NaNoWriMo + Romance in Stories + Homosexuality

So I have been gone for like a month... wowzers. Uni's been crazy busy and my internet's a bitch right now but I AM SO HAPPY TO BE BACK.

Anyone else planning to do NaNo? I'm seriously excited for it. I'll be done with uni by then and I'm already planning my story and I CAN'T WAIT.

LINK ME TO YOUR NANO STORIES AND WE CAN HYPE EACH OTHER UP. (even though it's only September...)

The story I'm planning to do is Defiance.
Basically it's a fantasy-esque story that initially takes place in the Otherworld -- a place where people go once they die. The thing is, when you're sent to the Otherworld you have no memories of your past or how you died, so you could be walking past the people that you love all of the time and not recognising them at all. The only way to get your memories back is to complete a task set by The Fates, which could be absolutely anything, and their motivation for this is unknown.

Anyway, it centres around a boy named Oli, a young boy who is particularly obsessed with getting his memories back. He gets given a task and sent to Earth, but instead of it being something simple, the note says two words: Noelle Harding.

I don't want to give too much away because a lot happens, but basically Oli must fight between his desire to know about his life and how he died and his desire to keep Noelle alive.

TELL ME 'BOUT YOURS.

----------

Secondly... romance in stories. I know that I'm fond of it, but I had a conversation with my sister yesterday that made me question it.

I don't know if you guys have heard me talk about my twineroo, but she's not the nicest person (though I love her to pieces). Anyway, she was complimenting me on the stories that I'd sent her, but then she made a comment about how they all seemed to centre around romance.

It really made me think. I don't personally think my stories are 'romance' stories -- I think that that is one aspect of them and that a whole lot of other stuff happens too. But it's really made me insecure about my stories, and I'm starting to wonder why I can't seem to write a novel without even just a slight side story of romance.

What do you guys think about romance in stories? Do you guys have the same problem that I do? I don't know... I don't think that there's anything wrong with it. I don't think it makes the story any less significant or mature. It's a personal preference I guess, but the way she worded it makes me feel like one of those tween writers on Quizilla with ridiculous plotlines.

-----------

For my literature subject at uni I had to study Brokeback Mountain. I'd never seen the movie before so I didn't really have any idea what it was about, and I'll admit that most of my knowledge about the movie was based off of other people's thoughts.

The movie blew me away. It really, really hit me hard. I consider myself heterosexual and I'm very comfortable with my sexuality but the whole concept of two people being so scared of being who they are really got to me.

I know it was set in the sixties to the eighties but I've never really seen discrimination like that here in Melbourne. Sure, kids get bullied sometimes for their sexuality, but it's never been to the extent that I hear about. What are things like in places like America? Are people repressed that badly? I've never been anywhere else but Australia all my life so I'm honestly unsure.

Studying the movie really made me think about discrimination on a whole. As a result I started writing a short story based on both racism and homophobia, which is something I've been too afraid to breach before. But yeah. I'm really enjoying writing it, and I hope that I've done it justice.

But then I started thinking about whether it's considered a 'slash', and I really don't think that it is. Sure, it has aspects of romance in it, but it's more about the love than the gender of the people involved. And by love I mean a lot of things -- friendship, family, and yeah, romance, but that's not quite the point of the story.

If you're interested the story page is here: Colour Blind. I'm not gonna be offended even if no one is because I've learned a lot through writing it and it doesn't really matter to me if I only get one reader. I love my characters and I feel a lot for them and that's not going to change even if their story's unheard.

OKAY LONG JOURNAL OVER PEACE OUT GUYS