[Gary Wassner]

Okay, how do you all feel about sex in Epic Fantasy series? Does it add to the reading experience or detract from the other-worldly aspects of it? Do you like your characters to be realistic in that way or not? Are love interests in fantasy interesting? And if they are, how explicit should they be?

[Evil Agent]

I'm fine with sex in Fantasy, particularly if there are love storylines... I know a love story can be done without sex, but sometimes it's needed. And sometimes the more graphic stuff is, unfortunately, reflective of how our world was in medieval or ancient times...

I think it works great in Martin's aSoIaF series... I don't really care for Jordan's 'fade-to-black' approach... Yeah, I really don't have a problem with it at all, and if it adds to the story in some way, then I'm all for it.

[juzzza]

I like it, and appreciate it. But I have the same opinion as I do with violence, it has to be meaningful, I.E. either be relevant to the plot or characterization. If two protags are just humping for titillation, I doubt it would make me put the book down, but may shape my perception of the author's ability to plot a good story.

Why Gary, you planning on a group orgy around a Lalas tree in book five? :D

[Joe Bloggs]

Depends a lot on the nature and context of the scene.

Sex can do a lot to a person psychologically and emotionally.

[Gary Wassner]

As an author, once you start down that path, it's hard to know where to stop. Sometimes I think that sex should be grouped with the more mundane aspects of life like jobs and earning money and bathroom habits, and kept out of Epic Fantasy completely. If it can't be explicit, then it might as well not be included. I agree that the fade to black is just plain annoying. I could write hard core if I had to, but that wouldn't be appropriate either. So I would just as soon leave it out all together.

If you use it as a technique and allude to it - the seduction of evil etc. - you can still make it intriguing and add a dimension to the story, but once you start with the descriptive side of it, where do you stop?

That's not a bad idea Juzza. Free love, dancing under the branches, naked swims in the lake. What kind of drugs do you think they might have had there? Organic, definitely organic.

[juzzza]

As an author, once you start down that path, it's hard to know where to stop. Sometimes I think that sex should be grouped with the more mundane aspects of life like jobs and earning money and bathroom habits, and kept out of Epic Fantasy completely. If it can't be explicit, then it might as well not be included. I agree that the fade to black is just plain annoying. I could write hard core if I had to, but that wouldn't be appropriate either. So I would just as soon leave it out all together.

Ooh, each to their own but I would NEVER even suggest that sex is mundane, I know you aren't suggesting that Gary, but I wouldn't group it with bathroom habits and eating etc. As Joe said, it can shape a character in so many ways and tell you a lot about them (how they do it, what they feel, who they do it with) and adds great depth for me as a reader.

It doesn't have to be explicit, or fade to black, why can't you take the same approach as you would to a violent scene? He gets his arm cut off, he sticks his **** in her ****... What's the difference?

[Joe Bloggs]

but once you start with the descriptive side of it, where do you stop?

We all known the "mechanics" of the beastly act. Perhaps the passion and emotion involved, would tell us more about the copulators.

[Gary Wassner]

No, that's not what I meant - it's definitely not mundane. But it brings a differerent slant to the story. It's very worldly, and Epic Fantasy is very other-worldly.

[juzzza]

I disagree with that, or at least for me personally. It's the worldly aspects of a novel in a fantasy setting, that make a book great. It's the characters reactions to the fantastic, which intrigue me, that's how I identify with them.

So, okay, have your protag humping a large lizard creature, but you see what I mean. Yea fantasy is other worldly, but most characters are humanoid, with desires and emotions... so why aren't they humping, raping, rutting... whatever.

Let me ask you G, does every exposition of violence drive the plot forward, or is it sometimes in there for pure entertainment?

Juzz edit: Actually, sorry Gary I see that you stated clearly EPIC FANTASY as opposed to preferences generally. Would you include GRRMARTIN as Epic Fantasy? Cause that worked for me. Dothraki style on the sand dunes is a given the next time me and Mrs Juzzza are on a beach holiday.

[Gary Wassner]

It's important to Mieville for sure. The grotesque and the unusual helped to define his world. Like the movie Freaks from half a century ago, the shock of it enhanced his perspective.

You want sex in my books, Juzza? You just haven't known me for long enough - you should read some of my x-rated books that I write under my pen name.

Everything drives the plot, whether its integral to the story or just to the overall ambiance. So violence is meaningful and the extent and seriousness and explicitness of it as well.

It's a very tricky subject. By adding the dimension of sex to an Epic Fantasy series you are adding a very personal aspect to it. Certainly it could be done and it has been done, but is it important to do? Is it necessary to do? Does it add depth or just complicate things? The realism of it seems somehow out of place. It's messy.