All Comments on 'The Tale of Frank Vandenberg'

Certainly reasonably up to a point. Weird though, that the underage kids would wind up with the apparently broke, alcoholic, and abusive father instead of the apparently totally normal mother who had left her husband for justified reasons for a non-scumbag lover.

Okay:

The writing (composition) is very well done, would meet or exceed expectations by Writers' Workshop instructors--so well done on that.

The plotline is ingenious and puts a spin on the cheating wife--revenging husband trope that actually has a "final conclusion" to the story. The problem for many readers is that they do not agree with that conclusion with regard to how things worked out for the ex-wife. I can't say that I agree with the ending either--but I can at least imagine that "some version" of that scenario might have possibly existed.

Regardless, you wrote an interesting "complete" story that has generated considerable discussion. Congratulations.

Please keep writing.

MLJ

Moral of the story is not to read anything written by cucks

Just no.

She left her children high and dry with a brken man. Who does that except for a whore with no feelings! Why did you have the son left behind supporting her???

AH, the implication being what will happen to a man who doesn't "work it out" with his wife.

So then, here is another: it is better to die on your feet than live on your knees.

What a whire!!! Left her children under the care of a drunken and violent man. Who buys that bullshit?

entonces dejo a sus hijos con un alcoholico peligroso?

es eso?

???

No rating

Good but somewhat anticlimactic.

The unexpected end did it for me. Good tale.

Hahaha. Nice try 🐖

Not a fan of this pne.

She also seems to have a creative side. When a marriage fails why is it one spouse feels entitled to run. Leave the kids? She left and he didn’t.

Not at all quite MY cup of tea! Very disappointed"

Heu, c'est quoi comme histoire ?

Once again, the woman has no agency or accountability!

Not what i expected. The ending was unexpected. Very different type of story. Gave it a 5.Very seldom do i give a 5. Unusual. I really enjoyed it.

Even if what she said was true about him becoming a bad husband and a bad father, 3 things still remain: (1) she claims she kept her vows but for better or worse only applies when she feels like it, (2) she abandoned her children with an abusive parent and (3) she is still an adulterer. Delusions, delusions, delusions.

A typical Swingerjoe story. Just plain awful.

Scores 1/5

5☆ for the comments below. The story was well written, but left me cold. So 2☆ for the story.

⭐⭐⭐⭐ 2nd time through on this one. I think this is one of the saddest endings on this entire site. But, with this reading, several things become obvious.

Luanne is a lying, cheating slut. Her cheating caused Frank's drinking. She abandoned her children to a man she claimed was abusive and dangerous. A lie. She didn't give a damn about hubby nor the kids. Etc., etc., etc...

The saddest part is that he had no revenge at all. They lived in an apartment, she burned off. So, she paid no child support, no spousal maintenance, nothing.

The kids weren't even smart enough to ban her from the funeral. Her "paying respects" is the last indignity.

( ... and I guess Joe didn't stick around ... )

Well the usual shitty story ending with shifting the blame from the cheater.

If anything when Frank became a drunk, it was because he discovered Luann cheating. A man can prepare himself for a lot of things, but he is never really for a cheating life pardner. What I don't understand is why the business failed when Grandpa died. Frank should have been ready to take over, or obviously not.

XYZ

At first reading a very unique storyline. But if the reader does some analysis there are some unanswered issues.

If Frank was so abusive and drunk all the time, why didn’t Luanne get a restraining order against him to protect herself and the children rather than become romantically involved with Joe? Perhaps she could have gotten help for her husband as a condition of reconciliation.

The wording indicates that both Joe and Luanne got divorces meaning two marriages were destroyed by their affair not one. Further allowing yourself to become emotionally involved with a man outside of your marriage is still cheating.

Finally Luanne left her children for another man knowing her ex was emotionally disturbed and potentially violent. Nice mother!

To fall in love with another person when you are married, does not just happen, one allows it to happen. Regardless of who is right or wrong, she is the one that committed adultery and thus it is her fault. Further to this, never trust a cheater they rose tint it to their way. Thus I favour his version. It also seems she traded up.

