I Know It When I Read It: Erotica vs. Porn

February 13, 2014 by Alexis Duran

I was recently having a discussion with a writer friend about my efforts to write an erotic novella. I noticed very quickly that whereas I always used the term “erotica”, she always said “porn”. It rankled me. Eventually I expressed my enranklement and she explained that erotica is just porn dressed up in a more marketable guise.

I beg to disagree. I believe that there is a significant difference between the two genres, though there is a point at the extremes of both where they overlap. This is not a judgment call or anything to do with morality, but simply that, as a writer, I have no interest in crafting porn, just as readers of erotica and readers of porn have different tastes and come to the page looking for different experiences.

Pornographic fiction and erotic fiction share one major thing in common: hot, graphic sex. It’s my opinion that while in porn the sex is the reason d’etre, in erotica it is the icing on the cake, sometimes the filling as well, but never the whole cake.

In porn, there is a setting; a roadside bar, an office, a castle on the hill. There are characters defined by easily identifiable labels; bored housewife, rebellious biker, lonely traffic cop. There is a very brief set-up; bored housewife stops at seedy bar and meets rebellious biker. There is action; hot, graphic sex on a pool table. That’s it. Erotica has these things as well, of course, and depending on the style of the writer and the subgenre, these elements are developed and complicated to varying degrees. In erotica, the setting becomes a more richly detailed world designed to heighten the senses and provide both opportunity and challenges. The characters become actual people that transcend labels. They have lives beyond looking for sex. They have complications and maybe as many reasons to avoid their destined mate as to jump their bones. There’s not only action, but plot. Here things really diverge. In porn, there is very little resistance between contact and coitus. Readers of porn aren’t interested in watching characters overcome obstacles to be together. As a matter of fact, I’d guess the reason they prefer porn is that they are tired of obstacles and just want to have fun. Porn is lust at first sight. Complications, if they exist, involve questions like “how many bikers will this pool table support?” not “if I have sex with this stranger, will it be the end of my marriage?”

Essentially, erotica offers two major elements that porn does not: Romance and suspense. By romance I mean a developing relationship at the core of the story. By suspense I mean obstacles, doubts and delays that get in the way of the romance, or in other words, the grand human mess that is human intimacy. Erotic fiction ranges from pure fantasy to gritty reality, but always, there is some element of that most delightful state of being: anticipation. You might scoff and say there’s no suspense in romance because we know damn well who’s going to boff who. Well, that’s just like saying there’s no suspense in your average mystery because we know the detective will solve the crime. The suspense lies in the journey. What twists and turns shall we endure? What challenges will the lovers face? How often will their fatal flaws get in the way? Will X panic when he falls in love with Y? Will Y go back to her old boyfriend, or run away with Z? It’s all deliciously complicated, frustrating, and if done well, arousing.

And speaking of sex. Porn goes straight for the hot sex with a sprinkling of story on the side. In erotica, it is the story that makes the sex hot. It hardly matters who does what with which parts, or how large or slippery those parts are. The reader has already slid beneath skin of the characters and ridden out the storm with them. The sex will be hot!

I believe that we all dream of that perfect mate, that awesome, mind-blowing connection with another human being. That’s what erotica offers that porn doesn’t. The purely realized fantasy of love achieved, love expressed in its rawest form; hot, graphic sex. Dirty sex. Kinky sex. Sad sex. Angry sex. There is physical bliss but there is also emotion. Doubt. Fear. Longing. Rejection. Joy. Erotica removes sex from the realm of simple fantasy to that of complicated fantasy. Characters in erotica earn their orgasms, by golly.

Maybe I’m splitting hairs, but in this world we market and shop in, labels are important. While I might click on a book labeled erotica, I’d never click on one labeled pornography. So maybe my friend is right? Maybe it’s all just lipstick and fishnet stockings and fooling the search engines?

Call me a romantic, but I don’t think so.

Weekend Writing Warriors #3

February 8, 2014 by Alexis Duran

This post is part of an ongoing blog hop hosted by Weekend Writing Warriors. Every Sunday, participating authors post eight sentences from their current work in progress. Then we hop to our fellow warriors’ blogs and check out all the fabulous fiction that’s happening! I heartily invite you to participate as a reader, writer, or both. Click the link above or copy & paste this address: www.wewriwa.com

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Curse of Salar

When Mira and Alandra were young they’d both harbored dreams of reclaiming the throne. She still held that against him. The Grand Premier had convinced her it was more profitable to concede defeat and cooperate with her own exile from power. Mira had been stupid enough to resist. Now he would never be trusted.

