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[Stories without sex in the first chapter?]

I’ve used my potter fanfic as an example because it’s always intended to have a low/high road type of feeling, a plot-focused and more sex-infused versions, but with FF.net’s shenanigans regarding explicit material, and a review, I had shifted to plot-focused only.  After my disastrous edit (the one that produced a 107kword CHAPTER), I had dabbled with “smutting it back up”, using styles/colors in libreoffice.  And TBH, that felt tacky, because it was, as the sexual bit is an afterthought, not part of the process.

When I returned to revise and realized it needed to be rewritten, I of course, flexed my programmer hat, created my little utility.  As I rewrite, I can consider the implications of both the sexual and plot sides of the story, together; so in a discussion with Dumbledore over a new breed of bats, it can be an ordinary conversation (well, ordinary for the story) … Harry’s stark naked in the explicit, so comment on his todger, whereas he’s implicitly dressed in the cleaner version.

Explicit’s become more than smut, it also allows for me to go deeper.  So, Harry’s scar, after Voldemort learned of its existence, Harry had trouble keeping Voldemort out… he learned he had the strongest power to repel Voldemort by having gay sex.  After a while, Harry learns to keep it in balance with memories of it, however, in a scene I wrote yesterday, I had Voldemort go stronger than ever; not sure who was more surprised by that scene, myself or Fred Weasley.   I can explore Ash’s (OC) little nudist group, one that arose because of Ash’s insecurities and his steadfast belief in Harry’s innocence.  I can explore Ginny’s fangirl lust for Harry, to the point of schemes to snag him (Ron’s accidentally bitten that bullet more than once for Harry).

I do worry about the cleaner becoming a second class story to the explicit one, given the efforts I put in.  Though I find it easier and less tacky, overall to clean up an explicit scene, versus smutting up a clean scene.

[Stories without sex in the first chapter?]

11 minutes ago, Deadman said:

For details, most of my stuff here involve at least 5-15 pages of story before the sex actually happens in the story.
However, for this story it would probably by 20-30 pages and either will have sex around page 25. Or I could just have 20-30 pages of non story, then chapter 2 will be the sex stuff.

Lets reshape the debate, as talking about it as “non-sex” vs “sex” stuff feels a bit wrong.  In my originals, I’m sprinkling the sexual stuff throughout the story; sure, some sections are steamier than others.  In my potter fanfic… the explicit one does the same, sprinkles in the sexual material within the “cleaner” scenes.  In explicit, I’d have two male characters continue their conversation into the lavatory and their dicks hang out; in clean, I’d skip the restroom.  In explicit, I’d be describing some of the dirt and grime to underwear, perhaps a hole or two; in clean, maybe mention the underwear, or try to write it out of the scene.  In more compromising situations, I’d have explicit make them naked; cleaner would keep their underwear in.  Sex… when needed, it’s fade to black for cleaner (unless plot requires it shown, at which point, details are kept as brief/light as possible).

One fun way that shows the differences, I’ve got Ron and Hermione going on a date to London.  In the explicit, its full details.  In the clean, it’s Harry reading/commenting on the citations for lewd/indecent behavior the morning after.

[Stories without sex in the first chapter?]

3 hours ago, Wilde_Guess said:

Agreed.  I have no idea whether someone else’s “page count” story is single-spaced, double-spaced, or something else.  And, what size is their page in the first place?  What size is their font?  Word count (five characters plus one space equals one word) is used commonly enough that you can get some idea of what you’re about to be looking at.

I remember playing games with fonts/margins back in school (when you’re given a minimum page count).

[Stories without sex in the first chapter?]

9 hours ago, Deadman said:

Usually my stories on AFF are about 20-30 pages long per chapter. Whereas the first couple chapters of the clean on is 10 pages or so, if not less. So combining them together would put it in line with what I usually put on AFF.

I combine… usually the other way, since I try to keep it reasonable on length (4-9k), but there’s some deviations.  To the same plot point, clean is 110 chapters, while it’s 263 on the explicit.  (Note, I use kwords because the “page” metric is highly subjective to font choices, layout, etc.) 

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8 hours ago, Deadman said:

The original story was very mystery oriented. Two female characters realize that they’re starting to have feelings for each other. The clean version does “fade to black” in the one sex scene that exists.

Around chapter 3 or 4, they go away for the weekend with their boyfriends. The more sexual version has the four of them getting it on during their weekend away in various ways.

It started similarly for me on the potter fanfic rewrite.  I’d have them starkers in the explicit, clothed in the clean, fade to black, etc.  Sometimes it’d be easier to exclude a scene entirely from the clean too, like Ginny sneakily pleasuring herself to a naked Harry in the Burrow in the first chapter (because the story’s Harry/Muggle not Ginny, and Ginny’s a tad jealous with a sense of entitlement).  During Harry’s summer holiday trip across Europe with muggle, Ron, & Hermione; the explicit showed them starkers practically the whole time, after Harry & Ron make sure the girls’ prank backfires to that.

