Sex Scenes Are Just Another Scene: How to Write Them Without Making It Weird

Let’s just say it: writing sex scenes is weird… until it’s not.

In this episode of Margs & Manuscripts, we sit down with author Susan Ferber to talk about how to write sex scenes, why they matter in storytelling, and what separates a good scene from one that completely pulls the reader out.

This isn’t a “how spicy should your book be” conversation. It’s about craft—how intimacy functions in a story, how to write scenes that actually move the plot forward, and why sex scenes should be treated like any other scene in your book.

We get into the nuance of writing desire, tension, and connection—without overexplaining, overdescribing, or making your reader cringe. From dialogue-driven intimacy to the power of what you don’t show on the page, this episode breaks down what actually works.

We also talk about the bigger conversation around women writing sex, the double standard around “smut,” and why stories centered on female desire are still treated differently in publishing.

If you’ve ever wondered:

• Do I need a sex scene in my book?
• How explicit is too explicit?
• Why do some scenes feel natural and others feel… off?

This one’s for you.

What We Cover

•  How to write sex scenes that feel natural and not forced 
•  Why sex scenes should function like any other scene in your story 
•  Writing intimacy through dialogue vs description 
•  How much detail is actually necessary (and when less is more) 
•  The role of tension, power, and emotional stakes in intimate scenes 
•  “Spice” vs “smut” vs storytelling—what’s the difference? 
•  Do you need to show consent and protection on the page? 
•  Writing awkward vs polished intimacy (and why both can work) 
•  What makes a sex scene cringe vs compelling 
•  The double standard around women writing sex 
•  Why romance and intimacy are often labeled as “lesser” 
•  How reader imagination plays a role in writing intimacy 
•  Whether a book needs a sex scene at all

About Susan Ferber

Susan Ferber is the author of The Essence of an Hour and We Were Very Merry, with her third novel What Other Years Have Done releasing September 2026.

Her work explores female identity, women’s relationships, and the complexities of love, desire, and power across time. She is particularly interested in how stories set in the past can shape our understanding of women’s rights today.

Susan is also a book editor and currently lives in London with her husband—yes, very much a romance novel setup.

Listen + Follow

If you liked this episode, make sure to follow Margs & Manuscripts wherever you listen to podcasts and check out our full episode library on our website.

You can also shop books from our featured authors (including Susan!) through our Bookshop—supporting both indie bookstores and the writers we love.

Let’s Talk

What’s your biggest pet peeve when reading sex scenes? Drop it in the comments or DM us—we’re dying to know.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Who are we talking to this week, Kate? Beyond excited. Susan has been um somebody that I have been saving this episode for like the exact right time. And this week, I I literally was like, Susan, I'm feeling it. Like, do you what are you doing this week? I need to get you on, and I I'm so excited to talk about this topic. And she's so cool, and she was immediately ready to go. So I need to introduce her properly. But Susan Ferber, she was born in Buffalo, New York. She's the author of The Essence of an Hour, and we were very merry. And her upcoming book comes out this September, What Other Years Have Done. And that's going to be published by Valley Press. Susan writes about feminine and the female identity, as well as women's friendships and doomed romances. So she's got it covered. She's particularly interested in how setting stories in the past can inform our understanding of women's rights today. Yes. Never more accurate. She's also a book editor and lives in London with her husband and has the most perfect, wonderful life.

SPEAKER_02 1:06

Like you, she is who we picture when we think of the perfect bookish life. Yes, I love her.

SPEAKER_01 1:13

And I'm recording this intro after we've already talked to her and I geek the fuck out talking to her because she is so cool.

SPEAKER_02 1:20

So and I just I just want to be here. I want to be as chic as she is. I want to have that accent and not sound like a Canadian. Like, how can you be as cool as Susan? I don't know.

unknown 1:31

I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 1:32

Yep. But it was delightful. I am gonna have one tiny disclaimer on this topic. It is all about sex scenes. So if you're not comfortable talking about sex, we rarely have like these types of disclaimers on any episodes. But if you're not talking comfortable talking about sex, that's totally cool. That this may be an episode where you get like five minutes in, you're like, maybe not today.

SPEAKER_01 1:53

We don't censor language or anything, but it's a fun chat with your writer friends about the experience of writing sex scenes. If you're down, if you're a clean author and you don't write them and you have no interests, then totally fine.

SPEAKER_02 2:08

Totally fine. But also, we dive deep into the topics of feminism, about sex scenes from the female perspective versus the males. And it's also a lovely conversation about what books we read when we were younger that gave us a new perspective on what literature could be. But please enjoy the episode. We're very excited about it. Um, if you did not see on social media this week, but we launched our website. It is a labor of love, and it is going to be all things marks and manuscripts, where you can find um all of the guests that we had on the show. Um, it has a link over to our merch shop. And also, very excitingly, we have our bookshop on our site. Um, so any book you buy through our bookshop is a means of supporting not just us, but also our author guests. Um, it goes through bookshop.org. It's a place for independent bookstores to give more of the profits back to the authors versus shopping at some of like the bigger stores like Amazon or Target or any of those. So if you want to support our authors or if you want to help support us, shop through those links. Super awesome. So buckle up, enjoy the episode, and afterwards, maybe comment on social media or leave a comment on the podcast about what's your biggest cringe when reading sex games.

