:23 AM NeuroFizz (http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/member.php?u=1846) vbmenu_register("postmenu_647571", true);
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Sex scenes (as well as scenes of violence) can come out at two opposite extremes. If they are not germane to the plot, or the particular scene, or useful for characterization, or some other essential component of the story, but rather they are only tangential, they could receive the deadly label, "gratuitous." On the other hand, since both deal with extremely intense emotions, they can represent an opportunity to show some real characterization in how your players react to the intense situations.
One well-known author (and I'm sorry, I can't remember her name) said that jumping from the first passionate kiss directly to the cigarette can be a huge mistake. What's in between is where the passion and the emotion come out. She wasn't talking about a detailed description of the physical events, but a playing of the emotions, and the reactions to those emotions, as a very powerful way to say something about the characters. They can also say something meaningful about the times, and the circumstances of the story. Both sex and violence also can represent two important forms of conflict.
If the sex scenes are important for the story, go for it. If they are included because everyone else seems to have them in their stories, they should be re-thought. You can apply this same logic to the surgery scenes and to the medical discussions of the hospital events. If you are including the medical terminology just to show that you know what your are writing about, cut it to the minimum and include only what is necessary and pertinent to the story.
I've said this before, and it is thrown out here for discussion only. When considering putting something like this into a story, one could use the two-pronged test of necessity and sufficiency. These are useful in a variety of fields from mathematics and finance, to the sciences, and probably a whole slew of others areas. In effect they ask, and I'll frame this in writing terms--is the scene necessary for the story development, and is the scene (as written) sufficient to move along that story development? Applying this to your sex scenes or hospital scenes in your story, or to scenes of violence in other stories, may be helpful in determining their possible inclusion. This last part is just an idea, and not particularly well thought out at that.
Note as an example of another use: In my work, the necessity and sufficiency rule is used to determine if a neuron can be considered a "command neuron" in conrolling a behavioral reaction, giving a strict experimental basis for the concept.
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When I write (and granted, I am an unpublished newbie) I write what I want to see happen. After all, if I don't like it, how can I expect anyone else to?
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If the scenes are not important to the plot or character development (and sex scenes are usually not) then it's perfectly fine to leave them out. Or do a narrative summary. A novel is not a diary, and even in a diary, you don't detail everything, do you?
And how about this? How about just writing out the scenes anyway. Then in your later drafts decide if you need to keep them or edit them or whatever. This way, you don't lose the momentum or what you want to say, but you have the power to cut, trim and change later.
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Uncle Jim is fond of saying that everything in a book should advance plot, show theme or develop character. I find that a very good litmus test to see what goes and stays. So the sex scene might be good for developing character since, as earlier posters have said, it's an emotionally intense time. But if the characters are already engaged then the sex isn't developing the plot as it would if, say, it was two otherwise-married people beginning an affair. There's another thread about mentioning that characters need to go to the toilet, and the concensus was that that's understood. Unless it advances plot then I think the same thing could be said of a normal sexual relationship.
Re the surgery - I can't see how the details of that would fulfill any of the three requirements, since the MC will be unconcsious during it and in one way, isn't present as a character at all. Of course, just because *I* can't see that doesn't mean it's not there!
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Leave out everything that doesn't propel the story forward. You might have it in a first draft, but consider truly examining its importance in the second and third drafts and be prepared to cut, slice, hack.
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What about the sex after the surgery? If they're still together at that point? If the relationship between the two is important, then I'd have thought that the sex after surgery and particularly after hysterectomy (assuming they have no children yet) could be a testing and developmental phase of their relationship. Not that you would need the gory detail, but perhaps some of the intimacy of touch and communication and perceiving how the other person feels and what the meaning of the sex is?
Other than that, it doesn't sound like you believe the sex scenes would advance the story, and I agree with you that you couldn't really show the surgery while she's unconscious anyway (unless she's doing that horror story thing of 'I look anaesthetised but I can feel everything' agghhh).
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I can see how a sex scene can develop character, but I'm having trouble doing the same for a surgery scene. Unless the doctor was a main character, of course.
