Thinking about doing a story about a home invasion

[purvis2]

In the story three women are home alone in an old mansion when three criminals break in. It will have some aspects of a suspense story in which the main characters try their best to stay out of the reaches of the desperate criminals.

My question is how do you stay away from the violence / rape prohibition and make the story OK? Most of the violence will be directed toward the criminals. But, how do you have the sex scenes not cross the non-consent prohibition?
I am far from a professional writer. I want to make the story both interesting but not violate the rules.
Any suggestions from more experienced (and vastly better) writers?

 

[KeithD]

There isn't that much of a nonconsent prohibition.

In your scenario you could make most of what sexually could happen in such a home invasion passable here by establishing before the invasion that the women fantasized (maybe individually without necessarily sharing that with each other) what could happen and were mentally prepared--thus prior consenting enough to show want--before anything happened. Up front consent/want can be established enough to get stories through here. It's probably best to keep the violence to the "forceful" level and not too damaging.

 

[RejectReality]

Caught and using the only option they have left to bargain/get one over on the criminals is the first thing that comes to mind. It's going to depend upon the female characters, what the end game is for them, and a lot of other things.

Typical violence is only prohibited when it delves into the sadistic. If they're bashing these guys over the head or something, that's not a problem. Even if they end up killing them in the end, so long as it's not something like cutting their dicks off and choking them to death with their own schlongs, it's not going to run afoul of violence for the most part. They're criminals and likely violent ones if you're worried about rape prohibitions, so a few cracked skulls or bullets to the head are likely justified.

Sexual violence is where things get stickier. The less permanent physical/psychological harm is involved, the better the chances of it passing.

Honestly there's not enough in the bullet points to determine where you might be pushing up against the line.

 

[Rustyoznail]

I edited a series by Bdrew86 called Breaking & Entering. The woman is raped, and a point of amusement for the rapists is how her body reacts positively to their assault. Eventually she gives in as they made it clear they will kill her.

 

[RetroFan]

I think your story should be okay if you make the criminals' motivations for their home invasion financial ones rather than anything sexual. Perhaps include a note to this effect when you submit the story so that the site administrators note this when your story is reviewed prior to publication?

I wrote a story series once where a group of three criminals kidnap a 19-year-old heiress. I make it clear that their motivation for abducting the girl is purely financial - they want to extort a ransom from her rich parents. I also play the situation for laughs - these criminals are downright stupid and hopelessly inept at carrying out their abduction and attempting to claim their ransom, which lessens the menace factor. For example they steal a van to do so, but choose a bright purple van with hippie motifs and wait days before sending their first ransom demand, by which time it is all over the media and the police are involved. It is a fetish story so of course there are sexual elements. The abducted girl is an absolute spoiled brat with a big mouth and a bad temper, and she fights back viciously, her abductors having to keep her ankles and wrists bound at all times. This means they have to sit her on the toilet and wipe her bottom for her, change her panties and wash her vagina for her, and assist her when she gets her period - something else the bumbling kidnappers didn't account for.

If however the criminals had abducted the girl with a sexual motivation in mind, I don't think it would have been accepted for publication.

 

[HeyAll]

1) Violence in the story is okay -- just can't be extreme/graphic violence

2) Noncon sex is allowed -- the person recieving has to eventually 'enjoy' it (ie forced orgasms are allowed)

 

[thomas1965]

You could make the rape implicit.
He pounced on her and ripped her clothes off. End of scene. Leave it to the imagination of the reader.
Maybe at the end you can mention she got some counselling

 

[BobbyBrandt]

I'm not going to provide a link or even name the story, but I have one here where a female federal agent is brutally gang-raped before being tossed naked into a river to die. It's pretty graphic. Later in the same story, the character who instigated that violent act gets dismembered as revenge.

I believe the key is for the acts described not to be intended for any sexual gratification. That's harder to do in the scenario the OP described.

 

[lovecraft68]

If you feel compelled to write this story, my suggestion would be this isn't the place for it.

The rules are vague at best on Non consent, the enforcement even more spotty. You can get rejected for something that didn't cross the line, but find a brutal gang rape story released the same day.

