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writing a love story between two boys



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Thu Mar 09, 2017 7:15 pm
ewolf20 says...



i may have plans on doing some sort of short story or screenplay concerning the love between a sheltered christian boy and a boy who was raised by ravens (
Spoiler! :
they turn out to be fair folk of some kind
). now here comes the hard part. although i am a christian, I'm far from being a closeted gay person. so i might not know how to approach this idea. which brings me to a few questions pertaining to this idea.
  • is there several ways a 14 year old devout Christian finds out he's gay?
  • and so, how might it affect him?
  • and how can he come to terms with his homosexuality?
  • for the titular raven boy, would a relationship work out between them.
  • would the raven boy in question even understand this of love due to his upbringing?

these are the questions that myself and some of you might ask. i might have the answer, i might not, and honestly, i don't have an answer for this one. and that's being sincere about it. (PS. if you ask, why not try researching it? why yes i would if you could kindly point me to the right direction.)
  





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Thu Mar 09, 2017 7:38 pm
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Lumi says...



Hello!

Gay guy who began coming to terms with his sexuality while, ironically enough, a 14 y/o devout Christian here. Let's talk about your question.

There is no one answer because, like all individual lives, every experience differs. You will be hard pressed to find a real account--or a reader who accepts a written account--of someone waking up one day with the realization of "Oh dear, I think I'm queer." But the amount of time it takes to come to grips with it is what can differ largely. And that depends on upbringing and environmental influence, how threatened the person may feel by acknowledging those feelings of attraction to the same sex, etc. It could be years. Decades. It could be off-and-on acceptance and denial. It can make for a war inside you if your environment is tumultuous enough. Ya feel? Personally, for the sake of brevity, I think the off-and-on acceptance and denial may work best to save you from years of character development that lends itself to novel-length chronicling or info-dumping.

I can't speak for the Raven Boy as I have no experience with ravens nor being a raven, and very limited research on ravens; but I believe that would be your own mythos to develop, albeit tastefully.

Answer some basic questions for us to help you further.

1. Does your devout Christian boy have a girlfriend or any significant other?
2. How harsh has his upbringing been?
3. Why will he be attracted to the Raven Boy specifically? Because he's different/exotic? Because he has insight others don't have? Because his family is so different than his own?
4. How long has your Christian boy had feelings for the same sex, if ever before?
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Thu Mar 09, 2017 8:37 pm
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Rosendorn says...



Lumi's questions about factors that impact how a devout Christian feels coming out is a solid place to start. I would toss in, as a sort of 2.5, how likely is he to lose support if he says anything? There's harsh upbringing that feels like it has some possibility to change, and there's harsh upbringing that'll turn you out on the street for deviating. There's also a not harsh upbringing that has minimal risk.

Whether or not the raven boy understands the relationship 100% depends on the fair folk's view of sexuality (and even gender). Whether or not a relationship works out depends on chemistry you create, so I'd add in:

- How has the raven boy been integrated into society? Is he "newly human", so to speak, or is this one of his first times out in the human world?
- Do they have the required chemistry/matching compatibility points? (like, a person who doesn't want kids and a person who does want kids will never work out)
- What's his opinion on human culture?
- What are his parents' opinions on human culture?
A writer is a world trapped in a person— Victor Hugo

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Thu Mar 09, 2017 9:02 pm
ewolf20 says...



actually, he has one parent
Spoiler! :
who's the morrigan
. if that answers one of your questions.
  





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Thu Mar 09, 2017 9:30 pm
Rosendorn says...



Nope!

Because it tells me nothing about how the morrigan views gay people, or humans, or anything of the sort. While there are some basics under mythology, you have a lot of freedom to re-imagine things or fill in blanks based on your interpretation. Until you figure that out, we can't really help you.
A writer is a world trapped in a person— Victor Hugo

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Thu Mar 09, 2017 10:01 pm
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Megrim says...