I think a surgery scene can safely be left out, no problem, and if you think there's no need for a sex scene, and that not having one does not make a difference, then you are probably right.
The important things are to move the story forward and show character development, so unless those scenes will do that, you can let them go. Why would a book *need* a sex scene unless it was something expected of the genre? It doesn't sound like you're writing a romance, but then again, I could be very wrong.
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If the book is well written and the reader is swept along in a great story they aren't going to be sitting there going "What! No sex? Where's my obligatory sex scene?" Not unless you are writing erotica of course. ;)
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It sounds like if you try to write the sex scene, the surgery scene, you'd be forcing yourself to write it based on what someone else wants. Not only is it a lousy way to write, it's a good way to kill your enjoyment and your own story.
When I write, I write everything I want to see in it. Sometimes, this means long and whittering scenes that stagnate on the page, but that make my writer-self happy before my editor-self or reader-self. I write 'em anyway. Granted, I may cut it out once I'm at a couple hundred thousand words (lordi) or I may not. It'll depend on the flow. For now, just write it as it comes to you. If it comes without sex scenes and surgeries, write it thus.
You can always tell a sex scene in a novel that an author didn't want to put in. You really can.
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If the woman having the surgery is the viewpoint character, I'd imagine she wouldn't have much recollection of the actual operation. Of course, I'm not a doctor and it's possible this may be done under local anesthesia - but I doubt it. So it should be natural for the surgery to happen "off camera" if none of your viewpoint characters are actually watching it.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MadScientistMatt
If the woman having the surgery is the viewpoint character, I'd imagine she wouldn't have much recollection of the actual operation. Of course, I'm not a doctor and it's possible this may be done under local anesthesia - but I doubt it. So it should be natural for the surgery to happen "off camera" if none of your viewpoint characters are actually watching it.
....and it would be confusing, tedious, and boring to jump into the operating doctor's head for this single scene while the operation goes on, and then jump back out.
Skipping things is good. It gives your story a beat. A lot of times when a story of mine dies on the page, it's because I pushed a scene a few pages beyond where it was supposed to end, and it just folds up on me. I find that if I go back, chop out the old scene, skip all the stuff I thought I needed to write, and then keep going, my story gets back on track easily.
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HeyBooBoo: Your scenes of intimacy sound fine. In fact, many people think less is more in this respect. Imply it & leave the rest to the reader's imagination....classic show versus tell (I think?).
As for the surgery, it sounds okay. My initial thought, though, is "How much time has passed between the time the character says to the doctor she wants the hysterectomy and the time she wakes up in recovery?"
If it's like 4 hours, go back and make sure this even happens. I guess in cases of cancer being discovered, it could happen this fast. But usually, even in cases of cancer, days can pass between deciding on surgery and actually getting it. Make sense? So, if what's going on is they're prepping her for surgery and the doc says SURE YOU WANNA GO THRU WITH THIS? YEAP, I'M SURE, then you don't have a problem at all.
But, if it's during the consultation and she's picking Option #3 out of the 4 he/she gives her, then I think we need to come up with the typical amount of time that needs to pass between that point and the surgery. Whether it's an hour, a day, a week or a month, only you can determine if missing the IN-BETWEEN-TIME is important to the plot.
Hopefully I'm making sense here....Good luck with whatever you decide, though!
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Thanks for all the great advice everyone! I'm going to leave the sex and surgery out as they are, since neither does anything for the story, and I'm pretty happy with the way it flows as it is. I just never knew if sex was expected or not. Thanks again! :)
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There are a lot of places in life where sex will be expected of you (just wait till we go to dinner) but in the confines of your story is not one of them.
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I'm always cutting things out - - as long as it doesn't take away the progression, surgery is a good thing.
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Sex scenes are tricky because they can often seem indulgent. Doesn't mean they're bad, though. I think if you write the scene and it feels to you like the sex is missing...put it in. If you write it and it feels like the scene is complete...leave it out.
