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Message-ID: <30491asstr$991051803@assm.asstr-mirror.org>
From: Katie McN <katiemcn@cutey.com>
References: <30483asstr$990997802@assm.asstr-mirror.org>
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NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 27 May 2001 20:44:48 PDT
Subject: {ASSM} {REVIEW} Alco-Pops (ff/f rape)
Date: Mon, 28 May 2001 08:10:03 -0400
Path: assm.asstr-mirror.org!not-for-mail
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Newsgroups: alt.sex.stories.moderated,alt.sex.stories,alt.sex.stories.d
Followup-To: alt.sex.stories.d


The author of this story attacked the writing workshop Malinov is
currently conducting at alt.sex.stories.d. He proposed that we were
wasting our time working with malinov and should instead use some
unnamed Internet resources I assume made him the person he is today. 

Could you imagine my excitement as I rushed over to ASSM to read a
work by someone who suggested he was better than Malinov, Uther
Pendragon, Souvie and all the rest of the people participating in the
workshop?

Where do I begin?

Perhaps the spelling error in the Notes prior to the start of the
story should have warned me what was to come, but I plodded on anyhow.
I was determined to gain value from a person who had no problem
putting himself ahead of some of the best writers I've had the
pleasure to read.

Normally I would not continue reading a story once I noticed the point
of view switching from third simple past, third compound past, second
person present and periodic omniscient. It's painful to read this sort
of thing. Yet, the person did say he was better than everyone else so
perhaps hidden at the end of the story was some means of bringing it
all together, and I didn't want to miss it. 

I knew I had a grim journey ahead of me when I read this sentence,

.. The mysterious bravado that had landed Jenny in this predicament to
begin with, vanished like the patronage of a bank when you lose your
job.  


Here is what else I discovered as I read the story.

Let's start with the second sentence of this short missive. 

.. An argument with one of her classmates had resulted in a few harsh
words from Miss Penny in public, and since her relationship with Miss
Penny was important to her, she felt disproportionately hurt and
embarrassed.

My head hurt as I tried to decode its meaning, but eventually I
discovered the hint of a back story that motivated the protagonist.
The readers weren't going to be told what it was immediately. Good
move in suspense building to start the story with a hint of some
terrible problem previously faced by the protagonist. Unfortunately
several other problems are thrown into the pot within the first ten or
so paragraphs and soon only those who like to take notes while reading
are able to keep track of what is going on in the story.
Unfortunately, none of these problems are ever mentioned again and so
we have no idea what the author meant by including them. I couldn't
believe it so I had to read the story two more times just to make sure
I didn't miss the explanations. I didn't. There were none to be had.

As we travel down the muddy road that is this story, we are presented
with the unrealistic scenario of someone being spoken to harshly by a
teacher who is so embarrassed by this that she decides to sneak out of
school using some back exit. The very same timid waif meets up with
the school bully  and responds to a question about her love life with
this, "Better than yours, you slut!", and then this, "You deaf as well
as stupid?" Does the author feel his reader is also stupid and not
able to determine that the stereotypical bull dyke is the villain of
the piece? Can we be expected to believe that a girl who is sneaking
out of school because a teacher spoke harshly to her would say things
like this? Perhaps anyone who would read this story to the end might
need to be hit over the head with these blatant descriptions crudely
disguised as dialog, but I felt put upon seeing dialog used in such a
clumsy and obvious way to describe another character in the story. The
exclamation point in the first sentence conveyed the low opinion the
author has for his reader. Yes, we're too dumb to read emotion so it
has to be underscored. I was surprised to find that  every other word
wasn't marked with asterisks to even further direct me to the possible
emotion contained in these two impossible sentences.

Let's join the author and forget about overall story logic. Instead
I'd like to call your attention to individual components for a moment.

Here is a phrase that I stumbled over, "...an argument with one of her
classmates had resulted in a few harsh words from Miss Penny in
public,...". Miss Penny never shows up in the story again so the
thought she needs a name is dubious. However carefully selecting one
that results in the phrase 'Miss Penny in public' causes one to ask
what the author was thinking about. There is no need for the use of
compound past such as found in the phrase '...had resulted in a few
harsh words...' unless of course he was trying to make this work as
tedious to read as possible. Try saying that phrase three times as
quickly as you can.

