[Potentially NSFW] How does female written erotica differ from male erotica, or for that matter a 'regular' novel?

Men get to the point. Women give reasons for getting to the point

Don’t ask me, I am a female romance hater.
I never understood women that are addicted to romance novels, let alone bodice ripper erotica. Just seems so droll and sophomoric to me.
I need intellectual stimulation to get in the mood.

My ” love language” is wanting a mind mate, massage my mind please, not my feet. lol.
I think the male version is probably more action oriented, more explicit sex and the female version is more titillating in terms of like 300 pages of foreplay before Sven actually rips the heroines blouse off and uncorks his champagne bottle all over her. lol

I’m not sure there is actually “male erotica” and “female erotica”. Probably, there is a greater effort to market literary erotica to women, because men are sterotyped as preferring images to words. Whether a person enjoys one erotic work over another is going to be a matter of individual personal taste, not a matter of what their gender is.

Old school playboy usually featured stories of “male erotica” in addition to the photo shoots. It was somewhat entertaining.

Well, the stereotype is Penthouse Forum vs. Harlequin.

Since this is 2016 and I’m inescapably an adult at 30 years old, I think it’s fairly safe to say that the market for adult literature has shifted.

At least since I was a high school aged teen, erotic FanFiction, the writing and reading of same, has been a major source of erotic lit for both males and females.

This is evident in visual erotica, too. Porn parodies of mainstream works are very popular (Hairy Pooter and the Sorcerer’s Bone, anyone?). Even the incredibly (astonishingly) popular Fifty Shades series began its life as a Twilight erotic fan fiction.

@Seek Right, a lot of the erotica being written now is in fanfiction, because anyone can do it and anyone can read it. Most of it seems to be written by women (but not all of it), and I would guess most of it is consumed by women. It must be impossible to gather good statistics on this sort of thing. And you certainly can’t glean anything from the gender pairings.

It amazes me that the truly awful Fifty Shades is the one piece of fanfiction that managed to become a mainstream blockbuster. There’s so much better writing out there, not to mention a fairly rigorous BDSM contingent that tells people when they’re doing it wrong.

Well, I can say I was a member, in my teen years and early 20s, of an adult fan fiction roleplaying game. The females outnumbered the males, but only just. At our height, we had over 75 members.

Female erotica is more relationship focused than male erotica, which is relatively more likely to focus on genitals and body parts.

Also, women are more likely to read and write erotica as words are enticing to women while most men are more turned on by porn.