Hushed footsteps approached from behind him and a figure swept aside the silk drapes, allowing a beam of lantern light to cut across the marbled balcony. Mira glanced over his shoulder and was surprised to see Timon standing there. Timon was the latest in a string of attractive attendants the premier had sent to seduce and spy on Mira.

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Curse of Salar is an erotic fantasy novella, third in a series set in the world of Salar. Prince Mira, along with his sister, is the last in the royal line of Jahar, a ruling family of powerful magicians. Mira and Alandra are held as virtual captives in their family’s own palace, kept alive to placate the masses of peasants who are traditional royalists and still believe in the fabled powers of the Jahar. Mira chafes under confinement and dreams of escaping. Rayn Matisse is a soldier in the rebel army. He has no interest whatsoever in seeing the royals reinstated until he meets Mira and begins to fall under the prince’s magical sway. Rayn’s people were cursed by the Jahar centuries ago, and though long thought to be a myth, the curse begins to assert its powers once again. As assassination and rebellion upset the false calm of the kingdom, Rayn finds himself torn between love and fear of the young man who possesses an uncanny ability to control him.

Weekend Writing Warriors #2

February 1, 2014 by Alexis Duran

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Curse of Salar

Mira sat back on his calves and filled his mouth with the strong red wine, which he spat out into the clay pot. Then he stood, smoothed out his silken tunic and wiped his mouth with the back of his wrist. He rarely had a moment alone, and usually he had to fake a rage in order to drive away the spying servants who dogged his footsteps. Lashmi would soon be returning with whatever offering she deemed necessary to sooth his temper.

He wouldn’t be slow and confused at the dinner tonight, but he’d have to act like it. Mira had become such a skilled actor that he could make a living with a traveling troupe of troubadours if need be. Life in the palace, and the small degree of freedom remaining to him, depended on everyone believing he was a heedless wastrel, a spoiled figurehead content to waste his life in coddled luxury. The only one who suspected his deceit was his sister, and that was only a suspicion, or so he hoped.

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Curse of Salar is an erotic fantasy novella, third in a series set in the world of Salar. Prince Mira, along with his sister, is the last in the royal line of Jahar, a ruling family of powerful magicians. Mira and Alandra are held as virtual captives in their family’s own palace, kept alive to placate the masses of peasants who are traditional royalists that still believe in the fabled powers of the Jahar. Mira chafes under confinement and dreams of escaping. Rayn Matisse is a soldier in the rebel army. He has no interest whatsoever in seeing the royals reinstated until he meets Mira and begins to fall under the prince’s magical sway. Rayn’s people were cursed by the Jahar centuries ago, and though long thought to be a myth, the curse begins to assert its powers once again. As assassination and rebellion upset the false calm of the kingdom, Rayn finds himself torn between love and fear of the young man who possesses an uncanny ability to control him.

Weekend Writing Warriors #1 – Eight Lines from the WIP

January 26, 2014 by Alexis Duran

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Curse of Salar by Alexis Duran

Mira, last prince of the royal family of Jahar, Son of Khiros and Leena, Chosen of Ka’atar, Divine Hand of The Spirit of the Armazin Mountain, Living God of the Ashtar, Earik, and Tobald Peoples, bowed down on hands and knees and vomited into the potted Elmar tree on the balcony outside his chambers.

He’d partaken of his usual plum wine and smoked the harrar powder since midday, but that wasn’t why he was sick. The purging was self-induced; to rid his system of the drugs he knew had been added to his wine. The drugs were meant to make him slow and confused. Sometimes he didn’t mind these effects, but tonight at the state dinner, representatives from all the regions under the control of the Jahardin and even some from beyond were gathering at the palace to affirm and celebrate Grand Premier Skala in his role as overseer of the Kingdom. Mira wanted to be sharp in order to watch the ambassadors, lords and ministers interact in this highly ritualized proceeding, as they paid tribute to the usurper and gave insincere homage to the remnants of the royal family of Jahar; Mira and his sister Alandra.

The Grand Premier never bothered to drug Alandra, as she was a loyal member of his entourage. Mira had not earned such ill-gotten trust.