Since I'm a lesbian I always like to see how stories featuring my
gender preference handle the subject. I'm pretty sure that Lesbian
Nation will not be handing out any prizes to the hackneyed stereotype
of lesbianism we find here. Yes, we have the butch dyke who probably
was wearing a black tee shirt with a pack of cigs rolled up in the
sleeve. And, yes, we find the de rigour side kick who would do
anything for the butchie girl to include dropping to her knees as was
pointed out in the story. Thankfully we didn't have to learn what
would happen if she did. I probably wouldn't have been able to have
sex for a week after reading what that might entail.

The author of course shows his disgust for lesbians by having his
omniscient voice philosophize in the story about the gender preference
of the girl who is being established as the bull dyke. I quote,

.. Nobody ever accused Kerry of having lesbian tendencies. (Katie jumps
in to point out that the author of the story earlier painted her a
probable bull dyke, but who would listen to him.)  For one thing they
didn't dare, but it didn't seem appropriate in any case. (Ah, the
voice of the all knowing god is one of my favorites from stories
written in the eighteenth century.)

In another place the author demonstrates a total lack of ability to
provide metaphors to describe his character's actions. How daring in a
so called lesbian story that the only thing he could come up with to
tell how his junior bull dyke faces the world is to say she, "grabs it
by the balls." Not once but several times. How very guy.

Instead of continuing on kicking this dead horse, I'll just list a few
more examples from the story and allow the reader to make up his or
her own mind:

.. With that she pushed Jenny away suddenly, sending her staggering
back as she advanced menacingly.  Kerry stepped lazily into the path
behind Jenny, blocking off her retreat.

.. "Sit on her face," demanded Kerry, clearing the plug of phlegm that
had formed in her throat, and taking a swig from the bottle she held.

.. Girls can be very cruel, since they are not constrained by mere
physical violence. (only god and this author...)

.. Rape is about power, not sex, and Kerry revelled (sp) in that power.
(Ah yes, Moses rushes back from the Mount hollering our, "Hey
everybody, I forgot one.")

I didn't see the value of learning one girl was wearing clean
underwear either, but this must be important to the author for some
reason. Perhaps he has some sort of phobia, but I digress.


Finally the pay off. I started laughing when I read this because I
thought it might be parody, but then I realized the author was serious
and included this juvenile pap because he felt it had some deep
significance. Imagine the antagonist of the story living through the
whole mess only to be embarrassed to be part of this ending,

.. "What a loser!" laughed Sylvie as they watched her go.

.. Kerry was silent for a few moments.

.. "Here, I don't want any more of this," she said, handing Sylvie the
bottle.  "You finish it."

.. "Thanks!"  Sylvie took the bottle and drank.

For no apparent reason the antagonist and her side kick are drinking
something called alco-pops which must have some meaning for the
author, but lost on the vast majority one would assume. Perhaps a
glossary next time?

I decided alco-pops was some sort of alcoholic beverage. That caused
me to wonder what type of high school these girls attended. Imagine
young girls wandering the campus drinking booze. In any event, this
had nothing to do with the story as close as I could tell except to
give a reason for using a title which would befuddle readers and so
diminish readership. It would seem the author knew the value of his
work and was trying to help us avoid this story. And we also find that
a girl could be raped on campus at the end of the school day and no
one would notice so we must assume that everyone at the school drank
this stuff and so had a difficult time understanding anything.

I'm guessing that the last few passages have something to do with an
insight gained by the antagonist of the story. Personally, if I was in
the story I would continue to pound down the booze in order to black
the experience out of my mind.

This is not the worst story I've ever read. It would be memorable if
it was. This is certainly not a good story. The posting on assd
suggested that this would be a story written much better than anything
Malinov could do. It hinted at shocking subject matter and writing
that was leading edge.

The person lied when he said those things.

This story is a poor beginner attempt and not very well done at all. I
assume that the person gets great encouragement from family and
friends and so is deluded into thinking he has skill and talent. In
the words of some anonymous philosopher, "Don't quit you day job,
Nick.'

During the American Civil War, General Grant turned the tide of battle
in favor of the Union Forces. President Lincoln was expressing his
happiness with the results when one of his advisors pointed out that
Grant was an alcoholic. Lincoln responded by saying, "Find our what he
drinks and send a barrel to all the other generals."

In much the same spirit we find the author of this story stating else
where that he gained his knowledge and expertise in various unnamed
places on the web. One would wish he might take the time to list these
so we would know what to avoid and thereby not end up like him.

--
It's me! Your pal,

Katie McN <katiemcn@cuteandcuddly.com>

Read all my stories at:
www.asstr-mirror.org/files/Authors/Katie_McN/www

-- 
Pursuant to the Berne Convention, this work is copyright with all rights
reserved by its author unless explicitly indicated.
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