At this point, I don't know whose story is true. I have to believe Dad's story since Mom deserted her children.

What was this? Everything in this story cancels everything. Waste of time.

Worth coming online and trawling some crap just to find this gem. Nicely done. TC Ireland.

From some of the comments, I'd say you were casting pearls before swine. Great story.

zerozerozero. the most pathetic miserable piece of drivel I ever read....

The revenge was in his head. He didn't burn the bitch and its possible she didn't even cheat. The Tale was of a sad man who we don't even know if was a victim of a crap wife or his own failures, a depressing read about a depressing person with a equally depressing death. I understand trying something different from the usual revenge/btb stories but that was thoroughly unsatisfying.

so there was no btb

no cheating

no revenge

So why use those tags?

Great story!!!!

wat a shitty story ending. No Stars

yours, theirs, and the truth. good read, thought provocking, LOVE slap hapy papy #9

Why do you have great stories with shitty endings?

"You've finally found peace."

Coming from his ex-wife, that sounds like witch's cackle as she cursing someone.

Jane should have spat in Luanne face and frog hopped her out the door of the funeral home never allowing Luanne next to the casket... Serves her right !!!

I’m glad she could stay true until she had her exit strategy lined up.

Good writing - kinda (no spelling or basic grammar mistakes). Lousy message.

🤮💩

This was a horrible story, The husband caught her cheating, But in the end she never cheated while she was married to him. Yet she left him and her children to marry her new love? Was this the ramblings of a demented man? It doesn't paint a pretty picture of the mom either, No mother would abandon her children to a demented man just to marry her new love. Just like a suicide it just leaves more questions than answers. Nothing in the title applies to this story. Horrible!! Makes me question your own thought process. If you had turned something like this in an English Literature class You would have been sent back to Elementary to re-learn the whole thing. All your stories I've read so far are so horribly written to where they don't make any sense, I guess you just don't have the knack to write a story that will grab your readers.

Joe, I picked this story because Luanne mentioned it in Bebop's story comments. I made a mistake. I usually like your stories, but this was a slap at my people. I am firmly in the BTB, no cheating without consequences group. I do like reconciliation with sufficient penance. But it's a big no, never, to cucking, swinging, and unpunished cheating. It wasn't hard to see your intent here. Color me offended. The comment wars here were great, as usual. You hurt me, but I'll be back.

Nothing has changed and my previous comments remain the same this time. Your story was not rewritten so the rating remains low as well.

FTFY

while the avenging angel seeks retribution

SirThopas

Terrible story! Please don't insult old men for that matter us men any age! ★ WOOF!

Not normal to twist and make your main character a dilutions old man. You also had the poor taste to take away any dignity he had. He was only partially correct about the children the daughter did hate the mom. Hell you really could have wrenched the tail around by having the daughter Love her mother.

Your half effort gets a 2 and a overall 1.

In your story there was no indication that this character was delusional so you could say anything and to your discredit you did! Through most of the story after he found her cheating Walt kept him from killing the cheaters. Then you switch at the end that he lost his mind. Still his two daughters are fucked up by what their mother did to their family by falling in love while still married. Imagine if things were so bad nobody knew but the cheating wife. You need to rewrite this mess of mixed up stories together they don't match!

Couldn't wrap my head around this one, so I read other reviews. Didn't help. Very queer (using that word old school way) story line. Can't suggest or not suggest fellow fans of "Loving Wives" read it. I can't rate it bad or good because it's just different. Story line is easy to follow and perhaps I will re-read it later, but... mmmmm.

Frank was an abusive, insecure, asshole who got really depressed after his dad died and Luanne tried her best but fell in love with another guy (she couldn't help it) but absolutely never acted upon it until the divorce. Also, the fact that she fell in love with another man while married and then went on to be with that man had nothing to do with the divorce, obviously. The kid who liked Bitter Frank is miserable and alone and the kid who defends the mother is happy with his wife and kids. C'mon man.

