hate seeing ANYONE get all mushy.

Um... you probably aren't enjoying that epic of mine, then. Humm.

OK, if not mushy, how about overcome with manly emotion and regard for someone they've seen as a comrade but now realize is much, much more?

t no, I have not been reading the badfic, my mind's in a weird place today

I generally only like slash if I can see the subtext on the show. I think that's probably why Fraser/Ray K. slash is my favorite stuff out there, closely followed by Clark/Lex. Sometimes, however, a really good writer can sell me on a pairing that would otherwise ring totally false to me.

I also tend to like slash for the emotional content more than for the explicit bits--just so long as the characters remain recognizably themselves and recognizably male. It irks me when slash authors write one of the characters in a way that makes him seem stereotypicaly female. I've seen this a lot in Sentinel fic.

"But Buffy/Willow doesn't work. "

I'm gonna have to disagree with you on this one. I find this pair quite eficacious. Of course, ymmv.

I don't go looking for slash generally. I'll read it when recced to me, and enjoy it if it's good. But it's not my only interest in fic, and some slash pairings (Mulder/Krycek) interest me a lot more than others (Spike/Angelus). I tend to like the painful kind of slash more than the warm/mushy slash, but then I've read several dS stories I really liked, and those were funny/warm rather than painful.

So all I can say is that there are just about as many reasons to read or not read something as there are stories out there, and the one sure way to start a flamewar is to assign reasons or rationales for why someone does or doesn't like/read/write a certain kind of story.

t polishes bofq badge

Is it the same sort of mushy a het guy/girl would display towards each other? Do you mind that, PMM?

a really good writer can sell me on a pairing that would otherwise ring totally false to me.

Very true. I can be sold on a very good Willow/Tara, for example, and I've been known to read and enjoy very well written Spike/Riley.

Shrift, I too found that very very odd.

I tend to skip over the explicit sex bits too, especially if it's the third or fourth (or sixth etc.) time the pair has been together. Come on, we know how the parts interlock, by this time I'm more interested in how the relationship is developing.

I'm also a romantic at heart- I believe, however strangely or crazily, in 'true love'. I want a fanfic writer to sell me that for whatever pairing.

So Spike/Angel, not Spike/Angelus, for example.