All Comments on 'The Brave'

Hi, yes, hello, thank you for reading! This story had a really interesting gestation period and I'd like to tell you about it in exhaustive, borderline obnoxious detail.

So, I was a fan of a somewhat prominent Lesbian Sex author who decided to pull her stories from this site. There wasn't any drama, at least as far as I'm aware; she just wasn't into it anymore and was uncomfortable with her work being public. But we started a friendly on-again/off-again rapport while she was publishing and we kept it up after she had Laurel nuke her profile. I was always kind of interested in writing girl-on-girl before, but after talking to her for long enough, I really wanted to do one so she (a gay woman herself) could actually maybe enjoy something I had written.

In one of our conversations, we shared a mutual love of Black Lagoon—if you haven't heard of it, it was this ridiculous, over the top modern day pirate anime that had some of the sickest action scenes of its day. It also had a female action hero in Revy, who took the so-called "strong female character" cliché and pushed it to such an extreme, she became a literal psychopath whose few mushy feelings for the hero, Rock, were buried under so much pain and anger and stress they were never coming out into the open. The show ruled, and it ended up being the base inspiration of this story; no, this isn't a modern pirate adventure, but I wanted to write a lesbian romance that also happened to be an insanely violent action-adventure, with a heroine that wrecked just as much ass as Revy did.

From there the story started to conflate with some other interests and images I had. Let's break this down bit by bit.

• I have a thing for historical erotica, which isn't terribly hard to find on here but I can be kind of particular about it.

• I also have a thing for Native American women—same deal as above.

• I already knew what I wanted the big sex scene to look like: in the desert, under the stars, lit by campfire.

• Most of all, I had an itch to play around with the "mysterious stranger" trope. My friend did something similar in a story she wrote that made me first take notice of her, so I thought it might be a neat way to pay tribute.

So pretty quickly, I knew I'd be writing a western, and my cast came together really easily from that. The first character I had was a Clint Eastwood type being filled by who would normally be the polar opposite of Clint Eastwood—my Native heroine, Wind. From the jump, I knew I wanted to wear down her mysterious facade over the first half of the story, so she goes from this badass of few words on a mission to someone who's effortlessly bantering with her love interest. Problem was, I only had enough ideas for scenes to fill a few days without spinning my wheels, so I needed a strong, bubbly personality who could force a person like Wind out of her shell and make her fall in love (and vice versa) almost instantly. Luckily, I have a thing for blonde cowgirls as well; enter Sally.

The idea of Sally turning out to be an infamous badass in her own right was part and parcel of my piss-take on the mysterious stranger trope. To me, presenting Wind as some unstoppable force of nature, gently breaking her down to reveal the thoughtful, tortured soul underneath, and then have the person who broke her down come out of nowhere to be just as much of an utter beast, struck me as fucking hilarious and awesome. That said, I ended up making her past a lot more obvious than I intended, to the point where hopefully it's not about shocking you with the reveal, but making you wonder as you read when it's coming out and how.

From all that, I knew I had a story, but what surprised me was just how little sex was in it. Discounting the scene of Sally masturbating and the two scenes of Wind teasing Sally, the sex only really makes up a tenth of the story; I actually struggled to justify this as erotica and wondered if it belonged on the site. In the end, I decided to go for it because I felt the sex was explicit enough and ultimately there for the reader's edification. I'd also argue that the explicitness was warranted; the love and intimacy Sally and Wind share in the desert had to be proportional to the violence they visited upon their enemies in order to help put across how much they mean to each other.

Anyway, let's go over some other random bits. As I've implied, my frames of reference tend to be more movies than literature, so most of my characters would spring out of some of the references I made and parallels I wanted to draw. Jake, for instance, was originally named "Big Jake" as a direct homage to John Wayne, and his character is based on a popular archetype that would show up in John Ford's movies. Here are a few others:

• Banshee, a recently-ended Cinemax show which was kind of a modern day western in a few ways, was a BIG influence. I specifically drew the character of Goss to evoke some of the monsters that the show's main character, Lucas Hood, would occasionally find himself up against, particularly The Albino and Chayton Littlestone. The way Wind and Charlie take him out is actually inspired by a scene in the show's first episode. If you think it reads sick, the show's version is even sicker in motion, despite being tamer (in Banshee, the bottle never shatters in the dude's throat). The first two seasons are currently on Amazon Prime if you have it; hit it up. Highly recommended for people who love pulp.

• Before that, Wind's fatal beatdown of George Brinley-Foster, aka The Englishman, was inspired by the first scene of Wild At Heart, necessitating George to stand out against the environment and the other characters. My take on it still doesn't have the weird chemistry between stringy, strung-out Nicolas Cage and tiny, profane Gregg Dandridge, nor does it go from 0 to 20 to HOLY FUCKING JESUS SHIT to OH MY GOD IT'S STILL GOING and back to 20...basically I'm saying watch Wild At Heart if you liked that scene because while my story isn't cinema, *it really doesn't matter,* I'm embarrassed to have lifted from something too great to possibly do justice.

• Wind kissing Sally before confronting Garrick was a straight-up Drive reference, as was Charlie caving Goss's head in. I suppose it could've come from anywhere, but because I'm a white male film nerd, we're contractually obligated to tip our hat to that movie at least once in our lives. So there you go. I am now A Real Human Being and A Real Hero.