Luanne good, Frank bad. This is about as cartoonish as any tale you've ever lobbed that criticism at Joe and consequently it's your worst story. Any claim that you had some sort of message to deliver with this one is bogus.

I do really like your swinging/open marriage stories and the emotions and particulars involved in those lifestyles.

The marriage of the dickhead never took place. Remember when Walt said Frank had a way of making up stories? Dickhead was just a story. Frank is a metaphor for a good number of the writers here in LW. The fact that you couldn't grasp that is just PERFECT. Perhaps the most fitting end to the story.

As has been mentioned before, you don't just fall in love. It takes a concerted effort, looking to find time for one another, seeking common ground. It's actually a choice that has to be made and this bitch made hers. She violated her commitment to the institute of marriage. She had a problem with her husband, she should have divorced him and cleared the decks before moving on to number 2.

And by the way, what happened to the marriage of the dickhead?

in da house of crapy twat and share da fat meat cigar with JOEDAFAGG

it takes a whore to understand a cuck... normal people won't even try.

Luedon, you win the prize of the day! Congratulations for being one of the few (only?) people on the planet who actually understood this story! Not only did you get it, but you nailed the creative thought process behind it as well.

I don't blame Randi or Vandy for taking offense that I used their names (or similar-sounding names) in this story, and I think it's adorable how they teamed up yesterday. I just wish they had executed it better. Show a little imagination. Tickle our funny bone instead of whacking it with a hammer. And if you're going to satirize something, your satirical character should have some resemblance to the object of your ridicule. I mean...the "loser in mom's basement?" So lame. If you're gonna tarnish your reputation as a writer, at least put some effort into it!

It was an interesting experience.

It seems to me that Joe started with an idea that continued his on-going battle with formulaic Loving Wives stories. He then added the twist of giving some characters names that were recognisably similar to a few other authors who have written stories that conform to the formula.

Unless I am misreading the situation, the idea for the story came first and making the reference to the other authors was secondary -- a not-so-subtle dig. It was not the primary purpose of the story.

In response, Vandemonium and Blackrandi have now launched a broadside. Where I thought Joe started with the story and added the names as a joke, it seems to me that Van and Randi started with the felt need to retaliate and wrote stories to suit.

I thought Joe's story was clever. If it had used neutral names for its characters, and if Joe had enabled scoring, it may have scored quite highly.

I didn't think either of the other two stories was clever. I doubt they would have scored highly if they had used neutral names. I thought it was sad that two accomplished authors did what they did.

Lue

A good story.....no winners, no losers. Just life at its worst.

We're all waiting...

It's not about the overt subject, it's about deeply closeted gay men hiding their homosexuality even from themselves, by hiding their concentration on the cocks of the story behind a convenient beard.

Yet another one who commented on this story without reading it. This may be my favorite story now just because of the comments it generated.

I don't get it, why get married if your going to run away when shit hits the fan. I mean your wife is getting fucked and she justifies it by saying in her mind the marriage was over. Why not end it for real before you cheat? Just another cheater trying to justify the BS of it all.

You must be new here.

LOL.

A depressing waste of time, I don't know why the author turned of ratings, probably to sucker people into giving this story a chance.

If there had been ratings I expect it would have been low enough for me to be warned away.

What an incomplete piece of shit that story was!! When you went to school didn't you learn that a story has a beginning ..a middle ...and ending! Yours has no middle... And besides flesh out the characters will you...You lead us on with how things supposedly happened and then Luanne comes in at the end and everything changes. Learn how to write or stop. Your story gave me indigestion!!

to be truthful your story is stupid your comments are dumb and you make no sensr so do this site a favor and shut up.

Meh...ONE *

Stick to what they can do best, and writing isn't what you do best. My opinion.

Remember that time you mixed up a couple of names in your stories? Oh, that's right. You don't write stories. You don't contribute a thing to this site except bitching and moaning about the stories that others write for you -- for free.

