Happy International Lesbian Day! What's your favourite lesbian story or scene on Lit?

[FrancesScott]

your recent and well-deserved visit to the top ten

You left out ‘fleeting.’

Actually my score tanking seemed to be contemporaneous with this thread, after I’d been happily in the top ten for a week without offending anyone. Perhaps a coincidence. Definitely another mystery about the place.

What you’re saying - and others don’t - is what the person giving me advice had said. I’ll have to think about it some more.

 

[Jackie.Hikaru]

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Now that I feel called out for not shouting out another author I’d be remiss for not mentioning @Candy_Kane54 and, in particular, her story “Your Silver Nights and Golden Days” for its moving premise of a military officer navigating her, well, life, in a time when being gay in the military was strictly forbidden.

 

[plainplane]

I have a question for people on this thread. Does me writing stories other than lesbian ones put any would be readers off? I had someone suggest to me that the path to success is to pick a category and write that exclusively, which is the total opposite of my current approach.

I'm not a writer, so I can't see analytics (or don't know where to find them).

I look for good writers, and tend to binge read them. For those, I will read virtually anything, but I will try everything they offer.

Obviously, I do have my preferences, but I've read and enjoyed stories in every category. A few I still can't believe I actually liked. I won't go searching randomly in 11 of the 33 categories offered on Lit. But I've enjoyed stories from all of them. Yes, I even ran one through a translator.

 

[EmilyMiller]

I'll join in the chorus of people saying that the only reader who matters is you. Write what you like.

However, I will say two things:

1. As was pointed out on this thread many readers won't cross category boundaries. (I'm one: there are some categories I just won't read. I've loved your lesbian stories, but I probably won't read your others.) The thread I linked to suggests I'm not alone. So it depends what you want. The top list of Lesbian Sex is dominated by writers who pretty much exclusively write lesbian content (yes @onehitwanda used to write IT and Romance but she hasn't published in those for years). So, if your recent and well-deserved visit to the top ten has left you wanting a permanent, troll-proof slot, then specialising seems to be the way to go. I don't know why that is, but it's definitely the trend (seems to be in other categories too).

2. Shit... now I can't remember what the second thing was!

But the most important thing is to write what you like. You don't owe anyone anything.

I kinda feel that sometimes from the other side of the fence. I fully appreciate this is going to sound whiny. But whether it’s my forum profile, or the range of categories I write in, or being bisexual, or just a facet of being a less good writer than I aspire to be, but it does feel a little as if there is a barrier when it comes to lesbian sex stories. It’s maybe not quite ‘gold star syndrome’ but the most popular lesbian writers do seem to write only in lesbian.

You could argue that some of my lesbian stories are kinda male gaze. Instead I’d say they are playful lesbian fantasies. But I’ve written very grounded, woman centric lesbian stories too. I do think that some readers are looking for a hard focus on the type of stories they want to read and thus gravitate to authors who most frequently meet their expectations.

I get it, after writing arguably my best women loving women story - Twelve Months - my next substantive story was about Indiana Jones’s kid sister and a Lara Croftesque figure. While they were lesbian partners, I guess the Minotaur sex might have been a bridge too far for some.

To put it more succinctly, @Devinter once told me that he never knew what to expect when he opened one of my stories. He intended it as a compliment, and I took it as one, but there is a definite downside to that.

 

[lovecraft68]

@PacoFear Macallen Promises. It's in sci fi but is a hybrid story that also explores a taboo lesbian theme.

One of the rare trifecta stories, a Green E, an H and a W

https://www.literotica.com/s/macallan-promises

 

[Justplainjeff]

Happy International Lesbian Day, sapphics everywhere! Woohoo!
Let's celebrate! What's your favourite lesbian story (or perhaps a favourite sapphic scene) here on Lit? Tell us what it is and why?

I'll start with the story that made me want to try writing lesbian erotica, Walking With Sam by @onehitwanda. I've read a lot of good lesbian stories on Lit, but I keep coming back to this one. It has a beautiful romance that builds to a climax, a well thought out structure from start to finish, rich language and emotions that never fail to make my cry, and tense up and laugh at the appropriate places, however often I read it. It's a beautiful representation of women loving women, and I wish there was more literature like it out there.

So that's me. Who's going next?
Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Anyone?

J C McNeily's 6 part classic: Beautiful. Even us old guys loved all 6 parts.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I have a question for people on this thread. Does me writing stories other than lesbian ones put any would be readers off? I had someone suggest to me that the path to success is to pick a category and write that exclusively, which is the total opposite of my current approach.

Basically what @THBGato said. Posting stories in other categories is probably not going to affect your Lesbian stories much one way or another. You'll get a small number of viewers coming over to check out what else you've written but a lot who'll only follow you within a category. There aren't many readers who'll avoid your Lesbian stories just because you're posting in others, or vice versa.

Maybe a bit if you were posting in something controversial like NC/R, and LW drama has been known to breach containment, but aside from those categories you're probably safe.

It can be frustrating for authors writing stories that would fit equally well in multiple categories - I think a lot of my readers from Lesbian Sex would enjoy Riddle of the Copper Coin and maybe Corpus Loss Function, either of which could easily have gone in that category, but without a nudge they may not go check them out. But that's on the category system here, not the readers.

 

[THBGato]

I think a lot of my readers from Lesbian Sex would enjoy Riddle of the Copper Coin and maybe Corpus Loss Function, either of which could easily have gone in that category, but without a nudge they may not go check them out. But that's on the category system here, not the readers.

Yeah but without a nudge from you, I wouldn't have read them (and goddess are they good!) and I'm a voracious reader who actively seeks out romantic lesbian content.

The new-ish tag display system, which allows you to see tags before clicking, has helped a bit. At the moment, I'm reading a lot of Sci Fi centred on lesbians that I've found through tags.

 

[Nightaelf]

Thank you @AwkwardMD @StillStunned @MelissaBaby @onehitwanda and @Nightaelf for your responses. I feel like I misstep here all the time. So many unwritten rules. I appreciate your candor and will keep doing what I’m doing.

Hey Frances, no problem, you’re very welcome. But I think it’s a shame that you feel like you’re constantly making missteps. Because honestly, who decides what a misstep even is? Unwritten rules are unwritten for a reason. No one here gets to decide what’s right or wrong. It’s up to each person individually how they want to handle things.

Maybe you’re holding on too tightly to those so-called unwritten rules instead of focusing on what you really want. And I’d hate for that to make you feel uncomfortable in your writing or make you doubt yourself, because there’s absolutely no reason for that. You’re a very good writer, and I really enjoy reading your stories.

People tend to cling too much to what they personally want or expect. And yes, this topic happens to be about lesbian stories, of course it is, it’s Happy Lesbian Day, so it’s not that strange that it’s lesbian-themed. But you, as a writer, are completely free to do whatever you like, in any category you want. And everyone is free to read whatever category they prefer.

In my own case, I often include male characters in my stories too, there isn’t really a bisexual or pansexual category. And you know what? Don’t stress too much about what others think, because people will always have opinions about something.

@THBGato even was the first one who praised me for my male character in my story Between Needles and Need, saying she actually rooted for him.

So really, don’t take it all too heavily or too seriously. Just write good stories that people want to read.