How explicit should sex scenes be in romance novels?

As much/little as you wish to write.

sophiabegum1980 said:

How explicit should sex scenes really be in a romance novel? what is inappropriate, do you think?

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As WillSauger said, as explicit or as non-explicit as you like to write. Some readers don't want to read about explicit sex, and might suggest you avoid referring to body parts, describe sex in terms of metaphors or just close the bedroom door and skip to the couple waking up in the morning.

But other readers like to get the details, especially if the sex scenes deepen the couple's relationship or add to the conflict. It depends on what you yourself prefer and what market you're aiming for.

This is one of those questions that cannot be answered. You can find romance novels with 20-30 pages of very explicit sex, and you can find others with nothing more than a discreet paragraph. You can find lush, purple prose and you can find almost clinical detachment.

The only real question is what fits the book you are writing, and you are the only one who knows that.

A romance novel doesn't "tip over" into being an erotica novel because of the quantity and explicitness of the sex in the story. That may well make it an erotic romance, but erotica is a different beast than erotic romance, even if the participants in both do spend a lot of their time naked.

The romance - erotic or not - story is defined by the focus on the developing romantic relationship and the happy ending for the lovers. Erotica is about the sex and the characters having it, and they don't have to have what we'd think of as a "romance" and they certainly don't have to walk off hand in hand into the sunset together at the end.

The romance genre has books at every "heat" level, from romance with no sex in the story at all, some with fade to black off page sex, moving on through more explicit and more frequent sex scenes until they are erotic romance. Some romance publishers will publish a range of heat levels, some will publish only erotic romance, or others will only publish romance with no sex at all (that's usually the Inspirational Romance sub genre these days.) The key is to target the publisher who publishes the type of book you are submitting. Write the book you want to write and see which publisher it's suitable for.

I've been reading historic romance for years,some of those are very steamy. I think of erotica as... sex with props.If it isn't just the bodies that are involved,then I consider it erotica.I guess I'm just old fashioned but I equate love with romance, not erotica.Sometimes I feel erotica borders on a control issue not love or romance, but that's me.

There is no heat level that is "inappropriate". It will only be inappropriate for a certain line, or imprint with a publisher. Meanwhile there are whole imprints and publishers that specifically look for high heat levels.

I currently write erotic romance which is a high heat level. But even erotic romance has different heat levels within it. I have also read books that were only branded "paranormal romance", but that were at such a high heat level that I might have labeled them erotic romance so the lines are blurring somewhat these days.

It is entirely up to you. Decide what kind of novel you want to write.

If a book has a strong romance with a full romance arc than it is erotic romance and not erotica. The label erotica would indicate that the protagonists do not end up together in a happy for now, or happy ever after at the end of the novel.

Yes, great advise in here. I'd peruse some on line Catalogues with heat rankings. All Romance comes to mind.

sophiabegum1980 said:

If sex is very explicit in a romance novel, then it could be classed as an erotica novel, couldn't it?

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Erotica is a different genre. You can have erotic romance, but it will still be still romance because of the relationship and HEA requirements. Sexual content does not determine genre.

As for how explicit, you can have anything from hand-holding sweets to erotic romance. Your call.

gingerwoman said:

There is no heat level that is "inappropriate" it will only be inappropriate for a certain line or imprint with a publisher. Meanwhile there are whole imprints and publishers that specifically look for high heat levels. I currently write erotic romance which is a high heat level. But even erotic romance has different heat levels within it. I have also read books that were only branded "paranormal romance" but that were at a heat level that I would consider erotic romance so the lines are blurring somewhat these days.

It is entirely up to you. Decide what kind of novel you want to write.

If a book has a strong romance with a full romance arc than it is erotic romance and not erotica. The label erotica would indicate that the protagonists do not end up together in a happy for now, or happy ever after at the end of the novel.

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All the replies in this thread are interesting. I've just written an erotic romantic mystery thriller. As a general rule are agents turned off by reading explicit sex? It concerns me that it will stop me getting a deal.

But I believe I needed to do that (and I enjoyed writing it) in the first half of the book to develop the characters better and explain why things happen in the second half.