SPEAKER_01 3:37

Susan, you have been on our list for so long to get in touch with. So thank you for being available. We've been like dying to talk to you. Every time you come up on social media, I'm always like, oh my God, she is so cool.

SPEAKER_00 3:51

God, that is like make it when you make it, baby, because I'm cool.

SPEAKER_01 3:56

You are I feel the same way most days. Yeah. And it was so um, I was very validated as soon as I emailed you and I was like, hey, do you do you like, do you want to come on and like talk about what we're gonna talk about? And she was and and you were like, yeah, I'm in England. And I was like, God damn it, you are so cool. So what is it in I totally want to get to our topic and we will we'll we'll arrive there eventually. What's the what's the um tie to London? Is it is it your husband? Did you grow up living there? Like what's the how did you end up in London?

SPEAKER_00 4:29

Yes, I'm originally from Buffalo, New York, or kind of like a small suburb outside of there. And I came over, gosh, 14 years ago to study at Oxford. Um, and then I met my husband, and then I've just kind of never left. Yeah, like we got married quite young, so I could purposefully stay out of the country. So I always say, I'm married to convenience, conveniently we loved each other. Um, so yeah, so that's that's why I'm here. He's from London, uh, and we just we've just met at university, and yeah, that's kind of we live in, as I said, kind of a one-bedroom flat in Pimlico, and we are both obsessed with books. Um, so yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:11

Cheers, like living with cheers to that.

SPEAKER_02 5:15

Oh god. So you're telling me essentially, you are living a romance novel. I know.

SPEAKER_00 5:21

I mean, I wish. I wish it was as exciting as that. I feel like now I'm in like the bit after you end it, and it's not that exciting anymore. But for a year, for a year I was living it.

SPEAKER_01 5:32

Amazing. So the history here is that Susan hit me up. Um, Susan's been a friend of the pod. She's been listening since day one, and and we've been in touch with her, and she's awesome. Um, but she hit me up and she was like, dude, let's chat about sex scenes. And I was like, absolutely. This is something we haven't covered yet. We briefly touch upon it in a few episodes, and every time we touch upon it, I'm like, we need to do a whole episode on this, and but we need the right person to just come in and like really like get in the weeds with us about this topic because Jenna and I, like, we have varying degrees of very different degrees of spice. I am a little baby baby author when it comes to sex scenes. Jenna is a little bit more experienced in writing them. And I feel like Susan, like you can just talk a little a little bit more about like your personal experience and like opening up and and like what works for you and what doesn't work, or like I don't know. I literally just I'm here to learn.

SPEAKER_00 6:39

I mean, I think I write sex scenes because I enjoy reading sex scenes. I mean I think it's a book should cover what life is, and it's such a part of life. And I don't know, maybe it's because I grew up in a very conservative Catholic household. It was like never speak about sex. Then from like quite young, 13, 14, when I wanted to be a writer, I was like, I want to include sex scenes as sort of this rebellion, I think, in a way. Uh, and then also like even reading books around that time, I was just imagining sex scenes in them. Um so even though they clearly is not there in Wuthering Heights, I was like, yes, they definitely do. And I reread it like recently, and I was like, where where did you think it was? Like, where were you? Right. But I heard this memory that was definitely there. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_02 7:32

And even when you watch, this is a mild tangent, don't care. Um, when you watch the movie, everyone's like, this isn't the book. I'm like, it's not supposed to be the book. Like, it's supposed to be that excitement that you had when you first read it. You're like, whoa, this is an epic love story, but it's not like Yes.

SPEAKER_00 7:51

I I completely agree. And I felt like it gave that to me. And I was like, oh, like this is my 13-year-old brain gone mental, but like it's not there. But it's kind of about like that reader perception of it. And I think that that kind of brings me back to what I like writing in sex scenes is it's both about being somewhat graphic enough or detailed enough, but then launching it into the reader's own imagination and what they can uh do with it and what they want to be there or not to be there. Um, so I think sometimes less is more, but you have to give something. So maybe I'm like between the two of you. So my favorite sex scenes in literature, I think, is um in James Baldwin, his writing, I just find it phenomenal. Uh, another country, I again I recently reread it in preparation for this, so I could so I could name drop it. Um to me, I remember reading that book. Oh gosh, I was 20 years old, and like there was just this one sex scene, and I was sitting in a cafe, and I was like, I don't know if I can get on with the rest of my day because this is this powerful and impactful, and like it just it's so transgressive, and it's just about this couple that's getting together for the first time, and like there's so much like hate, but love, and just like they're alone and yet they're together. I don't know. It's just everything that ever goes into that very intimate moment, just unpacked and explored, um, and through lots of metaphors, and yeah, this it is quite detailed, like there's lots of smells, and you know, you get those feelings of touch, and um, it's it's very visual and it's writing. And so that kind of is always my my go-to point. I cannot write as well as Baldwin. He was a genius, but that's kind of my that's kind of my go-back point. Like, how did I feel when I read that scene? Met with a lot of other scenes that I love from literature, like Lady Chatcherly's lover, or um, another example is like I really love uh Alan Hollinghurst. And I think when writing sex, and I think sometimes where people like get so weird about it is in writing it, certainly in reading it, but even in writing it is because they're like, I'm writing a sex scene, rather than it just being like, I'm writing a scene, and this is what needs to happen in the scene. So for me, I really love writing dialogue. So I don't like writing descriptions that much. Um, my whole thing is like, how do you get people to interact with each other? Where, how do they ping off of each other? What in the world are they going to say? You put two people in a room, and what happens? So, that to me is a sex scene. It's about what has to be accomplished between these two people. What do they both want from this? What do they not want from it? What alchemy comes from it? Um, and I think if you think of it as this dialogue, and also, you know, when you're writing dialogue, you do cut out certain words that you don't need, or you know, the commonplace things that, like, yeah, we get that you wouldn't put that in a book. That to me is writing a sex scene as well, is how do you how do you trim it and convey uh what you need to within that kind of set limit of of space.