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leaving things out of a novel
I'm wondering if it's okay to leave certain details out of a novel. I have two things that I've left out, and I'm not sure if they should be included or not, (more importantly, if agents and editors think they should be included). My main character gets engaged in the first chapter, but I didn't write any sex scenes for them. I didn't think it was important, since it's not a romance, but is it necessary to write sex? I have instances that allude to the fact that they do have sex, just so the reader doesn't think they have a June and Ward Cleaver sleeping arrangement, but it's only mentioned. The first chapter leaves off with my main characters boyfriend proposing, then in the next chapter she mentions something about spending the weekend in bed. Or I end a scene when she's leading him to the bedroom, and start a new one after they're done doing their business. I'm not uncomfortable writing a sex scene if need be, but it's just not important to the story, and I honestly don't want to waste the word count on it, unless, of course, it's something a reader would want in the story. So, I'm not sure if it's okay to leave out.
Another thing I've left out is a surgery scene. My main character is diagnosed with ovarian cancer halfway through the story, but the cancer is a means to an end in relation to the main plot, the story's main climax is not cancer, but it's a necessary part of the story. I spent two chapters dealing with my character finding out the news, the reaction of friends and family, and her own feeling during the process. I ended one scene where she tells the doctor that she wants the hysterectomy, and start the next one when she's in the recovery room after the procedure is finished. I didn't think it was important to include the details of the surgery, but I'm not sure if it's okay to leave that out. I felt that showing what the surgery means, after the fact, to all the characters, versus showing just the sugery fit better into the story. I just don't know if details like this should be left out for the sake of moving things along, or if it's something that the reader would like to see happen.
Any suggestions would be appreciated, thanks! :)
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Just my .02, but if it doesn't move the scene forward, I wouldn't include the detail. Many a good novel has not a single sex scene. But part of the reward of writing is the feeling you get when you have mastered-- or at least vastly improved-- a certain technique you've been subconsciously avoiding.
You've got an engaged couple, and a protag with a dx of cancer. You don't need to get blue with the sex, or sound like a chapter from Medline with the cancer, but I would think it would be hard to get around addressing those two issues.
So if the story requires certain types of scenes, practice writing those scenes until they sound right. (But don't get derailed doing it in the first draft, as I've been told, and now firmly believe! Getting frustrated spoils momentum).
I have a similar problem. My WIP has a violent scene. I'm not familiar with writing convincing dialogue, never done it before but because I feel it's integral in this case, I'm reading authors who do these scenes well and making note of the things that make them compelling. If the writing feels like a copout to you, it will to your readers.
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Use what you need to tell your story and move it forward. Don't think of it as leaving things out.
When you're making chocolate cookies, you use what's needed: flour and chocolate and sugar, etc., but no one will miss it if you omit a cup of chopped chicken. Chopped chicken added where it's not needed is noticeable--but in a baaaad way! :tongue
Ask yourself if any action by the character, whether having sex or buying bread at a grocery is needed for your plot.
Quote:
unless, of course, it's something a reader would want in the story.
Whoa, right there! This is YOUR story and you should write it to please yourself, not some imaginary reader. Don't second guess what another person would like to see, write about what you want to see!
(Otherwise you will go nuts--I've been there!)
When I first started whacking away at a typewriter I tried to guess what an editor would like to read. Then what a reader would like to read. It just made me frustrated and the writing stopped.
Then the dawn came: "Gillhoughly--write something that YOU like to read."
And to mix a metaphor, the dam broke and I've been swept along in the flow ever since.
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Thank you both very much! I do have a fair amount of medical terminology, mainly coming from the doctor as she explains to the main character what her options are. The characters talked about the surgery both before and after, I just wasn't sure if it was necessary to include the actual surgery as well. I don't even know how to go about doing that while my main character is knocked out for the procedure, and she's the one I follow.