I don't have a lot of cred in this subject, being a woman and an atheist, but I do write gay characters and purportedly managed a pretty convincing and turmoil-filled m/m romance. I'm probably a better authority on the Raven boy, being from a fictional culture, than the Christian boy.

My characters live in fictional SFF societies, so I define the rules of gender norms and diversity. This is a similar situation to your raven culture. First step is to establish ground rules of your choosing. They don't have to think twice about homosexual relationships, or maybe they're just as uptight as the Christian boy's family. It might make for a good juxtaposition to have your two lovers come from completely different backgrounds, because that allows very different perspectives, and each will have learned different life lessons, and face different personal challenges. Perhaps the raven culture is prejudiced about something totally different--maybe something our western culture doesn't think twice about (you could borrow from other cultures, or make something new up). Do the ravens care about gender roles? Do they have a religion/deity of their own? Do they mate/raise children in pairs, groups, etc? Do they bond for life or will that be a new concept for him?

The most important thing is to focus on the characters themselves, namely their motives and personalities. They need to be individuals, not just "roles" (eg more than just "the love interest" for each other). They need passions, skills, fears, quirks, all that stuff, which will inform every decision and action they make. This will be influenced by their culture growing up, but it won't be identical. What makes him HIM and not someone else?

That will be especially important for your devout Christian boy. What makes him different to every other devout Christian boy? What does he care about most? What does he want to be when he grows up, and what does he do in his spare time? How devout is he, really--does he go through the motions because it's expected of him, or does he spend hours every evening studying the bible on his own time, etc?

The tension in the relationship arc is going to come from the characters, not their environment. This means it needs to come out of their OWN fears about discovery (or not), their OWN misgivings and uncertainty about their sexual identity (or not), their OWN goals for the relationship. What attracts each to the other? How do they complement each other, and how are they different? Are they both 100% gay, or do they also have interest in women? Have they been with women before, even if they weren't really into it? Have they been with other boys? How about their personalities--is one more pushy, more controlling? Is one more shy and reserved? Is one more bold and unconcerned? Is one more difficult to read?

Beyond the generals, we might be able to help more if you tell us more about the individual characters, too.
  





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Thu Mar 09, 2017 11:20 pm
ewolf20 says...



when I usually begin doing a story, I make something akin to tv bibles of the sort to remind me of my characters sometimes. I don't follow it 100 percent, though. but, it least helps to understand my characters more. let me just give a basic idea of what they are.

Andrew McCory, who I'll be calling from now on, is a mixed boy of African and Scottish descent. he recently moved to his new hometown to meet his uncle. since he's a bit different from the rest, he's commonly teased by the kids in his new town. sometimes, there's the rare racist remark. because of his fondness for animals, he took a liking to the ravens that hung around the graveyard near the church. his uncle warns him that those ravens aren't like any other kind of ravens but Andrew doesn't believe him, thinking it's him rambling again.

for his personality, I could say he's reversed and very cautious with his surroundings. he tends to be very soft spoken at the start but eventually becomes a bit more extroverted overtime. he's very generous but has his fair share of prejudices, especially with his viewpoints on another immigrant, who's a Jewish girl named Lilah. he takes every word from the bible as fact and uses it as a guideline to help him through in life.

in contrast, the raven boy (which I have yet to give a name), was raised by ravens when he was only 6 years old. he lost his parents in a car accident, leaving him as the only survivor. a white raven came to his aid as he cried to himself. she pitied the boy, taking him under her wing. unbeknownst to him, she was more than she appeared. some years later, he had since forgotten his past and lived on among his new family.

the raven boy, as I'll put it, is quiet and mysterious. he never leaves the shadows most of the time and rarely speaks. if he does, it's very short and cryptic. he tries to understand how humans work but can't seem to get it right. he ends up misunderstanding human concepts as a result. if one was to tell him an idiom, he might take it literally, for example. like Andrew, he's also reserved, but to a lesser extent. he's much more inclined in exploring and understand things rather than leaving them alone.

and there you go. a basic idea.
  





