Sex sells, we’re told. The allure of sex (most often manifested by scantily clad females) sells clothes, perfume, holidays, even airports – remember the famous Luton Airport ad? Sex scenes in books are reputed to be a strong selling point and the sales figures for 50 Shades of Grey would bear this out. Well it certainly wasn’t the quality of the prose, wherein page after page of quasi (and not so quasi) sexual abuse is recorded with repetitive tedium. (Or so I’m told; I only read an excerpt in a newspaper, thought it was a clumsy parody, and wasn’t tempted to read more.)
The best-selling novel, Normal People, by Sally Rooney contained a lot of sex: talking about it, doing it, discussing it afterwards … It all helped with sales, apparently. But she confessed recently that she didn’t enjoy either writing sex scenes or reading them. She wanted to be more allusive in her recent novel – Beautiful World, Where Are You – but her publishers insisted she kept the sex activity in as it was ‘a crucial part of how the characters relate to each other.’ So we will never know how well it would have sold if the characters had settled for just talking pre- and post- coitus.
Decades ago, many readers bought D H Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Henry Miller’s Tropic novels and Anne Desclos’s Story of O, for the sex scenes; porn being much harder to get hold of back then, sex education non-existent, and films and TV positively chaste. But more recently, 50 Shades apart, readers of mainstream fiction, as opposed to erotica fans, seem, by and large, to prefer the tongue-in-cheek jolly and improbable romps of writers like Jilly Cooper. Or for the author to just get on with the (non sexual) action.
Many writers say they steer clear of detailed sex scenes, as such writing can often end up cringe-inducing for both them and the reader. Or so boring it sends the reader into a coma. Giles Coran still rues the fact that his first (only?) foray into novel writing is now only remembered for it winning him the bad sex writing award.
Ian Rankin admits to including a sex scene in his first Rebus novel, as he thought that was what writers were supposed to do. But his heart wasn’t in it, readers didn’t like it, and he found himself feeling very squeamish thinking about Rebus in bed with someone. So all later books leave the couple as they enter the bedroom or, more often, see a disappointed Rebus going for a pint or three on his own – and developing a new twist in the plot.
Avoidance is my cop out too. Characters may think about, or even discuss, their sleeping arrangements at the end of a chapter, but the next chapter is likely to begin with one of the happy couple down stairs making an early morning cup of tea for the other.
Maybe I should try spicing things up and increase my chances of fame and fortune? Make the earth move, or at least get a few floorboards squeaking? Maybe not. At least, with the bedroom door firmly closed and the lights out, I will avoid being in the running for that dreaded bad sex award.
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