Latest / Show, don't Tell Writing with Suzy Vadori / 92. Kiss and Tell: Writing Romance with Michelle Hazen

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92. Kiss and Tell: Writing Romance with Michelle Hazen · Show, don't Tell Writing with Suzy Vadori

• 0:05
  Welcome to the show, don't Tell Writing Podcast with me, Suzy Vadori, where I peel back the layers of how to wow your readers with your fiction, your nonfiction.
• 0:13
  Anybody can bang out a first draft, but it takes a little more work to make your book as amazing as it can be.
• 0:20
  Join me as I share the step by step writing techniques you could apply to your writing right away.
• 0:25
  As I host successful writers who share a behind the scenes look at their own writing lives, and as I live coach writers on their pages giving practical writing examples that will make your own writing stronger.
• 0:38
  Nobody is born knowing how to write an engaging book.
• 0:42
  There are real and important skills that you need to learn on this show.
• 0:46
  I cut through the noise and get you all the info you need.
• 0:49
  I can't wait to see how this information is going to transform your writing.
• 0:56
  I know I always say it.
• 0:57
  I have a special guest, but this one I have a really special connection with.
• 1:00
  Michelle Hasan is somebody who I met almost a decade ago now, and she did a three chapter edit of my novel that ended up landing me an agent.
• 1:09
  And when I got her feedback, it was just like this light bulb went off inside my brain because she gave feedback in such a very different way that she talked, and I learned so much from just that three chapter edits.
• 1:22
  But like I said, I ended up landing an agent but also.
• 1:26
  I just feel like there are so many things that are unwritten that many editors have a poor time explaining.
• 1:32
  And so in a roundabout way, Michelle actually made me want to be an editor because I realized that there was a different way of doing things.
• 1:41
  And when I actually got my accreditation many years later as a book coach, when I was listening to the courses, there was a course in there or an a lesson that was narrated by Michelle Hasan and her coaching.
• 1:54
  I didn't realize that she actually had been involved with Author Accelerator long before.
• 1:59
  I knew her long before, and she wasn't doing it anymore at the time, but I realized I was in the right place if this is where she learned how to edit and how to teach in the way that she did.
• 2:09
  I didn't end up working with Michelle and them because she wasn't taking clients by the time that novel was finished, but I did recently run into her at a conference or a retreat in, in Denver, Colorado.
• 2:21
  And I told this story when I met and she just about cried because you don't realize how your work is going to affect other people.
• 2:29
  And so when she was explaining to me that she had a new book coming out, kiss and Tell how to write unforgettable sex scenes, I knew that that was the kind of book that is going to be so, so helpful to you listeners because if you love the style that I teach and the really practical way that I teach writing.
• 2:49
  I learned some of it, or at least was inspired in the beginning by the way that Michelle teaches and this does not disappoint.
• 2:56
  So, okay, I'm gonna have a content warning here.
• 2:58
  This podcast episode is rated explicit.
• 3:00
  We tried to keep it as clean as possible, but we are talking about sex scenes.
• 3:03
  So there are some things in here that if you are not interested in this, please skip ahead.
• 3:07
  But I must say that whether you are writing any type of romance or any type of relationship.
• 3:13
  Kissing, anything physical, anything intimate.
• 3:16
  This book is a great read because it's extraordinarily practical, which is what I love about it.
• 3:21
  We go into all kinds of things.
• 3:23
  I did read the book before I interviewed Michelle, and so we spoil a lot of it.
• 3:28
  You can get an idea, but definitely go pick the book up if you're writing anything in this sphere, because you're gonna learn a ton.
• 3:33
  Other than this current book, Michelle is actually the critically acclaimed author of nine Contemporary Romances, soon to be many more and writes Dark Romance thrillers Under the Pen named Nika Grace.
• 3:46
  Her books have won the book Pipeline Award Fiction 1 0 1 Award, the Lone Star Award, great Expectations Award and Linda Howard Award of Excellence.
• 3:54
  Do you see a trend here?
• 3:55
  She started out volunteering to mentor aspiring authors in Pitch wars.
• 4:00
  If anybody remembers that, it was a huge program.
• 4:02
  What an honor to be part of in any way, shape, or form.
• 4:06
  And she loved the creative collaboration process so much that she opened Sanctuary editorial.
• 4:12
  As a writing coach and freelance editor since 2016, she specializes in helping authors fall madly at a last with their own manuscripts.
• 4:20
  If she's not reading or writing, she's probably hiking, rock climbing, staring longingly at a horse, or driving an indefensible number of miles to get to a Revivalist concert.
• 4:30
  She's semi nomadic with a home base in Boab, Utah, but her Muse lives in New Orleans.
• 4:37
  Welcome to the show, Michelle.
• 4:40
  Thank you so much for having me on.
• 4:42
  Oh my gosh, I blew through this book.
• 4:45
  Couldn't wait to read it.
• 4:47
  And thank you for giving me an arc. It was absolutely amazing.
• 4:51
  I mean, there's so much to think about when writing sexes, who knew?
• 4:55
  Yeah.
• 4:55
  It's really one of the most technically complex types of scenes, which means you have a lot of options, right?
• 5:01
  Like you can calibrate it so precisely to your needs for the book.
• 5:05
  Like it's almost exciting to have that many.
• 5:08
  Oh my gosh.
• 5:08
  You're preaching to the choir here.
• 5:10
  I get excited about writing.
• 5:11
  But first, let's just back up for a second.
• 5:13
  'cause we have listeners from all different walks of life and from all different levels of writing.
• 5:17
  What do you actually mean by sex scenes?
• 5:18
  What are we talking about?
• 5:19
  Like what is a sex scene?
• 5:21
  I have a whole chapter in my book about how I'm like, Hey, you guys, it's not just penetrative sex.
• 5:26
  That can be all kinds of things.
• 5:28
  Yeah.
• 5:28
  You know what I mean?
• 5:29
  So especially when you're delving into queer couples and whatnot, like you can't be so prescriptive with what's a sex thing.
• 5:36
  But we're talking about like.
• 5:37
  Pass kissing, like heavy making.
• 5:40
  You know what I mean?
• 5:41
  Yeah.
• 5:42
  Like, like something that would normally be like I had SATs, not like we around.
• 5:46
  Yeah.
• 5:46
  What works for you and your characters preferences.
• 5:49
  Exactly.
• 5:50
  Okay.
• 5:50
  But how do they fit into books?
• 5:53
  Is it only?
• 5:53
  Well, and also I should say, there's a lot of stuff in the book that will help you make your closed door set seem steamier.
• 6:00
  So even if you're closing the door before the actual thing, there's a lot of other things you can do to make that read.
• 6:05
  Steamier, which I think people don't think about.
• 6:08
  And then also, there's a ton about how to write kissing, because writing kissing will be really.
• 6:13
  And I love that.
• 6:14
  And, and the writing kissing chapters came kind of at the end and I was like, oh, that's like, like what a nice bonus.
• 6:20
  Right?
• 6:21
  All the, because I wanted to pull from all the chapters that came before it and be like, okay, we're gonna take this principle and now you can see how you apply that to kissing and this other principle.
• 6:30
  And this other principle.
• 6:31
  But I would feel bad giving people a 30 chapter book on how to write a kiss.
• 6:36
  But girl, you can use 30 chapters on how to write a kiss, like.
• 6:40
  It's just two mouths smushing together.
• 6:42
  Like there's almost nothing good you can say about that.
• 6:45
  So you gotta get up pretty old to make it.
• 6:47
  You, you made that sound ly unsexy and that's amazing 'cause I've read your work.
