The banality of reality

[Senor_Smut]

I'm in the process of writing a mom/son story that's been kicking around my head for at least ten years. I took a stab at it four or so years ago, abandoned it, then recently started over and am having a more successful time of it. More successful, but hard. I want to establish these two characters and their situation to explain why they would come together in spite of all the hurdles their kind of relationship presents, and as such I feel tremendous pressure to make everything real and believable. I am sweating over individual word choices in a way I never have before, constantly thinking of revisions that I need to make if I ever get a first draft done, and questioning everything I do. I want to make it feel real.

But as I'm doing this I'm thinking back. At the early part of the millennium I wrote a mom/son story for another, now-defunct site, that got shocking amounts of positive attention. I mean it's 20 years on and people are still contacting me about that story (another one just yesterday). High on the list of fans of the story were many real mom/son couples -- and I mean ones who, of their own volition, sent me pictures and movies that they'd made together, linked me to discussions on incest lifestyle bulletin boards where they'd posted other proof, and generally more than satisfied any doubts I might have that they were real moms and sons in relationships. All of them made a point of telling me how they got together, and the situations were just so mundane. In one, a son came out of the bathroom naked when he didn't know how mom was there, and 45 minutes later he was screwing her on top of the kitchen counter; in several, mom was coming out of the breakup of a relationship and the son stepped in to comfort her; in at least two cases, the father (well, once a father and once a step-father) instigated the whole thing because he wanted it to happen. None of the real stories I heard were complex or even very interesting -- in fact, every single one of them sounded like something you could read in countless average stories on this very site.

It's a commonplace that fiction is harder to write than nonfiction because fiction has to be believable, while reality bears no such burden. I know that, and I know that even unusual relationships start and last for the most commonplace of reasons. So I ask myself why I'm making it so hard, and I keep coming back to the fact that reality is painfully banal. I know I don't need to write scores of pages of temptation and growing lust overcoming social norms and taboos gradually crumbling, when it would be much more realistic to have them just start fucking one day. But just having them start fucking one day is fucking dull.

I don't know why I'm posting this, and I certainly don't know what I expect anyone to say. Maybe I just needed to get it off my chest, because this story is turning into the thirteenth Labor of Hercules. Anyway, have a nice day, and may your writing come easier to you than mine does to me.

 

[Actingup]

Thanks for sharing! For what it's worth, I think you're here to spin a yarn, not record a documentary. If reality is mainly banal, that's all the more reason to discard it for something that is plausible but more interesting.

 

[oneagainst]

The reality of writing a story is that mundane doesn't cut it. What you said about the son coming out of the shower and then 45 minutes later - there are a hell of a lot of dots there to connect and even reporting it verbatim would get you a lot of "as if...!" comments.

But one thing I've found is that banal does work very well in a story, the idea of something extraordinary happening in plain view just under the surface. It can add a tension to the most mundane storyline. It's understated but effective. One other thing: you don't have to get into the characters' heads... you could just show what happens and let the readers work out what the characters are thinking. You don't have to lay everything out in black and white.

 

[StillStunned]

If you don't want to do the long, slow plod - which can be hugely erotic in it's own way, if you sprinkle enough breadcrumbs to hold the reader's interest - you can always start nearer the tipping point but make it clear it's not the actual beginning.

"I woke from a dream that left me hard as a rock. The details were fuzzy, but it had been about Mum. Again. Ever since last summer, when I first saw her sunbathing in her new bikini, she'd featured regularly. At first it was innocent, but even so I felt awful when I woke up. Even if nothing happened in the dream, I'd wanted it to happen. And I couldn't help myself. I started to see her in a different light. As the beautiful woman she was, confident and mature and alluring in a way none of the girls my age could ever be."

Or something like that.

 

[TheLobster]

I know I don't need to write scores of pages of temptation and growing lust overcoming social norms and taboos gradually crumbling, when it would be much more realistic to have them just start fucking one day. But just having them start fucking one day is fucking dull.

Yes, but consider this: "one day" is doing a hell lot of heavy lifting there. Something may seem as if it happened out of the blue, when in fact there have been years upon years of distinct and unique life experiences that lead to this one singular moment. Experiences that those people aren't even consciously aware of and therefore cannot accurately account for and convey.

Your task and challenge as a writer is to recount those developments for them. Embellishment is necessary because stories are usually character-driven and are expected to have certain structure, which is why most authors would tease out those subconsciously forming desires, then make them conscious and explicit in characters' minds. That's how you get with "scores of pages of temptation and growing lust" when, in reality, it might have been "only" 45 minutes -- because the legwork had already been done in people's subconscious over the preceding ten years.

