Someone asked this not long ago, but the discussion happened in private messages, so nobody else was able to benefit from it. Here's one answer to your questions, and this also feels like a good time to dust off an essay on writing in this genre and post it. Hope the following helps.
- - - Updated - - -Especially if you haven’t written fiction before, start out small and simple. There’s probably an itch you want to scratch, some particular component of a sexfight story you’d like to see more of, or a scenario that you have a preference for. Don’t worry about detailed prose or the mechanics of executing a satisfying conclusion, just jot down the ideas: who, where, how the conflict starts, and pieces of what happens next that come to mind. Then, go back and flesh out each part: introducing the characters, setting up the confrontation, describing the fight, and reaching the climax.
The first Catharsis story wasn’t Homewrecker. It was a much longer story that got abandoned halfway because it was too ambitious and ended up with a clunky plot. Homewrecker by contrast has a very simple setup, is mostly fighting, and the action in each room is fairly short. Simply finishing a story (even if you don’t share it with anyone) lets you experience writing each part of a tale in this genre, and that both builds confidence and sets the stage for future endeavors. With each additional story, you begin to notice patterns in describing action, of constructing scenes, of building tension from scene to scene, and in setting up story bits early on that will pay off later.
So, don’t worry about the technical stuff right off the bat. Write what you want to see happen. The things you think are more interesting versus uninteresting is unique to you. That will flavor your writing and help create your particular take on this genre. And if you want constructive feedback on your efforts or would like to know how some aspect of a story that you like works or got created, just ask!
Some other tips:
* Use a thesaurus. Look up synonyms of nouns and action verbs so you aren’t repeating the same words again and again. You might encounter a word that inspires you to use it during a certain scene.
* Notice which phrases in your favorite stories affected you the most and see if there’s a common word or pattern to them, and borrow them (words, not whole paragraphs). No less an author than Morton said that when it comes to the action scenes in this genre, there isn’t a lot of variation in what they can contain. It’s in the setup — the characters, their personalities, the environment, and the stakes — that give the action most of its flavor.
Some Thoughts On Writing Erotic Fight Stories
Writing is simply one thing: word choice. Picking a word that goes after the current one. Picking a sentence that goes after the current one. Et cetera.
The goal with word choice is to lead a reader's mind from emptiness into the world of the story and on to the tale's conclusion. The ability for an author to build a mental model of what a reader will imagine when reading a sequence of words is crucial in choosing what information to provide next, what words to use to deliver that information, and the rhythm of the sentences that beat the tale's fluctuating pace.
This may sound simplistic, but it is the essence of effective communication and the nuts and bolts of the craft of writing.
Writing erotic fight fiction is no different. It can be done in six words:
Female confrontation. Intimate contest. Victorious climax.
People with active imaginations can take the above words and fill in details in their heads: who, where, when, why, and how. Authors need to organize those details into a progression of sentences to create an erotic fight story that communicates them.
The Erotic Fight Story genre has three areas for authors to focus on.
1. The Erotic
Words are connected to ideas and emotions. Certain words are more charged with potential impact than others, especially those around things primal, secretive, and taboo. What words these are varies by individual and culture. Erotic fiction makes use of them to trigger arousal in the reader as well as convey the passionate action in the story. Words that have a greater taboo on them tend to be the most exciting. Don’t use them too early so that when they appear during the most intense sections of the story they still have all their impact. During the build-up, these words can be sprinkled into the text here and there, but at the climax they appear often, continuously bombarding the reader with erotic thoughts. Managing this frequency and reserving certain more taboo words for the later parts of an erotic scene or story are ways of controlling the excitement level of the reader and saving the biggest impact for the conclusion.
When describing intimate action, include more than visuals. The feel of smooth, naked skin, the sounds of desire escaping parted lips, the scent of perfumed wrists and hair, the salty taste of sweat... immerse readers in the sensations of the characters. Different people have different preferences, both fetish-wise and sense-wise. Authors find it easiest to add details that align with their own predilections, but by remembering to include ones outside of those they can better pass along the intensity of the scenes that fire their imaginations.
2. The Fight
Conflict is the key element that separates this genre from lesbian erotica. Characters are after more than their own pleasure. They want to battle physically against a rival woman and see who's comes out on top (pun intended). The enjoyment of victory for them can include seeing another woman submit in sexual defeat. For authors, making readers understand those motivations is important. While pride and superiority are often involved, the root cause of conflicts between women can be a much wider range of things. Stories like "Marrying Jim" and "Roll in the Hay" grew around the concept of a commonly found contentious female relationship. This is the main purpose for the build-up to the fight(s): explaining what's at stake and why the characters are willing to settle their disagreements with actions instead of words. A well-written action sequence is spicy on its own, but its flavor is even more intense when readers also understand just how badly the participants want to win.
