Gay Science Fiction discussion
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*closed* New Sub-Categories Development
Mod
I agree with Zeke. I'm just not that into menage and I'd like to know I'm not going to chose a menage book (or one with girl cooties) without realizing it. Can we have books categorized that way also? I realize it adds a lot of categories...
Mod
MMF (for menage) Scifi
M/M Romance Scifi
Gay Lit Scifi
Classic Scifi
Time Travel Scifi
Steampunk Scifi
Paranormal Flavored Scifi
Others? space opera, post-apocalyptic, cyberpunk, alternate reality?
(in theory we don't need to add Scifi after everything, but my thought is that it makes it clear that it does have to be science fiction based time travel (or vampires or whatever) and not magic or unexplained).
Those all sound great to me. Re the others, maybe a post-apocalyptic shelf? I think that's a popular subset that people go specifically looking for sometimes...(I doubt 'space opera' would be used/meaningful/helpful... I only brought that up in a geek-fit). :p
ETA: THANK YOU!!!, Charming and mm_reads!
just had a thought: so would the mmf shelf be exclusive? I.e., per Zeke and Anne's prefs (and mine), should we keep the mmf off the other shelves?More people are likely to want to avoid it than to search for it. I think... just thinking, anyway.
Mod
I think we can't make additional group shelves exclusive like we can our own personal shelves (does anyone know for sure?) So you'd have to look for the tag.
Mod
Please let me know if there are other shelves we should add. My thought is add them if we think we will need them, and if they end up not getting used much we can take them back off.
Mod
As they mentioned, everyone should help organze the books into the correct category if you have some extra time on your hands. Esp. for the books you've added yourself. I (and they) simply haven't read all these books and don't know where they fit.
AS for the whole bisexual discussion (read: MMF), the only reason I added that to the 'realm' of the group is many great scifi gay books had a scene or two of MMF action (or the such). And many members mentioned this at first...hence I added. In reality, it's not my thing...but it's also not a big deal...since with any book, you can just skip over that part ;) Now with Charming's sub cats you can tell right away if that book has any MMF in it...helpful I think...
Cheers.
Mod
Thanks for getting that done so quickly! From a cursory view, it looks like you're right. I have very limited features available for creating and editing group bookshelves.
The bookshelves that are up cover the bigger categories, but we might want to hammer out naming conventions at some point. The main thing is that they clearly express the shelf content. Most of them do, but I was wondering what "Gay Lit Scifi" means in regards to this particular group? Does that mean sci-fi with a political message? Or is it a broader concept, a more specific concept?
Thanks!
Meghan
Mod
Should there be an "erotica" category? If so what would the difference be between "erotica" and "romance". Is the shelf name "romance" too broad, since it seems like most of the books on the group shelf include romantic relationships at the least. Then there are a lot that include pretty explicit sex scenes ( "erotica" ) versus relationships ( "romance" ). I don't know if that is too subtle a distinction. ??
Oco brought up the desire to distinguish hard science sci-fi from the many other types of sci-fi. In such a book, if there are a lot of explicit sex scenes does that still get categorized as hard science sci-fi? On the opposite end, would it make sense to have shelves for "yaoi" and/or "humor"?
Then I was wondering if we should have any theme categories, like theme-war, theme-military, theme-cyber-mods, theme-moody (haha not really).
Thoughts?
Mod
Why don't we make some theme shelves as you suggested and maybe a hard scifi one as well (I'd like that one) and see how it runs for a couple of months? then do some follow up organizing if need be.
Oh, also, I know a number of members on another thread like to read non-eroctic gay scifi (meaning no sex but same sex relationship involved and supported)...so we should make a shelf for that as well.
Why do you think?
was poking through a little this morning over coffee, trying to classify a couple (didn't get very far). They look great. :)I'd like to know the difference between 'gay-lit' and 'classic' might be...?
Wondering if one (both?) might be the 'non-romance scifi in which one or more major characters are gay'. Haha. *sigh* labels. How to say that in two words...? Point is, doesn't have to be high-brow lit, nor 'classic' (could be modern).
ETA: Can there be parenthetical notes after the labels? How many characters long? Maybe I'm making this worse. Not my intent, I promise.
