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In my honest opinion, the female/male novels are inherently different from the beginning. Like, every author (that I at least know off) started writing as a hobby. But only some managed to sit through the period where they were trash, learning how to get better. Only then the truly good authors are born. It's not like talent can solve everything when it comes to writing with how writing, in reality, is a daily toil. That gives us a current situation:

• Author starts from a hobby, learning from the novels he/she read along the way and adapting their style a bit even if that's not the intention.
• Author fails the first few times, learns on his mistakes, writes more and more, watches lectures about the theorem of writing, and generally, gets better
• After countless fails and constant hard work over a long period of time, one finally manages to reach the level when the basic mistakes no longer apply to him, while his plots are interesting and original.

The problem is, most of the novels on webnovel, especially orignals (with all the due respect to the great original novels that there are plenty off) are made by the first category of authors. People that still belongs to the first stage that I mentioned above. That puts us in a situation where:

Male authors are mostly focused on Epics. Thats the general idea, steeming both from how masculine brain works, what do readers expect and generally the overall aims are similar to what one would like to achieve in his own dreams. That's why we have Hero's journey, Cultivation novels, Harem novels. Some might have better craft or ideas, but generally - it's all the same. Only once someone progresses along the way, would his plots turn diverse, his systems unexpected, their points flawless. But you are not seeing those novels. Outside of the selected few, most of what you are reading has the tough nut to crack to overcoming the burden of extremely explored genres, where everything has already been written to a huge extend.

On the other hand, you have female authors in the same situation. Learning to read from the novels they read in the past, overusing the same schemes... But there is a huge difference between how man's and female's brain works (No gender propaganda here, just the general consensus). Men are more inclined to think about facts, logic, reason. If they see the problem, they wish to solve it. On the other hand, women are more focused on the feelings - something that allows to make the novel very intimate, allowing the readers to immerse in it even if the truth about the plot is subpar.

It's because (in my honest opinion) this difference, that is the reason behind the point that OP mentioned. I would say those female novels have a way lower point of entry to get recognised, but there is a relative ceiling how far MOST (not all) of them would come. On the other hand, if an ml novel sticks around for long enough, its author has a huge chance of finding his own niche, in which he will produce something that will entice the readers just with the insane plot and craft.

It's not that female or male-oriented novels or any better or any worse. Its that they are different, and have inherently different market demands and tasks to fulfil.

MotivatedSloth You nailed it~!!!

MotivatedSloth I am going to have to point out one thing. The Hero' Journey is the oldest story telling technique in Western Literature. It's also the basis for most, if not all Disney movies not to mention TV shows like Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Mandalorian.

I do agree that beginning writers, like yours truly, are on a learning curve because many of them don't know that they don't know, so they make the same mistakes over and over again. They don't know what the Hero's Journey is or why they should care or the difference between 3rd person omniscient and 3rd person limited. A friend of mine who is a published author likes to tell people that you need to write a million words before you can call yourself an author. I'm not sure he is wrong.

I keep thinking about starting an advice thread for new authors to make their lives easier. Maybe after I finish my masters program I will do that.

Teacherman... Out

LVTeacherman True.

You make a good point about female protagonist for action stories. I've written two shonen fantasy with female protagonists and both of them are failures. I couldn't hit a bankable reader demographic. They're difficult to market as I virtually have to make them do a lot of guy action stuff. Since they' re chicks there's the emotional complexity that I tend to write in, which gets lost in translation with a majority of shonen readers.

Then again, I write a lot of weird stuff that's a miss for most readers. My bad habit of letting my warped imagination get the better of me.

Veronica8 You may not be hitting the tropes of your genre properly. Those tropes are the expectations your readers have for that genre. If you meet those expectations, you'll be more successful. Or, switch genres, you might have more luck with a more traditional fantasy novel where female protagonists are more accepted.

Didn’t read all the posts, so I’m just spouting my opinion randomly. I think this depends on preferences and who the author is a lot. However, I’m not surprised that female authors are (on average) writing better and more relatable stories than men.

