A note about shonen ai and "Shadowsong"

Shonen ai, or boys' love, is a genre of manga and anime dealing with homosexual relationships between men. You might have seen some of this in the anime "Bronze" or the manga "Prince of the Rising Sun." Usually, it is written as either a romance or something a bit more ecchi ^.^. For some odd reason, shonen ai is read mostly by women, the younger girls reading the romances with the older women reading the ecchi one.

Your typical shonen ai manga involves two beautiful young men meeting, then gives them way too many problems to deal with. Somehow, they make it through and either live happily ever after or something even more tragic comes along. Usually it isn't very realistic, but then again, who said manga was supposed to be realistic? It's also usually written by heterosexual women, so I'm nothing new.

"Shadowsong" is a shonen ai fanfic. Although I have had homosexual relationships in other Sailormoon Expanded fanfiction of mine, they were mostly of the lesbian persuasion and, besides that, merely subplots. Other writers, most notably Berk Watkins, have also written about homosexual characters but, again, mostly lesbians with the romance as a subplot.

I wrote this fanfic for a couple of reasons. First, as one of my cohorts so aptly noticed over a year ago, while we had written about girls in love, there was a distinct lack of their male brethen. Apart from Fisheye, all we had was a name of an Aino child, or rather a conversation.

Minako (to Kodachi): You're gay? I can't have a gay kid! It's against the laws of physics!

Calcite: What about Daisuke?

Minako: Shut up! He was a _guy_. That's different. Anyway, it's the all fault of your stupid youma genes.

I latched on to Daisuke, and, just after Mark figured out his profession and powers, I had given him an entire mini-history. Naturally, I needed to write a story about that history. Which is where the germ of the idea for this story came from.

My second reason is my mother is a lesbian. That does _not_ mean she's perverted, evil, et cetera. My mother is one of the smartest, nicest people I know and being homsexual does not change that. She's a damn lot better than some straight parents I could mention (like my friend Courtney's child-abusing bastard of a dad). Anyway, having homosexual relations give me a bit of a perspective on the whole sexuality business.

Although the general tone of the story has been greatly influenced by shonen ai manga, it has been even more influenced by Mercedes Lackey's Last Herald Mage trilogy, probably the best Sword and Sorcery Fantasy published in recent years. As Stephen described its animated incarnation (called the somewhat snappier "Magic's Pride") it's "part high adventure, part psychodrama, part shonen ai romance."

Daisuke's bad relationship karma, as well as his general brooding temperment and (sigh) bishonen looks were influenced by LHM's Vanyel Ashkvron, the tragic hero of the trilogy. Stephen's name, as well as his profession and economic situation also is taken from a LHM character, Stefen. No small basis of "Shadowsong" was found in "Magic's Price" the concluding volume of the trilogy although it isn't Daisuke who dies at the end.

Some characters, however, have no Lackey influences. Akemi and Akari have no counterparts in the trilogy. Neither does Rei. George is wholly mine, which may be why he's so . . . George-ish. He actually began as a minor character but I grew attached to him and wanted to bring to light his problems in the boxing arena of love. You can see as he grows to be less of a sterotype over time.

This probably should have been the author's note, but at the speed I write I'll be old and retired when this epic is finally finished. Hell, it's near 70K and I haven't even gotten a third of the way through. Sigh. With the odds that are looming, I'd quit this story exept for two things. First, if I ever finished a story Mark would stop teasing me (even when he's been working on "Hurricane Season" for almost three years). Second, Sam-kun, my co-author, favorite cabbit,best friend, love, and muse, likes "Shadowsong". A lot. With an audience like that, how can I not finish it?

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Dyceshi (Light's Guidance),

Becky Malsin

(November 12, 1998)