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That was the one sentence reader comment I got on a story of mine published yesterday at Fictionmania.
What goes around comes around or WGACA for short, was my poke at boy to adult female stories, or more precisely to boy to Mom body swap stories. Many of which have the son soon after becoming Mom going to bed with Dad, or some boyfriend and the former boy being just delighted with what has happened to them. Even happier if the swap is permanent, with maybe a 2 or 3 paragraph pause of unhappiness but that's optional, after all they're a strong powerful adult now.
As magic/sci-fi TG fiction goes, I thought these type of stories took implausibility to new levels for TG fiction. Here are two examples from authors who've written many TG fiction stories, more of them if I read them, I liked more than disliked.
Two main reasons I say for this-
The boy loses 20 to 30 years of life in the exchange
and
These stories find the boy thinking of Mom as some kind of sex symbol. Hormone driven crazy boys aren't going to find their Mom attractive. Someone else's Mom maybe, their own no chance.
I won't fail to point out most kids would rather not think of their parents having sex. If the teen becomes Mom, going to bed with Dad is not what the boy would be aspiring to.
TG fiction is fantasy fiction, but I decided to show the other side of the coin. The least traveled path for this type of story, but perhaps the more realistic.
Truth of it is, if you're transgendered and have all your freedom taken away, what's there to be happy about? I for one if I could be a woman, U wouldn't want my ability to make choices lost. To me it would be the same as being put in prison.
Some readers may agree with what Sarah. I'm just guessing that because of the lack of comments on part two(the finale) the same story at Big Closet. The story received just one.
One thing I'll add. This is one of the few times I've either used mind control or revenge as a major theme in a story of mine. My stories tend to happy endings and less sinister reasons for a person to be transgendered. Nothing like this story where a badly mistaken and vengeful wife changed her husband into a horse for life.
Life isn't always a happy ending. Portraying one in fiction doesn't make a story bitter, ugly, or hateful.
Comments
Some thoughts on your story
Danielle,
You are a great author, and while I did not like what I started reading in re the SRU story, I did what I normally do when I come across such stories - I stopped reading. That is all. No comments, no review. Nothing. I feel that comments and reviews should primarily be positive, followed by constructive. If I don't or can't read the whole story, I should not comment. I have made exceptions to this in the past, but only from severe transgressions. You have a storycrafting ability that can transport readers to your worlds; unfortunately, I choose to escape those trips if they do not suit me. My loss? Sometimes, but it is my choice and noone else's. Don't worry about abusive commentor's or their comments because you do write good stories, just sometimes no not my cuppa.
Hugs
Diana
Undeserved
I just read the story in question over on FM and posted the following review:
Enjoyed the story
Danielle
I read your story, enjoyed it and voted for it. I don't often comment on other people's stories since I never know what to write.
Keep up the good work.
Hugs,
Alys
Dear Danielle,
I just reviewed your story at FM. I didn't read the FM comments.
IMHO, I thought the story was fine, it was written very well. I don't think it was anything like bitter or ugly or hateful. Given the fact that spells R us and the computer program exist and function as described, I thought the story was very realistic. Jimmy wasn't acting like an evil sorcerer, changing many people however he wished, in fact he hadn't used the program at all, until he thought there was no other way to help his friend. He also helped out his father and himself. Unfortunately, Jimmy didn't think too deeply about taking away all of Sean's options for the rest of his life or giving Sean any say in the matter. That seems believable for a 14 year old, who was probably panicking about how bad Sean's life in Ohio would be.
Sean was disturbed about what had happened and how he was forced to behave. Probably few straight, non TG teen boys would enjoy being forced into a homosexual role (in Sean's point of view) and turned into a subservient womyn. Sean was realistically not completely full of love and forgiveness. He changed Jimmy out of revenge, but didn't really hurt him or take away all his choices in life. The story only illustrated the title: WGACA.
Thanks for the time and effort writing and posting this story. Thanks also for your insightful comment.
Hugs,
Renee
Hugs and Bright Blessings,
Renee
Every genre has its fans...
First and foremost, I’m sorry to hear that someone left such a pathetic “review†of your story. Even if the story felt harsh to him, he should have demonstrated a little etiquette.
Personally, I don’t care for the boy-to-woman stories either, but—having once been a worshiper of psychology—I’m fairly certain I understand why some people tend like that type of a story. Even if I didn’t understand it, who cares? Who am I to criticize what another person likes?
I was a tad bit concerned about your post when you said that you were poking fun at a particular genre. I pretty much agree with everything you said about that genre, but I honestly don’t see the point in posting something like that. Why not just stay away from the genre if you don’t like it? I also thought it was a little callous to provide an example of (and a link to) another person’s story that you really didn’t like.
Anyone who knows me knows that I tend to shy away from stories involving characters under the age of 19 or so, childhood abuse themes, or anything that smacks of lost-childhood to me. I occasionally read them, especially if a trusted source recommends one, but I generally tend not to. There are other types of stories that I generally don’t like either, but it doesn’t do any of us any good to sit around and criticize each other’s likes.
All that being said, I read your story to see what all the fuss was about. Your characters came to life quickly and easily. You have a wonderful gift.