Mod
I am wondering what the difference between gay-lit and classic might be..."
Oco: do you think "hard-science" and "non-erotic-gay-centric" would work instead of "classic"? Is there a particular book you know of that would fit the "hard-science"? I'm still not sure what "gay-lit-scifi" might mean to various people either. I hadn't even thought about it being more like "non-erotic" scifi.
Sean: I think you're right about putting a number of shelves out there, just let people tag them, and we use whatever sticks the most.
I think so. Sorry I answered before without addressing specifically what you'd said. But yes, either of those...I haven't read a lot (want to, part of why I hang out here, but haven't yet) of the type I'm talking about, but as one example, "Cyteen", Neb (? or was it Hugo?) award winner, clones, space exploration, main character gay with boyfriend). Has semi-romantic (not really though) elements, and even aspects of sex (NOT erotic). Seems that would fit well into either of the categories names you describe.
However, if there was a romantic m/m that was rated G with only kissy-kissy described and all sex behind doors, but the story really was primarily a love story with the classic romance arc that was set in the future... well-- does that fit in there too? I'd rather it didn't. Am I making sense? I'll see if I can come up with a specific example. Maybe 'a strong and sudden Thaw" (trying to choose a popular one) but with a little less explicit sex. To me, that is m/m romance first and foremost, with the 'scifi' mainly a backdrop or subplot.
ETA: I guess what I'm trying to do is try to find a way to separate stories with a romance arc (meet, conflict, HEA), from those with a scifi arc (varied, but about the idea that makes it scifi, whether that be a war, first contact, cloning, apocalypse...). sorry so many errors, trying to do two things at once.
Mod
My confusing terms:
Classic scif: what people think of first when they think of scifi. In the future; technology plays a big part; plays with ideas. "Hard science" might be a better term? It can have a romance or not - I don't see these as exclusive at all.
Gay lit scifi: along the same lines as gay literature in general. It may have romantic elements, but it doesn't have the romantic arc Oco talks about. THis was the distinction that got us started with tagging, because several members wanted gay scifi that wasn't primarily romantic or erotic.
Romance: the romantic arc, whether erotic or not. I am thinking of romance and gay lit as orthogonal, though we can't make the shelves exclusive.
Other possibly confusing terms:
Hard science - I think it was what I was calling Classic so we may not need both.
Non-erotic - this seems self explanatory but does it just mean "no explicit sex" or is there more to it?
The rest I think are self explanatory.
Mod
Mod
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Oh haha! Is that from your shelf? You are so anal!!spoken with love... ;)
ETA: I just realized that's prob from the m/m group shelf. One reason not to have TOO many categories, IMO. :)
I see what you are saying. When I see 'gay lit' I think all serious excellent snooty concept writing. Would others get this impression? Maybe it's just me and my poor self-esteem... :D
I tend to think it isn't the best tag, but I'm dick'd if I can come up with a better one -- one that's nice and short.
Mod
Ha ha; I'm glad that isn't from my shelf.
When I see 'gay lit' I think all serious excellent snooty concept writing. Would others get this impression? Maybe it's just me and my poor self-esteem... :D
Yeah - I don't know what to call it. "Lit" always makes me think of depressing endings. -- Then they all died. In the rain. And no one cared. --
"Non-romance" isn't quite right either.
Mod
I think "Hard science fiction" may be the best tag to combine "classic" and "hard science". No help on the "lit" thing though.
"Then they all died. In the rain." Hemingway!!Yeah, exactly. :D
Zeke wrote: "This could be an accomplishment that could be done relatively quickly and be an immediate benefit to those who like these books and those who don't."I hear you, but think you are wrong that this can be done relatively quickly. Just this morning I flipped through two pages worth of what I *suspect* are furry caveman stories (based on cover art) but can't be sure. They were all added by one person who I haven't seen here since so what happens to those? They might be, they might not be. I don't have the time or inclination to read them to find out. I'm fully expecting that we are going to end up with a lot of stuff that nobody active knows where it belongs, and maybe 90% of it will be garbage, but 10% won't be so do we toss them all? We'll see.
m/m vs. non-m/m is relatively easy to pin based on titles and authors. The others, not so much.