If you try to hard to force whatever it is into their sketchy parameters, the story is going to suffer and not be all that good....and you could be going through all this just for a rejection that may or may not be deserved.

Take it elsewhere is my opinion.

 

[Voboy]

My question is how do you stay away from the violence / rape prohibition and make the story OK?

...by being a good writer. That's how.

I've done three stories with elements vaguely similar to what you're describing (sexually, anyway; I include violence in many others). It's not hard to make them Lit-publishable as long as you remain true to where you want to go, while not forgetting Lit's rules. In fact, that's part of the fun: figuring out how to make the unacceptable, acceptable.

Mine included one story where a man is being held sort-of captive by 2-3 ladies, another where an undercover cop must fuck his partner to maintain their cover, and then the third one involves a man forcing his way into the home of a woman who thinks she's got things under control, but might not. Each one made a decent story, did fine here, and (most important) was the story I wanted to write. You can do it too.

 

[MrPixel]

I dunno. My experience with dancing around the restrictions was met with having the story taken down due to a complaint by a reader that the story implicitly violated the guidelines. It just takes one, evidently, and that the scenario was carefully crafted to be implicit and not graphic seems to not matter.

My assessment is a quasi-realistic home invasion scenario given the OP's setup is going to be difficult to achieve within the rules, or watered-down so as to lose the intended drama or - considering what this site is about - eroticism.

YMMV.

 

[MajorRewrite]

I can’t imagine such a story would be entertaining, unless you write it as a comedy. The women are oddly excited by the men who invaded their home. The men aren’t rapists and are respectful toward the women (the criminals just want a place to hide out while the cops search for them). The women go to great lengths to seduce the reluctant criminals. Jocularity ensues.

 

[lovecraft68]

...by being a good writer. That's how.

I've done three stories with elements vaguely similar to what you're describing (sexually, anyway; I include violence in many others). It's not hard to make them Lit-publishable as long as you remain true to where you want to go, while not forgetting Lit's rules. In fact, that's part of the fun: figuring out how to make the unacceptable, acceptable.

Mine included one story where a man is being held sort-of captive by 2-3 ladies, another where an undercover cop must fuck his partner to maintain their cover, and then the third one involves a man forcing his way into the home of a woman who thinks she's got things under control, but might not. Each one made a decent story, did fine here, and (most important) was the story I wanted to write. You can do it too.

Keep in mind violence against men gets reported by the incels, just ask Mr. Pixel.

People need to stop acting like there are set rules here, because end of the day, the site is a free for all, and even good advice and good writing isn't what's going to make or a break a site run on whim and riddled with a growing population of jackals who go full Karen over any story in NC/BDSM or LW that isn't bitch gets hers.

Because if you look at your post....seems like all the men made out just fine, you're not writing anywhere near what he's looking to write. He's going with something that's a mix of The Strangers and Last House on the Left(infamous for an opening rape scene, then just as infamous for the revenge)

Your examples aren't relevant.

The sugar coating of this place and part of its readership continues to be sickening.

 

[lovecraft68]

I can’t imagine such a story would be entertaining, unless you write it as a comedy. The women are oddly excited by the men who invaded their home. The men aren’t rapists and are respectful toward the women (the criminals just want a place to hide out while the cops search for them). The women go to great lengths to seduce the reluctant criminals. Jocularity ensues.

Because as I replied to you on my LW thread, not everyone wants to write brain dead smut. Some people like to write more serious pieces and explore different aspects of story telling.

In other words, some people are creative and take chances rather than pander to the stroke crowd.

Also you're idea of entertaining is yours, not the entire readership here.

 

[Voboy]

Keep in mind violence against men gets reported by the incels, just ask Mr. Pixel.

People need to stop acting like there are set rules here, because end of the day, the site is a free for all, and even good advice and good writing isn't what's going to make or a break a site run on whim and riddled with a growing population of jackals who go full Karen over any story in NC/BDSM or LW that isn't bitch gets hers.

Because if you look at your post....seems like all the men made out just fine, you're not writing anywhere near what he's looking to write. He's going with something that's a mix of The Strangers and Last House on the Left(infamous for an opening rape scene, then just as infamous for the revenge)

Your examples aren't relevant.

The sugar coating of this place and part of its readership continues to be sickening.

