What counts for the big "I"?

[BlackShanglan]

I don't know if I will ever write this, but since the plot popped into my head, I might as well ask. What counts as incest in terms of assigning a story category? My female lead would eventually be involved with a young man who is her nephew by marriage, but not a blood relation. She's been married to his uncle for twenty years and has known him since he was three and she was eighteen. They have seen quite a lot of each other in the meantime - i.e., this isn't "my long-lost nephew I never met arrives from overseas," but rather, "rather unsettling re-configuration of relationship with someone I've known most of his life."

I have a feeling that this is too close to incest to fly as "romance" and too far from incest to fly in "incest." I suppose I ought to write it for the sheer joy of knowing that it will be certain to annoy someone.

Shanglan

 

[Wildcard Ky]

Write it and submit it. If they think you've submitted it in the wrong category, they will move it to the one they think is appropriate.

They moved my last story to a different category than the one I submitted it under.

 

[cantdog]

They don't always do it, though. A sory can be trapped in the wrong category, not per se, but because of the preferences of the readers there. I have a story (the "Yacht Club Cunt" link in my sig) which I put in Group Sex, where it has fared poorly. Group Sex readers want happy orgies. Mine is (mostly) coerced sex by blackmail, wherein a girl is blackmailed into being the center of a gangbang over and over.

It should have been in Non-Consent.

On the other hand, one of the men is her father-in-law. He's the one who sets her up for this. Incest would have been a possibility. But incest readers want mom or dad with the children, or brother with sister, or at least auntie or uncle. The closer the better the reception. Or so I was told. A cursory search of the titles gives me that impression, too.

Incest readers read and vote a lot, but they are picky. I don't think your situation is hardcore incest, myself, but certainly you're welcome to try the waters.

 

[Boxlicker101]

I don't know if I will ever write this, but since the plot popped into my head, I might as well ask. What counts as incest in terms of assigning a story category? My female lead would eventually be involved with a young man who is her nephew by marriage, but not a blood relation. She's been married to his uncle for twenty years and has known him since he was three and she was eighteen. They have seen quite a lot of each other in the meantime - i.e., this isn't "my long-lost nephew I never met arrives from overseas," but rather, "rather unsettling re-configuration of relationship with someone I've known most of his life."

I have a feeling that this is too close to incest to fly as "romance" and too far from incest to fly in "incest." I suppose I ought to write it for the sheer joy of knowing that it will be certain to annoy someone.

Shanglan

Legally, it might not be "incest" but it would be close enough to be "taboo". I have a series of four stories about "My Cute Nieces" and they are all in the I/T category. They have all been fairly well received, each holding down the coveted H. The nieces are both by marriage and "I" met them when they were 12 and returned to them when they were 18, which is where the story starts.

I have another with a man and a stepdaughter, which sounds more like your story because it is technically not incest but it would be taboo because of the close relationship. One reader did point out to me that it would not be incest. It was good old Anon, or I would have resonded and agreed with him, BUT.

 

[Stella_Omega]

Nephew by marriage is not incest, in any way- unless you want to harp on the relationship every two sentences!

I would reference you to a lovely book by Mario Vargas Llosa;
"Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter "
The aunt is by marriage in this one, plus it has some of the loveliest "gimmicky" writing, similar to Nabokov in some ways. Very funny, very clever, very heartfelt.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

Why incest is Taboo is debateable and if we are honest, it's more a societal taboo than a natural one. It's illegal for the very sound reason that taking two gene pools that are so similar really cranks up the possibility of geneticly recessive traits that are very bad coming out in the off spring.

The actual reach or it varries by place, in som eit's blood relatives in others, it's relations out to first cousins.

For those who read the cat, it sems pretty uniform that the relation needs to be fairly close. You're scenario sound like one of those where you could possibly go wih the incest cat, if, all things being equal, it dosen't fit any other. In general the editors won't shift your work around much, unless you enter it as erotic couplings, which they consider a general catch all for heings and hseing without an overall structural theme that fits a less broad category.

