STILL SEXY

In February, we had a discussion on this blog regarding sex on soaps, in books, and basically how much was too much and how much not enough?

I was of the opinion that if sex serves story, it was justified, if it doesn't, then it's just hack-work. In this week's episode of Another World Today, I felt it was justified. Do you agree?

Coming from the world of romance novels, I'm pretty comfortable with writing a sex scene. The only times I wasn't, was when I wrote Oakdale Confidential, The Man From Oakdale, and co-wrote Jonathan's Story.

The reasons were two-fold.

One) When I wrote my own romance novels, the characters were all completely imaginary, so I could put them in any situation without qualms. When it came to the soap tie-ins, the characters were still imaginary, but they were played by actors who I actually knew and worked alongside with. Which meant that when putting them in the aforementioned... situations, I wasn't just visualizing the characters, I was visualizing the actors. And that felt... odd.

And two) Usually when I write a book, I don't have to think about who'll be reading it, save my editors, and this is all in a day's work for them. When it came to the soap opera tie-ins, the books had to be vetted by the ATWT and GL writers, producers, PR people and executives. Which, once again, meant that people who were my professional colleagues were reading sex scenes I'd written. Not the most comfortable feeling in the world.

As a result, Oakdale Confidential, The Man From Oakdale and Jonathan's Story are a bit tamer than my independent works like When a Man Loves a Woman. I'm sorry if that's disappointing to the readers, but I still needed to be able to look my bosses in the eye!