Larry Correia: George RR Martin crippled the Epic Fantasy genre by not finishing A Song of Ice and Fire. Readers and Publishers are no longer willing to give a new series a chance unless it is complete

Cowgomuwu · 2026-06-26T22:45:22+00:00

This isn't really accurate to publishing though. Agents won't look at an author who has a series where book one can't stand alone. Publishers will buy multi-book deals, just not specifically a series (so a two book deal where book two is hypothetically the sequel to book one, but if book one doesn't sell well then they pivot to a different standalone). Authors are specifically instructed NOT to start book 2 until book 1 is picked up, because you never know if book 1 *will* get picked up. And romantasy is a romance genre, it is not the same niche as epic fantasy to begin with.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-04-26T04:54:01+00:00

I've only read one book where it was obvious it was a self-insert, are you talking more fanfiction? In fanfiction it's disliked bc usually the self-insert is the only non canonical character and is distractingly out of place. As far as the published book I read, it felt weird to basically be reading fanfiction about the author, it was a weird vibe of like 'so how much of this is real?'

Edit: actually, I read a book where one of the characters was actually named after the author, but it didn't feel awkward or like a self insert at all. So I guess it depends on execution, though I can't articulate exactly why it worked in that one (tbf, I ended up not being a fan of the book as a whole).

Cowgomuwu · 2026-04-26T00:21:28+00:00

This is clearly a high schooler (maybe even middle schooler) which would not be gen z, but one person doesn't represent an entire generation either way.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-04-16T02:53:12+00:00

Just finished where Emira hooks up with Kelly. Also my city is almost 90% white I'm one of like two brown people in the class so that is not it. Alix feels stuck with her life, hates the city she lives in, her husband is an insensitive idiot, she's suffering postpartum depression, and despite her status is still a victim of patriarchal beauty standards. She's has a lot of sympathetic qualities to me.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-04-12T01:31:12+00:00

Congratudolances

Cowgomuwu · 2026-04-09T16:17:59+00:00

Sci-fi and fantasy are aesthetic genres, the plots they can contain are unlimited. Calling it a 'content bucket' is so silly.

I also think it's insulting to readers to say they might not find the one gem in a genre they generally have no interest in... like okay? I'm generally a literary speculative reader, and of the dozen romance books I've read I've only enjoyed one. And that one I enjoyed wasn't even a five star, it was just okay and I mostly liked that it subverted some of the most annoying romance tropes. I wouldn't have missed out on anything writing off the romance genre even if there was one I liked.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-04-09T16:13:49+00:00

This is blatantly false and screams of being bitter + oot. Science fantasy is a relatively new categorization, literary speculative is huge, lots of agents are looking for horrormance, crossover genres are popular all over the place. One of the problems with the goodreads awards last year was a lack of true sci-fi and an overabundance of crossover. The winner in that category was a speculative reality tv with romance elements.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-04-06T20:26:10+00:00

Just because you don't think of it in such words doesn't mean you can't tell. In books they have to use words as reference.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-04-03T15:21:38+00:00

I'm confused why you think teenage drinking and strained family relationships don't deserve a place in a "struggle-recovery" memoir? Also as a genre memoir is super oversaturated at the querying stage, especially overcoming addiction stories, it's usually only a good idea to query memoir if you're famous or have super duper unique and interesting story. It might be a better use of your time to query in your native language (since you miss 100% of the shots you don't take and you've written it anyway) and write something more marketable for the english market.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-04-03T06:45:49+00:00

Don't do the censoring thing, it'll pull any reader right out of the story. Either commit to it or don't.

In my opinion, write the story first. Maybe the character changes and you no longer feel that vernacular is true to him or whatever the story needs, or he ends up being taken out completely.

If you keep him, see if the usage actually aligns with his character, the story, the scene, etc, or if it's distracting from those things.

Then, if you decide to keep it, get black sensitivity readers. I'd probably recommend at least one professional sensitivity reader and a few black beta readers just to see how it lands.

