The first thing I would like to say is thank you to everyone who gave me feedback (and "fuck you" to the person who gave me no feedback at all!).
The second thing I would like to say is that feedback (including some I've gotten outside of the IS forums) I have gotten on Serial Rapist falls into two categories:
The point of this story never got written in time for the competition. It's supposed to be more about the internal struggle of the serial rapist himself and how he justifies the things he does for himself. After the rape, the character saunters back home, lost in thought, goes through daily actions (with a bit of a shake in his arms and random moments of daydreaming about sex). But then he finds he can't immediately sleep, and slowly realizes the gravity of what he has done. He becomes violently physically ill, perhaps being psychosomatic or perhaps its something else. The situation fucks from his head and he seriously beats up on himself and laments for what he does. He beings to fantasize at several points turning himself in and doing something to give back to Tatana/Tessa and to make the rest of their life okay again.
Raised Mormon, he embraces religion as an escape and ultimately finds it more damaging to him than good. He pulls his hair out on a daily basis, loses weight and hates himself but also struggles with an animalistic sense to continue and forget his sins.
The reader has a choice to end now or allow him to give in to urges. The reader will of course be in charge of picking all of his victims and all of him methods. He begins working out and eating healthily solely so that he may rape better. He gains a level of infamy, but is much smarter than he was that first time (he gets lucky his first run). This becomes the main portion of the story. The main character slowly evolves a sense of righteousness to what he does, but there is always a new excuse and a new reason he brings to the table, evidence that he just needs to believe that he is a good person for his own mental health. Hopefully the reader can understand these sorts of justifications and perhaps question the ways that they themselves justify themselves.
I'm not sure how the story will end, and perhaps that will be enough for you to read it (when I finish writing it of course).
Essentially, I understand the feedback. The character never got a chance to evolve. You never got to learn about him and how he thinks and what he needs.
Without further ado, el feedbacko:
Any reaction to this character be it empathy, hatred, or even jealousy is a healthy and natural reaction. My attempt isn't to make you feel some particular way about the rapist, but to have you make his choices and for me to get into his potential mindsets. From my viewpoint a serial rapist is the same as everyone else, he just deals with things different ways. He needs to have self esteem for self-justification, for example, and he needs to find a way to achieve this while he's surrounded by people who quote "Thou shalt not rape thy neighbor" at him through their television sets and newspapers.
This person gave me a 9 for enjoyment, even though they were "too uncomfortable to enjoy it". Such kind words and ratings could have only come from KatieWroteIt. Thank you Katie, very much, for your feedback.
Edit: Katie probably isn't it... Ves is my guess. "Perhaps I related too much to the victim."
This sounds like Apoth's writing.
I plan on completing more of it. The question always remains: how many hours should I allocate to what? Can I justify taking time away from X of N (here N is a very large number) of personal projects to write about rape? I sincerely hope I will get to continue writing this piece in addition to 2023.
The point that I perhaps didn't get across was that he didn't end up asking any hookers. He was in the ghetto asking whatever women he could scrounge up the courage to ask. He's pretty naive when it comes to spotting a hooker from growing up in a wealthy Mormon neighborhood, and there is a strain of superiority he feels over them. He thinks he can go to the ghetto and there will be women all over the place willing to hand out pussy.
This definitely could have been worked in had I envisioned it. It's pretty plausible and it would have created a tough scenario. It would then be a trial for the character to explain how he got baseball bat wounds (or whatever).
This will fuck with the main character's mind. I planned on dealing with this eloquently.
Hehe, totally a twist of fate. Hey, weirder things have happened.
Thanks again. ^^
Honesty. Thank you.
I'm not a fan of Thoreau, but I do find his quote "Most men lead lives of quiet desperation" fascinating and true. But haven't you noticed the men who lead rapid, loud lives of desperation?
I think it's a cop-out and an easy explanation to pass off innocent-seeming "sinners" as being deeply disturbed from a young age, and wholey an explanation which does not ring true. Here's a list of people who led rapid, loud lives of desperation. Okay, you can blame a few of them on "bed-wetting" incidents (I'm serious, read a lot of these), but on the whole there are a surprising number of serial murders who are in fact baby-faced-killers without that real level of menace.
In any case, I hope that the shortened outline of the story above will satisfy your lust for the realistic better than this introduction.
The second thing I would like to say is that feedback (including some I've gotten outside of the IS forums) I have gotten on Serial Rapist falls into two categories:
- Holy shit. I'm disturbed. It sounds like you are writing from your own serial raping experience. Very realistic.
- Ugh. I'm disturbed, and this story was totally unrealistic.