SPEAKER_02 10:52

And it's like you omit the things that would almost like pull the reader out of the scene. Like you want you want the scene to be like every piece of it was needed and not having readers like gloss over the in-between or gloss over the transitions. Like you want all of it to feel like this like tumultuous storm that has multifacets to it, and without one, it doesn't exist. And it's almost it, it's like pun intended, it's like chemistry.

SPEAKER_00 11:28

And you're kind of like, what are these two people going to do? And I think it's kind of like my favorite scenes are like, could these people like kill each other right now? Could they like it? Like there's like almost like a violence there sometimes. I think I think it's just so like emotional, and as a reader, you're like, yeah, what you then feel part of that, and you I think like with all you know parts of literature, you feel triggered into your own memories or into your own experiences and how you relate to that text. Totally agree.

SPEAKER_02 12:00

When you mentioned how there needs to be like a result at the end of this scene, and you treat it like any other chapter or scene of it needs to move the story along. I just the whole time you were talking, I was just thinking about like there's this one scene in like my book um that I I came up with the end before I even wrote the sex scene itself, and it was like something needed to happen. Like she had to deny him, she had to like deny herself. But I'm like, how do we get there? And then I like just worked backwards and it it made that scene so much stronger when I had to come back and edit it. I'm like, wow, this one like actually has that drive and the purpose, and it feels like the pace is correct because I started with the end in mind and then went back and kind of wrote their journey through it.

SPEAKER_00 12:53

So if it doesn't serve the story or it doesn't serve the characters and it's just there, again, like a piece of dialogue or a piece of description, does it actually need to be there then? So how does it, how does it move things forward? I think is is the idea.

SPEAKER_01 13:06

This is the only my book that's coming out is the only time I've ever written or had any experience writing a sex scene. Um and it was like very much part of her still like she needed to to do it. Like she needed to have this experience with somebody who wasn't like her long-term relationship or whatever, but it was like, I'm so awkward at this that I'm just going to, I was like, done, I'm gonna lean into that. I'm gonna make this feel really awkward for them because it's not always like, yes, there, I was like, I was like, I want this like really deep desire because there is just like infatuation and desire between these characters, and it's like deep, but they're both very awkward. There's like a lot of banter. There's there's just like trying to get to that like point of where they both want to get to, but they're like, I just this I have to make this feel as real as possible. To have two people that are just like really good at like like playing the game and like leading into the chemistry and like getting there really naturally is just not how real that is for me personally.

SPEAKER_02 14:10

Like when I read your sex scene, because I know you were you were so nervous about it. But I read it and I'm like, this is Kate, like this is like so real and tangible and like tactile, and it was just it was so fun, and it was that moment in her life that I'm like that is like a snapshot that you'll never forget. And it was so it was so funny, but not in like a like funny ha ha, but like a funny in that you could capture a moment like that so well without it feeling like you're trying too hard.

SPEAKER_01 14:50

When I was writing it, I've I'm like I said, I'm a baby when it comes to even reading like this material, just because I I just screw up reading the classic. Like I just didn't, like you, Susan, like I just it wasn't something that was even like in mainstream stuff that I was picking up for such a long time that literally my sexual awakening when it came to reading was like fourth wing. Like essentially. Very recent. Yeah. And I was just like, oh, this is what they're writing now. Like, oh, I like it. Oh, I'm like a fan. I don't dislike it. But like now that I've picked up a lot more kind of contemporary romance books and stuff, I'm noticing like trends of people needing to check boxes in their scenes that are like, okay, I need to make sure that they're having safe sex. I need to make sure that it's consensual. Like they're adding in like kind of dialogue that feels like, is this okay for you? Are you sure? Are you sure? And the woman has to be like, yes, let's do it. You know, like, and I'm like, is that always that doesn't feel as natural to me, but are we supposed to be checking these boxes now? Is everybody supposed to be like on the same page about whether two characters in it consensual and safe all the time? I don't know. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:03

Tricky. And I think like, um, I know for instance, Sally Rooney in her most recent book, Intermezzo, which I have a lot of thoughts on Sally Rooney. Yeah. Me too.

SPEAKER_01 16:14

I feel like we can really connect over Sally Rooney thoughts.