FYI, I resubmitted an edited version of this story with the corrected names the day after this was published. The admins have been sitting on it for eight days and counting.

How the FUCK could you have gotten the mother and daughter's names mixed up at the end? .... Smart move... not letting us vote.

I'm dazed and I think the author is confused - this story is fragmented beyond belief. Not much of a beginning, a confusing middle and a stupid end.

Only two women in the story, and you mix their names up at the end? Proofread, my friend!

It's throw-up time!!!

A really really bad downer, man.

There but for the deaf ears it will fall upon.

5*

Just like the writer

An odd little tale.

I got lost and I couldn't rate it anyway since that option was removed probably for good reason. I understand what this author might have been attempting to accomplish but it fell apart. I think the story from the wife's point of view would've been more successful.Thank you for your effort.

It appears the feedback on this story is being used as a "forum". Is this a new trend in LW? Seems like SharedSigne last submission was used likewise.

I can't comment on this story since I don't read this authors stories, but like always the comments are being hit right out of the park. Strike, you're out!

You describe symptoms of dementia and memory loss but they don't fit together and are inconsistent, much like the characters stories not adding up as another comment mentions about Luann.

Your grammar is decent but your story idea isn't very well constructed, your characters are inconsistent and unbelievable, and it appears you want to push a morality story, and from the comments, obviously didn't communicate it well.

Better luck next time.

Whatever you say, I believe it. Now go take your pills.

Nah, I'm pretty sure the message is that swingerjoe is an ass that likes to take cheap shots at other authors. Authors that he isn't good enough to carry their thesaurus. Yep, that's it. Jealousy and envy, that he isn't in their league. We get the message.

Once again, the message of this story is that if you allow someone else to define who you are as a person, and live your life in bitter anger as a result, you will die an angry, bitter, lonely old man. That's the entire message of this story, folks. Sorry if that message offends you.

This is a cautionary tale not unlike many of my other cautionary tales. Perhaps I allowed my attempts to lighten the mood of this dark and depressing tale to overwhelm the underlying message. Ah, well. Like I said, they all can't be Pulitzer material. And you get what you pay for.

I agree with anonymous

I'm not trying to insult you or your abilities, because I do enjoy some of your other work, but I just didn't like the story or the message behind it. The story was too contrived. It was obviously written to send a message, but the only message I got is that you lack empathy and you're petty. All the stories on this site have an audience, the BTB crowd, the romance crowd, reconciliation, etc., they all have their place. You shouldn't mock an author because he writes to the BTB crowd, just like you shouldn't mock a cuckold writer.

My favorite author on this site is Just Plain Bob, not because his stories are particularly well written, but because he writes for himself and his own entertainment and doesn't care what the trolls say. That comes across in his stories. They're entertaining, funny, and outrageously unrealistic and he doesn't care. Right now you're missing that. Stop feeding the trolls, you're giving them too much credit and attention.

Here's a problem in your story. If Frank changed, like Luann says, why'd she leave her kids there?

Because she's a liar. Jane has pegged. The is no excuse for the unfaithful, for the oath breakers. They deserve no tolerance nor respect.

That sucked. It had chuckle moments but mostly it was a ham handed agenda piece.

Okay, fair enough. My point is that two people can fall in love without going on a date or intentionally pursuing a romantic relationship. Luanne in this story was in a troubled marriage she described as "already over" by the time she met Joe. She would have left Frank whether she had met Joe or not. As she describes in the story, it "wasn't a factor."

Again, it's interesting to see that ALL of the focus from the readers has been on Luanne, and blaming her for the failure of the marriage, just as Frank did. It's almost as if Loving Wives readers are a bunch of Franks!

(Not you, sbrooks. You seem like a happy guy who loves his wife. Congrats on your long and healthy marriage. Now, to do some yardwork.)

I will accept that you fell in love on your first date, but you actually make my point!

