Another question
I am currently hard at work editing my sci-fi erotic romance. It's a 70k-75k story. Everything is going pretty good. I've edited this thing about 100 times. I want to finish before I lose my mind. The problem--I'm concerned my hero and heroine don't "get together" soon enough. I stumbled on an erotica author's website that states in her opinion if your hero and heroine don't have sex by page 18 or 5200 words in, then you'll lose your target audience. Is page 18 equal to 5200 words? And would you agree with said erotica author's opinion? Feel free to elaborate and give examples if you need to. I'm at a crossroads with this. On the one hand, I am loyal to my story and my characters will have sex when it's right for them. On the other, I want to capture the reader (the erotica reader's) attention asap. Thanks, PJ :?

I just had a review on a gay content review site. I believe the reviewer was a man. My story was considered to have a slow pace. The sex didn't happen until well into the story, about half way, though there was a mild masturbation scene about a third of the way through. Also, I had hefty plotwork in my story, and the story was deemed complicated, the characters complicated as well. Now I'm classed in erotica because I haven't much choice. I have erotic content about men on men in my stories. Most venues deem that as too steamy to be classed anything but erotica. But someone looking for pure erotica might expect 1) less plot, more sex 2) not much complication of characters and plot, because, well, it's supposed to be about sex. So I had a mediocre review there, but a great review elsewhere with my real target audience (women), who liked the complication, loved the characters, really got into the plot. So here's what I'm saying: what is your target audience? The story you are writing may not be strictly erotica. If that's the case, refigure your market. I consider myself lucky a gay man gave me a three out of five score for a book classed as erotica when it is actually more of a fantasy romance.

It's definitely an erotic story. Erotic romance actually. There's sexuality and sexual references before my hero and heroine have sex, but no real romance. Lots of set-up. Lots of story. Sexual tension.

Well, then you only need to worry about the publisher's idea of "soon enough" when it comes to introducing the first sex scene. :-)

Hee. :) Yeah, I think I just got spooked. I'm not going to worry about it. Thanks bunches!

No prob. I've been spooked over the same issue. :-)

I have these feelings all the time about my stuff. I just let the inner editors finally say to me 'write what you gotta write'. Heh, not much help though if you have to sell it to a specific place.

Yep, exactly. That's what I'm gonna do. Thanks, Maui. :)

It does depend on the publsiher. I find Loose Id very flexible on this, and Samhain takes all genres. For someone like EC sex should probably be soon and often but it all depends.

Yeah. I think it's more important to stay true to one's story than to write for a market. I believe in my story enough to trust that any fair-minded reader will give my story the time it needs to unfold and that if they give me a chance, it will pay off for them. Thanks you guys for the responses! :) xxx

I'm a bit late, but I'd like to add something. Sometimes well-written sexual tension will satisfy the erotic reader and buy you some time before you have to deliver the goods. Since you said you have sexual tension and a lot of set up, you're probably good. I doubt someone would buy a 75k+ word novel if all they want is a stroke story. Sometimes I do wonder if I'm getting enough sex in the story or if I'm getting it in soon enough for the reader, but I figure with my target audience having a gratuitous sex scene will hurt the story more than a delayed meaningful one.

Exactly! That's what I'm thinking too.

I've also sometimes used no-sex sex scenes to keep things simmering. You know, a sexy act that is explicit but not the wham-bam.

Guilty! Wicked minds think alike!