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Sign of the times
In terms of underlying premises, this story has much in common with Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time. Stories being written about revitalizing, cleansing, and reclaiming masculine energy in order to reestablish a balance of human spirit in the world is surely a sign of the times. Transition (particularly M2F) is not for everyone, but only for people who cannot be themselves without it.
Wow! Not many people have
Wow! Not many people have picked up on that premise, at least, very few that have mentioned it to me. I was intentionally ironic when I chose to transform three different characters into women in order to help reestablish the balance between the sexes.
Have a delightfully devious day,
I got that, too...
…though I didn’t recognize it as deliberate irony, more like a genre-induced incongruity (this is TG fiction, after all).
Have you ever read Prisoners of Tiresias by Christopher Leeson? There is much in this story that I think would speak to you. I think you would also enjoy the delicious satire of On Strike! by Nom de Plume, Working Title by Cherysse St. Claire, Trans Glimpses: Snips and Snails by Wanda Cunningham, and The Games (formerly available on Sapphire’s Place) by Sarah Bayen.
Oh, by the way… :) Having all the male Norse gods chained to the floor in some back room of Hel, chewing the fat and playing cards, certainly made the point. The imagery could have been made even more powerful by turning them into stone statuary, and more ironic by putting them on display in Hel in a museum-like setting…perhaps something akin to Madame Tussaud’s.
Irony is a theme that I try
Irony is a theme that I try to work into my stories quite frequently. Redemption is another subject that often appears though it often comes from minor characters like Nick Flint and Sam from RR and Farris in Battle for Earth.
No, I haven't read any of those. In fact, the only name I really recognize is Leeson's. Prisoners of Tiresias is on my 'to read' list, but I tend to be more than a little slow when it comes to reading off of said list. I think I may have to add the others to the list as well.
I did originally picture the male gods being caged like animals, but when the image of them chain to the floor 'chewing fat' popped into my head I just couldn't resist.
Have a delightfully devious day,
Bound and chained to the floor
is a powerful and standard image of immobility; frozen into stone is even stronger, and also a standard one. Being caged as animals (perhaps in a zoo?) doesn’t seem to fit the actual circumstances to me; my images for that situation are the yoke or harness for a draft animal, and the saddle for a pack mule. The standard TGtrope for the former is the absent husband who is at work all the time and, for the latter, the bringing along of a guy or guys to a mall trawl as the designated pack mule(s) to carry the shopping.
Redemption or some sort of resolution seems to me to be an essential part of stories that portray a problem, unless the purpose is to say that muddling through is the best that can be done, a sort of “what cannot be cured, dear, must be endured, dear.” Your Hunger Pangs very much has the feeling of enduring the terrible (which seems to be permanent) and making the most of whatever may appear positive in it (such as the bond of shared misery that grows between Rachel and Selena, and the finding of a home with a were family), which is what makes it so dark. As another example, Ellen Hayes’ so-called “Saga of Tuck” portrays, with its episodic style and linear story arc, a character who lives life one day at a time and makes the best of it, without any ultimate resolution to his/her gender difficulties.