You went on a DATE! If you were a presumably happily married man, would you have been on that date? I surely hope not, because "happily" married people don't date others!

Okay. Is it possible -- possible -- for a woman to confide in a co-worker and discover, after some time, that she has fallen in love with him? Has something like this never happened? I fell in love with my wife on our first date! We can bicker over the meaning of the word "love", but that was hardly the point of this story.

In fact, I find it fascinating that so many readers have focused on Luanne in this story. They're looking for ways to blame her for the failure of her marriage -- just like Frank! This was supposed to be a cautionary tale about allowing your anger and perceived betrayal to define who you are. Instead, readers are doing everything they can to twist this story's narrative so that they can hold onto that anger for as long as possible!

Not one comment has focused on the tragic main character of this story. I find that incredibly revealing!

Once again, you twist my words!

I am NOT saying a wife in a troubled relationship shouldn't talk to anyone (though a potential replacement is probably not the best choice!). Probably a FEMALE friend or a counselor would be better!

I AM saying that you don't "just fall in love", which is what these wives always claim.

She didn't "just fall in love" with her husband, they went on dates, walked hand-in-hand in the moonlight, tenderly kissed, maybe made out a bit, and after some period of time, some shorter, some longer, realized that they were in love with each other.

And to address an earlier comment, please spare me your pity, I HAVE fallen in love, with my wife, with whom I just celebrated out 42nd Anniversary! After all these years I honestly don't remember when we realized that we were in love, but I DO know that we dated for two years, and DIDN'T "just fall in love"!

So, if you're stuck in a bad marriage, you shouldn't talk to anyone about it because you might risk falling in love with that person?

It's odd that such a mess of a story has generated so much commentary and riled up so much emotion. It's almost as if I struck a chord somehow. Maybe hit the nail on the head a little too firmly?

Funny story ha! ha!

Why bother read a story i cant vote on. Interesting comments though

didn't read it. The comments are very revealing and instructive.

re:

foolscap 07/03/16

"In any case, if a relationship has run its course, you LEAVE it before entering into an intimate relationship with another person."

To do anything else is reprehensible. Thank you for the insight.

-----------------------

The screwed up thing is that people will walk out of a job before looking for a new one more often than leaving a partner before looking for another.

Who do you owe honesty to more?

A person that you at least once loved and presumably they love you

or an employer, who all too often neither respect or care about you?

This is not a story at all. Swingerjoe never intended it to be a story. This is the expression of his jealousy and anger that he is not respected. He thinks that by writing this he is getting some measure of revenge against authors that are better than him. He is foaming at the mouth because authors he hates are more successful, better writers and loved by their fans, so he writes shit like this to cope with his jealousy. He has to tear down other writers so that he won't look quite so pathetic. He just looks ridiculous. The court jester of literotica, prancing around in his bells, no one taking him seriously, begging for attention. Look at me!! Love me!!

To do anything else is reprehensible. Thank you for the insight.

You twist my words. Of COURSE people fall in love! But they DON'T "just fall in love" like tripping on a curb!

I didn't say you have to "work" for it, just that you have to put yourself in a position or positions for it to happen, and presumably happy people (NOT just wives!) don't put themselves in those positions.

In the stories you mention, the abused husband doesn't simply meet someone, fall in love with her and leave his wife for her. In those stories, the wife has either thrown away or driven away her husband, so any "leaving" has already happened before even meeting someone else, let alone falling in love with her! And as for the "falling in love" part, it is actually similar to my description of the wife's "falling in love"! The cheated on husband meets someone, maybe the wife of his wife's lover, maybe someone he works with, maybe just someone he bumps into. They meet up, share stories, get to know each other and eventually fall in love.

As for Luanne, your story was such a mess that it was unclear just what was going on, but of course she shouldn't stay in an abusive relationship! And even in your own example she met a man, but didn't "just fall in love", they had conversations, where he "listened" to her, THEN she fell in love.

In any case, if a relationship has run its course, you LEAVE it before entering into an intimate relationship with another person.