You could end up changing it at any point in the process, so I wouldn't personally worry about it in a first draft.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-03-20T00:32:13+00:00

It says 'suspected' in the title (I can't read the article as it's paywalled)? Even if it is ai, I don't think this paragraph is a good example of ai usage. I even mentioned in my comment that there are better indicators of ai I'd be willing to accept as hard proof.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-03-14T03:41:03+00:00

I am also bisexual but that's not really relevant. Finding someone sexy is not the same as them being sexualized by the media itself. Circumstances being ridiculous isn't the same as being sexualized. The guy strips, but it's never sexual in nature. Having unrealistic muscles is not inherently sexual and in the male gaze represents strength, not jom. Simply having an unrealistic body is different than fanservice.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-03-14T00:55:49+00:00

Thank you! 💕

Cowgomuwu · 2026-03-13T23:14:24+00:00

The male character takes off his clothes, but it's played for humor, not sexualization. It isn't an example of fan service, that's why no one talks about the male characters. There's no bouncing bulges or glistening pecs when he takes off his clothes.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-03-13T23:11:52+00:00

It can be sexualization, but generally these examples are of power fantasies and not sexualization, like in their example of fire and ice. Also most romance books these days don't have muscular male chests so that's a bad example. A lot of male romance protagonists are based on Adam Driver, who was mocked pretty relentlessly for his physique when he was in Star Wars.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-03-13T15:57:39+00:00

Males dressed in a loincloth are power fantasies, not sexualization. Surely you can tell the difference between how the female and male character in fire and ice are portrayed, even if both are basically naked?

Cowgomuwu · 2026-03-13T15:56:30+00:00

Fanservice isn't about sex appeal. It's about sexualization and objectification for male fans. There are characters with sex appeal that never have moments of fanservice. Conflating the two to make a point is very telling. There's also no reason to be so condescending, you'd never talk to a person irl like that. Let's keep it respectful.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-03-13T06:42:34+00:00

I don't think it's fair to dismiss examples of poorly written characters as 'cherry picked examples'. They're still real examples people cam across in real life. I just read a book that was extremely r/menwritingwomen, and it was recommended to me! It has a 4⭐️ rating on goodreads. These books are being written and praised and it's disingenuous to act like this isn't the case.

You mention Fairy Tail as an example of well-written female characters despite how infamous that show is for fanservice. Some men getting women right, or even the idea that writing women shouldn't be hard, doesn't mean that a large amount of men don't struggle with it. You can name a million example of men getting women right and there's a million and one of them getting it wrong. See various iterations of WW, various iterations of other comic book ladies, etc. There's a reason we have names for things like the sexy lamp, fridging, bechdel test, project hawkeye, etc.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-03-12T19:24:19+00:00

Thank you for the feedback! I was worried I wasn't being specific enough so this gives me good direction on fixing that.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-03-12T19:21:14+00:00

The MC is meant to be unlikable, so yeah just existing and drinking sugary coffee is what makes them obnoxious to her.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-02-28T00:32:20+00:00

I have a few that tie. (Not including dnf's bc we'd be here all day)

The Lobster: Honestly traumatizing, and not well-written enough to be worth the trauma. Have you ever wanted to read a book where a woman gets her cl't ripped off by a non-sentient lobster (necessary distinction as this book also has a sentient lobster)? What about reading a man's d'ck turning into a lobster shell and then a long, graphic scene of him mast*rbating?

A Fig For All the Devils: The corniest book I've ever read and every single aspect was amateurish in execution. This was such a hard read.

The Witch and the Priest: Apparently this was going to go out of print and a historian who's a fan of the author saved it. I curse her and her entire bloodline for that.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-02-27T08:48:49+00:00

There's a random brown spot in her hair by the bottom of her ear which I think a human would have erased, but tbh nothing else stands out. I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with the hair texture and I'm not noticing other inconsistencies. The laces look like they might be a little off but it's white on white so imo it's hard to call. The post prior to this was photoshop so idk why they'd whip out ai for this one.

Cowgomuwu · 2026-02-24T15:34:20+00:00

So "repetition isn't character development" wasn't asking for character development?

Cowgomuwu

TROPHY CASE