IMHO, you should consider the incest cat only if the story fits no other theme. I don't think the main thrust (pardon the pun) of your work is going to be the incestuous nature of the relationship and I tend to believe that has to be the acid test.

 

[neonlyte]

I don't know if I will ever write this, but since the plot popped into my head, I might as well ask. What counts as incest in terms of assigning a story category? My female lead would eventually be involved with a young man who is her nephew by marriage, but not a blood relation. She's been married to his uncle for twenty years and has known him since he was three and she was eighteen. They have seen quite a lot of each other in the meantime - i.e., this isn't "my long-lost nephew I never met arrives from overseas," but rather, "rather unsettling re-configuration of relationship with someone I've known most of his life."

I have a feeling that this is too close to incest to fly as "romance" and too far from incest to fly in "incest." I suppose I ought to write it for the sheer joy of knowing that it will be certain to annoy someone.

Shanglan

Shanglan
I don't think it's incest in the legal sense of the definition, except in some of the more puritanical societies. It sounds more in the way of a community disturbance, their activities being frowned upon by the community both for the family tie and the age differential. Play to your strengths, unsettle the reader by the setting, a conventional mildly puritanical community scandalised by their union reinforcing or suggesting the Taboo nature of their relationship. A close friend, pillar of the community, scandalised by the heroine 'taking up' with the younger man. Allows an avenue for the mildly incestuous relationship to ferment - if you indeed want to travel that path.

 

[oggbashan]

Incest as a Lit category seems to be better received if the relationship is very close e.g. brother/sister or mother/son.

I think Taboo is more society based - teacher/pupil, doctor/patient.

If the relationship is not critical to the plot I suggest that the tendency towards Incest/Taboo could be avoided by making the realtionship more distant e.g. the nephew who is a nephew by marriage, could become the child of 'Uncle and Aunt XXX' who aren't really related to the character but have been treated as relations all the character's life. The taboo is that the 'nephew' has been regarded as a nephew and therefore too close a relation but actually never was related.

Og

 

[BlackShanglan]

Shanglan
I don't think it's incest in the legal sense of the definition, except in some of the more puritanical societies. It sounds more in the way of a community disturbance, their activities being frowned upon by the community both for the family tie and the age differential. Play to your strengths, unsettle the reader by the setting, a conventional mildly puritanical community scandalised by their union reinforcing or suggesting the Taboo nature of their relationship. A close friend, pillar of the community, scandalised by the heroine 'taking up' with the younger man. Allows an avenue for the mildly incestuous relationship to ferment - if you indeed want to travel that path.

You've got the nub of it, Neonlyte. It is indeed in a puritanical society - Victorian England, circa late 1860's. Her situation is complicated by the fact that she manages, in the early plot, to divorce her husband. She does this the only way a woman was likely to manage it in that time period: with the assistance of a man who aids her in the legal pursuit and in gathering the evidence (as needed at that time) that the husband was not merely adulterous but also guilty of cruelty (or possibly bigamy; can't make up my mind). Her stalwart aid is, of course, her nephew, toward whom she has the warmest feelings of gratitude, but no inkling that he might see her in a somewhat different light. The eventual spectacle of her taking up with a much younger recently-ex-relation who helped her to obtain her divorce would undoubtedly keep the gossip columns busy for months; the thought is certainly enough to unsettle her when she's suddenly brought to see him in a much different light than simply the sweet young man who's been so kind to his aunt.

Hmmm. I shall mull it. Something to offend everyone, really.

Shanglan

 

[sweetnpetite]

They don't always do it, though. A sory can be trapped in the wrong category, not per se, but because of the preferences of the readers there. I have a story (the "Yacht Club Cunt" link in my sig) which I put in Group Sex, where it has fared poorly. Group Sex readers want happy orgies. Mine is (mostly) coerced sex by blackmail, wherein a girl is blackmailed into being the center of a gangbang over and over.