 

[lovecraft68]

Great post because I've always tried to walk that line of boring real life and spiced up erotic story.

Also had that story in my head for a few years before deciding to attempt it. I did a thread on it last year "Writer redemption" but that was more about the challenge of finishing it after failing to finish a prior series. The story itself, dips heavily into the psychology of GSA and a doctor thinking it can be treated with a medication. I won't bore anyone with the details, but I decided to take some basic easy sleazy tropes like "Oh, wow, I saw mom's boobs and had to have her" but use them as the every day occurences that can happen between people who live together, then use them as a launching point for when the "T-virus" kicks in and needs something to feed on to inspire the lust.

This is what I have left these days, trying to find knew challenges and ways to screw around with stories

 

[AwkwardlySet]

I love your post, @Senor_Smut, and I feel like many of us have been in your situation more or less. But the question I struggle with every time I feel like picking up my writing again is:

Is it all worth such an effort?

We already know that simple stories do better with the general audience. Much better. So are you happy going through such a tremendous effort and frustration just for your own enjoyment and for a very limited number of readers who will appreciate the complexity? Will the story be worth all the time and sweat in the end?

I ask this not to discourage you but because what you wrote resonated with me. Being an engineer, I can't stop myself from trying to quantize the number of readers and the level of engagement that would make it worth my while to continue writing my main story on Lit, one that took so much planning and writing, and one that's barely 20-30 percent done, even though it's well above 200k published words long right now.

I can't justify to myself going through all that effort and spending the truly insane amount of time needed just for the satisfaction of finishing it. I understand that maybe some people here can, and I respect that, but that's not enough for me.
The reason I am focusing on these complex stories is that they are so much more difficult to write. I've done both kinds and I find stroke stories so, so much easier to write. Yet they do so much better with readership. Rationally speaking, going into writing long and complex stories just to publish them on Literotica feels like self-flagellation of a sort, and not the type that even hardcore BDSM practitioners would enjoy.

 

[NotWise]

I've written a few mom-son stories. They aren't my most popular, but they've gotten me a few emails from readers claiming to be in an incestuous relationship. I've always believed those where people creatively expressing their own fantasy, and I've deleted them.

Maybe there are happy incestuous couples out there and we rarely hear about them. We do hear about the rapes and coercion and the victim's response--like the kid in local news whose father forced him at gun point to have sex with his mother, who then responded by murdering the entire family.

As near as one could tell from the news, incestuous relationships are train wrecks that destroy people and their lives. I write I/T stories, but my stories are fantasies. If I were to ever stop feeling that way, then I wouldn't be able to write them.

 

[Senor_Smut]

I love your post, @Senor_Smut, and I feel like many of us have been in your situation more or less. But the question I struggle with every time I feel like picking up my writing again is:

Is it all worth such an effort?

We already know that simple stories do better with the general audience. Much better. So are you happy going through such a tremendous effort and frustration just for your own enjoyment and for a very limited number of readers who will appreciate the complexity? Will the story be worth all the time and sweat in the end?

I ask this not to discourage you but because what you wrote resonated with me. Being an engineer, I can't stop myself from trying to quantize the number of readers and the level of engagement that would make it worth my while to continue writing my main story on Lit, one that took so much planning and writing, and one that's barely 20-30 percent done, even though it's well above 200k published words long right now.

I can't justify to myself going through all that effort and spending the truly insane amount of time needed just for the satisfaction of finishing it. I understand that maybe some people here can, and I respect that, but that's not enough for me.
The reason I am focusing on these complex stories is that they are so much more difficult to write. I've done both kinds and I find stroke stories so, so much easier to write. Yet they do so much better with readership. Rationally speaking, going into writing long and complex stories just to publish them on Literotica feels like self-flagellation of a sort, and not the type that even hardcore BDSM practitioners would enjoy.

I don't write for the readers. I write to create stories I wish someone else would write, and (primarily) as something to keep suicidal ideation at bay. I write long, complex, multi-chaptered stories because that's what interests me. Once you write half a dozen nuts-and-bolts sex scenes, nuts-and-bolts sex scenes get boring to write -- there's only so many ways you can describe Tab A going into Slot B. So I write to explore the psychology of the characters, the taboo situations, what it's like for them to expand their boundaries, the difficulties they encounter, all that. If a reader or three wants to come along for the trip, cool. If not, equally cool.

 

[Senor_Smut]

I've written a few mom-son stories. They aren't my most popular, but they've gotten me a few emails from readers claiming to be in an incestuous relationship. I've always believed those where people creatively expressing their own fantasy, and I've deleted them.

