Is this a kissing book? How to write sex scenes

This was a panel at #Nerdcon 2015. Transcribed here in 2023.

Patrick Rothfuss, Stephanie Perkins, Jacqueline Carey, Maureen Johnson

"Not necessary to be on the page, necessary to have happened" - Stephanie Perkins

Kvothe becoming the god of sex was a coming of age story
"I'm from the midwest, that's my excuse for so many things" -Rothfuss

Rothfuss--poetry and moonlight, "Who writes dialogue in a sex scene?"

That's on Youtube, Youtube Amber Benson Rothfuss sex…with safe search

"You're ruining our fantasy with your...woman parts"

Sex is super taboo--America.

"Pick your battles, choose your language carefully"

Most of our bad words are about sex, women, or both.

"I don't know how to combat [people being upset] except to put in in the book and know people are going to bitch about it"

"Let's get into the mechanics of sex"
Pat frustratedly cannot find a whiteboard marker.

No one way to write sex scenes (duh)
Stephanie Perkins--look at other writers who are writing them
She focusses on healthy sex relationships
(KKBB)
"friendship gong to bigger, better place"
"Gail foreman"
"Where she went"
Meaningful sex.

Note, 2023: I have no idea what the above means, at all

Pat--Not a lot of examples in epic fantasy

Heinlen does sex scenes in a "risque, comfortable way"--rothfuss
Rarely see two people who are just friends who are like "Why don't we have sex"

An author Perkins likes has a couple that’s been married for a while (Diana Gabaldon, Outlander, adapted into a show on Starz), still having fun sex.

Rothfuss talking about Night Shift
Unexpected when female goes and picks guy and then has sex

Rothfuss--acknowledged social taboos (homosexual), aren't pushing envelope like taboos people don't acknowledge (like people who've been married for a long time having interesting sex)

Good sex rooted in the emotion of the character's journey of that time, also earned

Stephanie Perkins is doing horror now?
Says not different from romance
(both unknown, about the leaving stuff out)
(once monster is revealed, things are less scary)
"Things are so much sexier when you're dealing with the emotions rather than the body parts touching", "give the reader the room to fill things in in their head"

Like the scene with kote fighting the Scrael, there is no fight.

"I'm not hesitant to bring in a conflict or a monster, why am I afraid to bring in sex?"

"I'm perpetuating that sex HAS to be special, it has to fit in with the character arc, it HAS to be essential sex"

"Romance does not belong in Mystery"
"If anyone is in love, they have to die."
"All those people have to go, anyone who's in love, or the person you would talk to next, they're gonna die"--paraphrase. --Jacqueline Carey

50 shades is TMI
Imagination is better.
"Too mechanical. Go back to home depot"

Consensually (esp re: 50sog)
 "Are there lines we shouldn't cross?"

Patrick:
Yes. But I'm going to talk about this in my NEXT panel.
There are things that are bad in our culture that don't need reinforcing
(The classic 50s movie romance, dude grabs a woman, she slaps him, he kisses are again and she melts. ) That's a bad thing to glamorize this.
"That's irresponsible"

Stephanie:
No, we should have EVERYTHING
50sog is erotica, different genre.
I'm looking for emotional connection.
But we need to analyze things and change them in healthier directions

Jacqueline:
When people get upset, they seem to be getting upset that people are able to give consent. They're responding negatively to agency, that people are able to make that choice. Reading old things from a new lens…it's a horror show.
You have to turn that off and hold both things in your head.

Patrick:
50sog is powerful, there's a market for it, but it feels irresponsible.

Moderator:
I made sure in my erotic books that consent is super important, so people have deep conversations about pleasure, about boundaries. Drawing lines between erotic play and sexual violent, there's a line and that line is consent….
...
…I have a problem with the commercialization of fan fiction on the scale of 50sog. I giggled because Stephanie Meyers perverse characters were turned into these things, and [I'd] feel kind of violated if those were my characters.

Perkins:
But things like 50sog bring in new readers, who look for things in that same genre, and then slowly expand, so there is some good from it.
...
"any time you're tired of hearing about a thing, remember that it's bringing in new people, and writers benefit"

Moderator:
Most women have a book that in their formative years is "that book" I don't know if that's true for men.

Patrick:
"I'm afraid I need more text in my subtext. What do you mean that book?

Women:
(start naming books)

Stephanie: Did you read something sexy that opened something inside of you? Did you have a blossoming?

What made Roth Fuss?

Patrick: I found my dads playboys from the 60s which are not the same as having "that book". I'm so grateful that that was my introduction, given what's on the internet.

I didn't have that book.