Tension in erotic fiction

[ttvttp]

Do you like to see tension in the fiction you read and write? Do you find stories more believable if there is tension? What are the best ways to build tension without making that the sole focus of the story?

 

[SimonDoom]

Do you like to see tension in the fiction you read and write? Do you find stories more believable if there is tension? What are the best ways to build tension without making that the sole focus of the story?

I think it's an indispensable element of a good story, as long as you define "tension" broadly.

There's nothing particularly erotic about a story about two people who have sex. What makes it erotic is tension/conflict/whatever you want to call it. It's erotic when two people have sex despite some obstacle. The obstacle can be another person, or society, or a person's own internal needs/desires/beliefs. But the tension has to be there, in some form or another, for it to be a first-rate story.

 

[KeithD]

Tension/conflict is a key element of fiction.

 

[AwkwardMD]

One of, if not the, most important tools in a writer's toolbox.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Yes, otherwise it's an instruction manual. How to do it? Write convincing characters with feelings, emotions and motivations, place them in a situation with either a conflict or an unknown (will they, won't they, should they, shouldn't they?); proceed.

 

[Hypoxia]

Yes, otherwise it's an instruction manual.

Some product manuals leave me pretty tense.

 

[ChloeTzang]

..... What are the best ways to build tension without making that the sole focus of the story?

Conflict of some sort and there are so many ways to build that in. I like those cultural conflict type situations that you get with chinese girls and white guys, but really it's only limited by your imagination. The forbidden is always good when it comes to erotic, but again, the forbidden can be so many different things.

Probably one of the reasons incest is so popular.

Some product manuals leave me pretty tense.

No joking. I've just spent a couple of hours struggling with Facebook. Opaque doesn't begin to describe it. You think they could at least come up with some clear user instructions on how to do things and then have them actually work. I'm at the point where I'm taking the Z out of Zuckerberg and replacing it with an F and getting rid of the berg. That's tension for 'ya! So now to relax I'm going to go and write someone's death in a story. Bloodily!

 

[TxRad]

No joking. I've just spent a couple of hours struggling with Facebook. Opaque doesn't begin to describe it. You think they could at least come up with some clear user instructions on how to do things and then have them actually work. I'm at the point where I'm taking the Z out of Zuckerberg and replacing it with an F and getting rid of the berg. That's tension for 'ya! So now to relax I'm going to go and write someone's death in a story. Bloodily!

Fixing FaceBook is rather simple. Go to programs under windows Control Panel. Click on FaceBook and click on uninstall. No more problems with FaceBook.

 

[ChloeTzang]

Fixing FaceBook is rather simple. Go to programs under windows Control Panel. Click on FaceBook and click on uninstall. No more problems with FaceBook.

That would work, except I'm finding FB's by far the best way to interact with my devoted fans. And it's really good for that.

 

[SimonDoom]

What are the best ways to build tension without making that the sole focus of the story?

I'm not sure what this means. To my mind, the tension, or conflict, or whatever you want to call it, IS the focus of the story.

A story starts with a person who has an unfulfilled need. There is some obstacle between the person and the fulfillment of that need. The story describes how the person overcomes the obstacle. This is the essence of every good story, erotic or otherwise.

There are four basic types of conflicts: person against person; person against society; person against nature; person against self. Many good stories incorporate more than one of these conflicts. Erotica usually involves 1, 2, or 4, or some combination of them.

An erotic story usually, but not always, involves person A connecting in a sexual way with person B. What makes the story interesting is that there is some obstacle in the way of A and B getting together. What that obstacle is, and how A and B overcome it, is what makes the story erotic and interesting.

 

[ttvttp]

I am talking about a story that is tense throughout without any ebb. Where a person keeps going through hell without any end in sight.

 

[AwkwardMD]

Tension without relief is exhausting. You would literslly fatigue your readers.

Peaks and vslleys of tension are how films do it.

 

[SimonDoom]

I am talking about a story that is tense throughout without any ebb. Where a person keeps going through hell without any end in sight.

If it's a short story, then you start lightly and build the tension throughout, accelerating the tension as you get close to the end. Examples are the famous short stories "The Lottery" and "A Good Man Is Hard To Find." In both, the dark ending is foreshadowed, but not made obvious, near the beginning of the story.

If it's a long story or novel, then you need to relieve the tension at times. Tension has to build in cycles. There have to be moments when hell isn't so hellish.

 

[Hypoxia]

Stories without tension? Even SEE JANE TRIP AND FALL is tense.

Shall I re-post some scholarly wisdom? Sure.

The six story arcs:
1. Rags to riches – a steady rise from bad to good fortune: /
2. Riches to rags – a fall from good to bad, a tragedy: \
3. Icarus – a rise, then a fall in fortune: /\
4. Man in a hole – fall, then rise: \/
5. Oedipus – a fall, a rise, then a fall again: \/\
6. Cinderella – rise, fall, then rise: /\/​

Stories can start and/or end at low points and can oscillate between high and low points. (Low points are tense, hey?) A story without a moving arc is flatlined, DOA.

