Skip a sex scene?

[NotWise]

I mean while writing, not while reading.

The couple in the story I'm working on now have sex three times in the course of the story, and each "event" is a long scene. I felt like all three scenes would be too much for the story, so I'm skipping the middle scene--using intimate conversation to build up to it, fading when they head to the bedroom, and taking the story up again the next morning.

Some readers might feel like I'm jerking them around, but I don't know how much I should worry. How would you feel about that if you ran across it while reading?

I've ended a couple stories with intimate conversation instead of sex. No-one's complained, and it worked out OK, but this will be in the middle of the story.

 

[MelissaBaby]

I mean while writing, not while reading.

The couple in the story I'm working on now have sex three times in the course of the story, and each "event" is a long scene. I felt like all three scenes would be too much for the story, so I'm skipping the middle scene--using intimate conversation to build up to it, fading when they head to the bedroom, and taking the story up again the next morning.

Some readers might feel like I'm jerking them around, but I don't know how much I should worry. How would you feel about that if you ran across it while reading?

I've ended a couple stories with intimate conversation instead of sex. No-one's complained, and it worked out OK, but this will be in the middle of the story.

I have done something like that a few times, and never heard any complaint, or saw any noticeable drop in scoring.

 

[SimonDoom]

You've been doing this long enough that, without having the benefit of reviewing your draft, I'd say, Go with your instinct.

My druthers are to put the hottest sex scene at the end. So if I have three sex scenes in a story, I don't have to draw out each one in gory detail. I can skimp on some things in scenes 1 and 2, tease the reader a bit, and promise a payoff in scene 3. But it doesn't have to be that way.

I think the needs of the story come first. Where you put the sex scenes and how drawn out you make them depends on what the overall story requires. My guess is, you can make it work the way you want to.

 

[SamScribble]

If I have an interesting story and interesting characters, I often skip some of the plumbing details. A few people grumble. But not many.

 

[PennameWombat]

If the surrounding story is interesting, I don't see a problem. I've done this, where the 'middle' is abstracted out, or, the reader gets told later that sex happened along the way.

You're already giving them bookend scenes. That's more than readers get in my Winter Holidays entry. It's all a build-up to the ending . And my Winter Holidays 2020 entry had only two very short sex scenes (more or less in the middle) which were both mostly alluded to.

 

[JuanSeiszFitzHall]

If I have this right, all three of your sex scenes involve the same two people. In my world, each sex scene in a story should have its own distinct reason for inclusion. So, with the same two people each time, I’d want the sex in each scene either to be physically different from that in the others (position, foreplay, orgasm-or-not, etc.), or carry different emotional content, or provide some sort of novelty, such as whether the sex is in a bed, a car, or a beach (location, location, location).

If you accomplish all of the story’s goals with two sex scenes and the substituted dialogue, the readers should be satisfied.