Maybe there are happy incestuous couples out there and we rarely hear about them. We do hear about the rapes and coercion and the victim's response--like the kid in local news whose father forced him at gun point to have sex with his mother, who then responded by murdering the entire family.

As near as one could tell from the news, incestuous relationships are train wrecks that destroy people and their lives. I write I/T stories, but my stories are fantasies. If I were to ever stop feeling that way, then I wouldn't be able to write them.

Happy incest couples don't talk to reporters because it opens them up to vilification and, in many places, criminal prosecution. What gets put on the news are cases of child abuse and adult rape, which are always wrong no matter who's involved. I found that happy incest couples keep things under such tight wraps that they're eager to talk to someone who reflects their experiences and, above all, won't judge them. We all want community, we all want to be seen, we all want to be accepted for who we are. I always felt honored when people trusted me enough to confide their secrets to me. I found that much more gratifying than number of views or whatever.

 

[KittyOfSteele]

It's a commonplace that fiction is harder to write than nonfiction because fiction has to be believable, while reality bears no such burden. I know that, and I know that even unusual relationships start and last for the most commonplace of reasons. So I ask myself why I'm making it so hard, and I keep coming back to the fact that reality is painfully banal. I know I don't need to write scores of pages of temptation and growing lust overcoming social norms and taboos gradually crumbling, when it would be much more realistic to have them just start fucking one day. But just having them start fucking one day is fucking dull.

Reality, by granted, is banal. The way you describe it, however, doesn't need to be banal. Otherwise we wouldn't have slice-of-lifes all over the place.

 

[Britva415]

If you don't want to do the long, slow plod - which can be hugely erotic in it's own way, if you sprinkle enough breadcrumbs to hold the reader's interest - you can always start nearer the tipping point but make it clear it's not the actual beginning.

"I woke from a dream that left me hard as a rock. The details were fuzzy, but it had been about Mum. Again. Ever since last summer, when I first saw her sunbathing in her new bikini, she'd featured regularly. At first it was innocent, but even so I felt awful when I woke up. Even if nothing happened in the dream, I'd wanted it to happen. And I couldn't help myself. I started to see her in a different light. As the beautiful woman she was, confident and mature and alluring in a way none of the girls my age could ever be."

Or something like that.

No criticism, I know it's just off the top of your head, but this reminds me of that recent discussion where the subject came up of saturating the beginning of a story with perfective-aspect statements vs. simple-past statements.

 

[Britva415]

Happy incest couples don't talk to reporters because it opens them up to vilification and, in many places, criminal prosecution. What gets put on the news are cases of child abuse and adult rape, which are always wrong no matter who's involved.

Maybe there are happy incestuous couples out there and we rarely hear about them. [...]

As near as one could tell from the news, incestuous relationships are train wrecks that destroy people and their lives

One wonders, among all the "quiet incest" out there, what proportion is happy and what proportion is just not on the news.

 

[Baztrachian]

I can appreciate the challenge of making a story seem realistic enough that it seems real and not outlandish as so much erotica is.

I think I did okay with my one story about "Forbidden Fruit" between a stepfather and stepdaughter. I did my best to make it plausible and not creepy. Maybe even a little romantic and not so overtly codependent which it could have been.

I like stories where the erotica isn't the overt purpose of the story but instead a reasonable part of the whole story. This requires creating a realistic enough situation to put my characters into and then letting them find their way. The situation then facilitating the erotica.

My current story I'm working on is based on what I have found out is a true story from my community. I'm fictionalizing it a bit for obvious reasons (like trying not to get sued!) and oddly I'm tempering the story because the reality comes across as something with a 1980's saxophone soundtrack. Like you, I'm trying to make the story a bit more readable than the reality.

I wish you well!

 

[NotWise]

One wonders, among all the "quiet incest" out there, what proportion is happy and what proportion is just not on the news.

I've never been able to answer that question, and I've tried.

 

[Senor_Smut]

...

My current story I'm working on is based on what I have found out is a true story from my community. I'm fictionalizing it a bit for obvious reasons (like trying not to get sued!) and oddly I'm tempering the story because the reality comes across as something with a 1980's saxophone soundtrack

I've always thought my life would be a lot different if I had a wakka-cha-wakka guitar playing everywhere I went.

 

[gunhilltrain]

I've always thought my life would be a lot different if I had a wakka-cha-wakka guitar playing everywhere I went.

Sort of like John Travolta walking down 86th Street in Bensonhurst. I wonder if he's actually playing the song in his mind as he moves along. There's a guy who stocks shelves in my supermarket who sings out loud all day long. It's all in Spanish.