• 6:52
  No, it's the opposite.
• 6:54
  So I love that you can like dress it, dress it down.
• 6:57
  But yeah, I mean the book really deals with, and Michelle, thank you for addressing it because.
• 7:03
  Those intimate scenes like KISS and Tell the book actually isn't just for erotica.
• 7:07
  So if you're listening to this and you're like, well, I'm never gonna write a sexy, but you want your characters to get together, if you have any level of steam or romance in your book.
• 7:17
  How do you make it hot?
• 7:18
  This is the, like, this is the right place to learn that.
• 7:21
  Okay.
• 7:21
  If people are listening along and say like, I don't know if I can write this.
• 7:24
  Who, who can put this kind of scene in their book?
• 7:28
  Everybody.
• 7:29
  Interesting.
• 7:29
  Well, like I said, you can use this for any heat level of romance.
• 7:33
  And I did wanna say, when I was researching the other things that were out there on this topic, what I found is almost all of it for erotica authors.
• 7:41
  This book is really specific for romance authors.
• 7:44
  'cause a lot of the things I'm delving into are the emotional resonance of those scenes, the metaphorical value of those scenes.
• 7:50
  It's not just the sex itself, it's really about what it's doing for the relationship around it.
• 7:56
  So it's not as useful for erotica authors because they're writing more of the pure encounters themselves, and this is showing you how to use it to serve your story.
• 8:07
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 8:08
  And they, the question that you asked about like, who can use this, who would put this in their book?
• 8:12
  Like, that brings me back to why I decided to write the book in the first place, which is I was getting so many editing clients asking for tips on how to write sex names and like, or not knowing where to start.
• 8:23
  And the question that comes up over and over is, what do other people find taught?
• 8:28
  And it's a really tough question to answer, especially because America has this weird thing where everything is kind of about sex, and we use it to sell everything from white beer to pickup trucks.
• 8:39
  But at the same time, we're not talking about it in detail.
• 8:42
  You know, Europe is way more comfortable with nudity than we are.
• 8:45
  They're way more comfortable with actually talking about sex than we are, like we are this weird mix of exhibitionist and rude.
• 8:52
  You kind of have to ask yourself, who benefits from our son?
• 8:55
  And the answer is mediocre men.
• 8:57
  Alright?
• 8:58
  Once, yes.
• 8:59
  Once women started sharing about.
• 9:01
  When they weren't satisfied in bed or when their marriages sucked, like they started leaving, they started demanding more for themselves.
• 9:08
  And that's part of what we're doing in romance novels.
• 9:10
  And I used as heteronormative example on purpose right there, because I don't think our sat problems with this, you know what I mean?
• 9:18
  Yeah.
• 9:18
  There's, you know, like there's such a range, but you're right.
• 9:22
  This, you know, sort of prude culture is specific.
• 9:26
  And we need to talk more in depth about what sets looks like in the context of a loving relationship.
• 9:33
  Um, my first book was a Don't Fake Your Own Orgasms Manifesto because I was like, nobody's gonna be improving if you're great and on a curve, babe.
• 9:41
  But I love that.
• 9:42
  Another reason that I'm glad I wrote the book, and it's not why I wrote the book, I didn't figure this out till the end, but another reason that I'm glad I wrote the book is so I was trying to write the conclusion and I was like.
• 9:56
  Hey, I wrote 30 chapters of different things you could do to your sex scenes.
• 9:59
  Like I said, what I said, and so I was on this hike with my husband and an engineer friend of ours, which is not the brain trust for how to write romance novels, by the way.
• 10:09
  But I was s though, like, what am I gonna write in the conclusion?
• 10:12
  You guys read a read a lot of non and like, what are conclusions usually say?
• 10:16
  Like, I didn't wanna say in conclusion, I conclude.
• 10:20
  In conclusion or in conclusion, we covered these topics.
• 10:24
  No.
• 10:24
  Right.
• 10:24
  Like boring.
• 10:25
  Why?
• 10:26
  Why bother?
• 10:26
  So boring.
• 10:27
  So what we came up with, and my husband reminded me of this, and then once he reminded me of this, I was off to the races, but he was like, look, whether you mean it to be or not, romance is set.
• 10:36
  Set.
• 10:37
  Yeah.
• 10:38
  A lot of us grew up stealing our mom's romance novels to learn what was normal.
• 10:42
  And now as adults, we're still normalizing what we should expect for ourselves through these books because.
• 10:50
  Romance novels.
• 10:51
  If you think about it, they're the only creative medium where you see sex within the context of a loving and healthy relationship.
• 11:00
  Yeah.
• 11:00
  If every other medium, they're separate.
• 11:02
  Right?
• 11:02
  You have a rom-com movie where they just get to the kissing or you have porn where it's just sex.
• 11:08
  No relationship, not they teaches you.
• 11:10
  Okay.
• 11:11
  When you're with your.
• 11:12
  Partner.
• 11:13
  You know, when you're with somebody that's like really special to you though, one, what does sex look like?
• 11:18
  Then?
• 11:18
  What role does it play in the relationship?
• 11:20
  How does your communication happen in the bedroom?
• 11:24
  As well as in the kitchen.
• 11:25
  We play a really important role because we're telling people what to expect of themselves we're or what's possible in the next Exactly.
• 11:32
  That's possible.
• 11:33
  Teaching the next generation, like what their romantic relationships can be, and if you're gonna suck that bar, you better be setting it by.
• 11:40
  I love that and I love that.
• 11:42
  When we talk about it, it isn't, it's well integrated.
• 11:46
  And so everything in the book actually talks about how to integrate it into your novel, into the storyline, into, you know, the stakes, into the, the risks that the characters are taking and into their emotional arc and not just inserted as a sex scene.
• 12:03
  Absolutely.
• 12:04
  Absolutely right.
• 12:05
  They should all be load-bearing sex.
• 12:07
  There shouldn't be a single sex scene you can take out of your romance novel where the story will still make sense because I have to write those big turning point of my romances in the sex scenes themselves, right?
• 12:19
  Like what I've learned when I, when I first started out as a baby author, I would send my stuff to beta readers and they would be like, oh, what about this?
• 12:27
  And I'd be like, I said that in the book in words like, how do you not remember it?
• 12:31
  Then what I realized over time was you need to use images, right?
• 12:35
  Images stick in people's heads better than just telling them the information.
• 12:39
  And so we know people absorb metaphors better than just talking.
• 12:43
  So why wouldn't we use sex for a metaphor when that's the thing that people are gonna be paying the most attention when you bring it up on the page and wave it around in front of them?
• 12:52
  Like, why wouldn't you use that really grabby thing to sell the most important metaphor of your.
• 12:59
  I love that.
• 12:59
  And you are on the show to Tell podcast.
• 13:01
  So the fact that you're saying, you know, imagery works better than telling them.
• 13:05
  Of course it does.
• 13:06
  Right?
• 13:06
  And, and I love, love, love how you talk about the fact that sex can be a metaphor, and also that those moments or those intimate moments, whatever ends up happening, can be a snapshot of everything else that's happening around us.
• 13:21
  And it's, it's something that I often coach in every area of your book, really.
• 13:25
  Like don't just have them sipping tea to have the busy, but, and I say sipping tea because every time I say they're not doing anything, they're standing around talking and then they come back with a, you know, writers often come back with sipping tea or pouring tea, and I'm like, that's not enough.
• 13:40
  It has to be a metaphor for something that compares or contrasts or mirrors.
• 13:45
  What else is happening in their lives and, and sex is the perfect place to do that.