In any case, the process of doing these isn't sped up much (if at all) by going through them once for the paranormals and another time for the rest. Just the nature of choosing shelves.
I think that this discussion is going on even as people are shelving things, so it isn't losing much time. And have you shelved the ones you know? I'm working on mine, but know a small % of all.
Mod
Mod
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/65...
Did it lose its identity in the great Amazon delinking? Cherie Noel added it - is she around?
No idea what that book is. Cherie Noel does have a blog post dated today, so she seems to be around.I wouldn't call The Administration cyberpunk. To me, Cyberpunk needs a strong computer/AI aspect, which it doesn't. It does verge on apocalyptic.
It is certainly an awesome example of dystopic future scifi. Should that be a shelf? *wince* btw, I've been writing on and off from work, but will work on shelves more this weekend.
Well, this is a drag. I've been through all that I know. The only ones among those that I didn't touch were the Administration since I supposed we were still figuring out how to classify them. Otherwise, I've done all I've read (actually, y'all got to most of them first).Some of them are familiar, just not my bag. I could ask around about them if they continue to be unclassified (Ann Somerville, Sonny and Ais, Twisted Hilarity).
As for the rest, honestly, a lot of it looks like stuff I wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole, but of course I can't be sure.
Mod
All: I have actually been reading the blurbs for books I haven't read and guessing - so everyone should feel to remove tags that aren't correct since they may well have been my lame guesses.
One other issue - I am wondering if we ought to have a "candidate for removal" shelf. I seems a bit . . . aggressive, but on the other hand Sean does want this group to be scifi only, and there may some books that really aren't. And I can't see why we would keep "C" by K, since no one can possibly tell what it is. What do people think? Am I being over-exuberant in my newfound powers as a moderator and I should chill out?
Candidate for removal shelf:Gosh. That seems like a great idea to me. Because they wouldn't actually be removed for a while, and people could speak up for them? And if it's been some time period (month, more?) before actual removal, that seems pretty fair to me.
In the interim, it would also be a good way to ID which books have not yet been classified.
I think it'd be aggressive to simply remove, but not to have a temp shelf like that. After all, Sean's introduction to the group makes it fairly clear that he doesn't want it to turn into an 'anything goes' group. If one were worried about hurt feelings, a broadcast message could be sent to group members warning them that there was a purge coming and to come speak for books that might be lost.
Mod
Hi Charming, I think both are great ideas. I would call it dystopia-post-apocalypse since the long shelf names get cut off. For the removal-candidate shelf, we might want to give the first time a couple of weeks or maybe a month. That way more people will have a chance to tag books, discuss the books to remove, etc. After that, depending on how active it is, we can designate once a week or once a month we remove books on the removal shelf.
Although, it just occurred to me that maybe we need to keep a shelf or discussion topic that keeps track of the books we've pulled off the group shelf. Since anyone can add books, there might be certain books that some people consider sci-fi that the group deemed non-applicable. What if other people or new members add them back later? Did I say that clearly? Know what I'm talking about?
Meghan
Is there a place where there could be 'directions' for adding to shelves. Something along the lines of, "make sure to categorize the book" and "note that vamps, shifters, zombies are paranormal, not scifi so they should not be added here" and "books not clearly categorized may be moved to the 'consideration for removal'".That idea, not that wording. Obviously the wording would have to be decided on, but is there a obvious place a statement like that could go that would be seen?
Also could make a sticky faq that more clearly explains each of those cats.
Add: sorry, Meghan, it probably isn't clear, but that was a lateral response to your points. Certainly wouldn't hurt to upkeep a thread on the topic, including running lists of what had been removed and a brief 2-3 word 'why', e.g., "not gay" or "paranormal, not scifi".And, what do you think about creating a shelf now that is labeled 'not yet categorized', then later, as we whittle it down, make that the 'to remove' shelf? I'd find it helpful to have one list of books that are giving problems. We can leave notes on the ones that we think are not appropriate (there is a notes field we can use). Or maybe that's getting too complicated.
Okay, a specific one. There are ten or so books by Jade Buchanan that from everything I can see (description, reviews) are caveman styled stories about half-men half furry feline shifters, that uses 'another planet' as a justification. To me these are prime 'shouldn't be here' candidates, but I see one of y'all classified them as paranormal scifi. I'd already dumped one or two to the TBremoved list. Is there a difference of opinion? If so, I'll concede. But on the off chance that was just a quick assessment, I thought I'd bring it up.
