Male writer seeking feedback from women

[MarkLivingston]

Hello, all. In this serial story I'm trying to put the 18yo me, sexually-inexperienced, from a small, mostly-white Midwestern city, into a college setting where he starts noticing black women, then meets 2 black female seniors who "take him under their wing" to advance his sexual education.

I can write my character of course, but I want my female characters to be as realistic as possible.

A lot of that is simple male vs. female stuff, which any woman could speak to, and that would be great, but I'm hoping to find a black woman who's sort of lived the experiences of some of my female characters. Someone who's experienced that racial divide, who's maybe dated white guys in HS, or who was dissuaded from doing so because it was somewhat taboo. I graduated HS in 1981, and in my small town it still mostly was. Today that's not so much of a 'thing,' but there still seems to be an expectation to date within your race. That's the piece I really want to get at. How did an 18yo black girl 20 years ago feel about white boys her age? Is she conflicted about being attracted to them, about dating them? Those sorts of things.

I want to make sure I'm at least close to right on my female characterizations. So if any women out there would like to read it:
White Freshman, Black Coeds Ch.1 And: Chapter 2

Thanks!
"Mark"

 

[djrip]

Hi Mr. Mark, I'm not an African American woman or anything but I read your stories and enjoyed them. For what it's worth I suspect some readers may have been put off by the fact that all the action in the first chapter was in the MC's imagination. We're already fantasizing, we don't necessarily want to fantasize about fantasizing, if that makes sense! (Well maybe sometimes we do.) That said it does build the scenario and I liked where things went in chapter 2. But I'd chalk any lower scores than usual to the daydream.

I think a daydream can be fine, but you might want to give something real also rather than making a fantasy carry a whole entry on its own. It was a hot and well written daydream though!

 

[MarkLivingston]

djrip, thank you for reading both and for your feedback! You say you're not an "African American woman or anything," so are you neither? I can't tell from your profile, and only want to know because I'm really looking for female perspective on my female characters. But I'll gladly take any feedback, and was heartened that you said the daydream was hot and well-written.

I did struggle with including that, but I wanted the first chapter to set the stage, to explain where Mark had come from and where he was and all the new things he was experiencing and thinking. I had Candace give him the little bending-over show, but I knew where my story arc was going already, so I couldn't really have Mark and her interacting beyond that.

But then it was a short first chapter with no sex in it, so I did what I would've done at that age, and had Mark later fantasize about this pretty girl he'd just met. And since Mark was doing that, I figured he may as well include it in his tale.
PLUS, I used that to set the stage for the "no touching"/denial stuff that comes later.

I agree that's probably part of the low scores, but I'm okay with that, it being the beginning of the story. Ch. 2 is carrying a better score, and I think/hope people will enjoy later chapters more as they get drawn into Mark's universe.

Thanks again!

 

[djrip]

I'm neither! Hope you can get some chime in from the ladies, but figured I'd go ahead as well. Yeah, the fantasizing makes perfect sense in the situation.