Fic kinks meme

[resonant]

From veronamay, a meme on "kink in fic." Or, in other words, an invitation to muse at length on what turns me on. No, that doesn't appeal in the slightest, does it?

Creature/Aliens: If this is in the sense of Aliens Made Them Do It? I'm a fan, and I've already yammered on about why, and posted recs.

If this is in the sense of characters loving aliens? or of characters becoming or being aliens? (which would cover some forms of wingfic, pon farr fic, etc.) -- still a fan.

I love the idea of a human learning his/her way around an alien's body and sexual response. I love the amount of experimenting, talking, questioning that this would require -- "Does this work for you? What happens when I do this?"

I also love the idea that an alien among humans would be craving someone with whom to be honest, someone who could see him as he really was.

Creatures/Aliens rec: Anna S.'s SGA story "An Aesthetic Solitary Thing."





Mpreg: Generally, not something I enjoy. Ordinary hurt/comfort seems less fraught with potential problems.

Slave, BDSM, S/M: That's the wording of the original meme. It's conflating a lot of distinct things, though, so let's break it down.

Pain: Not something I'm into myself, but I could totally buy that some of the characters would be into it. I can enjoy a story that does a good job of showing me that -- as long as there's no exploitation and lots of affection. I'm a fluffy bunny that way.

Humiliation, shaming: Hate it. Won't read it.

Power exchange, dominance and submission: Mostly don't care for it.

One character directing and controlling another's sexual experience -- e.g. restricting movement, restricting one or more senses, stage directing ("You can have anything you want, but you have to ask for it in words"), delayed orgasm, etc. -- I like these things very much, as long as they don't shade over into humiliation and shaming or into a level of power difference that makes me uncomfortable -- but they usually do. So I read them with caution.

Slavefic: I often like this very much. It's a great way to do that separating sex and intimacy thing I like so much. But it, too, often has levels of power difference or aggressiveness that I don't like.

Age difference: I'm neutral on differences in age, but I have a serious kink for differences in sexual experience level.

Bloodplay: A real head-scratcher for me.

Underage (chan): I don't want to read about children, but I enjoy high school type stories.

Crossdressing/Genderbender: Two different things. I'm not much interested in crossdressing stories, but sometimes I enjoy gender-switch stories, and often I enjoy stories in which a character isn't quite as solidly in the traditional gender binary as he appears to be in canon.

Bodyswap: Yep! Another example of separating sex from intimacy.

Dubcon: Well, one type of this (where a character is manipulated into consenting, against his will and against his best interests, for instance by blackmail) squicks me solidly; another one (where a character agrees to sex for nonsexual reasons, such as to get revenge or to hide a crime) is neutral for me. Where the only dubiousness has to do with someone being drunk or stoned, I don't mind at all, which is funny, because I'd have a major problem with that in real life.

Noncon: No way.

Incest/Selfcest: I actually quite like selfcest. Sibling incest is a headscratcher for me -- I don't really get the appeal. Cross-generation, or siblings where there's a strong caretaker relationship? Serious squick.

Threesome/moresome/gangbang: I like threesomes a lot. Four or more -- I like teamfic a lot. Not so much group sex without strong emotional bonds, though.

Death: Well, it's a legitimate authorial choice, but it makes me cry, so.

Watersports/scat: Absolutely not on scat, mostly not on watersports.

Crossovers: (I love having a community where 'scat' and 'crossovers' fit into the same category!) Sometimes I like these, but mostly they just disrupt my desire to sink into the world and the characters.

Unhappy/wide-open endings: Again: legitimate authorial choice. Sometimes the only plausible choice. And yet I don't enjoy them the way I enjoy happy romantic endings.

Violence/Torture: Violence: We read cop stories; these things are going to happen. Torture: Serious squick, the squickiest of squicks.

Established relationship: I've written about these before, so the short version is: I believe they can be done in a way that's moving and emotionally suspenseful, but they rarely are.

