On Writing Romance_ How to Craft a Novel That Sells - Leigh Michaels [88]
In The Kitchen Witch, Annette Blair shows a heroine who is liberated, experienced, and anything but passive, and a hero who's determined to make their lovemaking a special occasion:
"Oh," she said, still focused on the nest of his arousal. "Just let me feel all that nice soft black cotton ... and everything." She stroked him through the briefs, took him from his cocoon and into her greedy hands, and turned him into her submissive slave. She handled him with gentle reverence, kneading and nuzzling with fingers and lips, growing him, breath by gasping breath, stroking him against her cheek, nibbling with her lips, until he got so close to coming, he took her down on top of him.
"So much for making it last," he said as he slid into her, in one fast, incredible thrust. ...
She came almost at once, making him slick, easing his heaving way. When he caught his breath, when they both did, he rolled her to her back, still inside her, and rose over her. "That's one," he said.
"More," she said arching, pulsing tight around him as if to help.
"Greedy," he said, rising to the occasion and going for two, pretty certain that giving her as many orgasms as she wanted, before his turn came, would about kill him.
Though single title romance can veer fairly close to erotica, as in this example, it doesn't necessarily include any explicit lovemaking at all.
Erotica
In One Wilde Weekend, Janelle Denison pulls out all the stops, initiating her hero and heroine into the Mile-High Club in a steamy scene in an airplane restroom.
He skimmed his palms along the satin-soft skin of her inner thighs, letting the hem of her skirt pool around his wrists as he glided higher and higher toward his final destination. Once there, his long fingers delved between her nether lips, finding her hot and wet and ready for him. ...
With her hips tilted at just the right angle for him, he slid his rod through her drenched curls from behind, found the entrance to her body, and with a hard, deep thrust, he buried himself to the hilt. Dana's mouth opened in a silent gasp, and though he knew he ought to be just as discreet considering where they were, there was no stopping the primitive male groan that erupted from his chest. ...
As he plunged and withdrew in a building, gyrating rhythm, he swept her hair aside and nuzzled her neck with his lips, his ragged breathing warm and damp against her skin. He used one hand to caress her breasts and lightly pinch her nipples, while his other hand dipped low to where they were joined. His fingers stroked her cleft in that knowing way that never failed to make her come, and it didn't take long for her breath to catch in the back of her throat and for him to feel the clench and pull of her body around his cock that signaled an impending climax. Hers and his.
He drove inside her one last time, high and hard, lodging himself as deeply as he could get just as the plane rumbled through an air pocket ... she inhaled a quick breath then moaned softly, her entire body convulsing in a long, continuous orgasm that milked him dry.
In erotica, love scenes are frequent and explicit, starting right at the outset and building in intensity throughout the story. Though body parts are named more freely than in other types of romance, there's a tendency to use slang (rod, cock, nether lips, cleft) rather than clinical terms such as penis and vagina.
No matter what variety of romance, how explicit the scene, or how experienced or inexperienced the lovers, sex in romance novels is always better than average and usually of medal-winning caliber. Heroes always make sure their heroines are satisfied, even virgins are always ready for the next round, and everybody climaxes every time they make love.
But the most important thing of all about love scenes in romance novels is that heroes and heroines don't just have sex. In fact, they cannot simply have sex—they make love.
1. Flip through the romance novels you've been studying, looking for sexual tension and love scenes. Do the love scenes in the books you've read include intercourse, or is