Mod
I expect that was me who labeled them paranormal scifi, and yeah it was just a guess. Feel free to re-shelf them.
Mod
Wonderful idea! Suggest it be called To Be Determined. "
OK; added.
Did someone take A Roof for the Rain off of post-apoc? Because it seems to qualify to me. Or did I forget to label it in the first place?
Hi,I didn't do anything with Roof for Rain.
Um. Okay, I took Zeke's comment as not being current, since you'd already created the shelf. So now there are two different shelves? I've been using the 'to remove' as a provisional for the time being so that people can look through to see what has not been decided for lack of knowledge. Clarify?
Hence my take on the Jade Buchanan books. Not so much a judgment as wondering if you actually knew (since not all of them had been labeled).
This is getting all head-achy for me. Trying to find the line between fantasy/tarzan/paranormal and those that are fantasy/tarzan/paranormal that have a quick sentence or two saying it is on another planet (or whatever). It almost requires some decision on where the line is, even if the line is somewhat arbitrary. Ie., two books identical, one calls the place "Middle Earth", one calls the place "Zantu" in the "xylodene" star system. The first is fantasy, the second scifi? That's one of the reasons I make the distinction I was talking about with Hemovore, btw. Not a question of quality, just of what the overall genre is best described as. Again, I don't want to dictate, but as I try to actually classify these, I'm finding the question come up over and over. :/
Those Buchanan books are a prime example of this, btw.
If it's giving me a headache, I know it is probably giving you one too, btw. Don't mean to sound all bitchy (I'm not annoyed so much as confused), I appreciate your taking point on this, and will follow directions, once I'm clear on what they are. I rather wish more people were weighing in on their opinion on this: where to draw the line.
Mod
Regarding "candidate for removal" - my opinion is you should go ahead and put books on there even if you aren't sure, because if they are scifi, someone will probably rescue them. and if no one cares enough to rescue them, I am not too bothered.
Mod
Heh. I think we just need to wing it and not get too hung up. Everything is subject to later revision, so this can be a first cut. Hey, maybe if we do a bad enough job, someone will take over in disgust. :-)
Mod
I was about to post the following on the Author thread, but I'd like to get your input on my definitions first:
---- Dear authors: please make sure your books are on the correct shelves in our group bookshelf. Go to the "bookshelf" (upper right). Sort by authors and find your books. Click edit, over to the right of the book. Click "choose shelves" and check each shelf that is appropriate for that book. We are defining the shelves more or less as follows:
Aliens - self explanatory
Cyber-genetic-mods - cyberpunk and genetic modifications
Dystopian - self explanatory
Gay lit scifi - this one is a bit vague, but it is intended for scifi that includes gay characters and themes, but is not primarily a romance (though it may have romantic elements). Similar to the distinction between gay lit and M/M romance.
Group author - self explanatory
Hard scifi - this is intended to capture classic scifi themes - emphasizing hard science which is relatively plausible and important to the work.
MMF - menage with both genders
Non-erotic M/M - romance, but not sexually explicit
Paranormal scifi - this is intended to cover works that are science fiction, but are slanted towards paranormal themes. An example is "Hemovore" by Jordan Castillo Price, which is about a virus that causes mutations that resemble vampirism.
Post-apocalytic - self explanatory
Removal candidate - this group is for gay science fiction only. If a book appears to be a non-science based paranormal or time travel, for example, it doesn't go on our group shelves. Books that appear not to be science fiction are placed on this shelf to give group members a chance to defend their honor as science fiction.
Romance - works which emphasize the romantic relationship between the gay main characters.
Space opera - works that take place primarily in space and include impressive technology and a sweeping dramatic story.
Time travel - self explanatory, but should be science based and not magical.
To be determined - these are works that no one has shelved yet.
