What won't you write?

[crystal haven]

Originally Posted by Hex

Your body just isn't under your control any more and nothing you can do will change that. For hours.

I can really relate to this; I found the lack of control very hard. At one point, I can remember being told not to push - and thinking they must be joking!

[Warren_Paul]

Originally Posted by David Evil Overlord

...and squeezes his hand very, very hard...

I hope he has insurance on that hand.

[AnyaKimlin]

Originally Posted by David Evil Overlord

Being male, I can't and won't write childbirth from experience. Not unless medical science takes a sudden left turn into the Twilight Zone.

But I have had a dose of food poisoning so bad I spent nearly two days in hospital. And it felt a lot like Hex's description of childbirth.

P.S. I do have a childbirth scene, planned but never written, for one of my many WIPs. (To be) written from the guy's point of view as his lady love squeezes...

...and squeezes his hand very, very hard...

Actually that is what childbirth felt like to me - a really bad dose of food poisoning. From the TMI both ends.

There is one tribe where the man has a rope tied to his genitals, rope is run over the rafter/beam of a mud hut, the other end placed in the labouring woman's hands and everytime she has a contraction the woman pulls - for some reason my husband didn't want to try that experiment

[springs]

Oh, I like that.

It was not very nice. Any of it. Except the gas and air, and the pethidine. They were fine. Great, even. It does mean my description is rather less detailed that it might have been.

[Anne Lyle]

Unfortunately my medically assisted birth experience doesn't translate into a pre-modern setting, so I'd not be much better informed than a bloke when it came to writing a birth scene for one of my fantasy novels.

[Ökuþórr]

Originally Posted by AnyaKimlin

Actually that is what childbirth felt like to me - a really bad dose of food poisoning. From the TMI both ends.

There is one tribe where the man has a rope tied to his genitals, rope is run over the rafter/beam of a mud hut, the other end placed in the labouring woman's hands and everytime she has a contraction the woman pulls - for some reason my husband didn't want to try that experiment

There are very few men in the world (me included) that would be willing to risk damaging a perfectly good mud hut. Its just not cricket.

[David Evil Overlord]

Originally Posted by AnyaKimlin

There is one tribe where the man has a rope tied to his genitals, rope is run over the rafter/beam of a mud hut, the other end placed in the labouring woman's hands and everytime she has a contraction the woman pulls - for some reason my husband didn't want to try that experiment

Now we know why Man invented the epidural.

[HoopyFrood]

Originally Posted by Gumboot

Unless, of course, you do research... you know, that thing writers are supposed to do... how hard is it to ask a mother some questions about child birth?

Yeah, there are also plenty of women who haven't been through childbirth (and I don't think I really want to) -- I'd have to do all kinds of research for it, I have little idea of what goes on (beyond the obvious ), the real details, the processes, how, etc etc.

I couldn't write rape -- I've been delving into the issue quite a bit lately, due to the heartbreaking #ididnotreport hashtag on Twitter and I am just increasingly sickened and angered by it. Not from a POV, not from distance, almost certainly just not at all.

I can kill off people easily (and probably would have been accused of terrible torture in one story, the amount of times I rewrote a scene, looking for the right way to kill off a certain character) but I can't do animal cruelty. It's like I can watch any number of people die in films and the worst horror films, but I can't watch animal led films in case they die. The one time I did kill off an animal, it was a bird with such human characteristics, it didn't feel like bad.

On the other end of the scale, I can't seem to not write characters with fluid sexuality (I don't often deal with romantic relationships in my writing, but there's a 'feel', as it were); they seem to shoulder their way in while I'm looking the other way, which is always a nice surprise.

[Lilmizflashythang]

Originally Posted by AnyaKimlin

There is one tribe where the man has a rope tied to his genitals, rope is run over the rafter/beam of a mud hut, the other end placed in the labouring woman's hands and everytime she has a contraction the woman pulls - for some reason my husband didn't want to try that experiment

I can't quite imagine why. But I'm pretty sure that particular tribe doesn't have many births.

[Stephen Palmer]

I would never write about a Tory.

[Hex]

Originally Posted by Stephen Palmer

I would never write about a Tory.

No, I agree. Some things are too appalling to contemplate.

(@Anya -- I did something much worse. My poor husband had to listen to The Fratellis album 'Costello Music' on repeat for 5 hours. Ah hahaha! For some reason I can't listen to that album any more)

[Mouse]

Totally off topic, but I once hid in my car from Barry Fratelli while my brother asked him where we could park! This was while we were at their gig.

[Phoenixthewriter]

Fun topic! Honestly I'm pretty sure I could write anything. Skill and interest however would hinder me.

To give an example, I could write about a mom brutally harming her children if it's required for the story to make sense. Could I write a realistic tale about a mother who harms her children? No.

I could write about a dad who seduces his own son, but only if by some twisted means it is required for my character to develop a certain way.

I understand this is a science fiction website, but my line drawn when it comes to something that is mostly realism. Beyond that, I don't think I have a limit as to how far I will go.

[Mouse]

I could write most things from a distance. It's when you start living in someone else's mentalness that it gets weird.

I watched some thing about Death Row last night and it was fascinating. When they first showed the inmate and was talking to him, he was coming across as a normal, decent guy. Then when they said what he'd done...

[David Evil Overlord]

I some of Peter F Hamilton's books (Pandora's Star and Judas Unchained, IIRC) there is a character called the Cat. Exactly what her crimes are no one ever says, but they were sick enough to get her sentenced to a suicide squad in a human-alien war.

Because no on ever says what she did, the reader's imagination takes over to fill in the blanks...