Okay, maybe this is just me...

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Zoombie

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Or is it that we can't have a gay character without the book being about them being gay.

And by gay character, I mean a MAIN character, not just a side character.

It was hammered home to me when I was in class and we spent TWO DAYS of class time talking about why the characters in a novel are gay.

Do we ever spend hours debating why characters in a novel are straight?

Noooooooooooooo

God, this is getting really annoying to me. Being straight isn't all straight people think about, being gay doesn't mean you constantly base everything in your life around being gay...

So...why do we look at a book about a gay man and assume that its about him. Being gay.

Or having the AIDS.

It bugs me!

Am I alone? Or am I just reading the wrong books?
 

thethinker42

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Sounds like a challenge.

*casts gay male as main character in upcoming WIP*

(and yes, I've noticed it too)

ETA: In the movie The Night Listener, Robin Williams' character was gay...and it wasn't a central plot point, more of a side story. It just "was". Actually pretty well done...pity it was wasted on such a shitty movie.
 
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Zoombie

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Shame...

Ah...I know there has to be more stories that have a gay main character whose story is not about them being gay.

We need more hot gay cyberpunk stuff...<writes this down>
 

HelloKiddo

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Clair Dickson

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I spent a lot of my time in English classes wondering if what I was being told that the book was "about" was really what the author meant it to be about... I looked at my own writing and began to see where people could put symbolism or meaning where I had not put any.

Some English teachers seem hell-bent on finding the meaning where there is none. (And often only pick books that back up their theories.)

But at the same time, there seems to be a trend with books featuring characters that are not white men where what the characters are (African-American, Chinese, female, with Tourette's, etc) IS what the book is supposed to be about. It does seem as if a book with a, say, gay MC has to be about being gay. In real life, as you said Zoombie, a person is a person.

I wonder if a book with a gay MC would feel like a let down (for some people at least) if it wasn't all about being gay. As if some how, not dwelling on the difference between the gay person and straight people would lessen the quality of the book? I don't think it would, but I read books more for fun or interesting plots than for the growth and experiences of the characters-- particularly if their differences are a sledgehammer every page to remind me that the MC is different.
 

HelloKiddo

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If the book is not about their sexuality/race/whatever, why mention it? We rarely refer to characters as straight or white, unless that's part of the story.
 

Zoombie

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Well, cause, even though our entire life is not around being gay...it still affects quite a lot.

Even if its so much as glancing at the cute guy at the gym and going, "man...I'd sooo hit that."

Not that...I...oggle the men at my gym.

No, that'd just be...ahem...immature and...





Well if they don't want to be oggled, they shouldn't wear such tight pants and look so hot!

Anywho, Dumbledor...dosn't count, imo. I'm talking about openly gay characters. Ones that don't hide their orientation.

I dunnkow...I want a sorta...middle ground between the book being all about the gayness...and the book having a gay character but, wink wink, nudge nudge, its a secretlol.

If that makes sense...
 

citymouse

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There are very few books where the M/C is gay and the story isn't about gay situations. Many (most?) are written as erotica or porn.

A few such as Lori L Lake's books are mystery/adventure.
Antonio Marquez's two volume The Hunt is about a serial killer dispatching HIV positive Latinos in Denver. He has an array of M/Cs all gay save one.

You may try The Phoenix by Ruth Sims. Can a straight 70 something woman write a novel with gay characters? Yes! In fact she's shopping he second novel as I type. The Phoenix is about gay characters but the underlying themes are not particular to being gay.

Michael Halfhill's Sons is the third in a series featuring a gay man yet the main themes in these books are far from gay focused.

So why mention the sexuality of any character? Well in the case of a M/C it probably would come up if he/she had a same-sex partner who was recently lost to say, a car crash, or old age. Not all gay people die coughing their lungs out in an AIDS ward or beaten to death by homophobic teens. Although that does happen. Or perhaps the M/C could have a child who was going through some sexual soul searching in light of the parent's orientation. There are as many reasons for mentioning a M/C's sexuality as there are imaginations to write them.
C
 

Claudia Gray

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If the book is not about their sexuality/race/whatever, why mention it? We rarely refer to characters as straight or white, unless that's part of the story.