Thanks for the reminder that this my story Gillhoughly. It's always good to hear (see) that when I start fretting about this and that. I'm always worried that an agent will look at the story and think, "What, no sex? This is just rubbish!" (it sounds funny now that I've typed it out, but these really are things I worry about). :)
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I just finished reading a Pulitzer Prize novel (Empire Falls) and there weren't any sex scenes. Also, from what you said it doesn't sound like you have any need to describe the surgury itself.
Good luck!
Kevin
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Sex scenes (as well as scenes of violence) can come out at two opposite extremes. If they are not germane to the plot, or the particular scene, or useful for characterization, or some other essential component of the story, but rather they are only tangential, they could receive the deadly label, "gratuitous." On the other hand, since both deal with extremely intense emotions, they can represent an opportunity to show some real characterization in how your players react to the intense situations.
One well-known author (and I'm sorry, I can't remember her name) said that jumping from the first passionate kiss directly to the cigarette can be a huge mistake. What's in between is where the passion and the emotion come out. She wasn't talking about a detailed description of the physical events, but a playing of the emotions, and the reactions to those emotions, as a very powerful way to say something about the characters. They can also say something meaningful about the times, and the circumstances of the story. Both sex and violence also can represent two important forms of conflict.
If the sex scenes are important for the story, go for it. If they are included because everyone else seems to have them in their stories, they should be re-thought. You can apply this same logic to the surgery scenes and to the medical discussions of the hospital events. If you are including the medical terminology just to show that you know what your are writing about, cut it to the minimum and include only what is necessary and pertinent to the story.
I've said this before, and it is thrown out here for discussion only. When considering putting something like this into a story, one could use the two-pronged test of necessity and sufficiency. These are useful in a variety of fields from mathematics and finance, to the sciences, and probably a whole slew of others areas. In effect they ask, and I'll frame this in writing terms--is the scene necessary for the story development, and is the scene (as written) sufficient to move along that story development? Applying this to your sex scenes or hospital scenes in your story, or to scenes of violence in other stories, may be helpful in determining their possible inclusion. This last part is just an idea, and not particularly well thought out at that.
Note as an example of another use: In my work, the necessity and sufficiency rule is used to determine if a neuron can be considered a "command neuron" in conrolling a behavioral reaction, giving a strict experimental basis for the concept.
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If the scenes are not important to the plot or character development (and sex scenes are usually not) then it's perfectly fine to leave them out. Or do a narrative summary. A novel is not a diary, and even in a diary, you don't detail everything, do you?
And how about this? How about just writing out the scenes anyway. Then in your later drafts decide if you need to keep them or edit them or whatever. This way, you don't lose the momentum or what you want to say, but you have the power to cut, trim and change later.
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Uncle Jim is fond of saying that everything in a book should advance plot, show theme or develop character. I find that a very good litmus test to see what goes and stays. So the sex scene might be good for developing character since, as earlier posters have said, it's an emotionally intense time. But if the characters are already engaged then the sex isn't developing the plot as it would if, say, it was two otherwise-married people beginning an affair. There's another thread about mentioning that characters need to go to the toilet, and the concensus was that that's understood. Unless it advances plot then I think the same thing could be said of a normal sexual relationship.
Re the surgery - I can't see how the details of that would fulfill any of the three requirements, since the MC will be unconcsious during it and in one way, isn't present as a character at all. Of course, just because *I* can't see that doesn't mean it's not there!
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Leave out everything that doesn't propel the story forward. You might have it in a first draft, but consider truly examining its importance in the second and third drafts and be prepared to cut, slice, hack.
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What about the sex after the surgery? If they're still together at that point? If the relationship between the two is important, then I'd have thought that the sex after surgery and particularly after hysterectomy (assuming they have no children yet) could be a testing and developmental phase of their relationship. Not that you would need the gory detail, but perhaps some of the intimacy of touch and communication and perceiving how the other person feels and what the meaning of the sex is?
Other than that, it doesn't sound like you believe the sex scenes would advance the story, and I agree with you that you couldn't really show the surgery while she's unconscious anyway (unless she's doing that horror story thing of 'I look anaesthetised but I can feel everything' agghhh).