Fight scenes can end with a winner or in a draw, but during the fight, unless it's a one-sided beat-down it is important to include the "back and forth": what each side is doing and how successful that is. This can be done even if all the information is coming from one character's point of view. Managing this goes a long way toward keeping readers guessing the outcome and also toward maintaining the tension necessary to make them feel that both women are truly committed to their battle.
If you are struggling to write an action scene, here are a few techniques to try:
* Mention what’s happening in another area of their bodies. What are their hands doing? Their legs and feet? What sensations are certain parts of the combatants experiencing?
* Alternate describing the action between sentences like "X did this. Y did that." and "The two did something together." Describing an individual character's actions is good when giving a "play by play" accounting of events, especially if the balance of the fight is tilting one way or another. When things stay even for period of time, using "they" pulls the viewpoint back a bit and also gives some variety to the story's sentence patterns.
* Give the reader a peek into the characters' thoughts. It can be only the main point of view character, or both, or even someone watching (if any). How has the battle so far affected them in terms of desire, determination, understanding of their opponent, etc.?
* Sprinkle in some dialogue, whether catty exchanges or written out groans or a continuation of an argument. This is another way of showing the reader the intensity of the characters' desire and determination, and it helps keep the fight from becoming a mechanical recitation of what actions happened.
Once you become familiar with these techniques, you’ll start to use them without needing to stop and think about them, and the act of writing will be smoother and more enjoyable.
3. The Story
There are countless resources for writers to read and use to learn their craft. There's no need to repeat all that content here. The techniques for starting a story, building characters by having them take action in reaction to a situation (showing) rather than directly stating what their personalities are (telling), using sentence length for pacing, use of foreshadowing and metaphor, and avoiding word repetition all apply to this genre.
A few areas of the storytelling art have more prominence in this genre, though. Because of the focus on the erotic and the fighting ability of the characters, authors often give the reader detailed physical descriptions of them. While it may be tempting to get that out of the way quickly in order to get to the "exciting parts", starting off a story with a dry list of measurements as if from a medical chart isn't the best way to interest a reader. This genre is so well-populated with good-looking females that readers almost have come to expect them. Start instead with what makes the character different or interesting. Bonus points if one of their main characteristics is actually important to the central conflict. As an example, "Bad Self Image" begins with the main character buying a mirror despite the fact that she hates them. This hooks the reader with a problem that they don't fully understand and thus gives them a reason to continue reading. The physical description can be woven into the narrative after that.
One piece of characterization unique to these stories is the fact that the women in them stray from the usual societal norms. Not only do they settle things physically, but they do it erotically. Explaining the reasons behind this unusual character trait can be a challenge to do without resorting to a simple "X loved competing against women sexually". 'First time' stories avoid this because those give authors the chance to have characters discover their desires. For other tales, a flashback scene can show how the character encountered the idea. Another way that doesn't cause the narrative flow to jump in time is to have their desires come up in conversation, either during a confrontation or during a discussion with a side character.
This brings up the topic of dialogue. While the barbs and insults of the trash talking in these stories can be cliche at times, that's okay because their social taboo-breaking makes them thrilling. It's less interesting for readers to wade through conversations filled with ordinary, straight-forward phrases. Erotic fight fiction provides a unique territory for authors to be creative when it comes to two women who don't like each other having an exchange of words. It was only after agonizing under the requirement while writing "Perfect Pair" that the main characters' speech had to be both polite and also contain a second, more catty meaning that the technique of using subtext really clicked. The ability for an author to know what a character really wants to say (but of course won't state bluntly) alters the words the writer puts into their mouths. Readers then get a sense of a character's personality through how their hidden emotions and desires color their speech. As an example, the succubus in the Rowenna Hunter stories is always after pleasure for herself, and her spoken lines always contain an element of teasing seduction. Contrast that with the ghost in those same stories, whose speech is all about revenge and punishment. This makes it easy to drop the use of "X said" and speed up conversations because the reader will be able to tell who is talking based on the words that are used. Another benefit of avoiding bland and literal dialogue is that the repartee that precedes a fight becomes a battle itself, one where each woman is subtly asserting status, belittling their opponent with withering wit, and daring the other to be the one that abandons talk first and gets physical (thus losing that contest of self-control).
The main types of catty dialogue in the female fighting genre are insults, threats and challenges, and each one has a different purpose in building the tension and narrative. Insults can be said alone or as a barb inserted in an otherwise ordinary line of dialogue ("Have a nice day, bitch"). They can be used as verbal attacks or an expression of a character's frustration with the other woman's resilience. Threats are assertions of dominance like "my body will crush yours" or "I’m going to (fill in blank)"; they are attempts to get the other woman to back down or test her resolve and are indications that the speaker is projecting confidence. Challenges are dares like "you think your X is better?" and "only one way to find out"; they encourage escalation into conflict. One subtle way to indicate if a woman is itching for a fight is to have them goad the other with challenges instead of threats. Managing each of these is a way to indicate to the reader the progression of the animosity between the characters without writing that out explicitly in descriptive prose.
Hope all of this provides some inspiration.
Originally Posted by omegadeltaimperion
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