Forum: Author Hangout

First of all, let me just say I am super flattered to have inspired this question.

Second, let's just define male gender norms and female gender norms are really what we are talking about. The exception (the unusual woman) that proves the rule is not what we are talking about.

Imagine for example, you asked about an "authentic cat"

I could describe to you behaviors of cats. They like meat - saltier the better. They like to scratch things. They like to be pet. They like to sleep. They like to lick themselves. They like to show you their butthole the first thing in the morning when they are on your bed.

Yeah?

I could probably find you a cat that doesn't eat meat, or does something unusual like swims when most cats hate water. That doesn't mean you are writing an authentic cat by writing that they love water.

Those motivations though are not the metric you should be using to write them. If your intent is to say "I'd write a man or a woman the same if they have the same motivation" you are missing the point.

What you described above "This is a woman who likes casual sex". is an outcome. It is something she likes.

so if I showed you a dog, that likes to sleep and eat meat (saltier the better) and you said "Well, see he processes the world like a cat. So I am going to write him doing cat behaviors"

That's exactly what you just did with the question about women. You showed us examples of women who liked to do things that traditionally men like.

So my suggestion is forget going down that path.

When telling a story as if written from a woman's perspective it doesn't matter if she likes sex, or doesn't like sex. it doesn't matter if she likes to get things done, or is lazy.

There are going to be many different kinds of women with different value system. They TEND to have complex emotions, vulnerability and emotional depth that men do not have. Even your high powered attorney is vulnerable - she is just better at hiding and perahaps is compensating. She may be secretly quite submissive in the bedroom or desiring a mate who is going to put her in her place.

It matters that the tone of your writing reflect that of a woman. This is the subtle nuance that is difficult for men to write.

There is no one voice.

You gave an example of a high powered attorney who goes after what she wants.

What if she was once a silly 13 year old girl who had a crush on her math teacher and had no idea how to talk to him?

Same girl - different voice and values at different points in her life.

So my suggestion is to put yourself into the headspace of who you are writing. If it is 1st person this is easiest for me.

As you describe what this person sees, they are usually not just a man with boobs. Think about what women value and how they process.

There are certain characteristics MANY of them will have, but if you are writing the exception tot he rule then this does not apply.

A wall is not painted white.

It's taupe, or ivory, or ecru or something like that to most of them.

To a man, it is white or maybe off-white at best.

Another good example is clothes. I found a shirt I like. I bought six - one in every color they had, two that were blue in case one got fucked up. I like blue.

This is normal for a man. A woman would usually be aghast at that idea. My values are simple. I need clothes. I like those. They meet my criteria. They are acceptable for work. I bought them - done shopping.

This is not why women shop.

How things "Feel" is important to them. So they will spend more time describing the impact of an event on their feelings about it.

Men will tend to be more direct. "This happened. It sucked. Let's move on."

Imagine when a woman told you a story in the past about her path. Did she tell you just the facts like a police report?

"This happened. Then that happened. He had a blue sweater. He took it off. He stuck his dick in me. We liked it. Later we slept"

Very direct point A to B story telling. Women tend to be more indirect in their story telling and get there by way of including personal observations and wondering about the motivations of the other women in the story. If you listen to them tell you about Janice in accounting trying to destroy them at work - you'll see what I mean.

Imagine you are writing a story from Amy Schumer's perspective. (She is an American comedian if you are not aware). She would tell a joke very differently than Adam Sandler and that is because as a story teller (Which is what her jokes really are - mini stories) she processes the world very differently than Adam.

She does have some qualities that are similar to a man. She was once quoted as saying "I can catch a dick anytime I want. I don't care about my looks". very casually admitting if she gets horny she will get some strange sex.

That's awesome and unusual but what makes her resonate with female audience is she authentically speaks relatable experiences to them from a female perspective.

I don't know if that helped or not but it is not simply as easy as writing "Well, she is a get it done type, so she is going to act, speak and process the same as a man in the same role"

She may want to destroy and dismantle her rivals, while male attorney may simply be happy to remove them as competition and move on.

Hope that helps. Try reading Mercedes Lackey (The author) sometimes and see how different her female characters are.

Another good example is what may be called women logic.

Two men are talking:

Hey, I like this girl. She never calls me.

What are you? Stupid? pick up the phone and call her.

Two women are talking:

Hey I like this boy. He never calls me.

I hate when that happens.

The women are more likely to share their issues and empathize and the men are more likely to jump to a solution (skipping empathy all together) even if one is not requested.

The first issue is to decide what is and isn't an authentic woman. I've yet to meet two women who behave the same in all situations.

I've had people claim my depiction of the woman at the centre of my story Debt Collection is false as no woman is that way, yet I know the woman I base the character on and she does behave exactly that way. In fact, every woman I mention in my stories is based on someone I know or have meet and interacted with on a regular basis at some point in my life. The same is true for the male secondary characters in my stories.

To me, a person simply has to understand that men and women think differently. We can approach the exact same thing, and see it in 2 very completely different ways. I even had a business class about 25 years ago where I proved that.

One of the gals got upset when we were talking about marketing, and she thought it was stupid and pointless to try and market things just to women. She even said that we all thought the same.

I got 2 torso mannequins from the store I worked at, set them up behind a barrier, then asked random people to describe the clasp of the bra on them.

The vast majority of men would call them "front opening" or "back opening". Meanwhile, the vast majority of women called them "front closing" or "back closing". Exact same object and fasteners, yet each gender was drastically different in how they described the fastener.

Men and women do all kinds of things differently. We walk differently, we carry objects differently, and the first trick for me is simply to try and think that way as well.

I think y women are authentic if not always typically feminine. (I once had a college couple where the girl majored in chemistry and the boy inn English.) Sp. I challenged a group I was in to tell whether I was male or female. The reply I got was that one of my male POV stories couldn't have been written by a woman. Not quite my question

This is a classic - and they capture the female voice perfectly in this story. It's a coming age story from a girl's POV.

https://storiesonline.net/s/53917:98393

On writing style and quality alone this is a 10. As a story it is brilliant and full of naughty imagery. The author truly captures the voice of a girl learning to address her own kinks, guilty pleasures, and issues. If this were simply as someone said "A male without reason and accountability" she would just be an irresponsible asshole.

There is much more happening here. A primal desire that is the female condition emerges in her head as she develops into a woman.

I only wish this story had a sequel.