• 13:49
  Or you know, an intimate scene, whatever that ends up being.
• 13:52
  Okay.
• 13:52
  You know, I have all these writing exercises in the book and part of it is intended to just get you brainstorming outside of your box of what you've done before.
• 13:59
  But one of them is try to write a sex scene that shows like if you are introducing your character only through this sex scene, how would they have sex?
• 14:07
  Like, show us who this person is through how they would have sex.
• 14:11
  Yeah, and that's the other thing, right?
• 14:12
  Like splash their point of view.
• 14:14
  Over absolutely everything.
• 14:16
  Everything in your book should be colored by the way that your character sees the world.
• 14:20
  And this is no different.
• 14:21
  And that's what's funny is 'cause I do coach writers in romance and also in other genres who have these scenes in their books.
• 14:29
  And it's always this thing where they're like, uh, Suzy, like, I don't know, like, and I'm like, just write it.
• 14:35
  Like I'm pretty professional about it at this point.
• 14:37
  It's very, you know, I hate to say mechanical 'cause that's like the opposite of what we want, but like.
• 14:42
  It's very cut and dry to me in terms of what you need to do.
• 14:45
  But what's interesting to me is writers who are amazing at the prose in the rest of their book, they like stop.
• 14:52
  And then they pull back.
• 14:54
  They pull way back in their, I see this all the time.
• 14:57
  Newer writers who are just trying this for the first time, they pull way back and they write their sex scene like they're looking from the ceiling and they're looking down and they're not in their character's bodies and they're not doing, I mean, we can talk about all of this in a minute.
• 15:10
  But they actually treat the sex scene very differently, and it's because of that, that embarrassment or that awkwardness or that like, I don't know what I'm doing.
• 15:20
  So what do you say to writers who are embarrassed or terrified of writing these scenes?
• 15:25
  I mean, I'm dealing with, I'm so excited that you said all those things because I was dealing with that exact issue all the way through the book because I'd see the same thing.
• 15:35
  They're writing along, they're brilliant.
• 15:36
  The sex scene comes and they're like, you know, and they go, you can't see the, you can't see in painting to make me this etches sketch thing.
• 15:43
  I'm like, what are you doing?
• 15:45
  I see it my love.
• 15:46
  Renoir good.
• 15:48
  Yeah.
• 15:49
  Right, and it's like pull back a hundred percent just self-consciousness.
• 15:53
  And even in the introduction to the book, I'm starting to deal with that where it's like, listen, you need to be comfortable with this yourself before you can talk about it.
• 16:01
  And then the second thing is you're self-conscious because you're thinking of you.
• 16:05
  And nobody does good writing when they're thinking of themselves.
• 16:07
  Right?
• 16:08
  When you're really in slow, you forget.
• 16:10
  You have seen.
• 16:11
  You forget to eat, you forget to change the laundry over.
• 16:14
  You know what I mean?
• 16:15
  So if you're being really self-conscious and thinking, oh, people are gonna judge me, or you're thinking about yourself having sex, you're not gonna write a good sexy scene yet to get deeper into character.
• 16:24
  And I have a whole chapter about how to get into the mindset of writing sex to help get over that self-consciousness.
• 16:29
  But the first thing you need to do is write a scene that's not for anybody that you're never gonna show to make.
• 16:33
  I drawn that tip.
• 16:34
  Finally yourself up a little bit to do what you really want.
• 16:37
  Then you need to get deeper into your character.
• 16:39
  Like I say, if you're writing sex where your character comes up with something that you personally haven't tried or you wouldn't like, that's when you know you're doing it because then you're far enough into their head and not your, you're not writing a sex scene for yourself.
• 16:54
  That's gross.
• 16:55
  Nobody wants yourself insert fan fiction in your romance novel.
• 16:59
  It's for your characters.
• 17:01
  Your characters should be their own people, and I'm not kidding you, stupid way.
• 17:03
  It is creepy to me.
• 17:05
  A few times where my characters would come up with such things and I had to Google.
• 17:09
  I'm like, is that a thing?
• 17:11
  I'd never heard of this.
• 17:12
  How did it, like where did those ideas come from?
• 17:16
  So that you're like, my characters come up with something that I'm supposed to write.
• 17:21
  I just love the way that your brain thinks.
• 17:22
  It's amazing.
• 17:23
  But yeah, you had some great tips in there.
• 17:26
  Everything from.
• 17:28
  Get a glass of wine and like get into the moon and everything right to through to you.
• 17:34
  Write the sex scene from beginning to end and don't stop, right?
• 17:37
  Like, like all of those tips, there's tons and tons of tips.
• 17:40
  I'm, I'm serious.
• 17:40
  Longer writing sessions really help making sure you can't be interrupted by your husbands, your kids, or your mom.
• 17:47
  No, nothing breaks the mood faster than in-laws, my friend.
• 17:50
  Like when you're writing those scenes, go to the back room in the library.
• 17:53
  Don't go to the coffee shop where the guy can read over your shoulder.
• 17:56
  He'd read over my shoulder.
• 17:57
  Oh my God.
• 17:57
  I'm always editing sex needs on airplanes as soon as I get an airplane.
• 18:02
  Airplanes.
• 18:02
  'cause I ride on airplanes all the time.
• 18:04
  I mean, I lot of airplanes.
• 18:06
  I'm never writing a queen scene on an airplane, you know?
• 18:08
  And sometimes, and I'm usually, you know, like.
• 18:11
  I try not to edit like that scene, but people will often stop me or the, the airline hostesses will stop me afterward and be like, are you the one who was writing the book?
• 18:21
  Like, it's like, like, and you don't even, you don't even know that they're paying attention, but they are.
• 18:27
  They're looking, but they are.
• 18:28
  So, yeah, you wanna give yourself more privacy and more of a container for that and like, don't.
• 18:33
  It's hard enough to drop into slow for writing in general, but with Stax, you really want to do it start to finish because then you get the warmup arc and the cool down arc in state.
• 18:43
  If you're pulling in and out, you'll have to match up that arc of transition consciously, which is much harder than doing.
• 18:51
  Okay.
• 18:51
  I'm, I'm not gonna call out the euphemism that you just used.
• 18:54
  Fair.
• 18:55
  That was something that you said.
• 18:57
  If you're saying in and out.
• 18:58
  You're probably not doing the sexy.
• 19:00
  I'm gonna give away a lot of your Yes, and there's two more things I want to talk about.
• 19:03
  Yeah, actually that's a good point.
• 19:05
  Oh my gosh.
• 19:05
  Please stop at everyone with the in and out.
• 19:07
  We do not need you to narrate every in and out anything that's being done repeatedly, which sucks.
• 19:13
  We know you do the things more than one time.
• 19:16
  Don't describe them all on the page.
• 19:18
  Yeah, I mean that's the other thing.
• 19:20
  So people pull way back in point of view and I think that's a mistake.
• 19:23
  And we're gonna talk, I think, a little bit more about that in terms of the emotional resonance of a scene.
• 19:29
  But as well, and I love, 'cause it came up a few times in the book, but it's things that we talk about as editors and coaches all the time.
• 19:35
  The right hand, the left hand, the, the, you know, the third pen that appears out of nowhere because it's not possible, right?
• 19:41
  Like we get very mechanical.
• 19:43
  And I think sometimes in a first draft you do have to write it that way or you have to think about it that way and you're, you have to know that it makes sense, but then take all that crap out and we can imagine, right?
• 19:53
  Like it's just, it feels very like the left hand, right ear, and the right hand went there.
