And this time I'm honestly ready to hear it

[Chicklet]

Okay everyone, be brutal.

This is a M/F/m story dealing with BDSM, M/M sex, etc etc...so, if you're willing, check it out.

I'm thinking of using the characters in a sequel of sorts, so I'd like to know what I did right and what I did wrong with them. I'm not a pro at male/male sex scenes, nor am I very good at writing threeway/more sex. So, please, suggestions on the sex scene in particular.

Chicklet

Clarafication

(ps - the title is s'posed to be spelled with an "a" since the main character's name is Clara. Laurel corrected it by mistake so hopefully in the near future it'll be back to "normal")

 

[Moyds_jewel]

brutal feedback

I DON'T have...

I am new to these boards so forgive me please, if I step unintentionally on protocols I have yet to understand. I read your story and here goes with the comments:

Chicklet, you write very well. You have an extensive vocabulary and aren't afraid to use it; your transitions are smooth and seamless; you LIKE your characters and it shows. You avoid common and hackneyed cliches (a GOOD thing).

I don't know whether one male feels the emotions you have attributed during sex with another male...but it felt real to me.

I only have a few quibbles with the story as posted (and I had to look carefully for them) EDITORIAL COMMENTS:
"Not for the briefest of moments did my arousal wan."
Should be: "Not for the briefest of moments did my arousal wane."
and
"My breaths quickened as I sensed it approach," reads better to me as "My breath quickened..." or "My breathing quickened..."
and
"moving off of the bed.." would be stronger without the 'of'. "moving off the bed..."
and
"Closing my eyes I kissed him deeply, tasting the salty fluid from my own body still lingering in his mouth. My cock twitched, its pleasure so recently spent but already rising again at the coaxing of his hot mouth on mine. I kissed him deeply, my tongue playing inside his mouth..."
In this paragraph, Todd 'kissed him deeply' twice in the space of 3 sentences. I'm all for repetition when it's a rhythm thing...but this felt more like an authorial lapse than deliberate repetition.
and
I felt the ending was weak. All may have been clear to the author, but not so clear to the reader...Is it clear that he simply likes sex? or is it clear that he likes to submit? or is it clear that he gets to be Top next time?
BDSM COMMENTS:
Brandon "cooed" a few times too often. You have put Brandon in the Dom (or Switch/Dom) position and somehow a "cooing" Dom is antithetical (smiles) at least, to this submissive.
and lastly,
Speaking from a submissive POV, the sweetest moment is at the end of a scene when the Dom/me gives praise and approval to the submissive. I missed it here.

I enjoyed the story, I liked your style. You spend time on crafting your work and it shows. And remember, editorial comments are simply another point of view.

jewel

___________________
it is my joy to be His

 

[sirhugs]

I'm not much on gay stories, but the group aspect kept me rolling, together with the sheer intensity of the story. It rolled along like a movie ( on a late night cable channel, of course).

I saw a few tense shifts, and some iffy grammar, but not so much they distract from the artisty of the story.

I paused momentarily on the shift from Brandon as gift to Brandon as master. It is credible for Todd to remain a sub, but is Brandon a switch? I never got that clear. Maybe I'll have to read it again ( teeheee).

I agree that you avoid cliches. I found your characters likeable and believable. Or is that lickable? ( at least Clara - the moment where she climbs aboard Todd was sublime).

Clara taking charge, plus the nice use of dialogue rather than the usual sweatstained third party protocols of limbs intertwining, make the group scene beyond a mere grope. And accessible to the non-gay audience. Too bad about the Survivor contest- the group sex readership will miss out on a treat.

The level of detail was special- I don't recall any story that describes how giving a blowjob feels so intensely.

I craved Cara orally pleasing them. I felt cheated Clara did not tease Todd with a blow by blow of her initial taking of Brandon, or tie Todd up and make him watch.

Otherwise, I think the sex scenes were great. Please write part 2.

 

[Chicklet]

I saw a few tense shifts, and some iffy grammar, but not so much they distract from the artisty of the story.

i'm not surprised at the grammar part, but i think usually i keep my tense pretty good - can you find the points where it shifted, please?

Chicklet

 

[dr_mabeuse]

You might be writing for a tiny market here. I soldiered on to the end of Todd's blowjob, then bailed out, which I guess was cowardly, but gay stuff doesn't do it much for me. At least this one didn't.