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Curse of Salar is an erotic fantasy novella, third in a series set in the world of Salar. Prince Mira, along with his sister, is the last in the royal line of Jahar, a ruling family of powerful magicians. Mira and Alandra are held as virtual captives in their family’s own palace, kept alive to placate the masses of peasants who are traditional royalists that still believe in the fabled powers of the Jahar. Mira chafes under confinement and dreams of escaping. Rayn Matisse is a soldier in the rebel army. He has no interest whatsoever in seeing the royals reinstated until he meets Mira and begins to fall under the prince’s magical sway. Rayn’s people were cursed by the Jahar centuries ago, and though long thought to be a myth, the curse begins to assert it’s powers once again. As assassination and rebellion upset the false calm of the kingdom, Rayn finds himself torn between love and fear of the young man who possesses an uncanny ability to control him.

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Feel free to leave comments and impressions!

A Little Blue

January 21, 2014 by Alexis Duran

In my current location in the Pacific Northwest, we are fog bound. Walking through a daily soup of mist, my mind returns to a magical week I spent in the south of France, beneath legendary blue skies. When I’m traveling, I tend to not write much. Instead I take notes, sense impressions, and do the actual writing when I’m settled somewhere. So today I’m piecing journal fragments with photos that invoke the senses as an offering to the gods of light.

The woman who owns the linen shop says she wishes she could sleep in just one morning. She lives around the corner from the church bell tower. It’s ringing now.

M. and I stopped at an olive grove and tasted olive oil made from olives fresh off the tree ~ vert and ripe.

Had chevre for lunch at the farmhouse, surrounded by cherry trees, honey suckle, lavender, jasmine, fig trees, magnolia trees, roses, poppies, red poppies.

Magenta bougainvillea in Fayence.

Went to perfume factory. Bought fig scented room freshener.

Heard wild pigs squealing in the night, or maybe it was B. and T. making love.

Ici, c’est un bon vieux

Sunday ~ I think it is a wonderful thing to be woken up by birdsong, rushing creek and church bells.

In the village, we met a friendly white cat

Why Nice is nice.

December 20, 2013 by Alexis Duran

When I dropped off my rental car at the train station in Nice, I was looking forward to one night in that warm, Mediterranean metropolis of blue waters, beautiful bodies and seaside clubs. Coming down from the mountains of the Var region, I was a bit taken back by the heat, which approached 40 Celsius, or 100 Fahrenheit.

Being the nostalgic sort of person I am, I’d located the only hotel in Old Town, several blocks from the beach (Hotel Villa la Tour). Once an 18^th century convent, it sported long, steep stairs, no elevator and no air-conditioning. But the ambiance! The ambiance couldn’t be beat. Because I’d asked for a room with the view, I was given the honeymoon suite on the top floor.

Room with a view

Besides a shower big enough to fit all of your BMFs, there were cloth roses on the wallpaper, a tiny wrought iron balcony, and, as mentioned before, no air conditioning. After lugging my souvenir stuffed suitcase up five flights (a charming maid helped me on the last two flights), sweat dripped from my every pore. Undeterred, I took advantage of that vast shower and readied myself for a night on the town. On the last day of a three-week jaunt, I’d run out of warm weather things to wear except for a clingy silk dress I’d purchased from a market vendor in Fayence.

Lovely and spacious shower

When I wriggled my still damp, overheated body into it, I found it clinging indeed. And I didn’t have an appropriate bra for a strappy dress. The affect was not pleasing. When I stepped out onto the crowded pulsing cobblestoned streets of old town, I alone seemed to feel more like hiding than strutting. Not one to linger on my perceived imperfections, I soon basked in the near tropical delights of this fascinating city where Art Deco meets the renaissance meets medieval towers. The markets and narrow streets are an overwhelming cornucopia of colors, scents and sounds, almost enough to make me forget my lack of personal allure.

Promenade from Castle Hill

On the Promenade des Anglais, the long walkway that lines the oceanfront, a host of glistening tanned bodies from every corner of Europe and beyond strolled, frolicked and danced. Bikini clad urchins mixed with wing-sporting models. In my own sticky funk, I grew ever more aware of my pale, Slavic skin, still unthawed after a long winter under wraps in northern realms; the sweat that washed away all attempts at cosmetic refinement; the sun blocking floppy hat that trammeled my locks to a flattened mass, and the unflattering way my panty lines and bra straps were highlighted by the clingy silk. Not the lovely image I like to present to my public.

Nonetheless, as I passed from the markets of old town to the promenade, a dark-haired, dark-eyed gentleman in a white apron, smoking a cigarette, called out to me, “Bonjour, beautiful lady!”

“Bonjour!” I said, waving my hand.

And for the rest of the evening, I was beautiful. As was everyone in that most beautiful of cities.