A love analysis. Nice. I don't do straight love, so can't really contribute to the thread. I like what you've started here.

Veronica8 Ah, thank you for the comment! I'd like to think that love is all the same, whether it's a boy and girl, boy and boy, girl and girl, etc. Though my experiences may not speak alot haha.

I'm a bit curious, in your writing, do the protagonist fall specifically for their love interest regardless of their sexual orientation, an exception to the rule kind? Or do they identify as either gay or bisexual? I think BL are usually intended for girl readers so they don't tend to accurately represent the actual dynamics between non-hetero romance and I'd love to hear your take on this :)

RachelRuth Couldn't say for other writers.

For me, it's a bit of both. It depends on the story and character motivations and goals. Societal impressions are needed to ensure conflict and believability, but I aim not to make it a focus. Rather design the story to progress the development of the relationship's emotional fulfillment. So yeah, the "falling in love" trigger is generally because of personality chemistry.

The type of gay fiction that I'm comfortable to write are aimed for female readers. So, there's more focus on emotional connection and that kind of fulfillment. In most of my stories, the BL just ends up being a by-product with a larger chunk of the plot being the characters doing something to achieve a result together.

I've (horribly) written gay erotica targeted for male readers, which is, er, aimed for physical satisfaction from reader. You'd probably know this by Bara tag. There's an emotional connection between two parties to make the story believable enough. This connection is mostly driven through desire and lust. Yeah, most times, at least one of the characters is identifying themselves as gay. To be honest, being gay is never given much focus either since kind of everyone in the story is gay.

I guess, saying this, probably gay fiction isn't different from writing general romance.

Veronica8

Thank you for the in-depth and thoroughly explained answer! To be able to include societal expecations and impressions has always been something I really like, believability is something J look for or else I become a bit distracted unless the author paints another world with different norms. Though it makes more sense to focus on the personal chemistry as you've said as at the end of the day, it's what most or your readers eek (emotional fulfillment)

Interesting pursuit though! Erotica is one of the best selling genre and bara seems like a niche genre that people are willing to pay for! You have a point in that most sexually charged book tends to gloss over gender norms in lieu of the desire and lust that tends to surround them :D

You're right, based on your explanation, they're not so different although I see less people write BL than standard romance here in WN which is a bit of a pity.