reasons I like a/b/o: a shallow list

[snick_backup]

There's tons of cool, srs bsns things you can do with alpha/beta/omega dynamics, and a lot of people are doing them. When I talk about the trope to other people, those are mostly the things I talk about. They are not the only things I like, however. Some of my reasons are really fairly shallow.

Some other things I like:
* mpreg. obviously.
* alpha!women. alpha!women who are totally happy about being alphas (am writing this, will post soooooon), or whose feelings become conflicted for Reasons (am also writing this), or who are still really confused about what being an alpha female means, exactly (have written a tiny bit of this, and hope to write a lot more).
* genderswappy het dynamics.
* an excuse to describe lots and lots of smells. I am fascinated by characters who navigate their world with their nose.

Original entry posted at Dreamwidth. Feel free to reply here or there. ( DW replies)

Comments

[eilowyn.livejournal.com]

I need you to sit me down and tell me exactly what a/b/o is, because I still don't get it and I feel like I'm missing out on something.

[snickfic]

Well, I sort of wrote a primer here, which might help? It's more a description of the trope in general, not so much what I specifically like about it.

[gryfndor-godess.livejournal.com]

This primer is also very useful: http://archiveofourown.org/works/403644/chapters/665489

[faege.livejournal.com]

Mpreg is something I flip-flop on. Written well, it's fascinating, but it's easy enough to squick me with it too. :&

And yes to the smells!

[snickfic]

Ha ha. Mpreg is a recurring theme on this blog. Like, it is the thing I ask people to write for me when I am feeling stressed mopey. :)

[faege.livejournal.com]

Well, I guess I'll get the full spectrum, decide my likes and dislikes about the trope. ;)

There's so much about it that can be sweet, but at the same time, too much detail about the mechanics of the birth and I'm out. :P

[reapertownusa.livejournal.com]

Mpreg is one of those kinks I'm still working to understand - one of those that isn't my thing, but I'm fascinated by the why. Strong women roles I definitely totally get, though.

And a smell obsession? Now that is interesting. Mostly because I have next to no sense of smell. I have to work really hard to include that sense in my stories - it just doesn't register with me. So do you have a particularly sensitive sense of smell or is it just a concept that interests you?

[snickfic]

Mpreg is one of my (almost) bulletproof kinks. I love how it complicates gender-related things, and how it sets up really interesting m/f dynamics (in het mpreg, at least, of which there is not all that much). But I also like it for less respectable reasons like "Aw, guy with baby belly!" :)

I don't know that I have a particularly sensitive sense of smell, it's just a sense that I tend to pay more attention to than some people, I think. I love smelling new places, or having memories brought back by smelling old places. Smells just generate a lot of feelings for me. So then it's nice to have an excuse to write about them a lot in stories. Before the a/b/o stuff, my best excuse was Oz the werewolf, from Buffy, although I didn't write him all that much.

[brutti-ma-buoni.livejournal.com]

Mmm, these are not such shallow reasons. The a/b/o fics I dislike are usually heavy on the alpha males, which is a trope I can live without, but the more complex gender issues are fun.

I tried to write about smell quite a bit after Daisee's talk at a previous Writercon. Have a feeling I'm slipping back on it now.

[snickfic]

I know what you mean about alpha males. I struggle with writing them; I feel they should get fair play, but they haven't been in my stories so far. (OTOH, this latest SPN fic has both Sam and Dean as alphas for worldbuilding reasons, and I think I want to write at least one more fic in that universe.)

I remember that talk! I think I downloaded it and listened to a bunch of it, because I was interested.