Thank you all for reading, commenting on, and voting for Solar Flare. I feel like I've become friends with a lot of you as we navigated the story of Rowan and Luis together.
I wanted to give a bit of background on why I wanted to write this story. Because I live in the Pacific Northwest, I've always had a bit of a soft spot for werewolves, and have never been able to entirely bring myself to believe they don't exist... lol. So I started reading amateur werewolf fiction just about everywhere I could find it. I found a lot of disturbing themes pop up, particularly in the boyxboy/manxman subcategories. The stories seemed to normalize aggressive, stalking, distrustful, and unhealthy behaviors that led to abusive relationships. The alphas were nearly always written as dark, possessive and violent. The human mates were always innocent, scared, and most of the time a lot physically smaller than the alpha, which was sometimes used against them.
I imagined a young queer kid stumbling across these stories and assuming that that was how queer relationships work. I was horrified at the thought of any young reader accidentally being indoctrinated into a pattern of abuse by simply trying to explore their sexuality and culture through written works.
(I want to mention here that in NO WAY are the queer/werewolf categories the only genres guilty of this normalization, but because I'm gay and I like werewolves, those were the categories that caught my attention).
I set out to write something that broke the pattern. I wanted to stress consent, bodily autonomy, respect, and healthy communication above everything else. I wanted to write about cultures that were not my own (I'm white and was raised a Christian) so maybe a reader could feel like they were being represented. I wanted to show that you can have all of the delicious hallmarks of a wonderful werewolf romance without involving abusive behaviors.
At this point: I want to make a note. IN NO WAY am I putting down any written works that simply contain abusive content. There are lots of stories on Wattpad and on bookshelves that detail relationships in which both people grow and develop for each other. These stories show us that you can make an effort to break abusive patterns and become a better person. These stories often detail troubled characters with backgrounds of abuse, substance use, PTSD or any other number of things that could affect how a person behaves in a relationship. I think that watching a character's transformation from embittered, possessive, and angry to a healthy and supportive partner is a good reminder to all of us that we are never done growing as people and can always become better for our partners. Additionally, with love and effort, humans (or werewolves) can overcome just about anything.
Again, I'm not shaming stories that contain abusive behaviors. I'm shaming stories that normalize them.
I want to take a moment to give a shout-out to @SianaghGallagher. Her stories are wonderfully written, beautiful romances in the queer/werewolf/supernatural categories. She is a stellar (or should I say solar?) author who also refuses to normalize abusive behaviors. She is also the reason Solar Flare became popular as she added this story to her reading lists when I reached out to her.
Please share and vote for Solar Flare. If everyone reading this shared it to their reading lists, Twitter, tumblr, Reddit or even sent a link to a friend, this story would rocket up the charts. It means the world to me to see those numbers climb up.
Thanks for reading!
- Rian