The big question is how accurately you depicted gay sex. I've had my experiences in my wild youth, and all I can go by is that, but it seemed to me that Todd spent an awful lot of time protesting without ever telling us what he was so damned scared about. Nor did he ever mention what he had found exiting about the fantasy in the first place. Without knowing his motivations for wating to do this or the causes of his extreme anxiety it's difficult to judge his reactions and responses and makes them seem kind of shallow and random.

Once you get past the keejerk reaction that homosexual sex is just "wrong", what you usually find--between men, at least, and according only to my own experiences--is a confusion and mistrust over what having sex with another male does to one's status and place in the pecking order. Men are very status conscious, and a lot of guys think it's okay to be "serviced", but not okay to be the servicer, which they see as essentially feminine. I don't know how many men think in these terms, but I think a man's fear of being a "sissy" arises from the idea of being jocked by another man.

Anyhow,
You have an interesting tendency to use some words that are not quite exactly right in places, although they're usually close enough. I cut out an excerpt which I think shows a few things:
----------------------------------
My heartbeat seemed to quicken, my eyes struggling to remain shut. Suspecting that I knew what she was up to, my face began to heat. A fantasy I had admitted to my girlfriend two weeks ago, one I'd never been able to tell her before. Something that was almost more fantasy than urge, something that might be best left as fantasy and not reality. Frightened, I yearned to open my eyes and see if she had done it. Clara seemed to sense my fear and squeezed my shoulder reassuringly with her tiny hand. Best not to open them until she'd told me it was all right, but still, my curiosity nagged at me.
------------------------------------
There;s your tense shift in sentence #1. It also seems a little odd to talk about one's "heartbeat" quickening rather than their "heart".
The second sentence implies that your face suspected that it knew what she was up to, but also, does he really "suspect he knows" what she's up to or does he "suspect what she's up to"?
The next sentence is not a sentence at all. I don't mind sentence fragments myslef, but this seems like an odd place for one.
And then, would his curiosity be "nagging" him at such a time? WOuldn't it be more likely screaming and jumping up and down?

Other things I noticed: "...wrapped the soft hold around my ankle..." when talking about the rope. Going to his "...next ankle.: while Brandon's tying Todd. Todd's biting the "flesh between his lips." while Brandon's blowing him. You meant Clara's flesh. I had to read it twice. And then when Todd comes he "vaguely felt it through my member." That I had to read four times. You meant that he vaguely felt Brandon's swallowing him, not his orgasm.

See, none of these things is wrong, they're just a teeny bit off.

Other than that, I think the story was really well done. As I say, I think Todd complained too much, but other than that, it was good.

---dr.M.

 

[cherrylips_au]

I'm still learning myself but I did find a few things that just didn't gel for me. I will admit to not knowing a great amount about BDSM.

I read the story twice and still couldn't understand why Brandon was blindfolded especially as he became dominant over Todd.
I understand that he switched but was Todd ever dominant? He always seemed to be submissive to Clara and her will.

I felt the reference to Brandon's cock "was no longer than mine" was realistic from my experiences, most guys want similar sizing, they don't want someone bigger especially for a first time.

"I could feel his body pulsing, his heartbeat, his breaths, everything he did through that leg." I understand what your expressing but it reads as if he breathes through his leg.

"Do you know what I do with ungrateful little boys?"
Great line but then all she does is send him to the living room. I guess I was expecting a punishment or at least for him to be punished by listening to them have sex.

It seemed a contradiction when Todd goes back to the bedroom,
"Now, I feared that I knew exactly what was going to happen", he's acknowledging it but then a few paragraphs later it seems he doesn't. "Fear of the unknown was the only thing standing in my way..."
Wouldn't it be more his fear of his own reactions to what will happen rather then the fear of the unknown as he knows what is going to take place phyiscally?

I think you did a good job, the characters were interesting. I think you could have explained Todd's fears a little more. The only part of the sex scene which was a little confusing was at the ending I had to re-read the last few paragraphs to get it straight in my head, but that happens with extra bodies in a story.

 

[sirhugs]

i'm not surprised at the grammar part, but i think usually i keep my tense pretty good - can you find the points where it shifted, please?

Chicklet

My heartbeat seemed to quicken, my eyes struggling to remain shut. Suspecting that I knew what she was up to, my face began to heat. A

on close reading, not truly shifting tenses, but do you need to create that impression , possible lose readers?

