Alexandra
asked
Lois McMaster Bujold:
Hello, I hope my question isn't offensive. But I was talking to another person who also read your books (I don't think she counts as a fan), and she complained that Miles thought about sex too much -- she was referring to the Borders of Infinity scene, I think. Do you think she's just underestimating how much the average guy thinks about it, since they supposedly think about it every few seconds?
Lois McMaster Bujold
While I doubt that the "every few seconds" factoid is correct -- men vary about sex quite as much as women do, if not necessarily in the same proportions (and over time as well as by individuals) -- I do think expecting book-characters to be comfortably asexual, or at least anything about their sexual lives well-hidden off-stage, is less likely to be found in modern writing than in the older, more censored sort that she might prefer.
As for how authentically guy-like Miles is, guy readers will have to speak to that.
Ta, L.
While I doubt that the "every few seconds" factoid is correct -- men vary about sex quite as much as women do, if not necessarily in the same proportions (and over time as well as by individuals) -- I do think expecting book-characters to be comfortably asexual, or at least anything about their sexual lives well-hidden off-stage, is less likely to be found in modern writing than in the older, more censored sort that she might prefer.
As for how authentically guy-like Miles is, guy readers will have to speak to that.
Ta, L.
More Answered Questions
Karl Smithe
asked
Lois McMaster Bujold:
Is this the origin of Vor? The tattoos were the mark of a vor – the Russian word for “thief”, but also a general term for a career member of the Soviet underworld. https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/23/how-organised-crime-took-over-russia-vory-super-mafia
Shane Castle
asked
Lois McMaster Bujold:
In your "five gods" stories, you use the word "vail" as a noun in a way that implies a gratuity or emolument, but the only definition I can find suggests its usage was as a verb, meaning to show submission or respect, typically by removing a hat. How did you come by your usage of this word?
Andy Lopez
asked
Lois McMaster Bujold:
A question about the Five Gods world: I would assume that each soul is taken up by one God and one God alone. Has there ever been a case of a soul being given special honors by more than one God? I can think of a man who once bore the miracles for two different Gods, and was the cause of a restoration of something significant to a third. I can picture those funerary rights as being far from the norm.
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