Young adult - works with young adult characters and non-explicit sex. ----
Trying to be helpful, I added some stuff, reworded others. Places I did this a lot are in italics, to keep you from having to compare versions. Underlines are my comments/questions. I realize I’m taking some liberties in my insertions, especially with tone – if this were in person, I’d be saying things like ‘how about’, and ‘is this okay’ and gauging your reactions, so if I seem heavy-handed, pray keep that in mind. In general, I find that being just a bit ‘strict’ in definitions to begin is easier than trying to tighten afterwards. Also tried to come up with wording for all of them, and started each with something like “Stories that…” or “works that…”. Was fun, anyway, more fun than the grading I’m currently doing… or not doing. You know…---- Dear authors: please make sure your books are on the correct shelves in our group bookshelf. Go to the "bookshelf" (upper right). Sort by authors and find your books. Click edit, over to the right of the book. Click "choose shelves" and check each shelf that is appropriate for that book. Note that bookshelves are not exclusive, you may choose more than one. Also consider that choosing inappropriate shelves will probably not endear you to readers, so please choose based on major themes. We are defining the shelves more or less as follows:
Aliens – stories which are primarily about contact with an alien culture, either through space exploration or invasion.
Cyber-genetic-mods - stories in which the cybernetic or genetic modification of humans or aliens is an important plot element.
Dystopian - stories in which a dystopic (messed up/icky/creepy) society features prominently. Can include near-future Earth or other planets.
Gay lit scifi - This shelf is intended for scifi that includes gay characters and themes, but is not primarily a romance (though it may have romantic elements). Similar to the distinction between gay lit and M/M romance. I think the disclaimer about vague is unnecessary; all of these categories are a bit vague after all, it's in nature of the game.
Group author – if you are an author and a member of this group, choose this shelf for your books.
Hard scifi - this is intended to capture classic scifi themes, emphasizing stories that obey the laws of physics as we know them. These stories should not only be possible, but plausible, and the scientific realism should be important to the work. Please do not include fantastic creatures (elves, shifters, vampires, ghosts, zombies) in this category, even if you think you’ve explained them, as it is intended to be a shelf that persons who dislike those themes can specify to find what they like. Is that too much? Does it sound snotty?
MMF - menage with both genders in which the female plays a small role. Please do not post MFM in this group. (In mfm, the men focus mostly on the female, and is not primarily gay science fiction).
Non-erotic M/M – stories which are romance, but not sexually explicit.
Paranormal scifi - this is intended to cover works that are science fiction, but are slanted towards paranormal themes. An example is "Hemovore" by Jordan Castillo Price, which is about a virus that causes mutations that resemble vampirism.
Post-apocalytic – Stories that examine a world (usually Earth) after some cataclysmic event. That event has usually destroyed society as we know it. Most (not all) post-apocalyptic stories are also dystopic.
Removal candidate - Our group is for gay science fiction only. If a book appears to be a non-science based paranormal or time travel, for example, it doesn't belong on our group shelves. Books that appear not to be science fiction will be placed on this shelf to give group members a chance to inform us of a mistake. Charming, I took out the ‘defend honor’ bit because I feel strongly that one of the problems is that people are viewing the scifi classification as some sort of sign of worth, instead of simply an attempt to put the right books into the hands of the readers who enjoy them. Admittedly, hardcore scifi aficionados have contributed to this by looking down their noses at fantasy and paranormal, but I prefer that we not propagate the conception that being included as scifi is some sort of mark of honor/worth/quality. It only makes more people inclined to ‘disguise’ or come up with flimsy rationale to miscategorize.
Romance - works which emphasize the romantic relationship between the gay main characters.
Space opera - works that take place primarily in space and include impressive technology and a sweeping dramatic story. Yay! Space opera! What a wonderful description!
Time travel – works in which the ability to travel to different times is scientifically based rather than magical. I only reworded to keep syntax consistent with others.
To be determined - these are works that no one has shelved yet.
Young adult - works with young adult characters and non-explicit sex. ----
Odd - I had always thought of space opera as those stories that could happen down the street (substitute contemp. military factions for inter-planetary conflicts, etc.) but someone just happened to plunk it out in space instead. And that would be my old-fashioned, SF snobbiness showing, lol
I agree with you, actually. Heh. It is the western, the war, the adventure, but with the trappings of SF. But there is no question that many many people think of them when they think of scifi, and actually prefer them, so it'd be a disservice not to include them. I like the tendency to consider them a subset of scifi, rather than not 'true scifi'. And I can enjoy Star Wars as much as the next person. :D
Oh adding that in that context, I think I made the point earlier that most m/m scifi would actually not qualify as 'true' scifi, including mine, which is pretty scifi-ish. Because the main theme is the romance, and the backdrop is scifi.