It should have been in Non-Consent.

On the other hand, one of the men is her father-in-law. He's the one who sets her up for this. Incest would have been a possibility. But incest readers want mom or dad with the children, or brother with sister, or at least auntie or uncle. The closer the better the reception. Or so I was told. A cursory search of the titles gives me that impression, too.

Incest readers read and vote a lot, but they are picky. I don't think your situation is hardcore incest, myself, but certainly you're welcome to try the waters.

Did you know that you can re-submit it and have it moved to a different category?

I've done this.

 

[sweetnpetite]

I don't know if I will ever write this, but since the plot popped into my head, I might as well ask. What counts as incest in terms of assigning a story category? My female lead would eventually be involved with a young man who is her nephew by marriage, but not a blood relation. She's been married to his uncle for twenty years and has known him since he was three and she was eighteen. They have seen quite a lot of each other in the meantime - i.e., this isn't "my long-lost nephew I never met arrives from overseas," but rather, "rather unsettling re-configuration of relationship with someone I've known most of his life."

I have a feeling that this is too close to incest to fly as "romance" and too far from incest to fly in "incest." I suppose I ought to write it for the sheer joy of knowing that it will be certain to annoy someone.

Shanglan

Yes, it counts as incest and could [in my oppinion should] go there.

There is more variety in all cats than most writers here seem to realize. And plenty of stories get great scores that aren't in the majority for there category for whatever reason.

The truth is- it's always a gamble. You can write a fantastic story that seems to be just what the readers want and they might complain that 1 thing was not to there liking (Why did you have to put anal in there, I hate anal/ He should have fucked her ass, I would have liked it better if he fucked her ass ) OR they might not like it on the basis that it's just like every other story in the category.

By all writes, if every story had to be 'typical of it's category' you wouldn't have any H's at all- because nothing you write is typical. And yet, you do well. Because your readers recognize excellence. And the readers who don't appreciate excellence just skip right over and don't even have the chance to low vote you. Go for it.

 

[anon142au]

Hence why I asked that question in another thread. Cuz with my senareo it was my step sister and wondered if that counted cuz there's no blood relationship there.

 

[Boxlicker101]

Yes, it counts as incest and could [in my oppinion should] go there.

There is more variety in all cats than most writers here seem to realize. And plenty of stories get great scores that aren't in the majority for there category for whatever reason.

The truth is- it's always a gamble. You can write a fantastic story that seems to be just what the readers want and they might complain that 1 thing was not to there liking (Why did you have to put anal in there, I hate anal/ He should have fucked her ass, I would have liked it better if he fucked her ass ) OR they might not like it on the basis that it's just like every other story in the category.

By all writes, if every story had to be 'typical of it's category' you wouldn't have any H's at all- because nothing you write is typical. And yet, you do well. Because your readers recognize excellence. And the readers who don't appreciate excellence just skip right over and don't even have the chance to low vote you. Go for it.

By all means, it should go into incest. Legally it's not, but society would look on it as incest, because of the close emotional relationship between the two participants. Like I said, my four stories of sex with nieces by marriage and the one about a man and his stepdaughter have all been well received. Of course, the fact that they were total smut and the relationship just incidental might have something to do with that.

Anon142au, the same thing would apply to your story. If the step-brother and sister were raised as brother and sister, the sex between them would be thought of as incest, even if it was not legally so.

 

[neonlyte]

You've got the nub of it, Neonlyte. It is indeed in a puritanical society - Victorian England, circa late 1860's. Her situation is complicated by the fact that she manages, in the early plot, to divorce her husband. She does this the only way a woman was likely to manage it in that time period: with the assistance of a man who aids her in the legal pursuit and in gathering the evidence (as needed at that time) that the husband was not merely adulterous but also guilty of cruelty (or possibly bigamy; can't make up my mind). Her stalwart aid is, of course, her nephew, toward whom she has the warmest feelings of gratitude, but no inkling that he might see her in a somewhat different light. The eventual spectacle of her taking up with a much younger recently-ex-relation who helped her to obtain her divorce would undoubtedly keep the gossip columns busy for months; the thought is certainly enough to unsettle her when she's suddenly brought to see him in a much different light than simply the sweet young man who's been so kind to his aunt.

