There's something about those kids--all of them--that I just...fail...at finding them in situations or storylines other than canon, let alone in any sort of sexual situation. Gives me full body shudders.

Absolutely fair enough. But what of Remus/Sirius? Or Snape/Lily? Or plotty gen Marauders-era/ Albus Severus & co era?

Not that I'm pushing the fic - I'm just curious about whether your squick is about the sexualisation of characters you think of at a particular age, or about the source texts per se. (I remember initially just not being able to understand why anyone wanted to write or read fic about books. I mean, obviously, somebody broke me - but I do remember having that bafflement and sense of distaste.)

And while I value--nay, treasure--my slash-colored goggles, it's still not my default view of things. I have to be reminded to put them on.

I, conversely, was listening to a 6 year old read a story called 'Little Teddy Helps Mouse' (in which Mouse foolishly falls into a muddy puddle despite Little Teddy's warning, is greatly disorientated and discomfited, and has to be helped home by Little Teddy, with the implication that there is to be a bath in his immediate future) and found myself going 'Hmm...hurt/comfort.' And then sort of choking.

eta I have also named the 2 handpuppets I bought my kids after characters from a Big Gay Cracktastic 70s Manga - Klaus (the puppet is a cute little dragon with the ferocious roar) and Dorian (the puppet is a fluffy pink poodle).

Which reminds me - God, I do adore From Eroica With Love beyond all power to express. I've been guiltily eyeing up the Manga shelves in my bookshop, and came with in a hair's breadth of buying something called Boy Princess, in which, so the blurb assures us, a king covers up the fact that his daughter's run away rather than get married by dressing up his youngest son in drag and sending him to be the bride instead. Which goes down very well with the groom, and then the two young princes have lots of jolly adventures keeping their Some Like It Hot -esque secret a secret.

I'm belatedly discovering that all the most cracktastic and embarrassingly silly things one finds in fanfic have been published in Japanese manga and read in public for years. !!!!

But the thing that I like about Eroica - or, well, one of them - is that it ISN'T skinny teenage boys, or some kind of master/padawan vibe. It's two big strapping blokes, who are both grownups and experts in their fields, and competent, and very very pretty. And one of them is the most magnificently mischievous and screamingly camp fop in the history of 70s homosexuality, with a heart of gold, and the other is the most marvellously grumpy, agressive closet case in the history of 70s homosexuality. And the artwork? Is lovely. Really lovely. But I really like that they're both competent grownups with their own lives and careers, and that the ridiculously pretty one is busy pursuing the uptight manly one.

Um.

I need more Eroica. Stat. Failing that, I need more fic.

looks sad.

...I may even end up having to write some.

You mean Remus/Sirius *isn't* canon? And early Marauders, of course. I'd be willing to look into Lily/Snape. So yes, it's the children--even the twins--whose sexualization I'm not prepared to explore. To me, and I can't emphasize this enough, it's purely my own squick and I expect no one else to share it, it feels like exploitation.

Teenage sex in other fandoms, and in original fiction doesn't bother me, unless it's noncon. Bastard Out of Carolina was a well-written book and dealt with a subject that needed to be dragged into the light, but I certainly didn't read it for *fun*. And fic, while eddifying to one degree or another, is primarily entertaining for me.

Fay, I think you need to check out a series called "Fake." I really, really do. Also, I think I need to start in on Eroica.

One of my favorite HP fic series is by Fernwithy. She's doing stories set during Teddy Lupin's time at Hogwarts, and the feel is very close to that of the books without feeling like a re-tread.

the Winchester brothers' relationship is emotionally, mentally and physically *closer* than incest, on a lot of levels.

Yes. This. As Cass said, their relationship would be disturbing IRL, but it's wonderful to see play out onscreen. There's something appealing about the idea of that kind of closeness that I love to see in fiction but would not be nearly so appealing if it were for reals.

You mean Remus/Sirius *isn't* canon?

::chokes on her milk::

It's true, it's true.

This is where I knee-jerk rec The Shoebox Project. Because it's brilliant.

One of my favorite HP fic series is by Fernwithy. She's doing stories set during Teddy Lupin's time at Hogwarts, and the feel is very close to that of the books without feeling like a re-tread.

She is amazing.

There's a series by belovedranger that's all about Ron and Hermione, but it starts a few years AFTER the war and explores them crossing the line from friends to lovers to newlyweds to parents. She also writes them how I think Jo would write them if she wrote erotica. It's all very ... Nora Roberts/JD Robb-type sex. And all very loving.

The whole brothers discussion and no one came up with Boondock Saints?

I wouldn't call Boondock Saints a fandom. Though it is one of the very few sources where I look at it and say, "Yeah, I could see that."

Fake, you say? Fabulous! God love you, Anne - I'm very much wandering around unfamiliar shores without a map, and there's so freaking MUCH of it, and one can't actually open the books because they're all sealed with plastic - or, well, one can, but you're supposed to take them to the counter for the staff to unseal, and I couldn't not buy something after that - so I'm sort of lost. I bought what I thought was a Vampire Hunter D manga, thinking it sounded promising, and it turned out to be a bloody novel, to my annoyance. I mean, it might be a very good novel, but I thought I was getting manga. Damn it.

Fake. Cool.

And, hell yes, check out Eroica, for it is the shiniest, most swashbuckling thing - think Velvet Goldmine crossed with James Bond and The Scarlet Pimpernel, with more than a dash of The Man from UNCLE. Klaus/Dorian - they're just unspeakably adorable. And grownups. And together they fight the KGB and do crime, while bickering like mad.

(I've been hoping that the writer has other books out, because I do love the artwork and the stories both - but so far no joy.)

eta some links to pictures, and the information that she's written quite a lot of rather lovely looking things, generally of a swashbuckling historical nature. But they're not translated into English.

blows nose.

I, conversely, was listening to a 6 year old read a story called 'Little Teddy Helps Mouse' (in which Mouse foolishly falls into a muddy puddle despite Little Teddy's warning, is greatly disorientated and discomfited, and has to be helped home by Little Teddy, with the implication that there is to be a bath in his immediate future) and found myself going 'Hmm...hurt/comfort.' And then sort of choking.

Koala will kill him if he tries anything.

Holy cow. NYMag interviews Luminosity. Yes, Lum, the vidder.

[link]

Blimey!

t /impressed

...

...Anne, you don't know anything about GokuSen fanfic, do you? I went to fanfiction net, but it's just so soul-destroying having to wade through crap in the hopes of finding something good. And, er, you're now my go-to girl for anything manga/anime related (for I am So. Totally. Out. Of. My. Element).