SPEAKER_00 16:18

One, I don't like how she writes sex seats, and it really bothers me. Um, because I'll get to that in a second. But I did like, I did like this. I did like how in her recent book she had these two characters and they were quite like awkward characters. So like the one was like, Oh, do you have protection? And then he's like, Oh, I do have so like it made sense that these people would be checking in with each other about that. And like she's also really writing about millennialism and kind of, you know, the way ways we speak now with each other and everything like that. So it felt more natural. But yeah, I think it is it is it's a difficult one to navigate, which is you know, should should we always be checking in when we have sex? Yeah, of course. And we should be making sure that sex is consensual, but does that does that happen in such an obvious way all the time? Not necessarily. And so how do you reflect that? And then I also think, as I said, like books have to reflect all types of sex. And certainly my books, you know, I write about non-consensual sex. I write about what that, what that feels like, what happens when that happens to you, or you don't know how to interpret what what happened. Um, so I think, you know, I think it is good that we've moved away from like the kind of like gone with the wind, bodice ripper kind of like, yeah, I don't want it. And then she wakes up in the morning, she's like, oh my god, it was the most amazing thing. And you knew what I always wanted. Oh, now I'm a real woman. Like, that's really good that we move beyond that. Um, but yes, like there's such a thorny, difficult subject that it can't ever really be safe. Um, so I think you can have characters not having safe sex and still make that like that's not a good, you're not necessarily moralizing in the book. Like you can read that and be like, well, that's not good that they've done that. Um, or all that kind of stuff. So it needs to, I think, both reflect life and also challenge us. And we can challenge what we're reading as well and say, oh, that's not, that's not, that is toxic, that's not good, or I quite like that, but I recognize that that's toxic. What's going on there? Which is probably most of my reading experience. See what details.

SPEAKER_01 18:28

And I think at some point too, even it, even if the dynamics are safe and they're, you know, and it and it's gonna be a sex scene that you want to happen and it's all great and it's all good and it's all consensual, but there's like this also like suspending disbelief at some point, right? You're not describing a whole thing where your character's putting on a condom. I'm just gonna suspend disbelief that there's an alternative form of birth control happening unless she ends up pregnant in another part of the book. Like, I don't need like a paragraph about did you bring a condom? No, do I have a condom? Should we go get a condom? Do you have do are like and I'm like, just I'm gonna just assume everything's good, you guys. Like you don't need to crack all of it.

SPEAKER_00 19:10

Does it add up to anything? Like, is this about like, oh, he says he does, and then like he's kind of a bit of a cat of a character, and like he just used an old one, exactly like I don't know, like maybe that this is happening off stage somewhere.

SPEAKER_01 19:23

I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 19:25

What purpose is it serving? I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 19:27

Yeah, exactly, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 19:28

I think it's like teenage characters where that's really, really important that they check in on that. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 19:34

Yes. And it's like every part of the scene needs to be important to the scene's purpose. And if that isn't part of the purpose, I think we kind of get a pass. Like you don't need to talk about that if it's not going to be impactful of the progression of the story.

SPEAKER_01 19:52

Right. I think well it's probably dependent too, but I think there's I get really frustrated with that we could do a whole episode on this too, which is like this the readers that can't suspend disbelief at all. So like when I was beta reading or whatever, there was like those that were like my scene was like, she gets, you know, she she gets on a motorcycle or whatever, and they're like, Well, she had a backpack. Where's her backpack? Did she put her backpack on when she got on a motorcycle?

SPEAKER_00 20:19

I say this to you. Okay, so I will bring this back. I will bring this back to the point. So my first book, my first book, there's this scene where they the young couple, they go for like this picnic together. Well, not even a picnic, that's the whole problem. They go to a lake in the height of summer and they don't actually end up having sex, but it's one of the most romantic kind of sexual moments of her life because she realizes it's the first time she ever shows like herself naked to a boy and he sees her naked and she realizes she wants to have sex and then everything goes wrong. Anyway, it's supposed to be a very moving love story scene. My husband reads it and goes, but what did they have for lunch? And I'm like, Are you kidding me? He's like, Well, the character of Teddy definitely would have wanted to bring a beer. I can't imagine him having this whole scene without having a beer. I'm like, are you serious? This is what you're thinking about. Is it they had lunch or not? And I think he probably didn't.

SPEAKER_01 21:14

But so this is my thoughts on the sex scenes. I'm just like, I'm just like, can we just all agree that they both are consenting to this if this is if this is what the scene is giving?

SPEAKER_00 21:25

I suppose we can go back to this in a second as well. It's like, who are you writing for when you write those scenes? Um, and I think ultimately like you kind of need to write them for yourself in some regard. I mean, it's like, I think Robert Frost has a quote about no tears while writing, no tears while reading. So I just applied that to sex scenes. So if like it it needs to be arousing, I think, to everybody. Um, and so I go in with that. And then I have one particular friend that I'm like, I really want her to enjoy this. So I'm going to write this for her. And I think she's a pretty good sort of stand in for a general reader. But aside from that, as I said, it's it's really based on what I've loved to read myself. Uh in that, and well, all of my writing is based on what I would want to read, but in that in particular. I mean, the second book I wrote is about a marriage that goes wrong. And is it based on my husband? No. Because we're still marriage. But, you know, is it kind of somewhat entangled within our relationship? Yes. Uh, and I think he he felt quite flattered by the portrait of potentially somebody that might have been representative of him in no possible way. It is nothing like him, but there you go. Um, so I think yes, and I think you you just have to kind of suspend that that that caring in a way, and it has to be ultimately not selfish, but just detached. Um and yeah, but I think you are right. And it is, it is both. I think this goes to all writing that it is both you and it's not you at the same time.

