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Writing good sex scenes is hard (no pun intended). It's not all heaving bosoms and throbbing members, after all. This is the place to talk about writing sex.

Who wrote the best sex scenes you've read? And in which books?

70
Posted on 3/14/2011
Okay, what does it say about me that I'm starting all the sex discussions?

Anyway, I'm a firm believer in the idea that readers make the best writers, so, how about we toss out some of our favorite authors of sex scenes?

Research, people!  :-)

I'm currently reading Richelle Mead's IRON CROWNED which is fantasy full of explicit and wonderfully written sex scenes. The first two books in the series are equally great examples, if you don't want the fade-to-black sort of sex for your characters.
Showing 1 to 10 of 35 comments
2 years, 2 months, 4 days ago

Kushiel's dart had a few good sex scenes for the BDSM crowd.

The Anita Blake novels had some good sex scenes as well, starting with the third or fourth book. The problem with Anita Blake is that the author gets what I call baby gazelle knees. (Have you ever had, after sex, an issue where your knees are a little weak and wobbly? Like the cute footage of just born baby gazelles trying to stand up and walk for the first time? yeah, that. ) So the next 15 pages AFTER each sex scene suck. Then it gets progressively better, and just when she's back on top of the writing game, BAM, sex scene.

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2 years, 2 months, 4 days ago

I thought Laurell Hamilton's Blue Moon had some great sex scenes in it, but gave up on the series shortly thereafter, for the reasons that Alexander wrote.

My favorite sex scene writer is Guy Gavriel Kay.
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2 years, 2 months, 4 days ago

I have to say that Kimberly Menozzi's Ask Me If I'm Happy has some of the best sex scenes I've ever read. The book is kind of a cross between romance and literary fiction. I read the entire thing in one sitting a couple weeks ago. Definitely worth checking out.
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2 years, 2 months, 2 days ago

Oh, and I have to add, classic romance, like, every Harlequin novel written in the 70's and 80's? WORST sex scenes ever. Those things were my version of playboy as a kid, and I got really sick of reading about her "moist triangle". Really?
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2 years, 1 month, 28 days ago

I've loved Shelly Laurenston's sex scenes in the Magnus pack series. Loved, loved, loved them.

K.A. Mitchell always does it for me with hers also. Flirty, hot, intense, descriptive. mmmm ... YUM ... I could read them over and over again. Actually, I do read them over and over.

As for sex scenes that aren't explicit but are still wonderful, the one in Jennifer Crusie's Bet Me is fantastic. It gets across the hotness, the intensity, the drive, the want, even the love, without the detail that many other books have/need.

Alexander, I second some of that 70s & 80s stuff. Once, when I was young, a friend and I started to write down all the euphemisms we found in the romances we were reading. Somewhere around "her jasmined pearly core of pleasure" I was pretty much done. This might be part of why I now read more m/m. As long as there isn't female menage going on in the book, I don't have to deal with a "juicy apex of love" or anything like that.
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2 years, 1 month, 27 days ago

Pearly core of pleasure? that is too awesome for words. (Again, it would make a good band name).

Women get all the good ones though. Guy's genitals are either his cock or his shaft, I've never seen any really good metaphors for a penis in romance novels.
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2 years, 1 month, 19 days ago

One of the first authors that comes to mind is Linda Howard. But not the recent novels, some of the older ones like 'Dream Man' and 'After the Night'... the libido just seems to drop off after 2003.

I've read two authors recently that surprised with their sex scenes. Courtney Milan is amazing and shouldn't be missed. Not only are her characters sexy, they are smart! Oh my! It's amazing what a difference that makes when it comes to ...ahem...sex.

The other author is Alexis Harrington. Most of her books are only available as e-book now, but she's worthy of the read. What makes the difference with her sex scenes is that they are usually placed in the middle of a great story and happen with a natural passion... I love that!
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2 years, 1 month, 16 days ago

@Alexander ... I don't know if it's a "good" metaphor, but when my wife and I were in the dating phase, she told me about a romance novel where the man's genitals were termed, "steel wrapped in velvet." Still makes me laugh to this day!
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2 years, 1 month, 16 days ago

I feel a need to start a "Worst Genital Euphemisms" thread - LOL!
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2 years, 1 month, 16 days ago

@Colleen

Please do. That would be such a riot. I'll give you Sumatra (read: caffeine candy).

P.S. Info on how "purple prose" was named thus would be kewl.
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Showing 1 to 10 of 35 comments

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