• 19:59
  And I think when I start teaching choreography, people think I'm gonna be going really in detail with that, where I'm like, the knee goes here and the ankle goes here and I'm not because nobody is feeling sexy when they're thinking about their ankle.
• 20:10
  You know, and if, if you're doing it right, you're not thinking about it in the moment I thinking about, wow, my ankle is placed in a great place.
• 20:18
  B breath.
• 20:20
  Exactly.
• 20:20
  You just need to, your knows what to do.
• 20:23
  Enough of a clue to know what they're doing and where.
• 20:25
  And for it not to be confusing, but not to be pedantic with the right hand and the left every time that they start with the right hand and the left hand, all I can say is the hokey pokey and like put your left hand in, you take your left hand tinkling.
• 20:38
  We can talk about with that getting in the mindset.
• 20:40
  Nate, I really recommend the three tasks process for writing sex scenes.
• 20:44
  And you're gonna think that this is really dominant on saying write and then edit and that I wouldn't bother.
• 20:48
  I wouldn't bother saying that.
• 20:50
  What I'm actually saying is free pass process.
• 20:53
  If you're new to writing set scene choreography, it helps to sit down before the set scene, pick out your setting, pick out where they're gonna be, pick out kind of your emotional tone, if it's gonna be like an urgent fast wall bang, or if it's gonna be like a slow and romantic under the stars, slow buildup kind of thing.
• 21:10
  Oh my gosh, I'm blushing already, Michelle.
• 21:11
  I love it.
• 21:12
  Your positions.
• 21:13
  And when I used to, my critique partner and I used to write a bunch that seas, and I'd be like, how far in are you?
• 21:18
  She's like, I just like an arga.
• 21:19
  I, I gotta get to the third position chain.
• 21:22
  You know, she gets, just line them up.
• 21:24
  But, uh, you kind of wanna think about like, what is the best matter in terms of position for their relationship.
• 21:30
  Right.
• 21:31
  And so kinda give a rough, like, like the power, the, the power balance, the, like there's things that you can do, right?
• 21:38
  That's a really suggestion.
• 21:39
  Yeah, the power dynamic, like who has more at stake here?
• 21:42
  Who's in control, who's more uncertain?
• 21:45
  And then you map out a little bit before you start so you don't have to stop and consciously think about things in the scene.
• 21:52
  And then when you go to write it, you give yourself a bigger time of uninterrupted writing time than you normally do.
• 21:57
  You get more privacy than you normally do.
• 21:59
  You really try to get yourself into the mode with them.
• 22:02
  And then you write the sex scene in one big, fast blur.
• 22:05
  And the reason I, so, and then you go back afterward and edit all the figety stuff, the left hand's, the right hand, the exact way you said things, that's to your word choice sentence rhythm.
• 22:16
  The music of the sentences, the way they build and ebb and slow and climax and uh, and change.
• 22:22
  I wish you could say Michelle's face as she says these things.
• 22:25
  She knows what she's saying and she is doing it on purpose.
• 22:28
  She's using her words actually to mirror.
• 22:31
  I think you're real funny though, that what you're doing with sentence rhythm is you're building it empo and you're building to a climax or a crescendo because that's, that's what you're doing in your scene as well.
• 22:40
  But like, you don't wanna be thinking about all those things while you're writing.
• 22:43
  A lot of writers, I think, are sitting over there going, well, if I was good, I'd be able to do all of that.
• 22:48
  No, my friend.
• 22:49
  That is not how your brain works.
• 22:50
  This is how your brain, your creative mind is the most activated and the most turned on when your prefrontal cortex is deactivate.
• 23:00
  Right?
• 23:01
  So your prefrontal cortex does all the inhibiting function, the inhibiting that goes, you just said thrust seven tires.
• 23:06
  That says, oh my gosh, Michelle's chapter 12 through 17 is all this fidgety things I can be doing to my sentences, and I need to think about that right now.
• 23:14
  No, absolutely not.
• 23:16
  As soon as inhibition and self-critique come in, creativity flies out the window.
• 23:21
  Creativity is generative, it's playful, it's circular.
• 23:24
  It throws out 20 ideas instead of one right idea, and you need it to do that.
• 23:29
  If you really want it to flow and feel natural and be able to get into your characters, you can't be judging yourself in the moment.
• 23:36
  So you have to save all that judging and analyzing and polishing and fine tuning for the third.
• 23:41
  And sex teams do need more revising than other things because if you're in the mode, you tend to write too many sentences that are too long.
• 23:48
  I'll smashed together.
• 23:49
  Like I can write a thesis on sentence and rhythm, and all of my sentences are too long in the first pass of my sex.
• 23:56
  Right?
• 23:57
  Yeah.
• 23:57
  And I say all this back about word choice.
• 23:59
  I'm messing with that one.
• 24:00
  I'm writing my scene, I'm going straight through and I'm messing because I can't.
• 24:04
  I can't risk turning on my frontal cortex in the middle of a knee.
• 24:07
  Or it's like trying to drive with your foot on the gas and the brakes at the same.
• 24:11
  And honestly, I mean, if you're in the throes of a real intimate moment and your frontal cortex is engaged, you're probably doing it wrong.
• 24:19
  Fuck, you're probably doing it wrong, mom.
• 24:20
  Then you're trying to mimic the mindset of your characters and all these different levels, and you can't do that if you're faking it.
• 24:28
  Like it's just easier to do it if you're really trying to put yourself in that frame of mind.
• 24:33
  Yeah.
• 24:33
  And I love what you said earlier about your characters coming up with something and then you went into Google it and saying, well, let's go there.
• 24:39
  You know, you don't have to have done it to write it.
• 24:42
  Right.
• 24:43
  And, and it's not, your readers, avid readers of romance and that, and Avid readers of lots of genres that enjoy the romantic arcs know that they're not going to think that this is something that you have done.
• 24:54
  So do I?
• 24:55
  I do.
• 24:55
  But like the, the truth of the matter is, is you don't understand that I'm writing fiction.
• 25:00
  I don't know what to tell you.
• 25:01
  Like.
• 25:02
  I can't write just my own life or I would only have one book.
• 25:07
  I have nine novels out right now.
• 25:09
  I'll have 11 by the end of the year.
• 25:11
  I've got stacks more in the, I only have one sex life to pull from.
• 25:17
  I guarantee you like.
• 25:19
  It is not as interesting as if I wrote fictionals.
• 25:22
  That's lives for all my different individual characters.
• 25:25
  I love that.
• 25:26
  I love that.
• 25:26
  And if you, if you've met Michelle before, if you've ever read her work, you'll know that I think, I think you say that you can't stop, right?
• 25:34
  You, you write all the time.
• 25:36
  So yeah.
• 25:36
  It doesn't surprise me that you have that many books and many, many, many, many, many more to come.
• 25:41
  Okay.
• 25:42
  So we talked a little bit about it being more than just a sex scene.
• 25:46
  So context is really important, right?
• 25:48
  The context for the sex scene is the most important.
• 25:51
  What does that actually mean in terms of where they belong in Your story isn't like sex isn't just sex.
• 25:57
  How do we put it in the book?
• 26:00
  Yeah.
• 26:00
  I think try to go with beat sheet too much on this.
• 26:03
  And they're like, I'm supposed to do this by this.
• 26:05
  And then they get to the scene and it's not working and I'm like, oh, is it not working?
• 26:08
  'cause you're not listening to your characters, you're listening to your spreadsheet.
• 26:11
  Yeah.
• 26:12
  You know?
• 26:12
  At the 43% work.