SPEAKER_02 23:04

So my my day job, I'm uh user experience strategist. So I am always telling my clients, you are not your user. So don't make decisions based off of solely you. You are one of your users, but you are not the user. So we like do all these audience personas and we like strategize what does this audience need? What does that audience need? And I'm so used to that. So when I got to write these sex scenes, or really just like my book in general, it was like, I'm not even gonna think about who this is for. I just want, I just want to vomit it out. Like very visceral reaction, but like I just need to get it out. And what I found was I took probably like the mild forms of my personality and I exploited them until like they were almost, they were toxic at points for this character. And same with like her relationship or same thing with her friends. It's like I took moments from the people around me and I just amplified them, and it turned out really, really cool. And I'm very excited for people to read it, but I need to finish editing it. But um it was it was another one of those moments of this isn't me. This isn't for me. This is something that just came out of me, but you you aren't your work solely, and your readers aren't your sole audience, and it's a lovely Venn diagram of who the books are actually for.

SPEAKER_01 24:42

No, I completely, yeah, I completely agree. When you when you decide to include whatever type of sex scene you're gonna write, whatever it, whether it's like has all the words that everybody hates and you makes people uncomfortable, or it's gonna be romantic, or whatever type of sex you decide to include in your book, you're opening yourself up to that type of of criticism, which is which is fine. And I think um there's there's gonna be people who feel a certain way about it. I just read um The Story Might Save Your Life. Did anybody read that one yet? Not yet.

SPEAKER_02 25:21

No.

SPEAKER_01 25:22

Super fucking fantastic book, Obsessed, audiobook was insane, highly recommend. I came out of that. I'm I'm gonna there's no spoilers, but there's not a sex scene in it. But it is a like slow like relationship between two best friends. That if there was a sex scene, it would have been so good. Like so good.

SPEAKER_02 25:49

So it's almost like the antithesis of a sex scene that is almost as powerful as what a sex scene would be.

SPEAKER_00 25:58

Yeah, it would be a good thing. And like that is more powerful, isn't it? Like that it's all and like I guess I just want to read one so loud from these characters, but it just didn't it didn't happen. Yeah, like you just you desperately want these characters to come together and it just not but it is all there, and like I think that is a sex scene in a way. Like it's not the scene you want, but it's the it's the buildup and the without the release, I suppose.

SPEAKER_01 26:20

Yes, and it I mean figuratively and literally it's not that I missed it, but at the end, I was just like, man, if she had had a scene, it would have been so good. Um, still a great book, but yeah, and then there's there's gotta be re I think people like actively make the choice of whether to include them or not to include them all the time. Can I say things that annoy me in sex scenes?

SPEAKER_03 26:45

Yes, okay.

SPEAKER_00 26:47

So I've been thinking about this. Had sex scenes. So okay, this is back to Sally Rooney, and I you know, I do like her, but men are always moving inside of her characters, and I really hate that expression. He moved inside of me. I find it weird. I just find it weird. I mean, technically, yeah, it might be happening, but I find it like even from a feminist perspective, quite strange. It makes the woman entirely passive. And also like, I don't that's what that's why it bugs me. Yeah, thank you for articulating that. And like she always uses it. It's in every single book. Damn it. And I'm like, please just stop moving inside of people. I really don't like it.

SPEAKER_01 27:30

There are like, I feel like it definitely like on Instagram and stuff, you see a lot of people who are like, please don't describe your folds.

SPEAKER_00 27:37

And yeah, nobody wants to know about that. Like maybe they do, but like you, I again, like you just you you have to be like an immensely talented writer, I think, to pull that off. Um, and most, you know, most of us have to operate within our lanes and know what we can do and what what feels what feels natural to us. Um, and I think sometimes like going overly graphic just for the sake of it is not right. Um, so I just like to use words that I probably can't say on this podcast.

SPEAKER_01 28:08

Um, but you know number one, you can say number two, I didn't know that you could say those words in literature when sometimes when I was reading some of these books, I'm just like, oh my god, we can write that. Oh, right, we can write whatever we want from.

SPEAKER_00 28:24

I mean, to be fair, when I first read Atonement, I didn't know what that word meant. Um, with the the the C word. I was like, what is this? And I had to call up my friend and I was 15 years old, and he didn't really know what it meant either, but he had a good guess.

SPEAKER_02 28:44

So it wasn't even in the dawn of I have to Google it. It's a I need a firsthand experience of talking to someone about it.

SPEAKER_00 28:54

And I just use that word, and I feel really empowered when I use it because I'm like, I do know what this means now.

SPEAKER_01 29:01

See, so you're not including it just to throw it out there for people to be to feel a certain way about it. Okay, this isn't supposed to invoke a reaction from you. This is just how I want to describe, or this is just how I'm being moved to describe this.

SPEAKER_00 29:16

Yes, yeah, I think like somewhat like plainly is is quite like what I like to do. But okay, other bad sex scenes. Um, I read one recently, and somebody described the woman as having an orgasm as being like playing an accordion. I do not want to be compared to any musical instrument of any kind. This is also written by a woman, which I was slightly baffled by.

