: Re: Mentioning quickly repeated events in first person? When writing in first person, is it better to mention as little repetition of events as possible? Or can it improve writing in some cases

@Welton431

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I'll agree with Ash, but it depends on the situation. In this one, the events/actions are not a foregone conclusion. If your character is sawing wood or tightening a bolt or having sex or doing anything where repeated action is expected by the reader, detailing the repeated actions gets boring.

Edit in response to comment. On repetitiveness in sex:

I have no problem with either explicit sex scenes or pages of it; but after more than one or two descriptions of thrusting, licking, caresses or orgasms it becomes comical. What extremist metaphor comes next? (pun intended).

My recommendation for writing such scenes is to read and revise them fifty times in a row, or however long it takes to dissipate any arousal they offer the author, to actually be bored reading them so they can be seen objectively, and cut to their essentials to do their job. Even if their job is to titillate, removing repetition here is like removing repetition in prose or dialogue; more concision and originality is needed to prevent the reader from just skipping to the end.

The sex is in the minds of the characters. There is an arc to a sex scene that does not end with physical climax. Sex is about bonding. Creating one, affirming one, damaging or breaking one, with the partner or a third party off stage (e.g. a wife cheating on her husband). In the case of casual sex, it affirms a characters lack of bonds in her/his life, or the weakness of their social bonds. Or sex can signify submission (willing or coerced), oppression (e.g. rape), or a willingness to flout societal standards: All of these involve emotional bonds. Whatever the bond is, finalizing the nature of it, or the transformation of it, is the climax of the sex scene, and it probably does not coincide with the release of fluids. Again, even if the point is titillation or fan service; nothing we write should be completely excisable from the story. Sex scenes should both BE consequences and HAVE consequences in the characters or in how we understand them.

That is why a sex scene can be long and accomplish something. Not because it is full of repetition; but because it is changing somebody, or is the culmination of a change, and that deserves some attention.

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