However, the biggest contributor to the differences is a particular first year OC – Ash.  I’d created him with problems as a foil to Harry assisting Oliver Wood in teaching the first year’s flying lesson (Wood replaced Madam Hooch), thus Harry spent the entire lesson focusing on helping Ash, to Wood’s ire, including having Ash ride on the broom with Harry.  In the explicit, I wanted to make it super-awkward for Harry, so I loosened his Quidditch Robes, and when Ash grabbed around Harry to hold the broom handle between Harry’s legs, Ash accidentally holds Harry’s stiffy instead.  After that, Ash simply became fun to write, as a shy character that required genitalia contact in order to trust enough to talk, have confidence, function normally with another person.  This invoked a strong little/big brother type of relationship between Harry & Ash (non-sexual).  Thus, the related antics basically gets Ash banished to the explicit version only… him going permanently nudist in protest of the frame-up job being done against Harry.  Ash’s a “happy little accident”

I did praise my way because it’s resulted in the two versions that feel organic in writing – though I do worry a bit that there may be a sense of “missing something” in the clean, given how much I’ve been writing on the explicit side only (it’s around a 3:1 ratio on words).

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[Stories without sex in the first chapter?]

1 hour ago, BronxWench said:

I read for plot more than sex, if I’m being very honest. I don’t care how much sex is in a story, or how early it appears, if the story’s plot doesn’t hook me. And that goes for fan fiction as well as original fiction.

I think, reading as much here as I do, I’m somewhat jaded.  

I tried writing a smut fairly plotless oneshot once, it led to my brain rebelling, and now I’ve got a bunch of original universe stories whose eventual goal is to justify the environment/setup of that PWP!

[Stories without sex in the first chapter?]

7 hours ago, Deadman said:

I appreciate the suggestion but I don’t need it. I literally just copied the chapters into a new folder with a new name for the story and solved the organizational problem. I’ll keep them separate that way.

No problems, I’m guessing that everybody else does it your way.  I got a bit excited that perhaps I could hook somebody on doing it my way. 

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4 minutes ago, Deadman said:

I figured as much, but almost everything that I read on AFF usually has sex in the first chapter. I know at least a couple I’ve been interested in had no sex in it but the story didn’t make me want to read the rest. So I’m wondering if I’m an outlier or other people do bail on stories.

Basically, the first 3 chapters of the “clean” version would end up as the first chapter of the AFF version. The fourth chapter has a sex scene which I could add to the first three.

This is one spot my software shines, the ability to merge/manage chapters…  So, for instance, my “clean” chapter 111, covers Easter weekend & a bit more, it’s 5.7k (approx).  However, for explicit, I’ve got five chapters #264-#268 with 42.2k (approx).

[Stories without sex in the first chapter?]

18 minutes ago, Deadman said:

I’m not worried. I’ve already finished with one without sex in it. So I don’t have to worry about mixing them up or anything like that. It’s more about how people on the site will likely want to read it.

Whether people will read the first chapter expecting a sex scene but don’t get one. If that will stop people from reading chapter 2.

Well… first, you don’ t have to have sex in the first chapter, especially if it’s got a strong plot. 

And with how I’m doing this rewrite… frequently scenes that were penned under “clean” tend to not get too smutty even when they go to explicit, might have an odd remark to nipples, pubic hairs, todgers, clits, that sort to remind the audience the characters are starkers.   Whereas the differences are more pronounced when I write a scene to be explicit, only to realize I kinda need it in the clean too (thus starts a “clean up” where I mark off the explicit bits).

When I view my own stories, the first chapters very rarely have any real sex scenes...nudity or skimpy wear being more common.  Actual sex usually comes in later chapters.

[Stories without sex in the first chapter?]

8 minutes ago, Deadman said:

I’ve been thinking about a story I’ve been working on and it wasn’t originally intended to involve a lot of sex. However, I’ve since decided to do a second version of the story which has more sex.

But I want to post the first couple chapters together as the first chapter for context. Would you read it if they only had sex in the second chapter?

There’s a version of it where the end of the first chapter could have some sex in it. Not sure if I want to do this though.
 

How good are you at compiling & running software from source, and using something similar conceptually to LaTeX in usage?  I’m serious here, because I am writing two versions of my potter fanfic story within the same set of text files simultaneously, and I manage this with a custom bit of C++ code that I wrote.  (The fanfic is on AO3 under two separate “story” entries, and the word counts are almost a 3:1 ratio between them.)

As an example of the markup you’d be writing….

{They|Harry's soft todger dripped as they} continued.  A sharp bend to the right, they stopped.

In this case, the clean (which is the first “slot”) would read (after processing)

Quote

They continued. A sharp bend to the right, they stopped.

While the explicit (second “slot”) would read (after processing)

Quote

Harry’s soft todger dripped as they continued. A sharp bend to the right, they stopped.

And yes, with the right marking, you can do whole sections as one or the other.  I’ll typically write multiple chapters of explicit to a single clean chapter a lot of the time. 

I put my source code up on github a while ago, so it’s available for playing around with.

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