 

[Chicklet]

Another Question About The Story

Is there enough sex? One of the things I fear in my own writing is lack of sex and such. I hate to write a 6,000 word story and only have 1,000 words of sex. Does it seem to be too little, or is the sex just right?

Comments?

Chicklet

 

[Chicklet]

read the story twice and still couldn't understand why Brandon was blindfolded especially as he became dominant over Todd.

Did anyone else have a problem with this? Should I change it? My reasoning is that blindfolds are AWSOME. When Brandon was tied to the bed, the blindfold added to his charm and his own excitement.

Chicklet

 

[sirhugs]

Re: Another Question About The Story

Is there enough sex? One of the things I fear in my own writing is lack of sex and such. I hate to write a 6,000 word story and only have 1,000 words of sex. Does it seem to be too little, or is the sex just right?

Comments?

Chicklet

I think you have just the right amount of sex- the sexual imagery and tension builds from the beginning- breaking the tension too soon would be wrong.

On the blindfold issue, as I read it, when Brandon is blindfilded, he is being offered to Todd as a sub toy, so it fits. The blinfold comes off as Brandon switches.

It also ties in nicely with Todd being blindfolded at the beginning.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Blindfold was fine with me, as per Sirhugs reasoning.

I did wonder at Breandon's not saying anything during the first inspection though. Of course, I have no idea what he would say ("How do you like me, huh? Am I cute or what?") but it seemed off to me that he would hold his tongue like that.

And I don't see how you can worry about sex when the entire story is sex. There's maybe two paragraphs that are sex free.

Makes me wonder though: why would you possibly think there wasn't enough sex? Wasn't the sex sexy enough?

---dr.M.

 

[cybin]

for starters, i gave it a 5 last night

it's a very hot story, chicklet. i have only had a couple of male bi experiences, so maybe i'm not the most qualified to say but, your story kept me up all the way through. i would have rated it a 9 or a10 if the scale went that high even though my own fantasy would have had you more involved in the sucking, etc.

 

[gb77]

Chicklet,

I don't think you should ever worry about "how much" of it is sex. According to the film "Amadeus", Mozart has one of his compositions described as "having too many notes" - an indirect way of saying it was too long.

Mozart replied by saying it had "...exactly the right number of notes, not one more or less".

The point being, in any composition, musical or literary, use as many words as you feel appropriate to achieve what YOU are trying to achieve. Mozart was confident in his work - lucky bastard - but the point i s still relevant to all of us.

This topic is also near and dear to my heart. I have yet to post a story, and i know mine are going to be savaged for being too tedious with not enough description of sex. That is the price i will pay for being more erotic than sensual. Once I have established the characters and their relationships, the sex kind of just follows. I, like you to some extent, am more interested in the interaction of minds and souls.

 

[susurrus]

Yet another opinion...

Okay, yes, the story isn't perfect. Somebody find me *one* perfect story on this site or any other.

Let's see, Clara found this guy to satisfy a fantasy that her boyfriend/sub has. The assumption would be that when she "hired" him for the job, she explained what the deal was (How many strangers would let themselves be blindfolded, then tied to a bed if they *didn't* know what was happening?). The blindfold on Todd was for the surprise of being presented with the object of the fulfillment of his fantasy. The blindfold on Brandon was *also* for Todd. The idea would be that he'd be able to do whatever he wanted to Brandon with total anonymity, beyond sound and touch.

Todd has trouble coming to grips with the opportunity he's been presented with. Alright. I can see that. Homophobia aside, the great majority of us have had monogamy hammered so deeply into us, the thought of *actually* going beyond that relationship is relatively inconceivable. We may *fantasize* about this person or that, or adding another to the existing mix, but how many of us would *really* have the nerve to go outside the boundaries of the relationship we have with the *one* other that society says is your proper due? The homosexual thing is just a *part* of the equation.

The statement of "You know what I do with ungrateful boys," then sends him to the living room... No, it *doesn't* seem like much of a punishment. The punishment hasn't happened yet. And in the long run, is it truly much of a punishment? The "punishment" comes when Brandon is given *Todd* to do with as he pleases. It's the turnabout of the men's roles in the situation that is the "punishment." Clara is "punishing" Todd by removing his ability to control just how far things go, in light of his inability to come to grips with the fulfillment of a fantasy he never thought he'd be confronted with.

I agree, I like the fact that there are no specific measurements. Yes, men *do* compare, but it usually is in the context of known quantities. In this case, he was comparing to himself. Too many writers would then have made some attempt to specify just what that size was. In most cases for these stories, as in life, it's irrelevant.