And yet it's very rare not to indicate somewhere in text your MC's romantic situation/inclinations, or to describe the MC's appearance in a way that makes race clear. I think the point being made is that when the MC is gay, these indications are treated in a much less matter-of-fact way. Straight people get to be portrayed as everything under the sun; gay characters still get seen as gay first, characters second. ITA that this is overdue to change.
 

veinglory

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I would suggest that you/they are reading the wrong books. Literary books seem to be all about 'the gay' especially if they are over 20 years old. But genre books with gay protagonists are pretty common in sci fi, historical and detective etc. My reading of these is that they treat sexuality in pretty much the same way heterosexuality etc is treated in other books of the same genre.
 

IceCreamEmpress

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ETA: In the movie The Night Listener, Robin Williams' character was gay...and it wasn't a central plot point, more of a side story. It just "was". Actually pretty well done...pity it was wasted on such a shitty movie.

Well, the movie (bad) was based on a pretty good book by Armistead Maupin. So I'd recommend reading the book instead.

Lots of books are about gay and lesbian protagonists and what happens to them, not about THE ISSUE OF BEING GAY OH SO GAY. The thing is that in a school/university setting, it's often easier to teach the books that are all OH THE ISSUE than more nuanced books.

Some recent books with gay, lesbian, and bisexual protags that aren't all about the gay:

Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters
The Man of the House and Alternatives to Sex by Stephen McCauley
Southland by Nina Revoyr
 
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Kate Thornton

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I loved the late Joseph Hansen's series about insurance investigator Dave Bradstetter - who happened to be gay. The books were about the cases, but Dave's personalife (like those of other characters) was explored as well. Nice balance, I thought.
 

CheyElizabeth

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I hate that too. Its like if a character happens to be gay then the entire story is about that...

The book I'm writing has two lesbians in it (as minor characters) and they are never called out for it... I never write, "so and so is a lesbian" because its not significant to the story that they are or aren't straight, so I didn't bother to point it out. Its just how I saw them in my mind, so I wrote them as gay. Of course, my sis is gay and her personality just shines and I've copied that for one of the characters and I guess having gay friends and people in my life has affected the fact that I don't gay people as 'gay'. =)

So hopefully, people will read my story and not bother focusing on the fact that they are gay because it simply doesn't matter.
 

BenPanced

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Yeah, it's just you. God forbid somebody write a book with gay characters and give the story a gay theme because it's just so gay and why can't gay people just not have gay situations happen to them because then the story wouldn't be so gay and you would be able to read it without having to worry about gay situations and gay gay gay gay gay.

Deal with it. I'm gay. I write gay books with gay characters and gay situations.
 

tehuti88

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In one of my admittedly unwritten series stories, a few of the main characters are gay and another is bisexual but that's not the point or theme of the story. Also, in my erotica serial, there are lots of gay/bi/lesbian characters, and of course their orientation plays a role in the plot of some chapters, but in other chapters it isn't part of the plot at all. (The story is more about political drama and warfare and such.) The characters' sexuality is an issue for a few of them but not many, and then usually only when romantic relationships are involved. (The story started out as smut but quickly evolved into a real story with plot and everything!)

Granted, in that story, it's set in a society where the whole "gay vs. straight" thing isn't as big an issue so that might be part of it.

If it's stated in a story that the main character is gay, some readers will just assume that's a big theme of the story. (Akin to "If there's a gun on the mantel in Act One, it had better go off by Act Three" or however it goes.) I imagine it's often this way if the MC is considered fundamentally "different" from the reader in some way. For example, having grown up in a place that's like 99% white and Christian, I'd immediately notice if the MC in a book is mentioned to be black or Jewish, and I might assume that has a bearing on the plot. I'm not saying this is right, it just is. Readers will always have some sort of preconceptions. Only reading the book and finding out what the story is really about can clear things up. If I find out halfway through a book that, even though the MC is gay, the book isn't about that, I wouldn't really care, but that's just me.
 

citymouse

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Several members here in AW have stated that reading a book with a gay character much less a gay MC would make them uneasy.
One or two have complained that when a character is revealed to be gay mid-way into the story they (the readers) feel lied to and stop reading (angrily?).
One member said that he would never knowing read a story with a gay character. So I guess reading the biographies of Alexander The Great, Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Cole Porter, Johnny Mathis, or these English Kings: William II, Richard I (Lionheart) Edward II, James I (son of Mary Queen of Scots) would be off limits. I'm not judging their sensibilities but I do wonder why? This issue is very divisive so in that light I don't recommend a thread devoted to it. There's no need to start a pen war.

One thing that I do dislike about heavily skewed gay stories is when all the people in it are gay or gay friendly. Novels may be fiction but a touch of reality wouldn't be amiss.

