Greetings, friends!
I’m excited to share my first piece of published fiction, Suspension Points. Big shout out to Cleaver’s fiction editor Miriam Camitta, who helped me whip this story into shape, so to speak. On that note, fair warning that the story is adult in nature. Not erotica, but definitely not for kids (or squeamish adults).
This brings me to a very relevant advice column question that came in this week:
How do I get over the awkwardness of writing (and publishing) sex scenes?
Dear reader, how I wish I could tell you I’d overcome this particular challenge. I still find it incredibly awkward, for a complex mesh of reasons:
I can’t stop imagining the audience reading the scene and wondering if it’s thinly veiled nonfiction
I can’t figure out how much detail to include before it crosses over into straight-up smut (nothing wrong with smut, just not what I’m typically aiming for)
I feel sympathy for my overexposed characters
I typically default to writing awkward or unpleasant sex—writ…