A lot of times guys are focused on the action and girls are focused on the thoughts/emotions in life. You know, a wife says, “Do the dishes.” Her husband does them and is shocked when she gets mad because he did them with a bad attitude. She ends up saying something like, “You can smile while you do the dishes!”

See, the husband thought all that mattered was the action of getting the dishes clean. The wife wanted her husband to want to (or be joyful about) helping her with chores around the house. She was concerned about his emotions towards her and their life.

Similar things happen in books. A guy writes an entire book where the whole thing reads like, “He punches this bad guy, and then he punches that bad guy!” He thinks it’s amazing, but his plot and characters are stale and emotionless.

A woman writes the same book, but it reads like, “He fights with this bad guy to save a woman he loves because she has these characteristics!” As a result, the whole thing feels different to a reader.

The male book might have better action, but it doesn’t connect with them. However, the female book touches them on an emotional level where they can say, “I want to be like that hero. When will I find a girl that makes me feel that way.”

Again, just my thoughts. It is possible for women to write books devoid of emotion and for men to write tear jerkers as well though. I think the emotions just come more naturally to females while writing. They already (on average) spend more time thinking about what actions mean in terms of what the person doing them feels or thinks.

Emotions will always trump actions in written stories in my opinion because (unlike movies where you can see it), it can be hard to make action scenes exciting on the page without an emotion tied to them.

As for my opinion: most of the context of the difference of both flavors are already explained above so not gonna repeat that and it's damn too long.

Gonna be honest here and blunt here, a hate feminist genres and face slapping harems and it was never a competition of gender equality.

And this thread itself is really worthless in my opinion. You really cannot make that perfect formula in writing since each writer and reader has different behaviours and tastes when it comes to it.

I read a book. MC faces the enemy and is unsure of what to do?

Male comment - problem = the enemy - kill him/special jail holding enemy for eternity -> problem solved
Female comment - Don't kill/hurt him back, even if the enemy will come back, it will affect MC emotionally and he will no longer be the same. (special jail holding enemy for eternity also exists here at times)

One solves the problem and prevent it from popping up in future, (problem-solving mentality as the priority),
Other makes sure that at the end of the day when there is no problem, MC can live with himself (emotional aspect as the priority).

The way I see it female books delve more into emotional and more often than not enemy is somewhat converted no violence (ruthlessness). Needs more detail and character analysis for the change to be effective (+magical fairy takes care of ruthless enemy's future plans and makes him easily accept the peaceful way) and leads to the desired ending.

Guys books deal with current and the future problem with violence first (most cases) (+ magical fairy fix the emotional aspects ) leads to the desired ending.

Hard to tell which path makes the better story, it is based on personal preference.

Ps, this is my opinion generalized based on limited reading...

Veronica8

Veronica8 This was one of the story premise I wrote that didn't test well.

How the heck did that no do well? That is soo interesting. Did you purposely hide most of the chapters while publishing it? Otherwise, it is impossible for that to not sell. Just that short excerpt is hella interesting in my opinion.

Fern_is_Plant Quite accurate, second to MotivatedSloth who never misses.

First off, the OP comes off as very um... disdainful?... of male-written books for reasons of their own.

Not gonna comment on that.

As for the difference between male-written and female-written novels on Webnovel specifically, they seem to be the same story.

Female novels are tearjerker melodrama that occurs almost never in real life and male novels are testosterone-fueled power fantasy that also never occurs in real life.

Can you guess why? Because this is called fiction. Things that occur there are meant to immerse a reader into the world of the media in question, and stating that one approach to achieving this goal is the 'objectively' better one shows that you need to google what makes a novel objectively good... cuz you have no clue lol.

Veronica8 Tropes aren't bad, think of them as guideposts. I would also research the trope so you know how to put your spin on it. There is a website called TVtropes, I would start there. Be warned... It's a time suck. I've lost a couple of hours reading about different character and setting tropes.

One issue I need to deal with in my novella is making sure my protagonist sounds female or at least has enough female traits to be realistic. But since it's a hot mess draft, right now I am just trying to get my story finished.