Oh, heavens, yes, never wanted to imply that space opera doesn't belong on an SF board. It's a HUGE part of M/M SF. I always hold out hope for some with more SF meat on their bones - and there are some - but heck, sometimes you just want an adventure story with spaceships.
Still, it's fun to meet someone who gets that distinction. It's not a sharp one, but it's an important one to me. It's like the definition of scifi that I've seen that says it is the 'fiction of ideas'. Yes. That captures it perfectly. The problem with the definition is that it's an 'I know it when I see it' sort of definition that those who understand that difference see, and others just look at the definition and say, but, uh, isn't ALL writing about ideas? Which... yes, but no. Not in the way we mean it. Ugh. As if the words aren't there to explain. It's the 'what if' on a grand scale, where the answer to 'what if' is the entire purpose of the story, not the backdrop. It's why, IMO, Lord of the Flies is in some respect more Scifi than a lot of what people call scifi. It has that spirit of examination of the 'what if'. Take a new setting and watch what might happen.
It's a distinction that's important to make, I think, if it's only in light of setting expectations. Sort of like when the SciFi (Now SyFy *rolls eyes*) channel first came out. SF fans cheered and then found a channel populated almost exclusively by monster movies. That awful adaptation of Beowulf? Seriously? They thought THAT was SF? *snort* So when I read a book ostensibly about encountering non-Earth cultures, even in M/M Romance, I want to see the building of a non-human culture, not just a transplanted Earth culture with different words slapped on. Etc. etc.
And I expect it to deal with that culture as more than a source of romance. Yes.The thing that I keep harping on here in this thread is about the tendency to use the inclusion of a 'scientific explanation' to catapult a fantastic genre into scifi. To me, that misses the whole point of calling something scifi. And um. Okay. Stop harping, I know. :) *slinks quietly away*
I don't have a problem with a fantasy-feel series revealed as SF later on being included. There are solid precedents.
Zeke, as far as this group is concerned, I suspect it would not be classified under hard scifi. Probably what you will end up wanting to do (if I'm reading your preferences correctly) is to click on the 'hard scifi' shelf and restrict yourself to those to avoid those that have the other elements. Oh. And you'd probably like to watch the 'space opera' shelf, in case those don't quite make the 'hard scifi cut' (they wouldn't to me, but others may overrule me, and that's fine).
Mod
1. Shouldn't the FAQ be addressed to all Members, since anyone can add a book? And there can be a separate Author's Note about choosing their categories.
2. Perhaps instead of "Hard Scifi" (which I came up with based at that time on my understanding of what Oco was saying), we should call it "Realistic Scifi" (based on her pretty solid definition in the FAQ).
3. I'm defining the following based on my own view, but obviously other people have acted on a similar view. I'm getting a bit nervous about the push on paranormal chars in Sci Fi books. My take is if there is advanced technology that doesn't exist now and plays a substantial part in the story or enhancing the story, I personally count that as general Sci Fi. In that case, the extra-abilities of the characters seem irrelevant to some extent. They might as well be aliens, it doesn't matter. Thus "Paranormal Scifi". I don't think there MUST be a scientific reason for the existence of paranormal creatures. But there must be science and technology as strongly integrated into the story.
I understand that there are a few books on the shelves (the Pride series I think) that have furry alien creatures on/from another planet and the story probably follows the general shifter-mating story line. That I can easily agree is probably not Sci Fi. BUT if there is physical or social conflict between humans and the creatures, then that becomes less clear.
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Gay Science Fiction
Books mentioned in this topic
A Solid Core of Alpha (other topics)VN2 (other topics)
2001: A Space Odyssey (other topics)
Snow Crash (other topics)
Neuromancer (other topics)
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Last note, if anyone else wants to be a moderator...just add me as a friend and write a message along with that (since I think only friends can PM me) and I'll add you. :) Have fun.