Between Heat and Height: Writing Past the Obvious

Last week, in From Sparks to Structure: The Words Keep Climbing, I wrote about how every new word feels less like chasing a deadline and more like stacking bricks into something lasting.

This week, my focus turned inward — to the language itself.

There’s a part of me that sometimes wants to just go full throttle into pornographic material. It’s raw, direct, and easy to capture in words. But when I’m aiming for something bigger — something that could land with an agent and live on bookshelves — I know I have to push past the obvious.

If I wrote a line like “she orgasmed with his penis inside her”, that might satisfy bluntness, but it doesn’t satisfy the page. It would probably push away an agent (and yes, especially a female one).

Not because profanity is wrong — but because it’s flat. Clinical. It says what happened, but it doesn’t make anyone feel it.

The Difference in Language

Here’s how the same moment can live at different levels:

• Pornographic blunt: “She orgasmed with his penis inside her.”

• Elevated erotic: “Her body arched as if the moment had swallowed her whole, a wave breaking against his relentless thrust.”

• Literary sensual: “When he pressed deeper, it wasn’t release that shattered her — it was recognition, raw and consuming, as if her skin had learned a new language.”

The act is the same. But the experience on the page changes completely depending on the words.

Why I’m Aiming Higher

In the Devil’s Wake began as raw, incendiary, even what I once called “demonic porn.” Then it evolved into dark erotica. And now, word by word, it’s becoming something else entirely: dark literary speculative fiction with erotic transformation woven into myth, dread, and urgency.

I’m still writing about breasts against chests, skin on skin. But if the language can hit the sky — can be just as profane without the bluntness — then why not aim for that?

That’s the level I’m chasing.

Word Count Update

• Starting point: 38,126 words

• Today’s count: 44,334 words

• Progress so far: +6,208 words

• Distance to goal (60,000): 15,666 words left

Thanks for following along as I wrestle not just with the story, but with the very words that carry it. Every Saturday brings me closer — not only to 60,000 words, but to the voice I want this book to have.

—A.L. Bellettiere