Should I Censor Language In my Novel

I am writing a novel targeted at a mature audience, but still young (16-20 plus), and there is a lot of swearing and homophobic words being used. It's fiction based loosely off real-life events, so it kind of needs to be in there. I'm just wondering if this will affect my chances of getting published. Obviously I would have to be sure to choose the appropriate agent to query, but I'm still wondering and a little worried.

Thanks in advance.

My Work: http://dubbedpublications.com/mattgannon/

16-20 plus isn't really young anymore. The novel I'm working on has in your face moments as well dealing with race and gender topics. My opinion stay true to what you are writing. When selling a movie on todays markets it's the 'Unrated Versions' that are selling not the theatrical. If that makes any sense. Wish I could be more help. Let me know what you decide to do.

"In my head and out of my mind."

Thanks for your advice and insight. I have thought about it for weeks now, and I think that in order to be true to the writing, the language cannot be censored. So I'm going to leave all the swearing and homophobic speech in.

My Work: http://dubbedpublications.com/mattgannon/

While the use of course language may not keep you from being published, it will affect the size of your audience. Using the numbers of book buyers, and their particular demographics, you can be assured that there are percentages of your potential audience that will not read something with foul language. However, those that may appreciate it, will read it without the swearing. (Write so the potentially objectionable takes place in your reader's imagination, perhaps.)

There seems to be, among some writing advisors, some who put out the notion that you can't write freely without being crass. I think they are referring to themselves, not their potential markets. If you want to say you don't care about markets, you just wanna get published, write what you want, but these days publishers want marketable products.

Louis L'Amour has hundreds of millions of books in print, as does Clive Cusler.

If you exercise your mind while storytelling you can tell the same story to all audiences with great effect, without turning any away. That's the challenge.

. . . just an idea . . .

If it's in the dialogue, that's one thing. If it's in the exposition, that's another and that will hurt any chances of getting your work out there.

That said, if you can relay the meaning behind the swear words in body language or expressions or traits, you'll be much better off.

When I have questions like this come up I will typically try and answer it for myself by asking, "Would I, the reader, read this?"  Really think hard about that, because you, the reader, are a different person than you, the writer.

Personally, if I'm reading something littered with strong language and homophobic rantings, I'll put it down, assuming that the writer is not creative enough to bring forth the images they want to bring forth and so it's just simply lazy writing at that point. I'm not saying that you are lazy, as certainly I've not read your story.

How you use language is obviously important, but if you don't have the skills to craft a story without using tactics to shock, then it will show glaringly and might do you more harm than any good.

I am also dealing with the same thing with my novels. I think we should stay true to real life issues as we know them. I believe the readers will appreciate something they can associate with. I am a minister and I am writing romance novel, because that is the genre that I love. I was told that because I was a minister I should leave out explesive language and love scenes in my novels. However, I disagree with this because I my couples are always people of intergerty and christians. But on the real side, sex still is in play, and others in their atmosphere are not always this way and will use obscene language. This is life as we know it. I like to stay real. What do you thnk?

Hi Writers,

I personally don't feel it's necessary to cram as much Bad Language (BL), into a novel as possible.  I have read many a book that does have a limited amount of BL but it's more acceptable than having every other line filled with it.  With a lot of BL, I'm less inclined to continue reading the book because then I'm concentrating too much on the language factor than I am with the story line.   Hope that makes some sense.

Mother's Happy Child