7. Flatliner – it all stays the same: ___​

Or there's Mark Twain's three-act structure: "Send your characters up a tree. Throw rocks at them. See if they climb down." Rocks are vital.

 

[SamScribble]

I can't recall reading a single successful story that didn't involve tension/conflict. But I've read (OK, skimmed) many not very successful stories where the writer felt the need to spell out the conflict in foot-high letters. Conflict can be very subtle. And, sometimes, it should be.

 

[ChloeTzang]

I am talking about a story that is tense throughout without any ebb. Where a person keeps going through hell without any end in sight.

Well, you'd do conflict-resolution but the resolution would need to lead to more conflict. Basically you seem to be talking about stepping it up a notch, time after time. Either that or a short story with build up and a single point of resolution at the end. I can;t see that working with anything long, without any break.... you'd lose your readers I would think.

 

[ttvttp]

I am reading a story where there has been nonstop tension for at least 4 chapters. It just feels like an endless argument where nothing will ever get settled. I am not the biggest fan of tension so I just want to get better at it to make my stories more believable.

 

[AwkwardMD]

It's a tool. You use a hammer to put nails into wood, but you wouldn't use it to change a tire, install memory into a computer, or fix a leaky pipe. You only use tension when its appropriate.

 

[NotWise]

Without tension, you get and I/T story that goes like this:

Guy. "Wanna fuck?"

Sister, Mom, Grandma or Aunt. "Right now."

Fucking ensues.

You need tension to make characters and situations real. Tension is also used to bridge a story from episode to episode -- think soap opera or telenovela. If you don't like a lot of tension, it could mean that you're not much of a soap opera fan.

 

[Hypoxia]

Without tension, you get and I/T story that goes like this:

Guy. "Wanna fuck?"

Sister, Mom, Grandma or Aunt. "Right now."

Fucking ensues.

That's most of I-T, encapsulated. Embellish a little, throw in some anal, and you've got another Red-H.

You need tension to make characters and situations real.

Don't make them *too* real, especially not in I-T. Reality there is grim.

Tension is also used to bridge a story from episode to episode -- think soap opera or telenovela. If you don't like a lot of tension, it could mean that you're not much of a soap opera fan.

Tense cliffhangers FTW!

Suzi crawled quietly into Grandpa Ahab's handmade bed. He stirred.

"Umm. Huh? What are you doing, girl?"
"Shhh, Gramps; just wait till morning."

NEXT: Waking up on the wrong side of bed.​

Tease-em and please-em, sure.

 

[Kantarii]

Without tension in our stories, we’d probably all be writing bedtime stories for children. Kant

 

[NotWise]

Don't make them *too* real, especially not in I-T. Reality there is grim.

Child rape leading to prostitution and suicide. What's there to complain about?

I *do* write in I/T, but you know, it's fantasy.

 

[subtlekiss]

Love is not always straightforward

I think that real life always has a a lot of tension, but it is really stressful to live up to it because overcoming obstacles takes will power and strength. Real life is not always rosy and you do not control the ending; only how you feel makes all the difference. In stories, I know where it is headed because I always make it a happy ending. But yes, tension makes the story line more interesting and believable.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Do you like to see tension in the fiction you read and write? Do you find stories more believable if there is tension? What are the best ways to build tension without making that the sole focus of the story?

It's very hard to write an interesting story without tension.

I don't think tension has much effect on believability, but in the other direction, suspension of disbelief is vital for tension. If I'm reading an erotic story where the tension is will-they-won't-they and the author does something that breaks my suspension of disbelief, that's when I start thinking: "well OBVIOUSLY they're going to get it on, because this was posted in the erotica section", and then the tension's gone.

Building tension: this is a book-length question, I only have time to offer a few things.

#1: Make sure that your reader cares about the thing that's supposed to be the source of tension. If the tension is "will our heroine find True Love?" and the reader hates the heroine and wants her to die, that's probably not going to work out.

#2: Pose a question early on, and then leave the reader to stew over it. The question could be anything from "who's the traitor?" to "does she love me?"

#3: Don't give your readers tension fatigue. If everything is unremittingly grimdark, they're likely to get jaded. It's hard to get emotionally invested in characters when everything is awful all the time (see #1).

A lot of horror stories follow a day-night cycle: at night Bad Stuff happens, by day our heroes regroup, try to get through their Normal Life stuff like school/job/etc., and make plans for when things get dangerous again. That sort of rhythm can work across other stories too.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

Most of you guys are heaps better writers than me - I have not managed to master the art yet of this prescriptive stuff that most of you are talking about, and clearly since it works for your professional money-making careers, also swear by. And that is no doubt also why Hollywood is so relevant and why they make such amazing and successful blockbusters now - they have honed this thing of following a formula until it is so perfect all the rising population of autistic people (now that vaccines have become absolutely mandatory) love to go watch their films because they (the films) are all of course perfectly regulated now and excellently predictable.


BTW, I happen to think the OP's question was actually a good one, and a really good one at that. For me 'tension' in stories is a much more complex thing (and often 'weird science...') than the wonders of the trick of 'conflict' can achieve on their own.