A Mind Divided

Heaving Bosoms

My favorite kind of writing is to take characters from TV shows and movies and write stories for them.  The technical term is “Fan Fiction.”  I admit it.  I’m a geek.

However, according to current research on sexual desire, fan fiction (fanfic) and romance novels are for women what porn is for men.  Men like to look.  Women prefer stories.

Not necessarily about sex (though those can be tasty), but about the emotions and challenges of the Relationship.

They want their heroes to be savvy, competent leaders with the physical and social characteristics of a dominant alpha male.  But, they also want an alpha with a soft, chewy center.  Part of the titillation is digging through the tough exterior to find the guarded tenderness within.  Yum.

Women have druthers for their heroines as well.  According to researchers Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan, they must possess a Magic Hoo Hoo.  It’s that which makes her irresistible to the hero and creates such a powerful physical and emotional bond mountains move, oceans roar and time stands still.

Give a girl a story to read about an Alpha smitten by the Magic Hoo Hoo and she’ll gladly shake her groove thang.  I’ve been writing these stories since I was a teenager, never knowing I was plumbing the primal pump (so to speak).  Not all of them follow the standard “girl porn” format.  In one novel I’ll post on this blog, the hero is absent for most of the story.  However the big question that must be resolved is Will the Heroine’s Magic Hoo Hoo be powerful enough to bring him back?

Star Trek always was and always will be my default setting on fanfic.  Years ago, I wrote a great novel, The Jitters, set in the Star Trek: The Next Generation universe.  I got an agent, who sold the book to Pocket Books (the only publisher of Star Trek novels) on the condition that I make some changes.  I did, but by then a new editor was in the office.  He wanted only well-known authors on their Star Trek list, so my story got rejected.  Sigh.

While I worked on that book, I wrote a lot of Heaving Bosoms—romance, sex, titillation—all the good stuff I couldn’t put in the novel (The Star Trek Universe is, after all, a boys’ creation.  No Magic Hoo Hoos allowed).  These stories feature my character, Lt. Rachel Cabot.  She is an old friend of Will Riker’s and, in the novel, she developed a suspicious attraction to Picard.  My assumption is that after getting thrown together unnaturally, Picard’s interest becomes piqued, and he pursues her after the end of the novel.

Then, there’s Star Trek Enterprise.

And Criminal Minds.

And Batman—The Dark Knight.

And Marvel’s The Avengers.

And Firefly.

And all things Tolkein.

And I’m sure there will be more shows to be exploited.

I  spent decades as a “serious writer.”  I busted my ass to get published (which I did, thank you very much), but it wasn’t the ultimate thrill I’d always imagined.  It didn’t validate me as a human being.  Darn it.  Now all I want to do is hone my craft and entertain myself—which isn’t really publishable.  Oh, well.

I’m posting these stories because I’m an exhibitionist, not because I think anyone will actually want to read them.  But if someone does read them and has comments, either lavishly complimentary or scathing, do tell.  I’m interested.

Click here to read about my Short Stories.

 Click here to read about my Longer Stories.

Here’s Florence and the Machine singing about my whole Alpha Male/Magic Hoo Hoo obsession.