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I can see how a sex scene can develop character, but I'm having trouble doing the same for a surgery scene. Unless the doctor was a main character, of course.
I think a surgery scene can safely be left out, no problem, and if you think there's no need for a sex scene, and that not having one does not make a difference, then you are probably right.
The important things are to move the story forward and show character development, so unless those scenes will do that, you can let them go. Why would a book *need* a sex scene unless it was something expected of the genre? It doesn't sound like you're writing a romance, but then again, I could be very wrong.
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If the book is well written and the reader is swept along in a great story they aren't going to be sitting there going "What! No sex? Where's my obligatory sex scene?" Not unless you are writing erotica of course. ;)
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It sounds like if you try to write the sex scene, the surgery scene, you'd be forcing yourself to write it based on what someone else wants. Not only is it a lousy way to write, it's a good way to kill your enjoyment and your own story.
When I write, I write everything I want to see in it. Sometimes, this means long and whittering scenes that stagnate on the page, but that make my writer-self happy before my editor-self or reader-self. I write 'em anyway. Granted, I may cut it out once I'm at a couple hundred thousand words (lordi) or I may not. It'll depend on the flow. For now, just write it as it comes to you. If it comes without sex scenes and surgeries, write it thus.
You can always tell a sex scene in a novel that an author didn't want to put in. You really can.
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If the woman having the surgery is the viewpoint character, I'd imagine she wouldn't have much recollection of the actual operation. Of course, I'm not a doctor and it's possible this may be done under local anesthesia - but I doubt it. So it should be natural for the surgery to happen "off camera" if none of your viewpoint characters are actually watching it.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MadScientistMatt
If the woman having the surgery is the viewpoint character, I'd imagine she wouldn't have much recollection of the actual operation. Of course, I'm not a doctor and it's possible this may be done under local anesthesia - but I doubt it. So it should be natural for the surgery to happen "off camera" if none of your viewpoint characters are actually watching it.
....and it would be confusing, tedious, and boring to jump into the operating doctor's head for this single scene while the operation goes on, and then jump back out.
Skipping things is good. It gives your story a beat. A lot of times when a story of mine dies on the page, it's because I pushed a scene a few pages beyond where it was supposed to end, and it just folds up on me. I find that if I go back, chop out the old scene, skip all the stuff I thought I needed to write, and then keep going, my story gets back on track easily.
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HeyBooBoo: Your scenes of intimacy sound fine. In fact, many people think less is more in this respect. Imply it & leave the rest to the reader's imagination....classic show versus tell (I think?).
As for the surgery, it sounds okay. My initial thought, though, is "How much time has passed between the time the character says to the doctor she wants the hysterectomy and the time she wakes up in recovery?"
If it's like 4 hours, go back and make sure this even happens. I guess in cases of cancer being discovered, it could happen this fast. But usually, even in cases of cancer, days can pass between deciding on surgery and actually getting it. Make sense? So, if what's going on is they're prepping her for surgery and the doc says SURE YOU WANNA GO THRU WITH THIS? YEAP, I'M SURE, then you don't have a problem at all.
But, if it's during the consultation and she's picking Option #3 out of the 4 he/she gives her, then I think we need to come up with the typical amount of time that needs to pass between that point and the surgery. Whether it's an hour, a day, a week or a month, only you can determine if missing the IN-BETWEEN-TIME is important to the plot.
Hopefully I'm making sense here....Good luck with whatever you decide, though!
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Thanks for all the great advice everyone! I'm going to leave the sex and surgery out as they are, since neither does anything for the story, and I'm pretty happy with the way it flows as it is. I just never knew if sex was expected or not. Thanks again! :)
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There are a lot of places in life where sex will be expected of you (just wait till we go to dinner) but in the confines of your story is not one of them.
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I'm always cutting things out - - as long as it doesn't take away the progression, surgery is a good thing.
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Sex scenes are tricky because they can often seem indulgent. Doesn't mean they're bad, though. I think if you write the scene and it feels to you like the sex is missing...put it in. If you write it and it feels like the scene is complete...leave it out.
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