Jodie
xoxo
Danielle may have used the wrong word but I know what she meant
I think in this two-part SRU story Danielle was doing a skillful parody of such forced transformations stories. I am familiar with all three examples stated and they all disturb me and all three are by well established online writers. I am not criticizing the writers, it is that much of the *standard plot elements*, for lack of a better term, of these transformation stories go against my personal feelings no matter how well written.
What I believe Danielle wanted was a more realistic version of this genera, and to demonstrate the great harm it can do. The SRU wizard should be censured by the Wizards’ Council for this travesty. An innocent was grievously harmed by a well-wishers ill considered wish. When someone greedy or nasty has this happen, it is cosmic justice, but when the parties are innocent, it is tragedy. This is why these stories, even when well written upset so many, where is the justice? To each his or her own.
That is why it is a sad story, that under her happy exterior she has lost years of her life and most of her free will. At least the revenge she wreaked on her former male friend is mild and maybe she will come to love being a girl. At least she has some freedom of choice; her former best friend has none. Despite her fondness for the man and his former son, all the former boy now a adult woman can feel is the horror of it.
John in Wauwatosa
John in Wauwatosa
Feedback
It's fairly common for more or less thoughtful critiques of certain categories of transgender fiction to be published, for example, Dancing on Daddy's Shoes by Mark McDonald, in which the adverse consequences of mucking about with people's lives play a prominent part. The author here has also addressed the issue in another story, Satisfaction Guaranteed, in which a man is turned, willy-nilly, into a woman and only comes to terms with this assault when it's revealed that he would have died of skin cancer as a man. The fact that the transformation was an assault was clearly addressed, although the earlier story makes it more palatable by positing a sort of higher authority or hidden compassion to justify it.
In fact, there are entire subcategories of transgender fiction which freely express the most virulent misogyny and cruelty, attributing vile motivations and actions to women, mothers, in ways that beggar the imagination. An even larger category is the "Anything you can do, I can do better" story, in which the transgendered protagonist is magically more beautiful, talented, and "feminine" than the old-fashioned genetic models, a less obvious misogyny, but none-the-less eumphemised hate literature.
Although neither story is a typical "The Bitch Deserved It" or "Bitch Conspiracy" polemic, both women involved are incredibly cruel to their children, in Raven's story twisting the metaphorical knife by taunting the transformed son with the boyish pleasures she'll now be flaunting before him, and in Eric's story revealing both parents as villains of the highest order, who exploit their son in despicable ways, a thinly-veiled story of child sexual abuse and rape, "justified" by the folk belief amongst a certain class of lout that women secretly desire rape, and can't help enjoying sexual assault during the act, no matter how coercive the situation is, or how little autonomy or power to save herself the victim possesses.
In real life, it's mostly men who mostly abuse and murder women. We see, for example, in Darfur and the former Yugoslavia, that ethnic rape squads are composed entirely of men with guns, and their victims are women and girls.
In another story, Daughters of a Coral Dawn by Katherine V. Forrest, a lesbian love story and utopian novel written by a lesbian and for a primarily lesbian audience, the idea of women as perpetrators is so foreign that the only way the women can protect themselves from assault and rape is to set a booby-trap which the criminal male thugs spring upon themselves through theft and violence. Ms. Forrest is careful to show that one man, otherwise innocent, casts his lot with the rapists when given a choice, and in a related story has the final acts of justifiable murder performed by a sympathetic man. In real life, even lesbians aren't all that blood-thirsty, nor are all that many women comfortable with violence.
Cheers,
Puddin'
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Cheers,
Puddin'
A tender heart is an asset to an editor: it helps us be ruthless in a tactful way.
--- The Chicago Manual of Style
I Agree With Your Take On The Genre
As a transwoman myself,I struggled for many years trying to be someone I wasn't, to make everyone else happy. It is a gross injustice to force us to live in a way that is contrary to our nature. I have no problem with a story where a person with true Gender identity issues, willingly begins to transition. I believe that to force someone who is not really suffering from these issues to become something they aren't is a mirror image of the same problem stated above. To take away someone's free will and right to self determination is wrong. I knew when I read the first part of this story, that a day of reckoning was coming Jimmy's way for what he had done. It was only right that the scales be balanced. His friend actually showed more mercy that some other people might have in the same situation.
what goes around
I've read some vicious comments in story critique sections, myspace and youtube comments, jerks emboldened by the anonymity of the internet, who get a thrill from being hurtful. Cowards. Brats...
This "bitter ugly hateful" comment didn't seem like that, but that the commentor was expecting one thing from your story, and felt robbed by the outcome. Maybe was having a horrible day and needed something uplifting. An honest reaction rather too bluntly stated (It's right there under ADD A COMMENT, a plea for courtesy- "Don't just say 'this story sucked', if you feel this way explain why, and how it might be improved"),
and presumptuous in how it ascribing MOTIVES to your writing this that were pure projections.
It's easy to be thoughtless in cyberspace. Anyway, I left my critique at FM too Danielle...
~~~hugs, Laika
What borders on stupidity?
Canada and Mexico.
.