SPEAKER_02 29:40

But it's better than a bagpipe, I guess.

SPEAKER_01 29:44

Like, if you're gonna choose a musical instrument, it could be worse. And maybe that is her lived experience. And who am I to tell? But not how I personally would feel.

SPEAKER_00 29:59

Um, but yeah, and then I think obviously the obvious one is like when men just write bad like descriptions of women. And it like I'm always like really disappointed when it's like a male author that like I really love, and I just think like writes stunning like otherwise. And they're like, really? Oh no, baby. You could you edit that out for editing books like after the fact, but like part of me wants to be like for your own good. Let's just take that out.

SPEAKER_02 30:27

Yes, you like, especially people that we always talk about you have resources, you have people you can ask the questions of go ask a woman. Go just like take the steps, put your toxic masculinity away for just a hot second and go talk to a woman about how she would like to be described in a sex scene written by a man. Is that so hard?

SPEAKER_01 30:58

Who's the man writing it for?

SPEAKER_02 31:01

Hmm.

SPEAKER_00 31:02

Who's the man writing it for? Because yeah, we sometimes as women write for other women, don't we?

SPEAKER_01 31:07

But we talked about that in our writing men episodes where we were like, I mean, we're writing it for the girls. There are things that I I've put in noticing being like, ooh, the girls are gonna like that. Okay, yes. That one, the girls are gonna like that.

SPEAKER_00 31:24

I think that's important. I think sometimes you have to just be like, the girls are gonna like that. They're gonna like and I I think that's important. Like, get the people And then maybe and maybe the boys will read it and maybe pick up a few tips. There's this thing about when women write sex or when they write about pleasure, or they write about these things, then you just label it as smut and it's like, oh, it's lesser than. Um, and that's that's really that's wrong. And I think it is, I think that's why it's so important is women to write about sex because it is political and it is us reclaiming a space that one we're supposed to always be quiet about, and we're not supposed to talk about, and we're certainly not supposed to write about, and we're supposed certainly not supposed to have any kind of joy or pleasure in it or thoughts about it. Um yeah, opinions, heaven forbid. We should just be lying there and taking it and um letting him move inside of us. That's about it.

SPEAKER_02 32:14

Playing us like a bagpipe.

SPEAKER_01 32:17

It's so true though. I mean, I just think about how much advertising and storytelling and everything that we've ever experienced that appeals to the male forever, forever. Even if it's a literal commercial on TV, it has to appeal to a male's like sexual drive and whatever. And it's like as soon as women come along and we're like, and and this is, I feel like a very new thing. And we we talk a little bit about it with Crystal in our The Bodice Rippers episode, but like it's like this thing that like women should not also be appealed to in that same way.

SPEAKER_00 32:56

Like, if it is for women, I I still think we're living through this where if it is for women, it's deemed lesser. And like, yes, there are like thrillers or you know certain genres that probably men read more than women do. And then yes, there are like types of way that types of ways that you write sex scenes in that way because it is for a male audience, and maybe then you compare that to romance novels. But I don't know, I don't think I don't think it's a fair comparison in ways, because even in like literary fiction, you just assume that even when a man can't write sex about a woman that women are going to read that. And then there's because the men write in the universal, versus I think even women at a very high level are still seen as writing for other women. Um, and that's and therefore like there's not this hard divide between writing romance and whatever for women because it's all just labeled as lesser and smot. It's all women's fiction, yeah. It's all women's fiction. Like, what is what is women's fiction? Like, is there men's fiction? I think there is, it's just called fiction. Um, so it's just World War II history.

unknown 34:04

It's true.

SPEAKER_02 34:05

It's really true though, isn't it? Um The Roman Empire.

SPEAKER_00 34:12

It's called It's I don't know. It's just um, and like I do love, there are many, many, like most, not most, but a lot of my favorite sex scenes have been written by men. Have they been written by gay men? Yes. Or um, you know, men who are bisexual, yes. But you know, it's not to say men can't write it, but I think lots of men don't they they they're not genreified or they're not pigeonholed in the same way that women are when they write about these things, or they're not lambasted, um, or it's not like, oh, all it is is about sex, um, and that kind of way. Uh so in as as women are then held accountable for, or people like one of my favorite writers is Edna O'Brien, and um, like a lot of my books are kind of based on what she wrote um about Ireland in the 1960s uh in terms of women's rights, and they were famously banned because she included sex. Um, it was also famously banned because she may have included people from her own small town in Ireland, um, including a very well-to-do man that she'd had sex with. But they were banned by the Catholic Church and and kind of her local community, and her mother wouldn't speak to her for years, and they were burned and all this kind of stuff. Um, and I'm grateful, well, we are still living in that era in many, many ways. Uh, but you know, it is kind of that thing of like, ooh, people would open up those books to try to find the sexy scenes and not treat it Israel literature. And that also is, you know, the threat of that, which I don't think you would do with a man. Maybe, maybe, maybe some writers you do. I don't know, but not in the same way.

SPEAKER_02 35:46

But you also have to look statistically, who's buying books right now? Who's reading fiction? Women.

