Ask A Woman

PennLady said:

I won't entirely disagree, but I will point out that 1st-person present tense is the narration in "The Hunger Games" (and the narrator does not die at the end), and possibly the Percy Jackson books. I glanced at those (my son loves them) but can't quite remember. Made me wonder if it's a popular thing in YA fiction for some reason.

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I haven't read YAF lately, but as I said, 1st and 2nd person present tense have high intensity, and I seem to recall being quite intense when younger. Past and especially future tense put the narration at some remove from the readers. (I vaguely recall a really creepy 2nd-person future tense story.) Present tense hurls the reader directly into the storyline, and 1st-person present tense allows intimate identification with the narrator, straight into their brain. Perfect for grabbing adolescent attention, whether prose or verse.

sr71plt said:

I run across first person, present tense in novels now and again. One young adult novel naturally used it because the protagonist, using first person, dies of leukemia at the end, so past tense narration wouldn't be too logical.

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Exactly. I see first-person present tense as ominous, telegraphing the narrator's imminent doom. Not always, of course, but enough.

One could play with tenses and verb forms for effect. Imagine the tone of a story told in future tense 2nd-person plural omniscient narration. In a song or poem, it would be authoritative, commanding. In a prose story... creepy.

Hypoxia said:

Imagine the tone of a story told in future tense 2nd-person plural omniscient narration. In a song or poem, it would be authoritative, commanding. In a prose story... creepy.

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I think I've found my next story after FAWC, Nude Day, continuing chapters of my existing story, and Summer Loving: She Whom Y'all Will Obey!

stlgoddessfreya said:

... She Whom Y'all Will Obey!

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That has a nice ring to it, yes?

Hypoxia said:

That has a nice ring to it, yes?

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I'm thinking something post-Apocalyptic where the survivalist leanings and can-do attitude of Texas beauty queens makes them the top of the food chain. Sex slaves are rated not only on their physical attributes, but also by how quickly they can load shot and how well they tease hair.

The currency system is Moon Pie based.

stlgoddessfreya said:

I'm thinking something post-Apocalyptic where the survivalist leanings and can-do attitude of Texas beauty queens makes them the top of the food chain. Sex slaves are rated not only on their physical attributes, but also by how quickly they can load shot and how well they tease hair.

The currency system is Moon Pie based.

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lmao!

Actually, I like it. In your hands, that could be a funny, erotic, and really quite surreal story.

stlgoddessfreya—Hope you write a sequel to your pool story. That was simultaneously haunting and hot. If you go on, I think you should keep telling it from her perspective.

stlgoddessfreya said:

I'm thinking something post-Apocalyptic where the survivalist leanings and can-do attitude of Texas beauty queens makes them the top of the food chain. Sex slaves are rated not only on their physical attributes, but also by how quickly they can load shot and how well they tease hair.

The currency system is Moon Pie based.

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My house has a similar economy.

Edit: Also, as funny as that joke is, and it is really funny, if you're going Texas, you should pick a different currency. Moonpies are more commonly bartered in the South, and Texas is more Southwestern. Maybe the system could be based on hot sauce or Dallas Cowboy paraphernalia.

AMoveableBeast said:

My house has a similar economy.

Edit: Also, as funny as that joke is, and it is really funny, if you're going Texas, you should pick a different currency. Moonpies are more commonly bartered in the South, and Texas is more Southwestern. Maybe the system could be based on hot sauce or Dallas Cowboy paraphernalia.

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Ah, that's where I think you're wrong. Texas is very much (virtually) its own country, and it has many regions. East Texas is as much the South, culturally, as its neighbors, Louisiana and Mississippi. MoonPies, sweet iced tea, and big, giant hair galore. Obviously your comment begs the questions, though - what happens when the East Texas queens and the tejana queens meet in the middle for the big sex-slave auction? Do they have a currency exchange so everyone's on equal footing for bidding? I think the only appropriate answer is that they meet in Austin and exchange the barter currencies of their respective realms for old 45 records.

yesterdays said:

Very nice thread. Wow. I hesitate to post, but....

