Why do people get so hot under the collar about sex in thrillers?

[sportourer1]

Unless a book is described as erotica or maybe adult romance there is a tendency to describe sex scenes as gratuitous. I wonder why this is. Of all the activities or a character this has always to be justified and intrinsic to the plot or it will be criticised. Is that a little odd?

[hal2814]

Any activity not "justified and intrinsic to the plot" is by definition gratuitous.

[Worldwalker]

What Hal said.

It's like movies: for some reason, they always seem to find an excuse to jam a sex scene into a movie. They don't feel compelled to put in a car chase, or a spooky deserted building, or a spaceship, but the sex scene has to be in there no matter how bad the fit is.

Most of the time, sex scenes stuffed into books that don't need them require someone else who doesn't need to be there, and a justification to put that person in the story, and then something visibly pointless for them to do, to justify them being there, so the protagonist can have sex with them for no reason. That's a waste of my time. I have plenty of books with well-written sex scenes that are an important part of the book that I can read; I don't like seeing them stuffed in somewhere just because "it has to be there" when, in fact, it doesn't.

As Hal said, all characters and activities must be justified and intrinsic to the plot. It irks people when they aren't. If you're reading a cozy mystery where the protagonist wanders off and picks her niece up from school, there had better be a reason for it; if there isn't, you're irked. I go off all the time about the cement mixer subplot in Tom Clancy's Executive Orders -- it goes nowhere, does nothing. I think it's just a bit more obvious with sex scenes. You might forget about the school pickup a couple of chapters later, since it never turned into anything, but you keep remembering the sex scene and waiting for something to come of it, but it never does.

If there's a shotgun on the wall in the first act, it had better go off by the third (Anton Chekhov). That goes for books, too. Anything that is not important to the plot must go, and you can tell an professional writer from an amateur (or a self-important pro with bad editing, which is perhaps even worse) by whether or not they abide by this rule.

[Lemurion]

It's the old saying: Sex sells.

Anything that works in the context of the story is great. However, some stories seem to have sex added just to build up sales, and that's not great at all.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by Worldwalker

all characters and activities must be justified and intrinsic to the plot. It irks people when they aren't.

Not me.

It irks me when they're poorly-written or distract from the actual plot. (Both sex scenes and unnecessary details, like the random "picked child up from school" interlude.) But if they're well-written and contain some insight to the characters, I've got no problems with them. And it's hard to imagine a well-written scene *not* containing at least some character insight.

Also, I deplore the idea that sex is such an extreme and unusual act that it has no place in the majority of stories, and that including it automatically changes the genre. While gritty, explicit sex may not belong in a wacky college farce, it would fit very well into many private-investigator mysteries (and it's not like mysteries lack sex as a motive for various people's activities)--but many modern publishers won't touch stories not tagged "romance/erotica" that have more than a fade-to-black approach to sex.

Puritan ethics. It's not that sex plays no important part in the story; it's that sex isn't allowed to be described the way that other important aspects are described. The murder victim in a bloody heap can be described in excruciating detail; the seduction of the cop assigned to the case, can't be.

Which doesn't mean all stories that include sex describe or integrate it well, but it's so often censored entirely that I am in favor of it when it does get through, in the hopes that future authors will write those scenes better.

[Worldwalker]

But if they're well-written and contain some insight to the characters, I've got no problems with them.

If they contain insight into the characters, then they are intrinsic to the plot. The shotgun has gone off.

Sex is something people do, yes. So is chasing other people around in cars (at least in spy movies). So is picking relatives up from school. Whether any, all, or none of these should be included in a story should depend on the needs of the story.

[crich70]

I recently bought a kindle book about writing romances which answers this question I think. It points out that Gone With The Wind may have romance but isn't a romance in itself. That is the story is a historical fiction (tells the story of a character's life around the American Civil War) and a romance does occur but the romance is only a sub plot of the story not the main plot. In a thriller likewise the main storyline is supposed to be something like finding a nuclear bomb before it can be exploded by terrorists (ala. The Peacemaker) or some other such high action plot. There can still be a romantic sub plot which may include some sexual content but the romance/sex isn't the most important thing. If romance/sex is the most important thing in a novel then it's not a thriller. It's a romance or an Erotic novel. Otherwise it's like making a science fiction movie (say a Star Trek movie) and spending valuable screen time showing multiple passes of the Enterprise. It may look great, but it doesn't really advance the story of how Kirk and his crew are going to save the galaxy.

[Figlilly]

I hate explicit sex scenes that pop up (hmmm) out of nowhere. I flip past them. I don't want to read the titillating detail (hmmm again) of what people do to each other's bodies unless it is in my diary.

[Gudy]

Originally Posted by hal2814

Any activity not "justified and intrinsic to the plot" is by definition gratuitous.

True, that. But it seems to me that sex scenes are held to a higher standard than just about anything else, in this regard. It often seems to me that some people will only endure a sex scene in a book not categorized as romance/erotica when there is no other way for the author to tell what he needs to tell (and often not even then). I.e. a sex scene, even if it is important to the story being told, is still considered gratuitous when the thing said sex scene accomplishes could also be accomplished some other, more acceptable way.

I call puritan bullshit on that one.

[sportourer1]

It seems to me that the exclusion of sex scenes in mainstream thrillers is almost a policy decision. The exclusion of sex and yes to a degree the school run does great harm to characterisation. So many thrillers have utterly unbelievable central characters anyhow so taking away their "life" makes them even more wooden. Plot is all in these thrillers and I think it is a shame that this is so.
In my writing I am trying to counteract this trend.

[mr ploppy]

People who like reading porn/erotica fiction probably get just as annoyed when a serial killer turns up and stabs people in the middle of sex scenes.

[JLeighs]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

People who like reading porn/erotica fiction probably get just as annoyed when a serial killer turns up and stabs people in the middle of sex scenes.

HA!

Anyway, I get tired of the "obligatory torrid sex scene" in so many books. It seems like many authors just stick it in there because, as someone said above, sex sells. Not to me it doesn't. It gets old. Occasionally, a sex scene is germane to the story, but not nearly as often as many authors seem to think. If I want a blow-by-blow sex scene, there are plenty of bodice-rippers out there to read.

[sportourer1]

Do you think there are many "obligatory" scenes in mainstream thrillers? Certainly mega selling authors such as Jack Higgins, Tom Clancy, Clive Cussler, Colin Forbes et al have central characters who seem utterly sexless. This along with other factors adds to the unreality of the charcters who have utterly unbelievable lives. The escapist plot is one thing but making the hero just a little more human would help things along the way I feel.

On observation here, people who live on the edge be it as soldier, agent or cop usually live their whole life close to the edge I would suggest. It is not conceivable that that for instance a special forces soldier who stares death in the face daily does not party and party hard.

[dworth]

"If I want a blow-by-blow sex scene"

Oooerr missus!

Seriously, it's a very difficult thing to write well and hilariously bad otherwise. Mine are 'out of shot' so to speak, as I know my limits. The reader knows that it's happened but the actual squirting of bodily fluids is not decribed.

[JLeighs]

Originally Posted by dworth

"If I want a blow-by-blow sex scene"

Oooerr missus!

My only defense is that I was still working on my first cup of coffee when I posted.