SPEAKER_00 35:52

And women read more fiction, and women are the burden novel. We have Jane Austen. Like the novel, I think, is an inherently like it is it's a woman's art form. And so it makes sense that there are so many novels by women, about women, for women, and yet why then are more men celebrated in this category? It's bizarre, isn't it? Well, it's not bizarre, it's patriarchy. I wish it was bizarre.

SPEAKER_03 36:19

We have a word for it, patriarchy.

SPEAKER_02 36:22

There's a reason. Yes. So how about we just like disrupt it all? We say there's men's fiction and then there's fiction. That would solve all the problems.

SPEAKER_00 36:34

And then there could be a men's fiction prize, you know, instead of because we have women's fiction prize, which is fabulous and everything. But I just think every year, like, well, why do we do we still need this? And I guess maybe we still do, sadly.

SPEAKER_02 36:45

But it's like one would think at this point dollars would get the point across, like how much money women spend on this. But even then, the buying power does not equal the loudest like voices.

SPEAKER_00 36:59

No, because it's still just deemed like, oh, they, you know, like women have no brains, they just have uh like some money to spend. Um like, you know, like the whole thing around heated rivalry or even weathering heights, and like how people just were like, oh, there's nothing to them, like they're just like these like fluffy sex nonsense, and you know, oh fine, lots of women are spending lots of money on this, it doesn't actually mean anything. And that seems really wrong because who's saying that? Why are we being told that? Why are we being told that our our response to art about sex is lesser?

SPEAKER_02 37:35

And why do women like heated rivalry? Because there's no misogyny in it. And it's just great. Isn't it? Like it is.

SPEAKER_01 37:46

Can we just like because too women I think and and and and I don't mean to make like general assumptions or whatever, but I think like in the world making general assumptions, like women prefer an emotional connection to characters and people and places to then that's why we fucking love a slow burn all day, all day. Eat it up. Because I want to feel that connection to the characters and the plot and the story, and like that's what excites me about a sex scene. It's not like just this like visual part of it. I think that like in the general public, we all think that like men are super visual and they just like see something and that's what excites them. Whereas like women need a lot more I don't want to say stimulation. Like we need like more to like be able to like connect and and feel that like to like get into it. Sorry, whatever it is.

SPEAKER_02 38:45

But I think like we're not reading it just to read Yeah, we're not reading it just to find the dick. Like we're reading it because we want the relationship built.

SPEAKER_01 38:56

We want the story, and that's why this is such a huge money maker right now, because it's it is exciting, it is exciting to read. Like, I like it.

SPEAKER_00 39:06

And I think it's fine to be excited by it as well. Like, you don't have to just be like, oh yeah, I read that. Like you can be excited by it. You should be aroused by it, you should feel something. Like, thank God. It's that's what it's there for. I mean, it is and like that all all writing should make you feel like that. Like you should have a very visceral response to it. And if you don't, well then it's bad writing, isn't it? Like, regardless of whatever it is. Like, I remember probably the first response I ever had to actually reading a book and being like, ooh, that's sexy, was um, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants.

SPEAKER_01 39:41

Was it the coach in the soccer camp?

SPEAKER_00 39:44

No, it was the second book with the Greek, um, the Greek he comes over and they just go for this date and they like eat cookie dough in Washington, DC on like Capitol Hill.

SPEAKER_02 39:57

And then love how you remember everything.

SPEAKER_00 39:59

Oh my god, because I have like read this passage so many times growing up. Like it would mean it was like the most exciting thing ever. Because again, it was like what you were saying, like about how like they don't actually end up doing anything. And like that's actually even more exciting, I think, when you're that age. More obviously, like Judy Bloom Forever um was also great. And then I remember, like, yeah, I do remember when I first read the notebook, for instance, and I think I think it's like page 100, because we genuinely like passed this book around because the sex scene was so great, and we would just like hand it to each other in class and be like, read page 100. Um, and there's something like quite I don't know, there's something really exciting about that, that you have that like it feels quite safe in a way, almost like being being a girl and having these the just these books to read about it. Um like that it is contained, and yes, are they realistic? Maybe not, maybe they are a fantasy, but like it's it's a safe way to learn about your own sexuality and how to then to write about it and how to feel about it and how to respond about it and how to speak to your friends about it. Um that I don't know, maybe men don't have that in the same way, but that's yeah. I don't I don't know why I started talking about the sisterhood of the trailing cats, except that it's actually I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 41:09

I literally wanted to ask everyone what their like sexual awakening book was. That is 100% mine.

SPEAKER_00 41:17

100% mine.

SPEAKER_02 41:18

It it's a tie between that one and I think it's called Angus Thongs and Full Frontal Snogging. Oh, and perfect snogging. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yep, yep.

SPEAKER_03 41:30

What is this book? I actually read the book, but I have seen the film. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:36

So there was like a whole series of books. Um, it was by a British author about like it's a definitely YA, but it's just about this like awkward teenage girl that's learning about like we're learning about like how to kiss boys. Um, what does it mean to like dress like sensually, like like and she has this cat that's absurd and like fat, and it's just it's hilarious. And I remember reading that and be like, wait, you could talk about like kissing boys in books? Like, there wasn't even like a sex scene, I don't think. Not for like a really a couple books in there was. Um, but also Gossip Girl was another book series that I was just obsessed with. Um so like those three.