 

[alohadave]

Sort of like John Travolta walking down 86th Street in Bensonhurst. I wonder if he's actually playing the song in his mind as he moves along. There's a guy who stocks shelves in my supermarket who sings out loud all day long. It's all in Spanish.

Makes me think of this:

 

[SerenaSteeleMonroe]

The most common mother son/mother daughter stories (most places they call it Stepparent/Stepchild), are slow build stories and novella lenght.

 

[SissyBrandi19]

I'm in the process of writing a mom/son story that's been kicking around my head for at least ten years. I took a stab at it four or so years ago, abandoned it, then recently started over and am having a more successful time of it. More successful, but hard. I want to establish these two characters and their situation to explain why they would come together in spite of all the hurdles their kind of relationship presents, and as such I feel tremendous pressure to make everything real and believable. I am sweating over individual word choices in a way I never have before, constantly thinking of revisions that I need to make if I ever get a first draft done, and questioning everything I do. I want to make it feel real.

But as I'm doing this I'm thinking back. At the early part of the millennium I wrote a mom/son story for another, now-defunct site, that got shocking amounts of positive attention. I mean it's 20 years on and people are still contacting me about that story (another one just yesterday). High on the list of fans of the story were many real mom/son couples -- and I mean ones who, of their own volition, sent me pictures and movies that they'd made together, linked me to discussions on incest lifestyle bulletin boards where they'd posted other proof, and generally more than satisfied any doubts I might have that they were real moms and sons in relationships. All of them made a point of telling me how they got together, and the situations were just so mundane. In one, a son came out of the bathroom naked when he didn't know how mom was there, and 45 minutes later he was screwing her on top of the kitchen counter; in several, mom was coming out of the breakup of a relationship and the son stepped in to comfort her; in at least two cases, the father (well, once a father and once a step-father) instigated the whole thing because he wanted it to happen. None of the real stories I heard were complex or even very interesting -- in fact, every single one of them sounded like something you could read in countless average stories on this very site.

It's a commonplace that fiction is harder to write than nonfiction because fiction has to be believable, while reality bears no such burden. I know that, and I know that even unusual relationships start and last for the most commonplace of reasons. So I ask myself why I'm making it so hard, and I keep coming back to the fact that reality is painfully banal. I know I don't need to write scores of pages of temptation and growing lust overcoming social norms and taboos gradually crumbling, when it would be much more realistic to have them just start fucking one day. But just having them start fucking one day is fucking dull.

I don't know why I'm posting this, and I certainly don't know what I expect anyone to say. Maybe I just needed to get it off my chest, because this story is turning into the thirteenth Labor of Hercules. Anyway, have a nice day, and may your writing come easier to you than mine does to me.

I don't know if I would agree that reality is banal. That statement has a total Dunning Kruger vibe. People who believe reality is banal simply need to explore reality a bit more adventurously! Remember - the human brain does not simply encode reality - it interprets reality. There's The Key.

 

[SerenaSteeleMonroe]

@SissyBrandi19, You are correct, reality is a matter of perception. No two people see the same thing in the same way. This is why eyewitness accounts are so unreliable; everyone observes the same thing but processes it differently.

I don't know if I would agree that reality is banal. That statement has a total Dunning Kruger vibe. People who believe reality is banal simply need to explore reality a bit more adventurously! Remember - the human brain does not simply encode reality - it interprets reality. There's The Key.

 

[Senor_Smut]

I don't know if I would agree that reality is banal. That statement has a total Dunning Kruger vibe. People who believe reality is banal simply need to explore reality a bit more adventurously! Remember - the human brain does not simply encode reality - it interprets reality. There's The Key.

Sorry, I thought I was being clear that the beginnings of the real-life mother-son incest relationships that I was exposed to were banal, rather than suggesting that all of reality was banal. But thanks for being pedantic and insulting.

 

[SerenaSteeleMonroe]

Sorry, I thought I was being clear that the beginnings of the real-life mother-son incest relationships that I was exposed to were banal, rather than suggesting that all of reality was banal. But thanks for being pedantic and insulting.

Sorry for the ruffled feathers, and hope I wasn't part of that with my response.

 

[Senor_Smut]

Sorry for the ruffled feathers, and hope I wasn't part of that with my response.

Nope, you're cool, thanks.

 

[gunhilltrain]

Makes me think of this:

Believe me, working in that supermarket is not as much fun as that warehouse is depicted. And it doesn't have Kevin Bacon. It does have a short Latino guy in his forties.