Seems to me there's a lot missing from the memes list, so I'm going to list some of my favorites:

Aphrodisiacs/sex pollen
Bodyguard
Making out
Talking
Telepathy
Trapped together
Truth serum/in vino veritas
Yearning

Comments

[worn_words]

A++ on making out, especially when it leads to grinding and/or frottage (those neither of those are necessary, because making out is so awesome just by itself).

[resonant]

Yum. Or groping through clothes, or half-clad sex -- all of those get a big thumbs-up from me.

[amberfox]

If you read Sentinel stuff, cesperanza's "Nothing On" has a fabulous making out scene at the beginning. It's not up on her AO3 yet, but it's on her old site, along with a lot of other nice Sentinel stuff including the MASSIVE Nature Series, plus due South, SGA, and West Wing.

[resonant]

I think "Nothing On" was the first story I ever wrote a feedback e-mail for! Way back when I was too shy to say, "That was really hot!"

[carolyn_claire]

How about Fuck or Die? It's not always aliens making them do it, but is it a subset of that? Or the other way around?

[resonant]

I'd say Aliens is a subset of Fuck or Die, now that you mention it.

I don't especially care who's behind the gun or the plasma cannon or whatever; I just like it when the guys have to cooperatively do what they would never ever admit they want to do. Except that I guess for the writer the plausibility requirement is a little less onerous with aliens -- aliens can say, "Yeah, now sort of nibble behind his ear," whereas if, like, gangsters or Moriarty or somebody says that, eventually the reader is going to say, "Come on now."

[carolyn_claire]

Moriarty might do it. There's no telling what that dude might do. I love that about him.

[resonant]

He's sooo changeable!

[calico]

*approves of this meme LOTS*

I'm neutral on differences in age, but I have a serious kink for differences in sexual experience level.

THIS. Completely.

I hadn't read your essays on established relationships and threesomes before! Very interesting intelligent stuff. Quite agree. And now I really want to go and write, which I haven't felt like in ages, so, thank you. :)

[resonant]

Yay for more writing from you! (Also for the Doing of the Meme, if you so desire.)

[lobelia321]

*waves* Calico feels like writing?? Break out the champagne, yay!

[calico]

Aw, I wish I were inspired in anything that someone apart from me would enjoy reading. *g*

[veronamay]

Bodyguard = yespleasegimme. Depending on the power balance, that is. I'm not fond of bodyguard fics where the character being protected is portrayed as helpless/needing to be sheltered, but the protective instinct itself is a massive kink for me, oh yes.

Telepathy/soulbonding/linked-together-somehow is in my top five favourite things to read in fic, ever. Anything where the characters can sense each other's thoughts/feelings, especially when they don't know, or only one of them knows what's going on--I love that. I'd actually possibly expand this to include all forms of non-verbal communication: looks, touches, written communication (so also including sensory deprivation fic); anything that doesn't use speech as the most important form of communication. ('Primary' and 'most important' are not the same thing in this scenario. Stories where Character A is saying one thing but thinking/feeling something else, and Character B picks up on that? YAY.)

'Trapped together' is another one I don't get to read nearly as often as I'd like to. I have a particular fondness for 'stuck in an elevator' fic. High emotion + tiny space + forced intimacy = good times!

'Yearning' may possibly be my favourite thing ever. Well, no, that's UST, but yearning comes close. Seemingly hopeless yearning with the other character apparently (or actually) oblivious to same, only they're secretly yearning too, and then a big dramatic reveal and a shamelessly romantic HEA ... yeah, I sort of like those. A bit. Possibly.

[resonant]

Depending on the power balance, that is. I'm not fond of bodyguard fics where the character being protected is portrayed as helpless/needing to be sheltered, but the protective instinct itself is a massive kink for me, oh yes.

Yes, this. Probably one of the many reasons why I find BBC John Watson so lickable.

Also, for some reason, I seriously kink to protectiveness in female characters even more than in male ones. The only other trait I can think of that that's true of is foreignness/strangeness.

I wouldn't have thought of linking telepathy with nonverbal communication, but of course I see the connection. Stories that take the form of letters, texts, etc., do that for me -- where you're decoding the subtext, knowing that the character is doing the same thing.

And yay for yearning!