The point of this story never got written in time for the competition. It's supposed to be more about the internal struggle of the serial rapist himself and how he justifies the things he does for himself. After the rape, the character saunters back home, lost in thought, goes through daily actions (with a bit of a shake in his arms and random moments of daydreaming about sex). But then he finds he can't immediately sleep, and slowly realizes the gravity of what he has done. He becomes violently physically ill, perhaps being psychosomatic or perhaps its something else. The situation fucks from his head and he seriously beats up on himself and laments for what he does. He beings to fantasize at several points turning himself in and doing something to give back to Tatana/Tessa and to make the rest of their life okay again.
Raised Mormon, he embraces religion as an escape and ultimately finds it more damaging to him than good. He pulls his hair out on a daily basis, loses weight and hates himself but also struggles with an animalistic sense to continue and forget his sins.
The reader has a choice to end now or allow him to give in to urges. The reader will of course be in charge of picking all of his victims and all of him methods. He begins working out and eating healthily solely so that he may rape better. He gains a level of infamy, but is much smarter than he was that first time (he gets lucky his first run). This becomes the main portion of the story. The main character slowly evolves a sense of righteousness to what he does, but there is always a new excuse and a new reason he brings to the table, evidence that he just needs to believe that he is a good person for his own mental health. Hopefully the reader can understand these sorts of justifications and perhaps question the ways that they themselves justify themselves.
I'm not sure how the story will end, and perhaps that will be enough for you to read it (when I finish writing it of course).
Essentially, I understand the feedback. The character never got a chance to evolve. You never got to learn about him and how he thinks and what he needs.
Without further ado, el feedbacko:
The plot seems solid and I am interested as well as repelled. I don't think it is something I would read if I were looking for pornography, but it does have a perverse appeal none the less. Usually when I read something from the perspective of a criminal I feel for the criminal, but this guy is disgusting. Is that intentional? He seems like a "boyfriend rapist" but I kind of feel sorry for those guys most of the time. Although he seems to be romanticizing his rape he isn't justifying enough from the onset for me to really believe that he thinks what he is doing is ok. He is really disturbing. I'm interested however to see how he gets out of explaining the bruises he put on her face by back handing her twice. I kind of hope he is destined for some kind of rehabilitation facility hopefully where he will be butt raped. Anyway on to the rating stuff...
I was too uncomfortable to really enjoy it. Perhaps I related too much with the victim. But I am interested, and I think it is a solid addition to the site.
Edit: Katie probably isn't it... Ves is my guess. "Perhaps I related too much to the victim."
It’s a very well done story. If you had completed more of it you would’ve received several additional points to plot. Unfortunately, I could not justify giving you a high score with how little of the actual story was completed. Still, this is a good piece, worth finishing.
I plan on completing more of it. The question always remains: how many hours should I allocate to what? Can I justify taking time away from X of N (here N is a very large number) of personal projects to write about rape? I sincerely hope I will get to continue writing this piece in addition to 2023.
Well Xnull wanted a crapload of feedback, so here’s my uncharacteristic effort.
There are a few problems I have with the story despite liking it overall.
There are a few problems I have with the story despite liking it overall.
For the hooker branch, I have a really hard time believing the guy couldn’t get a skanky ghetto hooker and they were all turning him down. I could see it if they were high class ones or maybe even if he was impossibly ugly, but cash and ghetto hookers is pretty much a done deal.
A more realistic scenario is a ghetto hooker accepting the offer, but then having some thug mugging him when they got to the place where they were going to have sex. From this frustration then he goes and rapes another one (or maybe the same one later).
For the neighborhood girl one, the main problem is his serial raping isn’t going to last very long. His parents and her parent know one another and he told her mom that he was taking her out, so hitting and raping her would sort of tip everyone off pretty soon. Even if she was so scared to tell.
The only possible way out for him would be if his dad was some high ranking Mormon that could cover it all up and it was one those stricter closed society of Mormons who didn’t speak of such things and women were second class citizen status for the most part. Still, the rape might still be frowned upon (His dad might beat the shit out of him for disobeying god or something) and hell he might even be forced to marry the girl if he got her pregnant. (That would be a funny ending)
Anyway that’s my feedback.
What you have here are the beginnings of a potentially very good story. Your writing is clear, never too belabored, and I can see it improving rapidly through your future efforts. I would certainly encourage you to continue with this project, though it needs some major revisions and developments.
My biggest critique of this story, besides the fact that it’s incomplete, is that I find it completely unbelievable. The whole idea of the “baby-faced killer” only works if there is a real level of menace lurking somewhere in that individual’s personality.
I think it's a cop-out and an easy explanation to pass off innocent-seeming "sinners" as being deeply disturbed from a young age, and wholey an explanation which does not ring true. Here's a list of people who led rapid, loud lives of desperation. Okay, you can blame a few of them on "bed-wetting" incidents (I'm serious, read a lot of these), but on the whole there are a surprising number of serial murders who are in fact baby-faced-killers without that real level of menace.
In any case, I hope that the shortened outline of the story above will satisfy your lust for the realistic better than this introduction.
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