Let's Talk About Sex, Baby

Sorry, this isn’t porn. Feel free to leave this site now if that’s why you were thinking. I’m talking about sex in books, and why I think there’s a bit too much of it lately.

The old adage sex sells remains true, but, like violence in the media, we the consumer have become desensitised to it to the point that writers and artists are having to go to more explicit extremes to get the same reaction.

This is true of the content of books as well as in the cover art. After the success of Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L.James, erotic fiction has seen a popularity explosion and this trend has rubbed off on other genres. These days it seems there are more book covers featuring naked male torsos or bare female legs than not. However, Fifty Shades itself has a rather more demure cover, which didn’t seem to negatively impact it’s sales, and proves the point that it isn’t necessary to cover your book in naked flesh to garner readers.

 Of course, part of the purpose of a book cover is to give your potential readers some indication of the content so that the know what they’re in for. More cynically, the purpose of a cover is to get people to judge your book by it and buy it even if they don’t end up liking what’s inside.

Using naked models on the cover is a sure-fire way to get people interested, but in anything but erotica this technique makes me cringe. Is the most important or interesting feature about your book really the chiselled abs of your hero? In some cases, authors are likely selling themselves short by suggesting so. They also risk patronising potential readers by suggesting that readers are only interested in the sexy male love interests.

Personally, I think that only erotica warrants nudity on the cover. In some cases, the content of books is also so explicit that it belongs in erotica. Of course, sex does have a place in fiction, but there is a big difference between sexual realism and gratuitous sexual content.

 Young adult fiction tends to skirt around the issue of sex and is often deliberately unrealistic in its lack of sexual content. If the characters have sex at all, it is usually off page, which is appropriate for the audience. In new adult fiction, there is also a trend for less sex or less explicit sex, and I have heard of people distinguishing new adult from full adult fiction by the level of sexual content, i.e. if it’s about a twenty something and there isn’t much sex or swearing, then it’s new adult not adult.

 This definition is troublesome for me because not too long ago the majority of adult books did not feature explicit sexual content. Those that did had a distinct reason for it (more on this in a minute), and often intended to shock their reader. In recent years, however, it seems the majority of adult books include detailed sex scenes, to the extent that it is virtually demanded by the reader and some writers feel pressured to include more sexual detail in order to sell more copies.

But why is there so much sex in modern fiction? Writers are taught to only include events that further the plot or are essential to character or thematic development. Anything that doesn’t serve a clear purpose in the story should be cut. It is for this reason that sex scenes used to be included only if the sex acts were pertinent to the plot, characters, or themes.

 In a romance, the first time a couple have sex it is often depicted as the cementing of their relationship, thus it can be an important part of the story. If there are tensions in a marriage that are going unsaid, these could manifest in an awkward sexual encounter. A character’s secret sadistic or masochistic side could be uncovered in a sex scene. Rape scenes are clearly integral to the plot and characters involves, and could require more graphic detail to emphasise the violence.

However, apart from in some select cases, it is not usually important to show a high level of detail in sex scenes. Even in romances, why do some writers dedicate four or more pages to a graphic play-by-play when all the reader needed to know was that they had sex and enjoyed it?

 If the same writers spent four pages describing the two characters sitting at a table eating a meal at the end of each day, smiling and exchanging only few words, it would be considered pointless and would be edited out. So why aren’t sex scenes considered pointless clutter, particularly when the feature more than once within the same character’s story in a book?

Overall it seems that, in some cases, sex scenes are used to distract the reader from problems with the plot or characters, filling in gaps or breaking up lulls in the action, or just generally trying to add bonus points to an otherwise bland story. If this is the case, then I for one am not fooled.

If you think I’m being harsh here I have two words for you. Anita Blake. Enough said.

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As always, you can find me on Twitter @H_Y_Malyk