Men can sometimes use food as love too. It's not only a female thing imho. My wife is a better cook than I am, but I often put good meals on the table. Anyway, here's a story where I show a very young man doing that. I learned to cook some simple things when I was pretty young. I know I have room to grow as a writer. And I know I need to be more careful in my copyediting. But if you're willing, I'd be interested in any brief comments you might have about the woman in this story, "Alice." She's based on women I really knew and loved long ago....

http://www.literotica.com/s/alice-ch-05

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Okay! Took me longer than I wanted to get to reading the first five chapters of your story to give my thoughts, and here they are. If anyone else wants to read these, don't be deterred by the number of chapters, they're short.

The Good: The fact that this is based on something that you remember fondly from your own past really shines through. You have some really great descriptions of small things, particularly what Charlie notices about Alice. It does feel like being inside the head of a young man with an intense crush.

I found Alice to be an interesting, realistic character. She's been hurt in love and from losing her mother but she's still looking forward to having fun with Charlie without hurting him too badly, even though she knows it's inevitable. I really enjoyed her.

The Bad: I know it's the advice everyone gets when they start out, that the only way to get better at writing is to write. Your story is the first one I've seen where each chapter is a notable step up in the quality of writing from the last, which is even more interesting since you wrote them close together. Honestly, your chapter 1 and chapter 5 read like they were either written by different people or written a significant period of time apart.

I though one of the things that was awkward was the point of view you selected for your story. You have a third-person omniscient POV, but your focus is clearly on what Charlie thinks an experiences. It can be somewhat jarring when the narrator shifts into talking about what Alice thinks or feels. There are a few places where you do it in the same sentence, and it took some puzzling out.

There's a reason a lot of first time and incest stories are told from a first-person or more clearly limited third-person perspective. The uncertainty of what the other person thinks or feels is part of the conflict: Do they like it? How far will it go? Is this OK?

I don't think your story needs to be told entirely from Charlie's perspective, but I think being clearer with paragraph breaks between the perspectives of the two is the way to go. You also suffer sometimes from an issue that can come up with the focus on one character, which is that there are a few times that Charlie thinks something, then says exactly that. I noticed it more in the early chapters than the later chapters.

There are some times when your descriptions are detailed, but don't seem to have much purpose in advancing the story and can distract from things that are more important to your story.

Overall, it's a fun, sweet read that gets better as it goes, but would be really great if all the chapters were consistent.

Hi Freya,

I am in the beginning stages of a new Incest story. You made a valid point about how all my characters are black and white, so I want to try writing a more well-rounded realistic female lead this time.

In that line, I have a characterization question

She lost her mother when she was twelve (long drawn illness). She was very close to her mother and took the loss hard. Moreover, she was incensed when her Dad married someone within two months. It's not a rational rage, but twelve year olds are rarely rational.

The step-mom isn't a bad person. She really tries to please her new daughter, going to pick her up from school. But Amelia (the protagonist) throws enraged tantrums and calls her "STEP-mom" loudly. If anyone tries to reason with her, she adds that person to her hate-list. A real me vs the world type of situation. Her only ally is her younger brother (six years younger), who is too young to know better.

That's the backstory. There's a lot more to it. Eventually Amelia leaves for college in Europe when she's 18 and cuts all ties to her family and friends. The story is actually set when she returns at the age of 28. Her brother is 22 at the time.

So after all this, I finally have a question - is it plausible that she can carry that teenage angst till that age? Still resent her father for marrying someone else so soon (trying to replace the mother she loved)?

Also, she is many other kinds of messed up - (one incident I have thought up is in high school, she got bullied by another girl. As "revenge", she got the girl's Dad drunk, seduced him and led to his going to jail for statutory rape). For her, sex is a means for getting back at someone or getting ahead in life. She sleeps exclusively with commitment-phobic married men or executives at her company to get promoted. She is intensely reclusive.