...okay.

 

[MajorRewrite]

Because as I replied to you on my LW thread, not everyone wants to write brain dead smut. Some people like to write more serious pieces and explore different aspects of story telling.

In other words, some people are creative and take chances rather than pander to the stroke crowd.

Also you're idea of entertaining is yours, not the entire readership here.

There’s nothing “brain dead” about comedy. On the other hand, a rape story could be categorized as brain dead.

You certainly have become defensive and agitated after my one critical comment. So thin skinned.

 

[lovecraft68]

There’s nothing “brain dead” about comedy. On the other hand, a rape story could be categorized as brain dead.

You certainly have become defensive and agitated after my one critical comment. So thin skinned.

Nice try. You're the one questioning why people write what they write, and what right do you have to do so?

Some people have ideas that are darker than others. Some people want to write more than smut that panders to the one handed reader crowd. There's nothing wrong with either type

Providing one doesn't judge the other. If you want to talk about who would read a type of story I can't get my head around people who flock to the idiotic trope of a mom on a son's lap(keeping in mind I write a lot of taboo) I can write that drunk, so could most people. But the readers here like it and people who are here for numbers will write them for that reason.

The nature of this site-as in numbers are pretty much the only reward other then personal satisfaction-curbs creativity by encouraging writers to write the same story over and over again to get those cheap numbers, and it discourages going against the grain as evidenced in a lot of comments I've seen as well as discussions here where authors talk about how the readers took them to task for writing something different

Look at how unpopular the April Fools contest is. Why? Because it calls for more effort than "It was hot, it was cold, it was Halloween" and the readers will leave comments that they didn't understand the story or get the fact the contest revolves around tricks or swerve endings.

I'm not saying this has anything at all to do with intelligence, just effort, and the difference between exploring new things or eating the same damn sandwich every day.

What I will say is pandering stroke authors shouldn't question people interested in pushing the boundaries of ideas and their ability to tell a grittier more real story. Because the former is lazy, the latter a true creator.

 

[lovecraft68]

...okay.

I'm okay, you're okay, we're all okay.

 

[Voboy]

What I will say is pandering stroke authors shouldn't question people interested in pushing the boundaries of ideas and their ability to tell a grittier more real story. Because the former is lazy, the latter a true creator.

Relax. You're aware this is a free site for smut, yes?

Some people here aren't all that interested in being "true creators." Their definition of success or effort differs from yours. But you don't get to be the one who makes those rules for anyone but yourself.

Everyone writes for their own reasons. Deal with it.

 

[SouthernCrossfire]

There's no obvious forced sex but there is a rather violent home invasion in my story The Milkmaid - Pt. 03 (in Chapter 6, starting midway through page 2). The young man in the story had learned of the potential danger posed by his new friend's ex and had taken time to prepare, just in case, so the violence goes both ways in that story. That said, he'd forced her into a vaguely worded forced-escort/drug dealing situation before she had initially escaped from him and the gangster was in the house with her for a while as he tried to get her to tell where the money was. Therefore, readers might imply that something bad could have happened during that time but it's never revealed in the story.

 

[SimonDoom]

The major two limitations for a story on this subject, as I understand them, are:

1. The Site places some limits (and I don't completely understand what they are) on how graphic you can be in depicting extreme violence.

2. You cannot depict violent behavior in a way in which the victim does not enjoy it but it's presented in a way that is intended to arouse the reader. What does that mean? You can (according to the stated rules) publish stories here that feature rape and murder. Like a detective story. There's nothing theoretically wrong with that. Mainstream fiction features that all the time--obviously it's not illegal and the Site owners could not possibly get in any trouble just for publishing such stories. But you can't write rape and snuff in a way that is intended to get the readers' rocks off. You CAN write stories about nonconsensual encounters where the victim actually enjoys the encounter.

These rules obviously leave a lot of gray area, and a lot of opportunity for them to be applied inconsistently.

It seems to me that this story could be written in a way that falls well within Lit's boundaries, or it could be written in a way that it doesn't. You have to be extremely mindful of what you are doing and navigate the rules.

In response to the OP's question, my response would be there's no obviously correct answer to the question as presented in a general way; the devil will be in the details.