dr_mabeuse
seduce the mind
- Joined
- Oct 10, 2002
- Posts
- 11,528
Copied these from a BDSM publisher's Guidelines For Authors. I thought they were too good not to share:
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From Nexus editor Adam L G Nevill: I have written a few notes to the curious that may prove useful to aspiring and established writers of erotica. The biggest weakness with new writers are:
1) Inability to integrate exposition, dialogue, action, interior monologue - all the facets of story-telling - together. It's not unusual to get 8 pages of straight exposition, followed by three pages of dialogue, followed by 30 pages of overwritten adult activity. This demonstrates an all round lack of narrative awareness. 90% of submissions are too "told" and not "shown" enough. In most cases writers need to get rid of the authorial voice. Unless the narrator's voice is exceptional, do not preside over a novel in order to tell readers what is going on. Get out of the 19th century! And get down to some good creative writing classes. Most writers can only learn so much from reading and practice, eventually he/she will need to seek tuition from a mentor - particularly to improve the technical aspects of writing (classes taught by good poets are a bonus - poets tend to be masters of language).
2) Don't keep setting stories in schools or brothels - the first contravenes our guidelines, the second is often too sleazy and exploitative in tone.
3) Remember erotic fiction should be about pleasure - no matter how extreme the adult activity involved. And I don't want to hear that old argument about one man's pleasure...blah blah blah. I don't want to keep reading proposals about relentless pain and humiliation and degradation visited upon beautiful young women by unpleasant older men. It becomes something else beyond erotica if the pleasure of a submissive female character is absent. Inner conflict is fine - I like this, but I shouldn't - but not beating and rape. Not only is it unacceptable, it's dull and unconvincing. De Sade is overrated.
4) Descriptions of genitals - purple or clinical descriptions of excited genitals are pointless. Use simple language to describe physical arousal - 'wet' or 'hard' is always going to be better and more vivid than atrocious, overwritten flower analogies, mixed metaphors, and lots of excessive dripping and throbbing and gushing. More often than not, it is the situation, the participants involved, what is at stake for them, what they are wearing, the level of inner conflict/abandon in characters that makes a scene arousing. Rarely do lengthy descriptions of labia, clits, juices, lips, petals inspire anything but groans and yawns from readers (and editors).
5) I don't like cliché's - anyone who persistently uses clichés, at the expense of fresh, considered description that actually makes sense, I avoid like the plague[his bolds]. So please no more. There are always other ways of describing anything. Simplicity again is the key. Written in the third person, and not in a colloquial first person point-of-view (I mean this is the author's voice), I often come across descriptions like, "She was drop dead gorgeous. Best looking woman by a mile and a half. John felt his crotch spasm and throb to the depths of his soul." It's going nowhere fast besides the SAE.[my bolds--dr.M.]
6) Do not submit until you have rewritten the manuscript several times. Write a draft - put it away for a few weeks - rewrite it - put it away - tweak it again. As many times as is necessary until everything is easy on the eye and completed to the best of your ability. Unconsidered prose is immediately apparent to me.
7) Unless exceptional - the castle, academy, pseudo-aristocratic world, slave worlds and institutions are paths too well worn. Just about any setting can work in good erotica and I will be open to more imaginative ideas. I don't want to read top shelf confessional stories, but would consider novels with a more realist slant as opposed to the purely fantastic. Unless imaginative milieus are your natural cerebral habitat, don't be afraid of reality. And in terms of style, I will consider the literary as much as the populist providing the novels are about adult interests.
In short, most aspiring authors of erotica need to raise their game. But, I can assure you, I do read everything...eventually. If any changes to the Nexus brief occur, you'll be the first to know.
Adam L G Nevill
(Editor - Nexus)
------------------
Sounds like guy I could do business with. Unfortunately, Nexus is booked up till 2006 and isn't accepting anything right now.
---dr.M.
-----------
From Nexus editor Adam L G Nevill: I have written a few notes to the curious that may prove useful to aspiring and established writers of erotica. The biggest weakness with new writers are:
1) Inability to integrate exposition, dialogue, action, interior monologue - all the facets of story-telling - together. It's not unusual to get 8 pages of straight exposition, followed by three pages of dialogue, followed by 30 pages of overwritten adult activity. This demonstrates an all round lack of narrative awareness. 90% of submissions are too "told" and not "shown" enough. In most cases writers need to get rid of the authorial voice. Unless the narrator's voice is exceptional, do not preside over a novel in order to tell readers what is going on. Get out of the 19th century! And get down to some good creative writing classes. Most writers can only learn so much from reading and practice, eventually he/she will need to seek tuition from a mentor - particularly to improve the technical aspects of writing (classes taught by good poets are a bonus - poets tend to be masters of language).
2) Don't keep setting stories in schools or brothels - the first contravenes our guidelines, the second is often too sleazy and exploitative in tone.
3) Remember erotic fiction should be about pleasure - no matter how extreme the adult activity involved. And I don't want to hear that old argument about one man's pleasure...blah blah blah. I don't want to keep reading proposals about relentless pain and humiliation and degradation visited upon beautiful young women by unpleasant older men. It becomes something else beyond erotica if the pleasure of a submissive female character is absent. Inner conflict is fine - I like this, but I shouldn't - but not beating and rape. Not only is it unacceptable, it's dull and unconvincing. De Sade is overrated.
4) Descriptions of genitals - purple or clinical descriptions of excited genitals are pointless. Use simple language to describe physical arousal - 'wet' or 'hard' is always going to be better and more vivid than atrocious, overwritten flower analogies, mixed metaphors, and lots of excessive dripping and throbbing and gushing. More often than not, it is the situation, the participants involved, what is at stake for them, what they are wearing, the level of inner conflict/abandon in characters that makes a scene arousing. Rarely do lengthy descriptions of labia, clits, juices, lips, petals inspire anything but groans and yawns from readers (and editors).
5) I don't like cliché's - anyone who persistently uses clichés, at the expense of fresh, considered description that actually makes sense, I avoid like the plague[his bolds]. So please no more. There are always other ways of describing anything. Simplicity again is the key. Written in the third person, and not in a colloquial first person point-of-view (I mean this is the author's voice), I often come across descriptions like, "She was drop dead gorgeous. Best looking woman by a mile and a half. John felt his crotch spasm and throb to the depths of his soul." It's going nowhere fast besides the SAE.[my bolds--dr.M.]
6) Do not submit until you have rewritten the manuscript several times. Write a draft - put it away for a few weeks - rewrite it - put it away - tweak it again. As many times as is necessary until everything is easy on the eye and completed to the best of your ability. Unconsidered prose is immediately apparent to me.
7) Unless exceptional - the castle, academy, pseudo-aristocratic world, slave worlds and institutions are paths too well worn. Just about any setting can work in good erotica and I will be open to more imaginative ideas. I don't want to read top shelf confessional stories, but would consider novels with a more realist slant as opposed to the purely fantastic. Unless imaginative milieus are your natural cerebral habitat, don't be afraid of reality. And in terms of style, I will consider the literary as much as the populist providing the novels are about adult interests.
In short, most aspiring authors of erotica need to raise their game. But, I can assure you, I do read everything...eventually. If any changes to the Nexus brief occur, you'll be the first to know.
Adam L G Nevill
(Editor - Nexus)
------------------
Sounds like guy I could do business with. Unfortunately, Nexus is booked up till 2006 and isn't accepting anything right now.
---dr.M.
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