We are pleased to announce our talented host for our upcoming Desire East Summit in Jersey City, NJ, on April 13-14! Meet Donna Jennings | AKA Dr. J. Sexuality Educator, Author, & Editor, working hard to promote healthy conversations about sexual wellness. Dr. J arrived at her new writing career after being a sex educator, sex therapist, and finally a college professor of human sexuality. Using her vast knowledge and experience of sexuality and the mind, she continues her education efforts by integrating positive sexuality into her fiction and nonfiction works.
Dr. J will be hosting our romance author panel where she will be leading discussions with some of your favorite romance and erotica writers, Lucy Eden, Anne Shade, Kristina Forest and Alexis Daria. You won’t want to miss this great conversation! Be sure to click here for more info and tickets, and follow Dr. J on social media to stay up to date with all of her latest projects.
What inspires you to write?
I draw writing inspiration from everyday life muses. I find a thought, an idea, a moment, or an interaction that I can blow life into. While I do this now, it wouldn’t be happening without my former students. They are my ultimate inspiration. When I retired from the college classroom ten years ago, my students suggested I write and continue teaching. As I started with erotica, I found that writing for arousal was a powerful element personally in my experience with menopause. Writing what I wanted provided me with the *more* for psychological stimulation. Scientific research has proven make erotica serves as a non-chemical prescription for desire, arousal, lubrication, and orgasm. Now, I write for others using educational words wrapped in story form. They are powerful, and that helps me stay inspired.
What elements make a book compelling?
For me, a book is compelling when the author writes in such a way as to connect with the reader. I love to use brain science and understand the mechanisms that connect the reader to the story. Also, a huge part of a compelling story is heart. If heart isn’t in the story, it can’t move the reader. As we read stories, our brain anticipates what comes next. We feel the emotions provided in the story. With the different feelings, the reader’s brain lights up, allowing them to have the experience the character is having. The more I understand the fundamental aspects of the craft of writing, the more excited I get and the more I learn how to make stories more compelling.
How do you approach sex in a story?
I approach sex in the story from a holistic perspective. Everything that I use about sexuality sits within the meaning of it, past, present, and future. Meaning drives sex. The intimate actions characters take physically embody the emotion or meaning.
My approach to writing is like my career in sexuality work: holistic and interdisciplinary. As a story begins, a writer must anchor a thread for sex. This is so important to me; I wrote a book about it. The Fiction Writer’s Sexuality Guide: Sex-It’s More Than a Scene comes out May 28, 2024. I offer a new paradigm for thinking about sexuality in writing. It’s not about pulling sex off the shelf and putting it here— the “sex scene”, like a discrete event. Sexuality is with us all the time, and we can activate how we use it in writing and our lives. If one understands the importance of a character’s sexual history, the author’s sex-positive stance ensures that what they write is “factually accurate and fictionally realistic,” with clarity in the meaning of sex, one can write sex in a new way with a broad and specific brush.
What advice would you give to others looking to write erotica?
My advice for those wanting to write erotica is to write for yourself first, then write for a reader. And understand those are two different writing processes. When you write for yourself, you are an audience of one. Writing for others means tapping into the craft that gives the story oomph. Note that even in erotica, a story has a beginning, middle, and end. As an editor, I always want the author’s creative voice to shine through. While elements will come from the writer’s life, as an author, you are crafting a story about characters separate from you. You, the author, must know details about them to take us on their sexual journey. And for me, that journey, not the destination, is the fun part.