Mayor ,'Chosen'
There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."
Congrats, P-C!
ION, I just read a scifi novel where the main character has a gender-neutral name. I'd assumed the character was female. Then I looked at four or five reviews and all the reviewers assumed the character was male. Eventually I figured out the character's gender is never specified.
In case folks don't want to b spoiled, I'll white font the book's name: John Scalzi's Lock In.
Ha, I knew exactly what book you were talking about because I just started it and I assumed the character was male.
They released two audiobooks, one with a male narrator and one with a female narrator.
That's funny.
I'm trying to figure out why I immediately assumed the character was female. Lack of obvious male speech characteristics? Or maybe because I like female main characters more? I dunno.
I like female main characters more too, but I think I assumed male partly because the author's main characters are usually male and partly because of inherent sexism: FBI agent = man.
I am intrigued now....but would probably default male given a male author. (And vice-versa if it were a female author)
That’s great, P-C! Also happy belated birthday!
I am intrigued now....but would probably default male given a male author. (And vice-versa if it were a female author)
Yeah, I think that's a common bias. But another bias could be that the reader defaults to their own gender. I read a cool story by A.C. Wise called "The Last Survivor of the Great Sexbot Revolution," which is a neat use of second-person because the gender of the main character is never specified. (And even there I did default to female-by-author (and/or thinking of sexbots as female per male heteronormativity), I think, but the fact that the character is "you" seems to invite the reader to project their own gender.)
Also happy belated birthday!
Thanks!
And thanks to everyone for congratulations! It's wild.
Bravo, P-C! That sounds like great fun!
Thanks for the link, PC! Interesting--I couldn't say whether I was thinking of the narrator as male or female, because I knew going in, so it felt more gender-neutral in my head.
...but would probably default male given a male author. (And vice-versa if it were a female author)
When I was reading it, the character felt like a female character as written by a male author.
Brains are weird.