Sexpectations

As a Romantic Suspense author I'm in the enviable position (sometimes) of attracting readers from across both the Romance and Thrillers/Mystery genres. But though I might attract more readers by crossing genre lines, I also get a little more criticism. What gets me in trouble the most is never how graphically I kill someone, but how often and how explicitly my hero and heroine have sex. For some people--a small minority who probably don't realize the books are Romantic Suspense or just have no idea what the Romantic Suspense genre entails--murder and maiming is fine, but god help me if someone has an orgasm :) I am totally okay with people having their own set of values when it comes to reading about 'bedroom acts' (or 'kitchen' or 'wherever'...) but it never fails to amaze me that people can be fine with killing--gleeful even--and yet recoil at the idea of a little physical intimacy between people who are falling in love. 

I remember watching a Desmond Morris TV series in the nineties that took married couples who were very much in love and making them abstain from sex for several months. It didn't take long for cracks to form in the relations. What had been mutually supportive relationships became fractured and tense. The researchers postulated that men and women are different (ha!) in that men need sex to feel love and women need love to have sex.

It's an interesting idea.

Sex is important in a relationship. Even when people aren't having any, sex is very important in a relationship.

Love and romance are all tied up with sex in my mind. Maybe its the biologist in me, trying to make sense of something which is essentially nebulous. I mean, why is one person attracted to another? I really don't know on a general level, but I do know when it comes to the characters I create.

I personally like to read Romances that are both sexy and subtle. I like hot and I like sweet. But for some reason my stories generally veer toward hot. I have no idea why. I hope I don't upset readers with my sex scenes. I'd hate to do that. But I also don't write sex scenes wondering how people might react (else I might have anticipated my sister-in-laws comment about the height of kitchen counters while we were eating Christmas dinner). I'd never write another word if I allowed readers to intrude on my thoughts when I'm supposed to be in someone else's head. (Is this complicated enough for everyone? Multiple personality head hopping during the writing of sex scenes?).

However, my latest book, The Killing Game, only has one sex scene in the whole thing (that's what the story needed). Ironically I'm now worried I'll be criticized for not having enough sex in an action-adventure romance. For the main part, I am blessed by having readers who happen to like the same blend of Romance and Suspense that I do.

So, the climatic question of the day: How much is too much??

Wildlife biologist Axelle Dehn isn’t about to let anyone harm her endangered snow leopards—not the poacher intent on killing them, nor the soldier who wants to use them as bait. But Axelle is unknowingly entangled in a conflict that stretches back three decades, a conflict that could spark a war between two of the world’s great nations.

​

British SAS soldier, Ty Dempsey, is on a mission to hunt down an infamous Russian terrorist in a remote region of Afghanistan. Dempsey hasn’t failed a mission yet, but when Axelle is kidnapped by the Russian, he is forced to choose between duty and his heart. He risks everything to save the determined, prickly woman he’s fallen for, but in doing so sparks a deadly series of events that threaten to expose the most successful spy in history. A spy who will destroy anyone who gets in his way.


The Killing Game is available from Amazon.com, Amazon.ca, Amazon.co.uk, Kobo, nook, Smashwords, and Apple. And in print from Createspace.