I'm gonna create an alien race that never met humans. The dialogue will go like this: Alien: "Pardon me, but what is the difference between a human male and a female?" Captain Helen Chert: "I have boobs and can have babies. Lt. Copper here has neither. That's it." Lt. Heridon Copper: "Captain, are you gonna tell him about the social struggles between-" Captain Helen Chert: "Mr. Copper, don't make me teach this young alien here what happens when I knee you between your legs." Lt. Heridon Copper: <stiffens> "Yes, ma'am."
Hah! Well, I didn't identify the gender of the reader as such, although I offered the possibility the eyebrow-raiser and head-shaker would be a woman. Maybe next time I'll just stick to s/he - his/her - him/her so that gender neutral, pseudo-plural they won't confuse things too much.
The captain kicked him anyway, like stale eggs against a sledgehammer his mansack became liquid slime. Captain Helen Chert: STAY DOWN MAN DOG!!! DOWN!! LIKE THE BUH A BUH A BUH BEAST YOU ARE!! : THAT'S THE DIFFERENCE!! Chert's mouth foamed as she made out with the alien in front of Copper, who died.
"Human units are strange in their treatment of each other." "Still, we must speak their language, both verbally, as well as kinetically." "Agreed." *Kicks fellow alien in falopian hook* "Take that, female worm." "A-a-a-h-h, no." *Pretends to have genitals* "My genitals. The pain."
Captain Helen Chert: "Well, this is escalating quickly." Lt. Heridon Copper: "Hey, it's funny." <takes out a sledgehammer that has spikes and rusty nails adoring the metal end> "Here, everyone. Go to town on that alien." Alien: "WHYYY!?" Mishu Jerni: <bursts in> "I have come from the fantasy to remind everyone that just because I'm a female and an assassin, doesn't mean I need to be in a skimpy leather bikini. Anyone who puts me in that will die. Painfully." Kimberly Miggs: <enters> "I am from this idiot's General Mysteries. If he so much as thinks about painting me as some weakling, or a sex icon, I will go Lizzie Borden on him." Mishu Jerni: "Wait, didn't she kill her parents or something?" Kimberly Miggs: "My point exactly."
You are very welcomed. Captain Helen Chert: "But just to be clear, I do not tolerate violence on my starship, be they against men or women. You want to fight something, we've training droids in the gym." Helen, get back in my head -- I don't want to overstay your welcome.
Would be the first time I'm writing a tree monster with egg-sacs for gonads. I'll just go jot down its character profile now...
Mishu Jerni: <smirks> "I'm not kinky or anything but...this sounds good." Captain Helen Chert: <muttering> "I am going to kill my author..." Kimberly Miggs: "I'll go sharpen the axe, but he's mine, lady."
No, not men either. Sailors. Idea is that it doesn't matter what you are. You do your job. That's kind of what I was going for. Race, sex, sexual-preference, none of it matters when a job needs doing. Being that the setting is 3417, I probably need to throw in AI-rights as well. Problem is that Wheel of Time isn't 1st Person. It's 3rd Person Limited; one at at time it's written 3rd person from that character's point of view and, for the time of following that character, their knowledge. Meaning 95% of the time a "necklace nestling between her breasts," is usually written from the woman's point of view. For one character, I can see it making sense. But he describes it always in the same fashion. Or with crossing one's arms, he always mentions it as "beneath her breasts." Just say she crossed her arms. That being said, Wheel of Time is absolutely great. It just breaks my concentration when I come across that type of stuff and think "again?"
https://ronanwills.wordpress.com/2013/09/05/lets-read-the-wise-mans-fear-ch-96-98/ The round fullness of her breasts was lifted by the motion of her arms, and suddenly I felt like a stag in rut .... The arch of her bare foot said more of sex than anything I’d seen in my young life. Another step. Her smile was fierce and full. She was as lovely as the moon. Her power hung about her like a mantle. It shook the air. It spread behind her like a pair of vast and unseen wings. .... “No,” I looked down, my face growing hot. “I have never been with a woman.” Then I straightened and looked her in the eye as if challenging her to make an issue out of it. Felurian was still for a moment, then her mouth turned up into a wry smile. “you tell me a faerie story, my kvothe.” I felt my face go grim. I don’t mind being called a liar. I am. I am a marvelous liar. But I hate being called a liar when I’m telling the perfect truth. Regardless of its motivation, my expression seemed to convince her. “but you were like a gentle summer storm.” She made a fluttering gesture with a hand. “you were a dancer fresh upon the field.” Her eyes glittered wickedly. Does so bad its awesome beat just mediocre and forgettable? The answer is yes!
uh, no. So bad is just so bad. Purply prose is almost always, just bad. "I lay quiet, looking out under my eyelashes in an agony of delightful anticipation. The fair girl advanced and bent over me till I could feel the movement of her breath upon me. Sweet it was in one sense, honey-sweet, and sent the same tingling through the nerves as her voice, but with a bitter underlying the sweet, a bitter offensiveness, as one smells in blood."
Purple prose can have its charms, see Jack Vance's Dying Earth stories, but I thought this thread was more about 1st or close 3rd women who were constantly aware of their own breasts. Funny that mainstream writers never seem to mention men's awareness of their adjustable bits...
At the end of After the Wave (my first wip) the repellent Lt 'Topsy' Turvey is very aware of his penis - principally because the FMC Keri has just severed the top half of it whilst stabbing him repeatedly in the groin with a fighting knife... (they then leave him to be captured by hostile tribesmen who generally torture their prisoners to death and drink their blood )
It seemed to work for Bram Stoker. The quote was pulled from Dracula, the book that launched ten thousand vampire novels. Not a one as fine as the original.
