Forum: Story Recommendations

Your perception…

NC-Retired 🚫

The tale is so well written that you can easily imagine yourself as the protagonist of the tale.

It does not matter the genre or story descriptions, sqicks or 'I like that' descriptions.

The key is you can read the tale and imagine living the life described. You give it a high score.

Magical. Fairies. Aliens. Quantum mechanics. Lightning strikes. Solstice convergence. Faster than light movement. Oh look, an adherence to known physical limitations of orbital mechanics.

Whatever. Matters not the exact.

Whatever the story trope and mechanism that transports your mental perception to a more positive fantasy reality than our realtime 2026 daily reality that your life and experience exists inside.

I answered a recent 'what story' post with this one. https://storiesonline.net/s/53377/in-the-kings-army

Perfect? Nope. But damn good!

What is one of your 'I'm outta here' story links?

Replies: Dominions Son awnlee jawking

Dominions Son 🚫

@NC-Retired

The tale is so well written that you can easily imagine yourself as the protagonist of the tale.

My perspective: This is not a good criteria.

In my opinion, how well written the story is (or isn't) has no impact on how easily I can imagine myself as the protagonist.

There are very well written stories (in my opinion) that I enjoy reading, but I could never imagine myself as being the protagonist. Why? Because, I am a straight male and the protagonist is female. The notion that these stories are undeserving because I can't see myself as the protagonist is, in my opinion, absurd.

What makes it easier to imagine myself as the protagonist, is a protagonist that resembles who I am, or who I want to be. This has nothing to do with the over all quality of the writing.

There are technically well written stories that try to make the protagonist as much of a blank slate as possible so the reader can impose themselves on the protagonist. Personally I don't enjoy reading stories like that.

And I've read stories that are not "well written", but they still defined the protagonist in a way that made me think that could be me.

Replies: NC-Retired Vincent Berg

NC-Retired 🚫
Updated:

@Dominions Son

I cannot accept all of your response as written.

But, I cannot disagree with many of your words.

Everyone is different.,

Let's use your response as an addition to, and a refinement of, my original proposition.

Good on ya. Thank you for the enlightment.

Replies: Dominions Son

Dominions Son 🚫

@NC-Retired

I cannot accept all of your response as written.

I didn't present it at anything other than my own perspective.

Replies: NC-Retired

NC-Retired 🚫

@Dominions Son

I didn't present it at anything other than my own perspective.

And I responded to exactly that.

Your perspective added both content and context.

Again, thank you.

Vincent Berg 🚫
Updated:

@Dominions Son

Ah, you're too short sighted. It doesn't matter whether you're male or female, what matters is whether you can relate to the protagonist or not.

If you can, walking a mile in their proverbial shoes, then the story works. Yet if you're too caught up in sex roles, then you've completely missed the point. After all, how many women read stories with male protagonist's chasing all the tail they can find. Without those, none of us would have been nearly as successful as we've been.

That's identical to picturing oneself as Asian, Black, gay or bi. It's not about roles or perspectives, it's about authentic experiences which are written well enough, that we can easily step into those roles and imagine the roads never taken, vicariously living someone else's life for a couple hours each week.

So, what's the alternative, not allow female writers to write on SOL? Abjectly refuse to read anyone who's not precisely like you?

That said, 'blank slate' characters are not well-written by default, as there's no character development. That's a no-brainer. Yet, many stories start slow and develop over time, so just because a protagonist starts as a tabla rosa, doesn't mean they'll remain that way. Unless the author is truly a terrible author, of which we do have quite a few now.

As I keep insisting, the key to great storytelling (as opposed to simply writing), is authenticity. If a story doesn't feel genuine, then no one is going to buy it (the story premise, not the eBook).

Replies: Dominions Son

Dominions Son 🚫
Updated:

@Vincent Berg

Ah, you're too short sighted. It doesn't matter whether you're male or female, what matters is whether you can relate to the protagonist or not.

But that's not what the OP said.

The tale is so well written that you can easily imagine yourself as the protagonist of the tale.

I do not, can not, will not agree that "relate to the protagonist" and "imagine yourself as the protagonist" are equivalent.

So, what's the alternative, not allow female writers to write on SOL? Abjectly refuse to read anyone who's not precisely like you?

Take that up with the OP. I'm arguing that the criteria stated by the OP "The tale is so well written that you can easily imagine yourself as the protagonist of the tale." is overly restrictive and invalid. That not being able to imagine yourself AS the protagonist does not mean that the tale is not well written. That not being able to imagine myself as the protagonist does not mean that I can't enjoy reading the story.

You seem to have gotten my position exactly backwards.

awnlee jawking 🚫

@NC-Retired

The tale is so well written that you can easily imagine yourself as the protagonist of the tale.

Perhaps not 'imagine as', but certainly getting the reader to 'root for'. I don't imagine myself as Sabrina in The Outsider's story of that name, but I certainly root for her.

Exceptionally, the author might do something sneaky and get readers sympathising with the antagonist.

AJ

Replies: lnettnay

lnettnay 🚫

@awnlee jawking

Hi AJ,

I thought that Sabrina might be interesting but The Outsider has pulled his stories from SOL. I had to use Google to find it over on Storyroom. 🤔

Lonny

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Forum: Story Recommendations

Your perception…

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