• 26:14
  Where a s goes depends on what you're using it for.
• 26:17
  If you are using it for an obstacle to their future relationship, if you're using it to culminate their future relationship, if you're using it for a nice togetherness moment before you break them up so that it really hurts when you break them up the high before low, give them somewhere to fall.
• 26:31
  Right, exactly.
• 26:33
  And everybody does that.
• 26:34
  There's a reason that there's almost always a fight right after the sex thing.
• 26:38
  Sometimes you have to.
• 26:39
  Change things that just so you don't get cliche with that, but yeah, it usually goes high.
• 26:43
  Before, in my second book, I put a sex scene in the third chapter, which was a terrible, hard thing that I did to myself because once you used up the first sex, you have so many less firsts to go for, right?
• 26:55
  And so what I did to keep the tension up after I did that so early was.
• 27:00
  They had a kiss on the mouth, so I did the pretty woman.
• 27:03
  They had a kiss on the mouth and then the emotional intimacy, the commitment wasn't there, right?
• 27:08
  They weren't allowing themselves to go there.
• 27:10
  And so they had the physical, but they weren't allowing themselves to have that emotional closeness.
• 27:15
  And so you always wanna have something help back.
• 27:18
  So, yeah, with, with where you place the sex scene, it's all about what it's saying about the relationship, the purpose of each two individuals.
• 27:24
  Sex scene reminds usually end up at three or four in my book.
• 27:27
  So each one serves a different purpose and it has a distinctively different flavor to it.
• 27:32
  In the choreography chapter I talk about like if you were in a John Wick movie, you don't get two hammer versus machete fight scenes.
• 27:39
  And in your sexing book, you don't get too well sexing.
• 27:43
  You gotta do it differently every time so that they all feel different, but it's also because they should be serving different points of the plot and then also just the buildup.
• 27:53
  You need enough time to withhold that from the audience and make the audience long for it in a billion different ways before you give to them or they don't like.
• 28:01
  I think sometimes people think that what's hotter is just more quantity of sex scene, but what's actually hotter is making the reader want it.
• 28:10
  Making the carrots or want it before they get to have it.
• 28:14
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 28:15
  And I love the fact, you know, when you talk about having three or four of the scenes in your book, it's kind of the same concept as mirroring the beginning and the end of your book where you can put them in a similar situation and yet the character has grown and changed and, and their relationships have changed and everything that they react, like the scene might be the same-ish.
• 28:36
  But, and you're saying mix it up, of course, but you're putting them in a similar situation and the way that they, you know, the way that they interact is completely different depending on where they are.
• 28:45
  And so it's a really neat thing to show that growth and make sure that it doesn't always feel the same.
• 28:50
  They're not just stopping doing the deed and then moving on.
• 28:53
  Right.
• 28:54
  Like it's really good.
• 28:55
  You, I think you say in the book that sex is always a metaphor.
• 28:58
  For their journey.
• 28:59
  Right?
• 29:00
  And so the different pieces in their journey you can actually demonstrate or show us during that moment.
• 29:07
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 29:07
  That was a really good way to say it.
• 29:09
  I like that.
• 29:10
  Where it's a snapshot of their relationship at different moments.
• 29:13
  Like what was missing in the first step scene, what it changed between them by the second or the third.
• 29:17
  Like are they allowing more physical intimacy?
• 29:20
  To mirror the emotional intimacy.
• 29:22
  And one of the fun things to do, I think, is always have a character do something for the first time.
• 29:26
  Like in the nineties we saw a lot of virgin tropes and we see almost no virgin tropes nowadays, but there's always that thing you haven't tried yet.
• 29:34
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 29:35
  And I think yes, it shows the difference in their relationship.
• 29:38
  Yes.
• 29:39
  But it also can show the difference in.
• 29:41
  Your character, right?
• 29:43
  Like their personal growth and how they react in that moment.
• 29:46
  So yes, the relationship and also that character.
• 29:49
  You talk a little bit about in the book about point of view, right?
• 29:53
  And especially it's very popular right now to have dual point of view in a romance, and so you have a choice.
• 29:59
  How does point of view and whose point of view you write that scene from come into play.
• 30:03
  How do you choose that?
• 30:04
  Which one's better?
• 30:05
  Is it always your character?
• 30:07
  Most romance authors are female and they sometimes are worried about writing from the male point of view, but then when you get into same sex romance, you're not female male versus female point of view.
• 30:18
  And you still have to decide who's view pointer you gonna tell the sex scene from.
• 30:21
  Right?
• 30:22
  So it's always the character who has the most at stake, just like it would be for any.
• 30:26
  Other kind of scene where it's whoever has the most emotional vulnerability or the most on the line, like you're writing a romance where one person thinks they're more into that person and other one is then it's that point of view that you wanna use the sex thing is the person that's the more worried about it.
• 30:41
  Right?
• 30:41
  Yeah.
• 30:42
  And sometimes it's like, sometimes it can be fun to switch and have the more confident point of view so that they can be like reassuring and studying to the more vulnerable person.
• 30:52
  You don't have a lot of insecurity, self-talk.
• 30:54
  In general, it's the person who has the most at stake, or the one that, like if you're using it for a turning point in your book, the person who's going to chain or make a decision like this is the scene where they decide to commit.
• 31:06
  This is the scene where they decide to run away.
• 31:08
  This is the first time they've been with somebody where they told them their real name, that thing, that's a good story where they told them their real name.
• 31:15
  Now I wanna know more.
• 31:17
  All right.
• 31:17
  We talked a little bit about making the reader want it and anticipation and that sense of longing, I think is what you talk about in the book.
• 31:24
  But when do you put the sax like, like, okay, so we're talking about all the buildup.
• 31:29
  We're saying maybe three or four scenes and paying attention.
• 31:31
  When do you actually release that tension, pun intended, and, and put the facts, when does that belong in a book?
• 31:40
  So first of all, you don't release the tension.
• 31:42
  I have another chapter just on that, where you don't drop all the tension when you get to the step scene.
• 31:47
  You still want there to be things held back in every moment until the final scenes of the book.
• 31:52
  Otherwise it, you feel that tension sag like a string that you just dropped and you're like, eh, okay, I'm good now.
• 31:59
  You know what I mean?
• 32:01
  Exactly.
• 32:01
  And then they put the book down and they go get a drink of water and they think that their characters are happy and they, they don't feel the urgency.
• 32:07
  Fuck Paige.
• 32:08
  Right?
• 32:08
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 32:10
  Speech sheet wise, it's almost always the third quarter.
• 32:12
  Y'all third quarter has the lowest back because by the last quarter they're fighting and it's the first quarter they're still building up.
• 32:18
  But you really wanna listen to your characters.
• 32:21
  Like if they wanna have sex really early, sometimes, instead of trying to hold them back, you should let them and then blow everything.
• 32:29
  You can't ever drop the tension and the obstacles.
• 32:32
  So if they do have sex, then you need to have more reasons why they do anything.
• 32:36
  Like, for instance, I saw a Second Chance Romance.
• 32:38
  Recently where they were a divorced couple, so like why can't they have sex?
• 32:43
  They've already had sex a bunch of times and they made a no sex rule on their road trip.
• 32:47
  So that wouldn't get in the way of them trying to work through their actual issues, which was great.
• 32:51
  Of course they did.
• 32:53
  Of course they did.
• 32:54
  Right?
• 32:54
  Like, let's put limits.
• 32:55
  It's no different.
• 32:56
  I mean, I'm a fantasy writer.
• 32:57
  It's no different in fantasy.