The main driving point of the story is that the only person in her life she loved without an ulterior motive is her brother ,Kevin. Add in the guilt of "abandoning" him when she moved to Paris and cut all ties. From that ground, I am trying to devise the sex.

So yeah, I could use your opinion on the characterization.

LaRascasse said:

So after all this, I finally have a question - is it plausible that she can carry that teenage angst till that age? Still resent her father for marrying someone else so soon (trying to replace the mother she loved)?

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For what it's worth, I think it's quite reasonable that she would carry that anger into adulthood. However, I would also ask: where is her father in all this? Why is he not attempting to instill some discipline and respect? Or why is there no other adult to take her to task about this? Or even another adult to live with?

And if her father is attempting to appease her all the time, then that would have repercussions on his marriage, I'd assume.

Again, I'm not saying she can't be like this, but I think there needs to be a little bit more background, or explanation. It could be she's just pissed to the point of being mentally unstable, and nothing would help, but if I started reading this, that's what I'd want to know -- what did her father do, that sort of thing.

LaRascasse said:

Also, she is many other kinds of messed up - (one incident I have thought up is in high school, she got bullied by another girl. As "revenge", she got the girl's Dad drunk, seduced him and led to his going to jail for statutory rape). For her, sex is a means for getting back at someone or getting ahead in life. She sleeps exclusively with commitment-phobic married men or executives at her company to get promoted. She is intensely reclusive.

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Okay but where does that all come from? I'd think that there has to be something of a trigger for this. People don't out of the blue come up with stuff to entrap other people (mostly). So what led to her realizing sex could be a weapon like this?

Thanks for the response, ma'am. Here are my tentative answers (caveat - the ideas are still in progress)

PennLady said:

For what it's worth, I think it's quite reasonable that she would carry that anger into adulthood. However, I would also ask: where is her father in all this? Why is he not attempting to instill some discipline and respect? Or why is there no other adult to take her to task about this? Or even another adult to live with?

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Her father is already heartbroken at losing his wife of fifteen years, he doesn't want to risk alienating his daughter any further than he already has. Moreover, Amelia finds out that her father was having an affair with wife #2 even as her mom was in the hospital bed. He was grieving and vulnerable and this lady (a woman he knew from college) was simply trying to be comforting. She has a nasty habit of flinging that in his face whenever he tries to reason with her.

Amelia is a troubled rebel. People all around her have proposed medication/counseling but she refuses to acknowledge she has a problem.

And if her father is attempting to appease her all the time, then that would have repercussions on his marriage, I'd assume.

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Actually yes. The story begins with her brother picking her up from the airport and on the drive back, he mentions how their father and wife #2 broke up and he had a heart attack soon afterwards.

Again, I'm not saying she can't be like this, but I think there needs to be a little bit more background, or explanation. It could be she's just pissed to the point of being mentally unstable, and nothing would help, but if I started reading this, that's what I'd want to know -- what did her father do, that sort of thing.

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She had always been somewhat shy and reclusive, but these events made her grow a darker core, if that makes sense.

Okay but where does that all come from? I'd think that there has to be something of a trigger for this. People don't out of the blue come up with stuff to entrap other people (mostly). So what led to her realizing sex could be a weapon like this?

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As a teen, she slept around with older men (father figures?) to make her Dad feel even worse. That led to her "sex-as-a-weapon" mindset. This is only mentioned, not described in detail since she was underage during this time.

Hey! I'm really honored you're askingy opinion. Definitely what PL said. I'd add that yes, it's totally plausible for her to still carry a grudge, particularly against dad and step mom, even to the point where she's still keeping a list and actively trying to get back at the people on it. I've definitely known women like that older than your protagonist, although their career arc is one I'd describe as more "pissant criminal" than "corporate executive" because you can't get far in life with an attitude like that without lots of wealth and connections.

How self-aware is she of her antisocial behavior? That, to me, makes a big difference in her characterization. She can still be aware and do it, anyway, but if she hasn't progressed much emotionally since she was twelve, there's going to have to be another trade-off.

