Of course, there’s sex in my new Isabel Long Mystery, Finding the Source. It’s a given because I write about people and what they do. Sex is a part of that.
But writing about something so personal without being vulgar is a bit tricky. I believe I give enough, so readers can use their imagination. There are no descriptions of body parts. Nothing throbs. The sex scenes I create aren’t icky or embarrassing.
My characters are mature consenting adults who are having a good old time in the sack or elsewhere.
Things are on the light-hearted side for Isabel Long. After all, she tells the story. She’s a long-time journalist who becomes an amateur P.I. after she gets canned from the newspaper she was running. In the first book, Chasing the Case, she decides to solve the mystery of a woman who went missing in her town of a thousand people 28 years earlier. It was her first big story as a rookie reporter.
But given the success of that case — my lips are sealed — she takes on more. Finding the Source is the eighth.
There were other changes for Isabel when this series started. Her husband had died and after giving herself a year to grieve, she was ready to move on. How did she put it? It’s time to do something foolish or at least, have fun.
That’s what she does. And she doesn’t have to look far to find it with Jack, the owner of the Rooster, where she tends bar part-time on Friday nights. He’s a local guy, she’s a newcomer. He’s only had one serious relationship in his life — actually, the victim in her first case. There’s a lot of playful banter about sex between the two, but then again she is a bit on the sassy side.
Isabel and Jack honestly care deeply about each other amidst the fun and spontaneous sex, and so far, have only had one serious falling out.
There is a bedroom scene in Finding the Source that was so much fun to write. It involves the costumes they secretly chose to wear at the Rooster’s Halloween party. But my lips are sealed. I don’t want to spoil it for readers, but I smile thinking about that scene.
Finally, one last thing about sex, at least for this post: an anecdote about my late mother, who was an avid reader of romance novels. (She is the inspiration for Isabel’s mother, who is her ‘Watson’ in this series.)
I will admit a few of my adult kids were uncomfortable about the sex scenes in my first book. So, when I gave my mother a copy, I added this warning, “Mom, there’s a bit of sex in it.”
Here’s what she told me after reading it: “Oh, I’ve read a lot worse than that.”
Really, Mom?