• 32:58
  If we don't have any limitations on our magic, then it could do everything in the world.
• 33:03
  That's no fun.
• 33:04
  I could solve everything with one wave of my wand.
• 33:06
  Right?
• 33:06
  You gotta have limitations.
• 33:07
  I love that.
• 33:08
  Okay.
• 33:08
  Yeah.
• 33:09
  And then there, I've also talked about how there's an expectation in gay romance, in hetero romance where they're kind of expecting penetrative sex.
• 33:18
  If you fold that off, like if you have the earlier scenes be, you know, oral or you know, a hand job or some other kind of, they're fooling around, but they're not getting all the way there.
• 33:30
  That can be a good way to pay off a little bit of tension early and then keep back something more for later.
• 33:36
  Yeah, exactly.
• 33:37
  Save those firsts.
• 33:39
  Right?
• 33:39
  We don't wanna be seeing the same thing over and over again.
• 33:41
  Okay.
• 33:41
  We talked a little bit about the fact that romance books are a form of sex ed, and I love that.
• 33:47
  Love that view.
• 33:48
  And they are getting more prevalent, more accepted more.
• 33:54
  More and more, more, more, more.
• 33:55
  And also in TV and.
• 33:57
  Movies.
• 33:58
  We're also seeing more and more on screen that isn't pornography, right?
• 34:02
  Like that actually fits in the narrative and the rules are changing like it used to be that we didn't see a lot of bums on screens that we do now, right?
• 34:11
  Like that.
• 34:11
  That's a pretty regular thing.
• 34:13
  But what can we do better in books than we can do on the television screen?
• 34:18
  Ooh, that's a great question.
• 34:20
  You have a whole different toolbox than a novelist.
• 34:23
  Before I jump into that, I wanna go back to something else you said.
• 34:25
  'cause it's really funny that I wrote this book and I wrote the conclusion about romance novels being the only medium where you can really see the emotional resonance of sex within Yeah.
• 34:35
  A romantic relationship.
• 34:36
  And since I wrote that.
• 34:38
  Heated rivalry came to the screen and I know how can we not talk about it?
• 34:42
  I'm like, when is it gonna my up?
• 34:43
  My gosh.
• 34:43
  I almost, I was fronted up when you were talking about the game.
• 34:46
  Yeah.
• 34:46
  I'm a Canadian hockey mom, so Yeah.
• 34:48
  For those of you who don't know, heated rivalry is a gay hockey player.
• 34:53
  Romance.
• 34:54
  It was a book and it just, just become a incredibly, yeah.
• 34:58
  Cheryl Books saw HBO and Crave.
• 35:02
  But the reason that it's, I think one of the reasons that it's gotten so popular, and one of the reasons that I think it's different from any adaptation that's come before is it shows sex within the context of the relationship.
• 35:13
  It shows a lot on the screen for mainstream tv, like it's, it's basically everything but the private bits, and there's a lot of it, but it's all really tied into where they are in their romance.
• 35:26
  And actually, it's a really good example of how you can put steps early, but keep the conflict.
• 35:31
  Because they start out friends with benefit, right?
• 35:34
  They're hooking up and the feelings come in later.
• 35:37
  And so you really see that progression of increasing intimacy, trust and vulnerability with those boys.
• 35:43
  Where at first they're just banging and then like there's a level of intimacy where they're the only ones that they're out to.
• 35:50
  Then they're trying new firsts that they've never tried before, and then they're calling each other by their first name and not their last name.
• 35:57
  Every sex scene is a step up.
• 35:59
  It's a distinct step different than the one before it, and all of them are.
• 36:05
  They're a perfect metaphor for the relationship.
• 36:07
  I very rarely see what I would actually call erotic romance, where it is a romance, but the story of the relationship is told through the medium of sex, and I think heated rivalry actually counts because every single sex scene is different.
• 36:21
  Every single one tends a different turning point and a different step up in their relationship, but that we've never seen that kind of nuance come to the screen, and I think that's a lot of what the viewers are responding to and why that.
• 36:35
  It has become so popular is because in books we get more emotional resonance to the sex, like in a romcom.
• 36:42
  Even if it goes as far as to say that the characters had sex, you get like two minutes of pumping when they're kind of awkwardly wrapped in a sheep.
• 36:49
  Like it doesn't tell.
• 36:50
  I love that it tells you zero information other than we did it and we had a pretty good time.
• 36:56
  That's a very shallow message.
• 37:00
  In romance novels, what we have in our toolbox as novelists that they don't have on TV is we have internal thoughts, we have internal sensations, we have word choice.
• 37:10
  So in in movies, they have the grammar of lighting and shots and thoughts and music, emotional tone in a subconscious way.
• 37:19
  In books, what we're doing with those, set the music of your sentence, rhythms.
• 37:23
  Your word choices is even beyond what they're doing.
• 37:28
  You're giving an emotional tone or a texture to your reader, like it feels more romantic and wistful.
• 37:34
  It feels really hot and fast and rough.
• 37:37
  You know what I mean?
• 37:38
  It feels enemies to lovers versus it feels friends to lovers.
• 37:42
  You're setting all of this extra context up, and especially with getting the thoughts and feelings right.
• 37:49
  I think that's another way that early writers, when they're getting very self-conscious, they get really focused on who's doing what and you end up writing your whole sex theme, like C spot run.
• 37:59
  He did this, he did that, he did this Rights hand, left hand, that hokey pokey.
• 38:04
  Ah, yeah.
• 38:05
  Varying the capital.
• 38:06
  And that's absolutely not what we want in a romance novel.
• 38:11
  We have.
• 38:12
  For the context, we Kong for the emotional piece of the sex.
• 38:16
  If we just wanted sex, we could watch porn.
• 38:18
  The internet has so much free porn, you guys, you don't have to pay for a novel if you want that.
• 38:23
  Women want something different when they're came to romance.
• 38:25
  And there's been quite a few studies that show that men are more attracted to visuals like visuals, stimuli and women are more attracted to contents.
• 38:34
  So if my husband likes to say, they don't just want the abs, they want the story behind the abs.
• 38:38
  I love that.
• 38:39
  I love that they want the story behind the abs.
• 38:41
  And I think, you know, one of the things that really resonated for me, I mean, I coach this and I talk about it all the time with writers, um, but there were some things that were new and things that I hadn't thought about.
• 38:50
  And when you're bringing up heated rivalry, it kind of comes up as well because yes, there are lots of firsts and there are lots of tension and you know, one person maybe wants it more than the other at some point, and you know, there's this imbalance that they have to navigate.
• 39:03
  But.
• 39:04
  At the same time, the one that really dropped for me when I read the book was the commitment piece.
• 39:10
  Like we're having first, right?
• 39:12
  To think about, you know, the love declaration or the actual commitment.
• 39:17
  And I think that's the one where you can still hold that back.
• 39:21
  You can have all the actions and still be holding that one thing back.
• 39:24
  Are we exclusive?
• 39:25
  Are we really in this?
• 39:26
  Is this really something that we're going to pursue regardless?
• 39:30
  Right.
• 39:30
  So there's some neat things that you can do in terms of holding that back and, and I'd never heard it talked about quite in that way, like as a tool.
• 39:39
  You can hold that commitment, which is really cool.
• 39:41
  I mean, it's, we do it naturally.
• 39:42
  I just hadn't ever really thought about it that way, so it's, oh, we're all doing it in every romance.
• 39:46
  This, another reason that I think Rachel Reads books really appeal to people is they're written a little bit more like trans fiction in the best way.
• 39:53
  Where it's really a lot of the good stuff that you want, you know?