Have you thought about not having the parents broken up when she gets there? If they are, it takes current conflict (and possible moves towards resolution) with step-mom out of the equation.

LaRascasse said:

Her father is already heartbroken at losing his wife of fifteen years, he doesn't want to risk alienating his daughter any further than he already has. Moreover, Amelia finds out that her father was having an affair with wife #2 even as her mom was in the hospital bed. He was grieving and vulnerable and this lady (a woman he knew from college) was simply trying to be comforting. She has a nasty habit of flinging that in his face whenever he tries to reason with her.

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You said it was a "long, drawn out illness" for the mother. Is it the kind of thing where she's gone before she's gone, if you will? Was it the kind of illness where the mother was mentally gone, unable to have a real relationship with her husband, and so the father had the affair after he had already grieved, in a sense? Or was she lucid until the end, and perhaps even gave her blessing to the husband? Which doesn't mean Amelia would approve of that, or understand, of course.

LaRascasse said:

Amelia is a troubled rebel. People all around her have proposed medication/counseling but she refuses to acknowledge she has a problem.

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I'm not sure how it works, but as a minor, it could be that such things were mandatory for her. And she could have gamed the system, if so.

LaRascasse said:

As a teen, she slept around with older men (father figures?) to make her Dad feel even worse. That led to her "sex-as-a-weapon" mindset. This is only mentioned, not described in detail since she was underage during this time.

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But would he really feel worse, or would he just worry about her? Although for her it might have been the same thing. Sure, no details needed, I realize that, no problem. I suppose I'm still looking for something of a trigger event, accidental or not, that makes all this click in her head.

And I have to say, too, that I know I'm only one person and this isn't my usual fare, but I don't see a reason to care about her and hence about reading the story. Does she have any redeeming qualities, or does her affection for her brother fill that role?

Male and Female Vocabulary?

http://www.businessinsider.com/gend...ce=slate&utm_medium=referral&utm_term=partner

This article gives the top words in a study that either male or female participants overwhelmingly recognized. The study didn't track that men and women knew what the words meant, just if they recognized them as words at all. Any thoughts, Lit? Are there words of phrases that make you think an author is male or female?

stlgoddessfreya said:

http://www.businessinsider.com/gend...ce=slate&utm_medium=referral&utm_term=partner

This article gives the top words in a study that either male or female participants overwhelmingly recognized. The study didn't track that men and women knew what the words meant, just if they recognized them as words at all. Any thoughts, Lit? Are there words of phrases that make you think an author is male or female?

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I've read works of female authors and found that there's a subtle difference between their writings and their male counterparts.

When they write about their protagonist, they tend to write more stuff about emotions and things that doesn't really cross the mind of the typical male. Complexity of thoughts, emotions and character description (in terms of looks, clothes, etc.) are just some of the things that tell me whether the author is male/female.

I think that there's a whole thread dedicated to it, here in Lit. The user had read a novel which had a male protagonist but the emotions running through his head just didn't seem right to the user. He checked out the author 'Alex' and found that it's a woman

stlgoddessfreya said:

http://www.businessinsider.com/gend...ce=slate&utm_medium=referral&utm_term=partner

This article gives the top words in a study that either male or female participants overwhelmingly recognized. The study didn't track that men and women knew what the words meant, just if they recognized them as words at all. Any thoughts, Lit? Are there words of phrases that make you think an author is male or female?

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I saw that via Slate, and I recognized all the words. Not sure what that says about me.

Still, I do think that men and women have different styles. Not that I'm better than 50/50 at guessing.

stlgoddessfreya said:

http://www.businessinsider.com/gend...ce=slate&utm_medium=referral&utm_term=partner

This article gives the top words in a study that either male or female participants overwhelmingly recognized. The study didn't track that men and women knew what the words meant, just if they recognized them as words at all. Any thoughts, Lit? Are there words of phrases that make you think an author is male or female?

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As well as the recent thread in Author's Hangout, there was some discussion a year? ago about tools like this one that attempt to pick an author's gender based on the words they use.

