Comments on: Can I Just Stop The Conversation And Point Out Something Here?

By: TeddyPig

TeddyPig — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 20:46:45 +0000

Yeah, but using the excuse kids “might” read your Erotic Romance so you better make it such and such a character or story is not a direction I would want to go in.

Hell, Evangeline Anderson sells a fucking boat load of books and she writes in rape and 2 dimensional stereotyped characters and you name it. You have to admit there’s money in the guilty pleasure read.

So I honestly might say “in my opinion” I don’t like “rape” in my romance or I really hate the whole “straight to gay” thing when simply smacked in the story as added spice with no explanation but I have to hand it to those writers out there who get a good formula going and work it.

It’s the Lora Leigh who rocks the web and are the ones you have to respect no matter how much you might cringe at what gets thrown into their pot. They write it and they sell it like crack to street whores. They are successful in writing what gets talked about and what people want to read and that is all a writer should be caring about not worrying about the wankers of the world. Wankers do not make bestsellers they make Live Journal blogs that mean absolutely nothing to no one.

By: Lee Rowan

Lee Rowan — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 20:33:59 +0000

Actually, I do think about young gay readers looking for what somebody called ‘happy sex’ — two people who care about each other, physically and emotionally. I don’t care if it’s corny–when I was in my ‘hunt-the-naughty-bits’ stage of adolescence, all I ever found were stories about unpleasant men seducing unwilling (female) victims, or equally unpleasant men being porny with slutty women, neither of whom cared about the other. It wasn’t ’til I read Heinlein that I got a picture of sex being something pleasant two people could do to their mutual delight.

We’re all human beings. The equipment is different, but we’re all alike in some important ways and different in others. And the similarities are a lot more significant.

As for jargon wank…. it’s still just wank, only pompous, which makes it even sillier.

Thanks, Teddy.

By: TeddyPig

TeddyPig — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 01:30:09 +0000

I agree it’s nice to see more gay characters being written. Obviously I like the Gay Romance choices we have now. I am just as happy for all my escapist fantasy and scifi without any realistic portrayals of anything that I read growing up.

By: Angelia Sparrow

Angelia Sparrow — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 01:04:02 +0000

I’m pretty sure my daughter isn’t raising 5 children on an Oklahoma ranch and fighting
zombies with Archimedes’s flame-thrower either.

“Reflect the reader and experiences’ means, to me, having the characters find the same sort of love-interest attractive as the reader does. I only read pirates and harems and highwaymen in my teens, since I found contemporary heroes unrealistic. All the guys I knew were too shy and scared to even say hello, or too mean for me to want to. None of them were bold and hot, so when I went for a fantasy, I went all the way for one.

QLTBG kids and teens need to see characters like them, facing the same sorts of issues (“if I kiss my SO in town, will I ever be able to shop at the store again?”) and finding the same sorts of people attractive. Even something with no sex in it but showing normalized same-sex marriages will cause kids to think. I need to write YA at some point…

Anyway, the “WHat about the Gay children?’ argument is a stupid one. They don’t care who is writing it. They just want a good story.

By: TeddyPig

TeddyPig — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 00:31:32 +0000

I only found it all when links started showing up. I generally tend not to bother even reading those blogs anymore. Same crazy different day.

By: AnneD

AnneD — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 00:30:29 +0000

I think I might have found it by googling a usual suspects blog.

By: TeddyPig

TeddyPig — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 00:26:09 +0000

I decided not to link sorry but KZ Snow might know.

By: AnneD

AnneD — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 00:22:50 +0000

Since I’m not up for hours of WTF blog searching, someone give me a clue…

By: TeddyPig

TeddyPig — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 22:16:33 +0000

Oh, I read lots of steamy stuff when I was young.
The point is the whole “if it reflected my experience” was a mute point since I had none. Reading about other experiences is one of the big reasons to be reading in the first place and designating what will reflect your eventual experience is a little too specific for me.
I had to try out a lot of things growing up to find out what that was. Harlequin was just one of many types of books I read. It did not mean I turned out straight or a Sheik and no secret babies either.

By: Angelia Sparrow

Angelia Sparrow — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 22:08:36 +0000

I am thinking of the gay children.
Specifically my own. Who is of an age where explicit romances can be had off the shelf and wants to see her experience reflected in some small way. Also, I never knew a kid over the age of 12 who had no idea where to find smut/erotica/porn, even in preinternet days. The trick is making sure it’s accurate and making sure it reflects them.

As for the rest, what you said.
And this cranky old byke will happily point out any number of lesbians writing m/m romance. (At one point I asked a slash list I was on, “Are we ALL vegetarian lesbians here?” I got a “no, we’re not all vegetarian.”)