• 39:57
  Yeah.
• 39:58
  Just really getting to see those boys be sweet for each other and really care about each other.
• 40:04
  But because they're always still in the closet, she can get away with so much sweetness because she always had that conflict of they're not willing to come out of the closet and beat us for real.
• 40:13
  So they have to be a secret.
• 40:14
  So like she does a whole second book for Ilia and Shane.
• 40:18
  We get to see them be so domestic and cute and adorable, but the conflict is always still there because they can't come out of the closet or they feel they can't.
• 40:28
  Yes, they feel they can't.
• 40:30
  I'm giving away a lot, but it's gonna make people read the book.
• 40:33
  Talk about this for a moment.
• 40:34
  You're here to seduce your reader.
• 40:36
  Not your character.
• 40:38
  What does that mean?
• 40:39
  Because it, it's a really neat way of thinking about it.
• 40:41
  You're seducing your reader, not the characters.
• 40:44
  This is a tricky one because I'm telling you to be less self-conscious.
• 40:47
  But then I think that like, let, let's take it out of the sex world.
• 40:52
  And I think that makes it easier to understand when I'm teaching somebody how to write a romance, I'm not saying, okay, show us that Abby fell in love with Chad.
• 41:02
  What we want is the reader to fall in love with Chad.
• 41:05
  So it's not enough to tell us that your character is getting turned on and then just have 'em hop into bed.
• 41:11
  Like that's why I have trouble with these sex scenes where there's no foreplay and they're just like, I want you and me.
• 41:16
  I always say, I don't know.
• 41:17
  Like, don't tell me that.
• 41:19
  Show me.
• 41:20
  This is the show Don't tell podcast.
• 41:22
  You'll, it sure is.
• 41:23
  Thank you.
• 41:23
  If you don't seed up your character so that they want what they are doing.
• 41:28
  Then your reader is not also heated up.
• 41:31
  What you're doing is you are showing dope talent.
• 41:33
  You are bringing the reader along on that same emotional and arousal journey that your character is on.
• 41:39
  So if you wanna write a really effective romance, you make them fall in love so hard with your love interests.
• 41:44
  You know what I mean?
• 41:45
  And even if you're writing to straight women and you're writing a stack like romance, you can still do that.
• 41:50
  Like you're just making them.
• 41:52
  There's so many different levels of action that aren't just sexual.
• 41:54
  You're making them aesthetically appealing.
• 41:56
  You're making them demonstrations of value where they're competent or they're impressive in some way.
• 42:01
  They're just speaking Italian, you know, like everybody.
• 42:05
  You're doing all these things, like when you describe them, you're not just saying they are hot.
• 42:10
  You were describing them in a way that makes them sound hot to the reader.
• 42:13
  So you're thinking about.
• 42:16
  Creating an experience, not just for your character, but for your reader, where they can go along with all of those same emotions.
• 42:24
  And I mean that in terms of the Saxon arousal, but I also really, really mean it in terms of the emotional journey.
• 42:31
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 42:31
  It's just really not very satisfying to say like, my character was warning and then they opt into bed, like that's not hot to read.
• 42:39
  It doesn't allow your reader to find their place in it as well, right?
• 42:42
  Like in most novels, and, and here we're talking about it in a slightly different context.
• 42:47
  Your reader becomes your point of view character, right?
• 42:49
  And we want to, we want what they want and we want the things, we're in it with them.
• 42:53
  And so when you're saying like, heat them up.
• 42:56
  Make them maybe fall in love with that character.
• 42:59
  So that's like maybe one step removed from actually being the character.
• 43:03
  But yeah, we that, that's where internal sensations, that inner thoughts come in because you wanna be that person, right?
• 43:09
  Which you can't do on TV unless you have like annoying voiceovers, which is really limiting.
• 43:14
  Right?
• 43:14
  Right.
• 43:15
  And that helps a couple of things.
• 43:16
  So you get more emotional resonance, you get a toolbox that.
• 43:21
  Sets you apart from tv.
• 43:22
  So you give your reader some, you give your reader a reason to get off Netflix and buy your book instead.
• 43:28
  And then also you get out of that thief spot run method of writing where you're just talking about the mechanics.
• 43:33
  Like if you're finding that all your sentences start with I or she or he.
• 43:38
  If you're, if they're all short of factual, you're probably just doing too much action and you need to change it up with more emotion, more internal sensation, some metaphor.
• 43:47
  Absolutely.
• 43:48
  Okay.
• 43:48
  Talk about being gross versus being detailed.
• 43:52
  'cause I think this is really important and maybe we don't wanna go into the gross details, but, but you know, like, what does that mean?
• 44:00
  Because I think it's really important.
• 44:01
  'cause sex scenes can feel really gross if they're done poorly.
• 44:06
  A lot of it is about leading out parts that aren't as romantic.
• 44:10
  Nobody needs you to marry the squelching sounds.
• 44:13
  Not everything when you're talking about, I was talking on their tweet about this to somebody, they're like, I hate the part where they have to stop and put on the condom.
• 44:21
  Like I talk in the book about nods to birth control of and various pipes, birth control, and also protecting against STDs.
• 44:29
  And there's a lot of different ways you can do that.
• 44:31
  It's not just condoms, but whatever you do, you need to not break your own tone.
• 44:36
  You need to keep it within the same urgent romantic tone, and you need to do it really, really fast so that you don't slow your pacing with them stopping and walking down the hall to the bathroom in their socks and digging around in a roar.
• 44:47
  You know what I mean?
• 44:48
  That breaks the mood.
• 44:49
  In real life, what you want is fast enough and phrased quickly enough that it doesn't pull you out of a mood.
• 44:55
  But most of what's gross and not gross is almost all down to word choice.
• 44:59
  Word choice, bird choice.
• 45:01
  And my personal, I hate this one.
• 45:02
  Everybody does it.
• 45:04
  Pause me to, it's such a.
• 45:06
  Oh, a stringent way to say it.
• 45:09
  Like he caused me to, like, you could see how in a sex scene it's a filter.
• 45:12
  It's a filter, but it's so called back and mechanical.
• 45:16
  It's just, it's one of those free romantic can usually be eliminated, right?
• 45:21
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 45:22
  Don't be gross.
• 45:23
  Okay, so we're talking about, you know, introducing birth control or introducing other.
• 45:28
  Sort of things that are part of modern life and we wanna model.
• 45:31
  Right?
• 45:32
  Unless I, unless you purposely want to skip the birth control because there's going to be an unplanned pregnancy.
• 45:37
  Right?
• 45:38
  Yeah.
• 45:38
  Um, but let's talk about consent.
• 45:41
  'cause this is one that I, I have to have this conversation a lot with, with writers because the expectations of consent today in today's publishing are very different from what they were 20 years ago in terms of making sure, and it's something I even bumped up with my like.
• 45:56
  First, why like Lower YA fantasy novel where there was an unwanted kiss and my publisher's like, you can't do that.
• 46:04
  Right?
• 46:04
  Or you could.
• 46:05
  But then if you want every interviewer to ask you about it and to talk about consent and that's what you want it to be about, um, I was like, well, no, you know, like it's just something that maybe happened in, you know, when I was growing up.
• 46:18
  But talk about consent for a minute.
• 46:20
  'cause I think it's really important for authors and writers to understand what's expected of them so that they can adjust for that and not make that mistake.
• 46:28
  'cause it can really.
• 46:29
  Be a problem in the book.
• 46:30
  A lot of people are going into this at the angle of like, oh, I have to do the homework.