SPEAKER_00 42:24

And the Princess Diaries. Um Meg Cabot always like she was like really, really good about writing about sex and like kind of graduating you like upward of reading the Princess Diaries. And then I guess like she did talk a lot about safe sex, but again, like those books were for a teenage audience or like from like 12 to 16 or something. So it was actually they were educational in many, many ways. Um, I learned I learned a lot from those books that I certainly did not learn at public school. Thank you, Meg Cabot, for raising me and making me a safe adult. But like, yeah, I think but it's those books were so, as I said, like they were just so informative. Um, and I still think about them. Like, I think about like I want to write a scene that makes a reader as excited as I felt when Lena messed around or whatever with what's his name when he came over from Greece. Costas? Yeah, yeah. Whoa. That came from the depth. I mean, genuinely, like it was um fantastic. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 43:29

For me, it was the soccer coach, and that might say a lot about my preferences of story.

SPEAKER_00 43:33

Thank you, and press house, like for for education. Um, but you know, and I so I do think, yeah, like what I said earlier, like we need all different types of sex represented, and we need all different stages of it represented. And uh, you know, those those kind of difficult conversations, whatever, should be included somewhere. Um, at least, at least for me. Like, I'm I feel so appreciative as a reader to have. That um and to you know really learned from it.

SPEAKER_02 44:04

That was like that, you just summed up our entire one-hour conversation and it was beautiful. And I wanna like like that will be the ending right there. Cause I'm like, that was gorgeous.

SPEAKER_01 44:17

Did we want to do a mini wrap-up, Kate? I would love for Susan to just plug her books real quick. Yes, please.

SPEAKER_02 44:26

Yes, talk about your books for a hot minute and tell us where we can get them and any new projects to your website.

SPEAKER_00 44:34

Um yeah, so uh the third book, my third book is coming out in September, September 10th. It is called What Other Years Have Done. Uh, and it is the final book in a trilogy. Uh, so the first one is The Essence of an Hour, and that came out in 2021. Um, and it follows this character called Lily Kerrigan as she comes of age in the kind of just before the beginning of the Second World War in America, um, into that war period, and she questions things like losing her virginity, um, her loss of innocence and her loss of faith, uh, and her kind of toxic relationship with her uh female best friend, um, and also kind of falling in love with her male best friend at that time, and how all these storylines kind of come to together, and how does she make sense of what happened over one kind of long hot summer? Uh, and then the second book is called We Were Very Merry, um, and that follows Lily into the 1950s and her first marriage, um, which it's not a spoiler to say breaks up uh and is quite um unhappy, but she's trying to retrace the steps of to find out was that marriage always unhappy? It's kind of about this um kind of that post-war period of how women find their identity um when they still very much were beholden to their identity of their husband. And if you educate a woman, you know, what opportunities did she have to kind of forge her own path in in life at that period of time? So then finally, wrap up with this final book, which as I said is out for September. And as I said, it's called What Other Years Have Done. And it is about Lily in the late 1960s with the burgeoning women's liberation movement. Uh, she's now in her mid-40s and she's reflecting back on kind of all these toxic relationships she's had with men and women over the years, and how this all kind of culminates um into you know, women's lib and you know, advocating for uh abortion rights uh for women at that time. And being like, yeah, writing about 1968, 1969, and hmm, it's like pre-Roe vade, and now we're like post-post-Rove-Wade, um, which is very, very frightening. And uh kind of the options of women's birth control is again being very limited. So yeah, it's um it's it's wild. Um, and also I think kind of again that control of women's bodies, the the kind of back to trad wifedom and all that kind of stuff, it's it's scarily more important than I necessarily realized when I was writing it.

SPEAKER_02 47:13

Yeah, that uh you you were probably questioning what decade you actually were in when you were writing it.

SPEAKER_00 47:19

Very much so. Um yeah, very, very much so. I think sometimes you write about the past and you're like, oh, that's the past. And it's like, no, it's it's really not.

SPEAKER_01 47:28

We will have those available on our website as well. Um I'm obsessed with you. Like you're here. I I would clearly like know my love for Susan. But let us know how we can support you at all, like moving forward, like when your book comes out, and like please like keep in touch, message us anytime with just let us know how we can like promote you and what you're doing, and also that's really, really kind.

SPEAKER_00 47:55

I mean, that's why like I love listening to this podcast, even like from the first episode you guys did, because it was like, I don't know. I think being a writer now is very lonely, and like people get very much into their own bubbles, and then I don't know, like nobody really talks about how they did stuff sometimes or uh promotes each other, or there's this like cliche, you walk into a room of other writers, and you all kind of like secretly hate each other because you know, you're like jealous of each other. And like, I don't know, I like listened to that first episode. I was like, this is such a breath of fresh air, and this is like genuinely women supporting other women and supporting a writing community, and that's just so fab. Like that it doesn't have to just again like back to this whole like thing of like I'm gonna sound like a broken record about patriarchy, but I think like we're like in this wow realm of like where it's always competitive and it's always so putting other people down that that can doesn't have to exist, and within like women writing, they can be good women supporting other women. That's really exciting.

SPEAKER_01 48:58

We all win. Yeah, absolutely. And that's totally how it feels, and that's uh it's awesome.