[FYI: I'm talking about gay fiction here, at first.:D]
Well, this subject has been on my mind for some time, ever since I noticed my tendency to hit the back arrow on stories where characters are prostitutes. I'm not really a fan of prostitute stories, and I don't get its popularity (Though I have read a few). I can't really recall a trend in heterosexual romance where females were prostitutes and I'm quite sure if they were I'd gloss over them as well. I have indulged in stories with these types of characters by Ally Blue and Amanda Young, but that was because something really interested me in the storyline and I knew from the start that they were awesome authors.
So, does it matter that much: a person's sexual experience? I'd like to say no, but I am a guilty fangirl of the first timers. I could say its influenced by my own lifestyle, and maybe it is. Maybe ten years from now when(hopefully)I'm married I'll have a different perspective. Perhaps I am the victim of nearly ten years of historical romance where the damsel had to be pure as the newly fallen snow.
I think I enjoy the first time situation because I'm a hopeless romantic. Lets face it, more folks probably end up with a life partner after trial and error and hardly settle down with the man or woman who takes their virginity. But would they ever forget their first time? Even if that person was a jerk and the first time really sucked you'll probably still remember that person forever and ever. So the ultimate romance would be sticking with your first true love, right..or er..sex partner long enough for love to blossom?
Okay, maybe not.
Funnily enough, when a man has sex with women all his life and then sleeps with a man I still count him as a virgin. He's a virgin to gay sex and I still 'oh' and 'awe' at the first coming together.
In recent years, more so in heterosexual fiction, women are breaking out of their constrained roles as virgins while their male counterparts were sex gurus. I am happy about this and every now and then I'll pick up a m/f book regardless of either character's sexual experience. Though, nowadays, I read considerably far less m/f in romance then I do gay fiction.
If we authors are holding true to reality then we'd probably be able to say we know far more female virgins than male virgins (adult). Frankly, I don't know a single adult male virgin, unless somebody has been lying to me. In a world where exposure to sex is happening at far younger ages; teen pregnancy, and even contraction of STDS and fatal viruses are on the rise in some areas, keeping a boy or girl 'untried' until marriage is becoming but a glimmer on the horizon.
It never ceases to annoy me when folks arm themselves with religion to denounce gay rights because the bible 'says' it is a sin and yet no one ever talks about chastity to their children and how it is a sin to have sex out of wedlock. According to the bible their is no differentiation in sin. A murderer is just is guilty as a purse thief, but I digress.
Virgin or not to virgin? Surely we don't want to read hordes of bashful virgin men with horrible bedroom skills? Variety is the spice of life, yes? However, its called it fiction for a reason, and although some may grumble and huff--as they did when a certain --ebook that shall not be named released from Samhain--came out featuring a guy who had saved his virginity until he had a commitment from his partner, fiction is the only place where it is okay to be damn near perfect. Sure it may not be realistic for handsome twenty-three year old John to never have laid down with man when he's gay, but damn it, if nobody has written about a 220lb, five foot six inch man with a receding hairline in romance/erotica yet getting his happy ending, then I say let the fantasy be a fantasy. And give me my damn first-timer. :P
Now, having said all that I'd like to make it clear that I do not refuse to buy gay fiction books based on a character's sexual experience. Most of the ebooks I buy, you can't tell what is what until you start reading. I just think the V is an extra bonus, at least it is to me.