• 46:35
  Mom said I had to add a consent check in and now I had to fill it.
• 46:39
  And they're missing the whole point.
• 46:41
  That consent is pen check.
• 46:45
  We're giving you a whole nother tool, you guys to build tension and you're just throwing it out the window.
• 46:51
  'cause you think of it as homework like consent can be so sexy.
• 46:55
  Also, women tend to find it really sexy when men check in and like make sure that they're really for sure having fun.
• 47:02
  You know what I mean?
• 47:02
  You don't wanna be too repetitive.
• 47:04
  You can add more than one slash check in.
• 47:06
  It doesn't have to be verbal.
• 47:07
  It can be as much as like pulling back and checking their eyes.
• 47:11
  It can be just saying their name.
• 47:12
  It can be like spray like tugging on the bands of their panties as can I like Mother?
• 47:17
  May I kind of step like with consent, you can have all these different descending into filthiness.
• 47:24
  Levels of can we do this?
• 47:27
  What about this?
• 47:28
  What about this?
• 47:29
  Just like it can make your, your writing so much sexier.
• 47:33
  It really doesn't have to be like, don't write your own tone.
• 47:35
  If you don't want it to be on romance and like weird and box checking, then don't write it.
• 47:42
  That, that, like, you're literally the one writing the scene, right?
• 47:45
  An SFC way.
• 47:47
  So you said earlier, I'm getting a lot of way, but hopefully it'll make it, people wanna read the book, we can talk about all this stuff at high level, but honestly, I had to write a book because it's so detailed to get into every single one of these different things, and I put myself through how getting permission to publish examples so that I could have examples of all this stuff.
• 48:07
  Like how do you describe a sex position without going into the left and right, but still make it quick.
• 48:12
  I have all these examples of people doing it really well and they're amazing authors to provide examples for the book, including Katie, Robert, who's written so much incredibly great around, and Tiffany Rice who did that really hot Catholic priest dominant series.
• 48:28
  All these great authors.
• 48:29
  Yeah, I mean they, the examples make the book the examples, make the book and they make them real.
• 48:34
  I mean, we're, we're talking about show hotel, that's the ultimate, right?
• 48:38
  Like we can tell you how to write a sex scene, but we can also show you how it's done correctly or, or well, or hotly or whatever we wanna say, and whatever, whatever that ma makes that, that good scene.
• 48:52
  Um, you have so many examples and I think that makes it, I know it was a pain in the butt.
• 48:56
  Uh, we talked about that.
• 48:57
  How long It's not for me though, because.
• 49:00
  I wrote the whole book 'cause I knew what I wanted to say and then I had to go find examples from published books of the things I was talking about.
• 49:07
  And then I would write the little analysis after each one being like, did you notice they were doing this?
• 49:12
  Did you notice they were doing this?
• 49:13
  And that word choice thing, boy, if you don't think best selling authors are working their tails off on word choice, you have not been highlighting.
• 49:22
  It's like every other word.
• 49:23
  There's a very specific word choice or a very specific adjective choice that changes the tone or provides contrast.
• 49:31
  It's really fascinating.
• 49:33
  Like some of them, I had to cut back my analysis because they were doing so many things in like a one paragraph example that I was like, I literally don't have time to talk about all these.
• 49:42
  Oh my gosh.
• 49:43
  I can unpack what you just said for and hire our next episode.
• 49:46
  But here's what I wanna comment on.
• 49:48
  A lot of times we think when we're coming to write a book in general, not even talking about sex scenes yet, that you either have talent or you don't.
• 49:56
  Right.
• 49:57
  And that like if we try something the first time and people don't react to it the way that we want, we say, oh, we suck at writing and we never try again.
• 50:04
  Right.
• 50:04
  But there are good and real tools and sex scenes are no different, right.
• 50:09
  There are good and actual tools that you can learn that we teach on the podcast and in this book and in other places.
• 50:15
  And that's why there's book coaches and editors who coach and edits, right, and help you learn these things.
• 50:21
  And if you think that bestselling authors are sitting down with their glass of wine and just pounding out that first again story for the pun, you know, for that first draft, and then they're not actually going back and finessing it.
• 50:33
  The amount of finesse that's required for you to have the experience that you want.
• 50:38
  It's important to understand how is your reader going to react and what are the things and, and there are people that have gone here before and there are things to learn and so, you know, I could thank you for coming on the show today, Michelle.
• 50:50
  I think you said at one point in the book, I'm the Home Depot of tools for sex scenes or something, so I went back, yeah.
• 50:57
  Home Depot tools for sex scene writing.
• 51:00
  Yeah, right.
• 51:01
  It goes back to what I said at the beginning where people are asking me like, how do I write a good sex scene?
• 51:06
  What, whether people think of hot, what makes something hot?
• 51:08
  And I'm like, girl, I know these are the ways that you can do it.
• 51:13
  You know, bringing all of those tools that you think bestselling authors are doing unconsciously, or it's from talent and making it concrete and saying, this is how you do it.
• 51:23
  This is what you look for.
• 51:25
  If something's not working and it just feels icky.
• 51:27
  Now you can figure out why.
• 51:29
  There's a chapter in the book called Wine Tasting for Sex Seed that will help you with all of that.
• 51:35
  I actually saw that in the table of content and I was wondering if you were gonna have wine pairings with tastes.
• 51:40
  That's how my pairing goes.
• 51:41
  I'm like, is this like, you should have a chardonnay when you read this kind of sexy?
• 51:45
  I'm like, I want, it wasn't that.
• 51:46
  It wasn't that.
• 51:47
  You'll have to read the book.
• 51:48
  Well, you great person to talk about this with because you're a professional wine taster.
• 51:52
  When you get I actually, my Somalia wine taster, what you're doing is you're training your brain to differentiate between finer and finer variations.
• 52:01
  And if you don't have words for each of those things, you can't differentiate and you can't remember the different layers of labor.
• 52:11
  And so what I'm teaching people to do is the same thing for sexy, where you learn the words for all these different techniques so that when you tasted glass of wine or you read a sexy.
• 52:21
  You're seeing it on 30 different levels instead of too low, red or white, good or bad.
• 52:26
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 52:27
  And, and for those listening, I am, I do have my, uh, somalia's license.
• 52:32
  I have a university degree in wine.
• 52:33
  I've never worked in this se uh, in that space, but it's something I've never shared on the podcast before, which is fine, but Michelle knows that about me to know it's not a secret, it just never came up.
• 52:43
  But I wanna say, just in closing, and I said this in the beginning as well, and we're gonna mirror the beginning and the ending that Michelle, I met almost a decade ago now, and is.
• 52:54
  In a roundabout way, the reason that I became an editor, a book coach, because she showed me how to do it in a way that really resonated and I learned so much from.
• 53:05
  So if you're trying to learn this craft and you are interested in putting more romance, more kissing, maybe even a little bit of spice in your books, this is the right book for you to go and learn that.
• 53:16
  Um, there are real skills to learn.
• 53:19
  Go have fun.
• 53:19
  Take your idea and make it as amazing for the reader as it is in your brain.
• 53:25
  Thanks for coming on the show today, Michelle.
• 53:26
  Thanks so much.
• 53:26
  That was perfect.
• 53:27
  I'm really glad that you had me on.
• 53:29
  Talk about all that.
• 53:36
  Thanks for tuning into the show.
• 53:38
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• 53:41
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• 53:47
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• 53:51
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• 54:00
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• 54:00
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• 54:03
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• 54:15
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• 54:19
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• 54:24
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• 54:34
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• 54:36
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• 54:46
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