Hmmm. I shall mull it. Something to offend everyone, really.

Shanglan

Hmm... an interesting time period with regard to incest. Laws banning incestuous relationships were not enacted until the very late 1800's, 1898 springs to mind. England brought introduced incest laws around 1905. Up to that time incest was dealt with under Cannon Law and prosecuted through the Ecclesiastical Courts, almost exclusively male dominated tribunals. She is a glutton for punishment, this heroine of yours, runs the gauntlet of divorce - scandal! Only to take up with a younger man, a nephew no less. She risked the wrath of the Church, not the law.

 

[BlackShanglan]

Hmm... an interesting time period with regard to incest. Laws banning incestuous relationships were not enacted until the very late 1800's, 1898 springs to mind. England brought introduced incest laws around 1905. Up to that time incest was dealt with under Cannon Law and prosecuted through the Ecclesiastical Courts, almost exclusively male dominated tribunals. She is a glutton for punishment, this heroine of yours, runs the gauntlet of divorce - scandal! Only to take up with a younger man, a nephew no less. She risked the wrath of the Church, not the law.

Yes, and it puts her in an intriguing situation given the timing. The Divorce and Matrimonial Causes Act removed divorce from the ecclesiastical courts in 1857, but it preserved some of the circumstances - incest, bigamy, unnatural acts - recognized by the church as reasons to approve a divorce of a husband by his wife. Mind you, it's alleged that on only four cases had the ecclesiastical courts actually approved divorces for women. Men had a much easier time. But it does make her position intriguing in that the only thing technically preventing this from being incest is the dissolution of the marriage, a process directly aided by the nephew in question. Certainly a juicy tidbit for society and the church. But then, divorced women were viewed as such "damaged goods" anyway; at that point, if she'd had children, she would only have been able to petition for custody if they were under the age of seven despite proving adultery and "abuse likely to threaten life or limb" on the husband's part.

I think I imagine the nephew as something of the hero of the piece, although I need to work with my woman to make her something other than simply passive. Still, after twenty years of marriage to a man who resents and abuses her for evidently being unable to conceive, I think she's almost given up hope. She's decided that life will hold no joy for her and has nearly frozen over with denial of her own existence. It's her nephew, fond of her from the early age at which his kindly and pitying mother enjoined him to "promise me to always be good to your Aunt June," who decides that patient suffering just isn't good enough for her. I imagine that she's a strong person in her way - strong enough that she bears most of the worst in silence - but also, after so long, almost inevitably crushed her in perception of herself and her value to others. I think that the awakening of the possibility of joy and love, so late and after such pain, might be rather beautiful.

Shanglan

 

[anon142au]

Anon142au, the same thing would apply to your story. If the step-brother and sister were raised as brother and sister, the sex between them would be thought of as incest, even if it was not legally so.

I see. Well for the record we weren't raised as such. We didn't come together 'til later in life ' early to mid teens

 

[Huckleman2000]

I'm not sure about what Lit category it belongs in, but it seems to me to be an especially Mia Farrow-esque definition of incest.

FDR married his cousin. His ugly cousin!

Relationships between relations-by-marriage have societal taboos, but I find it difficult to consider these as actual "incest". I mean, there aren't the genetic considerations. I don't know if those are 'showstopper' prerequisites for fans of the "incest" category, but the genetic considerations are the one thing that consistently creeps me out about the cat. I kind of like the societal-taboo aspects of the non-genetic relations, though.