It just depends on how common and accepted sex is in that genre. I find explicit sex is quite common in mainstream books in fantasy, romance, literary etc. As such I expect agents in those genres are used to seeing it.

If an agent you're querying represents erotic romance books then unless your book has lots of extreme taboo kinks or something you aren't going to shock them any more than you could shock a long-time emergency room doctor. In both cases they've seen it all before.

And if you are putting in actually shocking stuff (extreme kinks etc) -- obviously go for an agent that has represented other stuff that extreme. But in terms of it just being sex. Well, it is pretty hard to shock someone in an erotic genre.

The only times I've been shocked are when the writers went too far in terms of how badly the hero could abuse the heroine (or the other hero) and get away with it. Then it was more like, "am I supposed to buy that he set her up to be gang-raped and she fell in love with him anyway?"

But consensual sex? Nah.

I am sometimes shocked at how tame books labeled as 'erotic romance' are--yes, I am looking at you Harlequin Blaze.

And remember that an agent or publisher who deals with erotic romance and erotica has almost certainly had stuff submitted to them that is way more "shocking" than the stuff they actually went on to represent or buy.

sophiabegum1980 said:

If sex is very explicit in a romance novel, then it could be classed as an erotica novel, couldn't it?

How explicit should sex scenes really be in a romance novel? what is inappropriate, do you think?

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Nope! Erotica is its own genre. The differentiation is that with erotica, sex is integral to the plot. Remove the sex and the story falls apart.

With romance, even without the sex scenes, the storyline and plot will hold up.

In my opinion, your sex scenes should be as explicit as you feel is right for the tone of the book, the characters and the audience you're writing for. My sex scenes tend to be quite explicit because I'm comfortable writing them that way. But there is nothing wrong with toning them down if you do not feel comfortable making them explicit.

Good luck!

I agree with everyone else who said it depends on what you the author, feels fits the book and the audience you are writing for.

theporcupinethief said:

All the replies in this thread are interesting. I've just written an erotic romantic mystery thriller. As a general rule are agents turned off by reading explicit sex? It concerns me that it will stop me getting a deal.

But I believe I needed to do that (and I enjoyed writing it) in the first half of the book to develop the characters better and explain why things happen in the second half.

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The term you want to use is probably erotic romantic suspense. That is the standard terminology for the kind of book you are describing. That's assuming that your romance plot line is as strong as the suspense plot line, and not just a side plot, in which case you probably just have a thriller with a little romance and some sex scenes, which you should probably just call a thriller.

And no, I'd say most agents who accept romance submissions at all, would usually be interested in erotic romantic suspense.

If an agent doesn't accept erotica they will specifically say that in their guidelines. But even then they may not mean erotic romance. I've seen publishers specifically say "no erotica" and then say they are keen to find erotic romance, which can be confusing.

I've considered dabbling in romance. I would consider it the same as any piece of exposition or action.

"Life with the boring parts taken out."

If the sex is boring/irrelevant to the story, skip it, take it out. If the sex is central to the story, it may be erotica instead of romance. If it's somewhere in the middle, consider using metaphor along with a few telling details.

Telling details. You might only mention a few details of the encounter among the metaphors as important to the plot/characterization. A lot can be said about a man who is highly aggressive and only takes what he wants versus a man who takes his time and goes out of his way to explore and see to her needs. Neither guarantees the man is bad or good respectively, but if you have a feeling for your ideal reader, you should have an idea how they'll feel about different sorts of men.

The call about how much women want to read about can only be made through reading and writing experience really. Unless you're writing *for* a particular person as your motivation(personally highly recommended ) then it's just a judgement call. Ask the important people, agents, editors etc about how much detail they want. Is their target audience the sort that are turned off by a play by play or the type that go into a pleasant dream/trance state reading those sorts of passages. Both exist.

Sinderion said:

I've considered dabbling in romance. I would consider it the same as any piece of exposition or action.

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Romance is just like exposition or action? Or did you mean something else?

As those with experience in the genre have mentioned, the level of sex you include depends on your goals w/ the story, and the heat level of the market you are aiming for.

I recently read an action, adventure type thriller written by a man, which included an explicitly described cunnilingus scene. Just part of the story. And no it wasn't otherwise an erotic book at all.