Just a quick question for users, so that I may write stories that turn more people on. Your answers will influence my future stories. Thanks!
"Mustache rides, and tunnel-of-love trips courtesy of my face!"
Jules0682 - @LordFuckWad68
For me the details are what makes erotica what it is. Without it it's just a story with sex in it.
When I read I want to be in the story, I want to be able to imagine it's me getting fucked or sucking his cock. For that I need details.
While my personal reasons are different than hers, I agree totally with Haineko. Just don't go overboard with minutia that really isn't needed. It's a fine line between a good sex story and something so detailed that they think they're reading a 'How-to'.
There is a balance that I am not sure I have found yet. You need enough contextual detail to make the characters and sex seem real (or plausible, at least) and enough graphic sexual detail to get the reader to be able to imagine the experience. You can have too much or too little of each but in a story that is supposed to about sex, I would err on the side of graphic sexual detail.
I'd vote for detail, however it can depend a lot on the story.
As an aside - I'm actually struggling with this right now with a new piece I'm working on. It's a lot more contextual and psychological and spans a considerable amount of time with multiple sex scenes. I'd initially intended it as a stand alone story because I've seen multi-part stories suffer with views. I think some people see the ominous "Part One, Part Two" in a title and skip over it in favour of something that involves less of a time investment. Having said that, I don't want to skimp on the detail or rush anything and at 9200 words right now, I feel like I haven't devoted enough to the sex scenes. To get it just right and dial up the heat, I think I'm going to have to make it a two-parter as I delve into the second draft.
Anyway, in general, I'd give the nod to the details however unless you're writing a very stylized piece of smut, I think there needs to be equal effort put into setting the scene, giving context, developing characters. There are some stories I've read where I really believe in the characters and others where it feels like two-dimensional cardboard fuck-bots. I'll read the latter - "hey cool story" - and probably forget about it just as quickly. Then there are others where the story stays with you for a while, makes you think and you remember it even years later. Some authors (like LadyX for example) are extremely skilled at this.
I think you can analogize this to film directors. Some directors - Joe Wright (Atonement, the latest Anna Karenina), Alfred Hitchcock, Woody Allen, Robert Altman, Clint Eastwood - tend to be very efficient in telling stories. They show what they need to show in order to tell the story and little else. As opposed to a director like Francis Ford Coppola who throws anything and everything into a film and takes the longest road possible to telling a story. Think about Apocalypse Now - it could easily be three-quarters the length it is. (And, unless you've laid in supplies for a few weeks you'd never want to sit down to watch a FFC director's cut).
On the other hand, Robert Altman's Short Cuts is over three hours in length, but it doesn't feel long (it's a film adaptation of a series of Raymond Carver short stories, tying them together) because he tells pretty much only what's necessary to move the story forward. And think how much he accomplishes in that incredible eight minute opening shot to The Player.
I think it's best to take the same approach to writing. Try to judge - are the details you provide necessary to tell the story and does the story have forward momentum? Or is it bogged down and moving slowly? That's difficult for a writer to judge in relation to their own writing, and why a beta reader is often a good idea.
I've found that with the story premise I've been pursuing in recent years that a level of detail is necessary, and getting into characters' pasts, background, life circumstances, and personal relationships and attachments have to be addressed. In responses I've gotten from readers I've found they very much like the level of information/detail in my stories as it helps to bring the premise from the edges of possibility into the real world of the possible and even likely. I don't tend to attract readers looking for quick get-off stories, but ones looking for real stories with real plots and characters, and some well-chosen level of detail is necessary to accomplish that.
With the right amount of detail a good author can make me feel that I am part of the story and have me experience all the things that the characters are feeling. Stories like that get me so horny.
I want the story to contain whatever is necessary to stay true to the characters, the tone, the author's voice, and the plot at hand. If that means heavy with everything then that's what it means. If that means light on some things and heavy on others then that's what it means.