 

[BlackShanglan]

Relationships between relations-by-marriage have societal taboos, but I find it difficult to consider these as actual "incest". I mean, there aren't the genetic considerations. I don't know if those are 'showstopper' prerequisites for fans of the "incest" category, but the genetic considerations are the one thing that consistently creeps me out about the cat. I kind of like the societal-taboo aspects of the non-genetic relations, though.

Agreed. I think that's what's drawing me to this one - that sense of delicately taboo connections. The last one I did that dealt with relations by marriage was simpler; it fit in "Gay Male." I think what's got me a bit stumped with this one is that it's not "real" incest, but possibly taboo enough that readers in a more mainstream category might find it somewhat objectionable. I suppose I will simply have to write it and cast it to the winds.

Shanglan

 

[anon142au]

Also keeping with the subject but a slightly different question. What counts as losing your virginity? I have a feeling I might've lost it to my sister

 

[impressive]

I only consider it "incest" if the potential is there for the genetic ramifications Colly notes. If not, "taboo" still fits.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

Also keeping with the subject but a slightly different question. What counts as losing your virginity? I have a feeling I might've lost it to my sister

Depends on how you define virgnity. If you define it as sexual innocence, then gender irrespective, you loose it when you experience sexual byplay.

If you go to the opposite extreme and insist ona "technical" definition, then for a woman, it's pretty standard to have occured when her maidenhead is broaken. For a guy, it's generally considered to be the first time he has intercourse as well.

Of course, by a technical definition your girlfreind couls still be a "virgin" after having sucked off and had anal sex with the fifth army, every man of them. Likewise a guy could claim to be technically a virgin, even if he as getting a handjob or blowjob every night before he went to bed.

The definition wil be personal, so the time when you lost it will varry with every person. They need not correspond either. If Mary give Johhny a blow job, she may still consider herself a virgin, while he may consider that to mean he no longer is.

I's highly subjective.

 

[anon142au]

Depends on how you define virgnity. If you define it as sexual innocence, then gender irrespective, you loose it when you experience sexual byplay.

If you go to the opposite extreme and insist ona "technical" definition, then for a woman, it's pretty standard to have occured when her maidenhead is broaken. For a guy, it's generally considered to be the first time he has intercourse as well.

Of course, by a technical definition your girlfreind couls still be a "virgin" after having sucked off and had anal sex with the fifth army, every man of them. Likewise a guy could claim to be technically a virgin, even if he as getting a handjob or blowjob every night before he went to bed.

The definition wil be personal, so the time when you lost it will varry with every person. They need not correspond either. If Mary give Johhny a blow job, she may still consider herself a virgin, while he may consider that to mean he no longer is.

I's highly subjective.

AH I see thanx. Cuz I've wonded if I could say I wasn't after getting a blowjob and stuff like that or if it had to be intercourse right til a guy cums.

 

[Guest]

slight threadjack

FDR married his cousin. His ugly cousin!

Just here to say, no matter the photograph (youth to old age), I've never thought Eleanor Roosevelt ugly, not in the least. I presume you meant to be funny, Huck, but given the woman's life the comment does her a disservice.

Fussily ,

Perdita

 

[matriarch]

Continuing threadjack.

Just here to say, no matter the photograph (youth to old age), I've never thought Eleanor Roosevelt ugly, not in the least. I presume you meant to be funny, Huck, but given the woman's life the comment does her a disservice.

Fussily ,

Perdita

Having looked at photographs.......I agree. Handsome face, full of character, humour, sensitivity and strength.

 

[Boxlicker101]

AH I see thanx. Cuz I've wonded if I could say I wasn't after getting a blowjob and stuff like that or if it had to be intercourse right til a guy cums.

One day the kid comes home from school and tlls his parents he has lost his virginity. His mother is upset because she doesn't like her child getting so serious but his father is happy because his son has become a man.

Then the kid complains that his rear end is still sore and wonders how long that will continue.