Living in totally gay bubble is a debilitating as living in a straight one. Although I will concede it can be more entertaining.
C
 

quickWit

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I had something for this...
I for one don't give a frog's fat ass how gay a gay character is as long as he or she is a compelling gay character.

If not, then I'm not reading about them anyway. :)
 

dawinsor

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Veinglory is right. Genre books do have gay MCs without making it the only issue. Try Bujold's Ethan of Athos or Gabaldon's Lord John books.
 

citymouse

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I take it you mean whose version of reality? Let me give you an example of what I mean. I read a book where a gay teen is in love (has a crush) on a fellow teen student. Every teen this gay boy talks to at school is either gay or gay friendly and these boys are just full of helpful advice. Then our hero gets a job at a mall bookstore where, you guessed it, the manager is gay friendly and facilitates a workplace romance between the MC and a co-worker. Naturally this pisses off the kid in the ear piercing kiosk because he saw the bookstore kid first. But never fear the high school is hosting a Halloween party where half the boys attending are gay and each finds love in the end.

IMO this story is not believable. It isn't real. Fiction doesn't have to be real but it ought to be somewhat believable. This book is an attempt to avoid the one-handed stories so identified with sex and sexuality ( straight or gay). But it failed in that the majority of gay teens do not live in a totally gay environment. Worse yet the writing was superb. Makes me crazy!

Stories where the MC is gay and lives and functions without his/her sexuality being an issue but is revealed through relationships are believable and I think more successful in the end.
Now that's my opinion. With that and $4 you can get a Cafe Vento at Starbucks.
C


Whose version?
 

BenPanced

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But it's perfectly acceptable for a book to have all straight characters and deal completely with straight issues.
 

citymouse

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No Ben, I don't believe that at all.
I like Jonathan Kellerman's Alex Delaware series. Milo the police detective is gay and has a lover. If you count the characters in most of the series it come out to be just about 10. So JK uses the 10% rule to balance his characters. So do I.

I wonder though if straight authors don't consider writing serous gay characters because they rarely impact their lives. While for the gay writer the gay experience is so intense because they are excluded from much of what is called mainstream life. This certainly would have the effect of concentrating or focusing energy around purely gay themes.

Or it may be a simple fact of the targeted audience. Too bad really because my own informal study reveals that there is a large readership for gay romance among straight married women.
C

But it's perfectly acceptable for a book to have all straight characters and deal completely with straight issues.
 

BenPanced

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No Ben, I don't believe that at all.
I like Jonathan Kellerman's Alex Delaware series. Milo the police detective is gay and has a lover. If you count the characters in most of the series it come out to be just about 10. So JK uses the 10% rule to balance his characters. So do I.

I wonder though if straight authors don't consider writing serous gay characters because they rarely impact their lives. While for the gay writer the gay experience is so intense because they are excluded from much of what is called mainstream life. This certainly would have the effect of concentrating or focusing energy around purely gay themes.

Or it may be a simple fact of the targeted audience. Too bad really because my own informal study reveals that there is a large readership for gay romance among straight married women.
C
Aha moment! I think we're in agreement on this part. Think about the target audience, the gay teenager looking for positive reinforcement in books. I know I wanted something positive when I was 13, 14, 15 years old because a lot of what I found only portrayed gay men as sick deviants; even much of the psychology was starting to get dragged kicking and screaming into the early 19th century (I kid). So if I found gay fiction that showed me that it was possible to have gay friends and live a "gay life", for lack of a better term, I clung to it like gospel truth.
 

Shadow_Ferret

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I spent a lot of my time in English classes wondering if what I was being told that the book was "about" was really what the author meant it to be about... I looked at my own writing and began to see where people could put symbolism or meaning where I had not put any.

Some English teachers seem hell-bent on finding the meaning where there is none. (And often only pick books that back up their theories.)
That was always my biggest turn-off in college. Did the writer SAY this is what he meant by this passage? If not, then it's all just mental masturbation and pretty meaningless. Why can't we just talk about what we can conclusively discuss? Plot. Characters. Theme.
 

NeuroFizz

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In a story, the people who have the greatest positive impact on a gay character might be the ones who treat him as just a person like everyone else. Kind of like real life?

Anyone who thinks that bringing out anti-gay behavior is the only way to confront a gay person with conflict is missing something--that all people have the same basic wants and needs, and the same frustrations and problems, and it's on these basic similarities that the complex effects of individual-based uniquenesses come in. A story can focus on these basics regardless of the gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or whatever, of the character.
 
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