Is Brandon a "switch?" Does it matter? As I've said earlier, he was most likely briefed on the situation beforehand, thus his willingness to be tied and blindfolded. As is said, Brandon gets pretty worked up, just in *anticipation* of what's supposed to come. Therefore when faced with the prospect of packing up his hard-on and going home, or taking up the role that *Todd* was supposed to have taken...

As far as if there's enough sex... Well, if you do it right, after a while, the characters should lead you to the sex. I think I've posited this strange theory before, of letting the characters tell you when the sex is supposed to happen, as well as when the story's over. Also, as has been mentioned, there's very little of this story that *doesn't* have some degree of sex in it. True, it may not be classic "in-out" stuff, but the sex begins in the first paragraph.

As far as Brandon not saying anything when Todd was touching him at first... Once again, you wouldn't bring a stranger into a situation like this without some sort of explanation. Brandon was brought in as a "toy." Being bound and blindfolded sort of would have made it rather odd for him to be speaking before spoken to.

I've had no actual experiences with another man, so I can't vouch for how accurate any of the male-male sex was, but I've written enough scenes with two guys going at it to say that it was as good as anything *I* could have come up with.

Well, I don't know if I've said *anything* in this massive diatribe. Maybe I read a *lot* into the story, but I guess sometimes, you just have to fill the holes in yourself, and in some cases, the holes fill in easier than others.

Once more, as other respondents have said: minor stuff aside, it's a good, hot story. The fact that it's primarily a guy-guy story will keep a lot of folks away, but it's their loss.

 

[SexyChele]

Overall, Chicklet, this is a good story and I enjoyed reading it! The story flows nicely, and yes, there certainly is enough sex!

There were only 2 things that I had a little difficulty with.

1. Todd's seeming overwhelming fright. I didn't understand where it was coming from. I made the presumption about halfway through that it really wasn't fear but anxiousness. Not sure if that was what you had in mind. I do understand that we have fantasies that, once faced with, we are not always prepared for the reality of. This is what I thought was going on with Todd, but it seemed unclear. Also, he seemed to have more fear of a man sucking him then he did of sucking off a man. It was a little confusing to me.

2. The BDSM aspects were a bit mixed. If Clara were truly a Dominatrix, then punishment would have meant punishment. A sub disobeying a direct command such as "open your eyes" would have some sort of action take place. Or total abandonment. What would have made more sense to me is, when Todd directly and willfully disobeys Brandon (into whose power his Mistress has given him), then Brandon would have brought his attentions to Clara, forcing Todd to watch them until Todd was willing to obey.

A sub derives their pleasure from pleasing, and from being forced to submit. Typically, in a r/l BDSM relationship, a sub is told once to obey. If they do not, there is an instant reaction from the Dom/me, and it is such that a sub fears what the Dom/me may do or not do than the act they are being ordered to perform. Make sense? It appeared that you touched on Todd's desire to be humiliated. That is fairly common among male subs, so it was good you alluded to it. However, you could have driven that point home, especially when Todd is giving Brandon a blowjob by having either Clara or Brandon refer to Todd as a "sissy" or some other names. It just drives home the humiliation factor. And, for those who may wonder, a lot of subs get off on that.

Beyond these two things, I thought it was a well written story. I didn't feel it was truly BDSM, however. I got the feeling the characters were playing at BDSM - which is fine. Lots of people do that and it is very sexy!

As always, a joy to read your work, Chicklet!

 

[Chicklet]

Beyond these two things, I thought it was a well written story. I didn't feel it was truly BDSM, however. I got the feeling the characters were playing at BDSM - which is fine. Lots of people do that and it is very sexy!

Thanks Chele = )

I didn't put it into BDSM for that reason...'course, I didn't really want it in "gay male" either. But oh well! I was advised that people reading BDSM stories would be more unhappy at seeing a man on man story than people in "gay males" finding some bondage in a story...

Chicklet

 

[one_gr8_guy]

I truly am sorry

Will you help me? I really think it would be in penguindances best interest I am trying to do the right thing here if you help me do one litlle thing I promise to never come to this sight again. Please

 

[Chicklet]

Re: I truly am sorry

Will you help me? I really think it would be in penguindances best interest I am trying to do the right thing here if you help me do one litlle thing I promise to never come to this sight again. Please

darlin', this ain't the time nor the place. pm me.