Sex and Murder

 

Terry here with our question of the week: 

Would you prefer to write a sex or a murder scene? Is it important to include both in a crime novel? The short answer is, I don’t have a preference. If the story calls for it, I’ll write it. And I hope to write it well. But in books I read, too often those high-stakes scenes don’t work. 

 One of my favorite panels at conferences is about sex scenes, where authors are given the text of a ridiculous sex scene and are supposed to read it with a straight face. Smirks, eyerolls, and squirming ensue…and that’s just the readers. The audience is usually laughing out loud. I’d much prefer having the author close the door and let me imagine the hot sex than having them write something that sounds preposterous. Or disgusting. Or isn’t particularly sexy. For a sex scene to be satisfying, I think you usually have to have some sense that the characters engaged in the act are actually attracted to each other. 

I’m thinking particularly of reading thrillers written by men in which the 48-year-old hunk of a man is like a god to the 23-year-old redhead with green eyes and the perfect body. (Yeah, they always have red hair and green eyes, a combination that actually exists in maybe .000002 per cent of the population.) She submits readily to his caveman technique. And then he goes away and kills bad guys—until she gets kidnapped and he has to save her. I don’t care how adeptly the author slots part A into part B, I don’t care how perfect their bodies are, if I don’t have some sense of emotional connection, it leaves me cold. 

 Which brings me to writing sex scenes. For me, it’s often more tantalizing to suggest the sex. Here’s my favorite sex scene I ever wrote in a Samuel Craddock novel, the beginning of An Unsettling Crime for Samuel Craddock (which by the way got a starred review—because of the sex scene? Probably not). 

     “When I walk into the kitchen, Jeanne is standing with her back to me stirring oatmeal on the stove. She’s still in her nightgown, and the outline of her body is visible through the sheer fabric. My breath catches. I walk up behind her, put my arms around her, and nuzzle her neck, where she says it always makes her feel weak. She shivers and nestles back into me. She smells like lemon and soap. I slip my hands up to her breasts and she whispers. “Samuel, the oatmeal . . .” 

 I reach over and switch off the burner. She turns around and her mouth comes up to meet mine. We’ve been married for six years and I still can’t get enough of her, ever. She steps onto my feet to bring herself up closer to my height, and also because she knows it arouses me. I move my hands over her and she begins humming that low sound she makes in her throat. 

 The phone begins to ring and she stiffens. “Leave it,” I say. My voice sounds strange to me, hoarse and urgent. She clamps her arms around my neck and I pick her up so she can wrap her legs around my waist. I carry her to the bedroom like that and slam the door to muffle the sound of the telephone. I hear the sound of the volunteer fire department whistle starting up. Thank goodness that’s not for me.” 

 There isn’t much sex in the Craddock novels, and it’s always offstage. But in the Jessie Madison thriller series, I feel less constraint. One, she’s a woman, and I can imagine things more from her point of view. Also, she’s young. And she likes sex. In the latest, In Too Deep, which I just turned in to my editor, there are a few sex scenes, and flirtation scenes as well. In each of the sex scenes, I set it up so that you know the characters engaged in sex are not just attracted physically, but they also like each other. And the sex is on the page. Works for me. Readers? 

 In a way, it’s just as hard to write a murder scene. I want details, but I don’t like sadism or too much gore (that said, I read a vampire novel that was full of gore—and funny as hell—The Southern Ladies Guide to Vampire Hunting). I just started reading a novel by an author I admire, but couldn’t continue past a horrendous scene of sadistic cruelty. I can’t even imagine what the author could have done to make it more palatable. I’m sure there are readers who were able to digest it and move on, but it was too much for me. 

Confession: I haven’t actually ever written a murder scene. The body is always discovered after the fact. In a thriller I wrote that never got completed I wrote a gunfire scene. It was hard to write because there were guns involved. It has to be the right guns for the characters and the setting, the right ammo, the right way the guns are brandished and fired (does the gun have a safety? Is it heavy? Etc). Not to mention whether the gun is going to be concealed, whether the shooter is well-trained, whether the gun belongs to him or her, whether he has a right to the gun. All that has to be set up for it to be a reasonable scene. Same is true with any kind of murder method. If you are going to write the scene, you better know how the fire is set and how it proceeds, how the knife is wielded and where the victim is knifed. It’s easier to just find the body! 

As for the last question, no I don’t think either scene is obligatory. As I said in the beginning, if the scene calls for it, write it! Otherwise, let it happen behind closed doors.