Writing a Menage: A Special Dynamic

Hi again– If you've just arrived, Welcome!! This is my fourth post today so be sure and scroll down and read about the contest! There's also a fun excerpt down there. 

Today, I’m celebrating the release of my new novel, Deceptive Attraction, which is a M/M/F ménage. And that’s what I’d like to talk about. Writing the ménage. I didn’t set out to become a ménage writer. It wouldn’t have occurred to me. My first book, Genetic Attraction, didn’t start out to be a ménage a trois. When I first conceived the plot, I expected it to be an older woman/younger man romance, but then one day I ordered a book by Jet Mykles called Heaven. It was my first male/male romance and I was hooked! I had to add another man to my book and, just that quick, it became a ménage.

Fortunately, ignorance is bliss. I didn’t know that writing a ménage is hard, so I just plunged in. That was the start of something for sure. Since that first book I have written seven more and, of those, only two have no ménage element. I’ve written two M/M/M books, two M/M/F book and the other books have ménage scenes or elements. My current WIP doesn’t have ménage  — but it’s still in progress. I guess I really like this dynamic. Here’s what I’m learning:

• Love between three people can be just as sweet and intense and passionate as between two – at least in romance novels! The real-life dynamics of a ménage are probably very tricky, but virtually everyone has harbored in their heart at sometime the thought that maybe, just maybe, they could love two people. Menage stories play into this fantasy.
• Menages make interesting plots. Simple, you have three people to play with, to make interact with each other, to provide richness and detail to your story. My new release, Deceptive Attraction, is the story of a young soccer star who meets a man who is as pretty as a girl and a woman who looks like a beautiful boy. Three characters– he's a carpeneter, she's a midwife, he has secrets, she's committed to returning to Africa. It's all plot fodder!
•  Pronouns can be killers! Writing male/male stories is a unique challenge since both characters are called “he”, so you have to find ways to differentiate them without using their names constantly, and without being confusing. Now, add another person to the mix as I did in my current release and it gets even more complicated. Yes, she's the only "she" but still …Yikes. It takes some creativity and very deep point-of-view for each character.
• Sex between three people needs careful thought. The reader needs to know where each character is and what they’re doing. No one can be left out, so we have to see reactions from each character as well as actions.
• There must be good reason why each character loves the other two. Each must have his own story, depth of character, motivations, just as if it were a love story between two people.
• But, oh, it’s soooo much fun. A ménage is fun to read and it’s fun to write. So many yummy things can be done simultaneously when you have three people. Just use your imagination.  That’s what I did.  :  )

Okay, remember to post comments so you can be entered in the Grand Prize drawing on Nov 20 — and be entered to win a t-shirt today. It has Volley Balls on the front. I mean really!  :  )