As with most such things, I think there are differences in the averages but they're not very good at predicting for individuals. It's like the difference between "on average men are a few inches taller than women" and "this person is five foot nine so they must be male!"

(Although, biological ignorance is something of a giveaway - hymens deep inside the body are the classic porn example.)

I'd like a woman's opinion on a story I wrote. It's the first time I've tried to write a first person narrative from a female perspective and I'm not sure if I got the tone right.

The story is a mother/son incest yarn with an unusual twist on a common theme. It's very dirty, and fairly long (7 Lit pages), so I understand if you might not want to read the whole thing. If you could read the first page or two and let me know what you think, I would appreciate it.

Not Your Typical Panty Sniffing Story

I was just rewriting someone's story (not to worry, it wouldn't be posted anywhere - I just did it for the exercise) and something that didn't seem that apparent to me when I first read it, became more apparent while I was rewriting it.

This also pertains to stlgoddessfreya's question "Are there words of phrases that make you think an author is male or female?"

The story I was working on was all lesbian. I noticed that the writer (who I now thing was a guy) used a lot of "give me those tits," "I want that pussy," "check that ass out."

Opposed to that, I think a woman would say "give me your tits," "I want your pussy," "check her ass out."

Personalizing (female trait) opposed to impersonalizing (male trait) or rather objectifying.

While I understand and respect what JBJ said once regarding if you want to write from the point of view of a woman, simply write it from a man's and change the pronouns," contrary to this, I think there are subtle differences that are exclusive to each sex.

Then again, I think women sometimes have said "fuck that pussy" talking to me during sex.

Thoughts?

AZMotherLover said:

I'd like a woman's opinion on a story I wrote. It's the first time I've tried to write a first person narrative from a female perspective and I'm not sure if I got the tone right.

The story is a mother/son incest yarn with an unusual twist on a common theme. It's very dirty, and fairly long (7 Lit pages), so I understand if you might not want to read the whole thing. If you could read the first page or two and let me know what you think, I would appreciate it.

Not Your Typical Panty Sniffing Story

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I saw you'd posted this with no answer, at least in the thread, and tried to read your story. Sorry, I couldn't. Part of the problem is the incest thing, which is not my preference anyway, but I just couldn't imagine a mother talking to her son like that. It's hard to say if you got the tone right when you're in a category that doesn't happen like this in real life (and I know I didn't get to the female-narrated part).

Anyway, sorry. Hope you got some private feedback that was more helpful.

LWulf said:

I was just rewriting someone's story (not to worry, it wouldn't be posted anywhere - I just did it for the exercise) and something that didn't seem that apparent to me when I first read it, became more apparent while I was rewriting it.

This also pertains to stlgoddessfreya's question "Are there words of phrases that make you think an author is male or female?"

The story I was working on was all lesbian. I noticed that the writer (who I now thing was a guy) used a lot of "give me those tits," "I want that pussy," "check that ass out."

Opposed to that, I think a woman would say "give me your tits," "I want your pussy," "check her ass out."

Personalizing (female trait) opposed to impersonalizing (male trait) or rather objectifying.

While I understand and respect what JBJ said once regarding if you want to write from the point of view of a woman, simply write it from a man's and change the pronouns," contrary to this, I think there are subtle differences that are exclusive to each sex.

Then again, I think women sometimes have said "fuck that pussy" talking to me during sex.

Thoughts?

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I don't think you're wrong, but it's hard to say, because everyone is different and has different attitudes and perceptions about sex. I'd say it's about even that a woman would say "Check out *his* ass" vs. "Check out *that* ass." I've probably said both myself.

In a story, seems to me it would depend on the character. Either way would work if it fits the way you wrote the character.

PennLady said:

I don't think you're wrong, but it's hard to say, because everyone is different and has different attitudes and perceptions about sex. I'd say it's about even that a woman would say "Check out *his* ass" vs. "Check out *that* ass." I've probably said both myself.

In a story, seems to me it would depend on the character. Either way would work if it fits the way you wrote the character.