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Fri Mar 10, 2017 2:21 am
GoldenQuill says...



Hey!

As family members and experiences differ in everything, I cannot offer any further perspective than the awesome perspective above. However, if you're looking for more examples of people recognizing their sexuality while being religious, I'd look to one of my favorite books, called 'UNFAIR: Christians and the LGBT Question' by John Shore. The majority of the book is letters by Christians who, normally by a young age, discovered they were gay.

Hope all is well!
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Fri Mar 10, 2017 6:07 pm
ewolf20 says...



i have a very urgent question. after doing some searching, apparently, Catholics are indifferent with Jews nowadays, which defeats the purpose of Andrew's bio.
Spoiler! :
see, there's a plot point where Andrew has to save lillah after she gets captured into the otherwoods. he must look past his prejudices in order to save her.


so now I'm left with what to even do to her. i could make Andrew a sexist but honestly no. I'm not sure if i should make Lilah Muslim, a protestant christian, or anything other than a Jew.
  





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Fri Mar 10, 2017 7:31 pm
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crossroads says...



ewolf20 wrote:i have a very urgent question. after doing some searching, apparently, Catholics are indifferent with Jews nowadays, which defeats the purpose of Andrew's bio.
Spoiler! :
see, there's a plot point where Andrew has to save lillah after she gets captured into the otherwoods. he must look past his prejudices in order to save her.


so now I'm left with what to even do to her. i could make Andrew a sexist but honestly no. I'm not sure if i should make Lilah Muslim, a protestant christian, or anything other than a Jew.


You're looking at things too generally. Catholics are not a homogenous mass of people who all think exactly the same. The official opinion of religious leaders, or even majority of believers, might be that they're indifferent towards Jews nowadays — but that doesn't mean that your character or whoever raised him has to share that attitude.
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Fri Mar 10, 2017 8:01 pm
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StellaThomas says...



While Roman Catholics wouldn't be what I would call indifferent to Jews or to Protestants, if this is a modern day story, I think a Muslim girl could make more sense, especially as an immigrant. But you do you!

Regarding Christianity & LGBT - it really depends on the family! For instance, I come from quite a religious background, but my family are very much in support of the LGBT community. In fact, my mum as a leader has talked a good few people around from originally homophobic stances to more tolerant ones (Ireland recently had a marriage equality referendum, and a lot of them came to her for advice and/or looking for her to validate their homophobic opinions, to which she basically responded 'love thy neighbour').

In my head there's two branches of Christians - those who genuinely believe the so called "golden rule" of love thy neighbour as thyself, and those who take a more Old Testament approach, regarding what is clean & unclean. Obviously some people fall in the middle. For conflict, you're probably going to have to go with those hardline Old Testament folks (although I'd love one day to read a story about a supportive Christian family).

Remember that other things will inform their opinion: their culture, their level of education, the opinions of the rest of the community around them. Religion is by no means the be-all and end-all.

Also: have you read The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater? Just because it sounds like you should. Actually for more reasons than one!
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Fri Mar 10, 2017 8:15 pm
ewolf20 says...



wait? it's been done before? aw great. but the Muslim idea seems great.
  





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Fri Mar 10, 2017 9:00 pm
Rosendorn says...



Everything has been done before.

Also, everything is unique!

Every single plot idea in general has been done, because there are only so many plots out there. But nobody can write your take on it except you!
A writer is a world trapped in a person— Victor Hugo

Ink is blood. Paper is bandages. The wounded press books to their heart to know they're not alone.
  





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Sat Mar 11, 2017 3:23 pm
ewolf20 says...



Bump
  





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Mon Mar 13, 2017 8:05 pm
ewolf20 says...



hey guys, i have some news, i'm considering moving the setting to Ireland and making Andrew of Irish and African descent.
  








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