Desiderius Price

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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.

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.

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

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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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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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!