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Because ALL the female characters in the story spoke in the same manner, I'm inclined to think it was a male writer.

Though it's possible that the writer was female, and simply lacked the ability to describe what she was thinking was going on, OR perhaps as you say, everybody is different.

.



I asked this question earlier, and received this feedback.

erotica_n_s said:

Is it pleasurable for a woman to be kissed on her stomach?

Can repeated kisses on a woman's stomach get her sexually aroused?

Another scene I thought of - a man is helping a woman prepare for her exams. Yes, she's a virgin, and a "good girl", so she's not interested in sex despite finding the man attractive, etc. She feels nervous around him because she knows he turns her on and that makes her feel guilty. The guy probably slightly bullies her.

So he's testing her knowledge by asking her various questions on the exam topic(s).

He's sitting in a chair, she's standing next to him. He's sitting down, and she's standing up, so his face is at the level of her stomach, his shoulders and upper arms at the level of her hips. He puts his arms around her hips, she is too scared to object.

He lifts up her shirt.

He asks her the questions. Every time she answers a question correctly, he plants a warm lingering kiss on her stomach. With every kiss, she blushes. Initially she is scared. Repeated kisses make her aroused and wet, to her own great surprise.

Wonder if that's possible, or if it sounds unintentionally comical.




.

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PennLady said:

Sure, why wouldn't it be?



I don't see why it wouldn't be, but it depends on the woman. If you mean could you write such a thing into a story -- sure.



Being a virgin or "good girl" doesn't mean a woman is not interested in sex. That said, it's certainly possible for *people* brought up with certain views to feel guilty when sexually aroused, especially perhaps if it's outside of marriage.

In terms of arousal, you lose me when the guy "bullies" her. It's one thing to encourage someone to get past a hangup, or try something new, but when you "bully" them, it's territory that I do not find exciting.



There's nothing wrong with that scene. The only thing that would bother me is the bullying.

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Okay, thanks very much for the response(s).

The point of the scene was that it’s the “prelude” to the other sex scenes. It’s the first scene with any sexual intimacy in the story.

Up until that scene, the sexual tension has been rising between the male and female protagonists. However, for religious reasons (she is a Hindu), and (perhaps more importantly), also because she happens to be engaged to another man, the female protagonist has been trying desperately hard to avoid giving in to temptation. This young man (the male protagonist of the story) is a handsome man, and the female protagonist feels guilty as she realizes she is having feelings (both romantic and carnal urges) for him – feelings she thinks might be “immoral”. And it’s not just his looks – it’s his personality – his arrogance, his unflappability, his unhesitating boldness, his breathtaking insolence and audacity – she finds it supremely irritating, and yet, at a deeper level, it turns her on… So even though she feels slightly awkward and nervous around him, they are still friends – they are both academically really good, so they need each other…

After weeks of trying to ignore the unspoken sexual tension between them, the young man decides he is tired of waiting, and yes – begins kissing her intimately – upon her stomach – during their study session. The young woman finds it so wonderfully pleasurable and she becomes so intensely aroused that she is powerless to resist him.

After they’ve discussed all of the exam questions, he congratulates her for being well-prepared for the exam, and as a “reward”, he performs cunnilingus on her, working her to orgasm with his tongue.

But yeah, perhaps the important question was – can a kiss on the stomach genuinely be so pleasurable for a woman? i.e., not just “slightly” pleasurable, but rather so intensely pleasurable as to break her will to resist?




.

I'm sure the universal woman will float by to give you the single universal answer to this, but in the meantime I'll suggest that, eroticism being 78 percent mental, I think it's fairly obvious that kissing anywhere intimate would be a turn-on for most people (and not just women).

I think that part of your scenario (the positioning of the bodies, the kisses) is quite erotic. I think the premise that she's not interested in sex would, realistically not put her in that position. I think it could be a hot scene, but that it would need a different lead-up seduction to the lead up you provide. To be believable, I think there would have to be something to transition from not aware through reluctance to believable acceptance of kisses on the stomach, to arousal, to copulation.