• Of course, I've taken inspiration from here, too. Fans of this category might recognize the banter between Jake and Sally to be a way amped up version of June and Jim's banter in SweetestThing's "A Proper Send-off." Another big influence from this category: loverofFUN, who wrote a blast of a lesbian action-thriller herself with "The Retrieval..." Also, I didn't discover this story until after I finished my first draft, but AwkwardMD wrote a spiffy lesbian western of their own called "The Incident at Last Home." Check those stories out, as well as their other works, if you haven't already.

• Regarding "Bright Star": Wind's background as a young girl with genius-level intellect who was taken in by a white family came to me relatively late in the process. The work made a lot of sense as something she'd obsess over and something that drew a couple of interesting parallels to my narrative (you may find it interesting that Wind recites this sonnet to Sally, Joyce's last before he succumbed to TB, just as she was getting ready to do something she was sure would get her killed), so I dropped it in and reverse engineered a background from it.

Finally, I did my best with research, something I'm notoriously bad at. Luckily for me, True West Magazine has been obsessively chronicling The Old West for over 60 years and had been super helpful four times out of five. It actually gave me some surprising information about homosexual lifestyles in the frontier age, teaching me the significance of Leaves of Grass and even the term "koskalaka." Their work really informed my approach to the story, so shout-out to them. If I got any period details wrong, it's probably because I didn't read the site enough.

All right, you're done! I bet you only rolled your eyes once or twice, too!

...oh. That many times, huh? Well,

I would hurry to say thank you for a completely amazing story. Keatsian western, indeed!

Its good to know the why behind such agood story.

I love westerns and being a lesbian , love them too. Put the two together

And youve got one happy reader.

Ok there wasnt much in the way of sex in it [ im not complaining ] , but what there was alot of is passion , drive and emotion . All sexy things when written like this.

I was right there in the bar with Sally and Wind , it felt so real.

Great story , thank you.

Thanks for chiming in. Despite being a straight dude who's done his fair share of objectifying, I wanted to write a story that gay women could enjoy as well, so your feedback (and feedback from other lesbian readers, however varied it may turn out) is especially treasured. Really glad you liked it.

Also, I thought I was embarrassed when I erroneously referred to James Joyce, not John Keats, as the author of "Bright Star" in my author's notes, but holy shit did I drop the editing ball on this story. That last chapter is supposed to be titled "Not Dark Yet." "YET." There's a fucking "t" in it. I'll submit edits when I get some time; my apologies to those who were bullied by horrible spelling errors in grade school.

Very well done!

I have always loved a good Western film (emphasis on the 'good'---even as a small boy of about seven, I thought that Roy Rogers and his like were crap) but for some odd reason I never liked Western novels. However, I'm making an exception for "The Brave". It's a mini masterpiece and really brings out the flavour of what times and violence must have been like in the old West. Wind and Sally make fine protagonists and even the minor characters such as Jake and Charlie are interesting. I particularly liked the twist in the middle of the story when Sally and Sam are revealed as not being quite the good people we had been lead to believe. If this is your first lesbian story, don't let it be your last. Don't ride into the sunset and leave your readers hanging.

very enjoyable read

This epic cost me my night's rest, beautiful plot and reflection. As the final shoot out commenced, it seemed too much, but after the lifting of the veil, the pieces fell into place.

I've always been a fan of erotica that isn't just erotica. This story made my heart race and kept me on my toes during its entirety. I love the characters and their moral ambiguity, the conflict, the descriptions-- thank you so much for sharing this. Know that you made my heart ache in the best way possible. Please keep writing! More power!

This was an incredibly enjoyable read from start to finish! Cheers!

One of the best stories I read in a long time

Very good story. Quite enjoyable to read. Love stories set in older times.

Intelligent and well crafted story. Kept me up very late - I just couldn't put it down. Loved it - thank you!

So I'm not one for historical stories since they tend to be forced and are usually romantic versions of the history they're trying to represent. I'm also not the biggest fan of western's since they tend to be overdone.

This was brutal, violent, and very moving. I was actually rooting for the characters and was invested in the story more than just the sex. A beautiful story that caught me by surprise. Instant favourite :)

This was amazing, I just couldn’t stop reading! I love the slow build and that it wasn’t all about sex but about the life and struggles of Wind and Sally. This was a true novel in any sense and can’t wait to read more of your stories.

I'm flattered that you were compelled to try this story out despite your biases! Thank you! If you're still feeling adventurous, I'd like to take this opportunity to repeat my recommendation for The Incident at Last Home—in my author's notes, I mistakenly credited the story solely to AwkwardMD. In fact, it was a collaboration between Awkward and AmoryParks, something that was stated right up front at the top of the story. My apologies to AP for the mixup.

But anyway, if you're looking for another tale of sapphic love in the Old West, definitely check it out! It's a really good piece that does some cool things in its own right!

Loved the way the story unfolded to its conclusion. I too am not a fan of westerns but am a closet romantic so any tale with a happy ending is great! 👏👏

I really enjoyed reading this. Thank you.

one of the best I have read on this site

I read a book about the Old West of about this period in, I believe, Nevada.

The book was non-fiction, but I read it like 40 years ago. I don't remember the subject of the book, but one of the things I came away with was that 90% of

the pistoles that were carried were stuck in the carrier's pants waist, not in a

gun holster. Gun holsters were expensive. In this very good story. I figure

that Wind, the sheriff and Blindside Bill would have had holsters. Nobody else.

A movie quality book with complexities and characters you love to hate and hate to lose. The shear audacity of women "gun slingers" reminds me of Bad Girls with Drew Barrymore and Andie MacDowell, thou this snippet of a story is already way better. Aah, but alas, it is what it is... a really good short story that I have the feeling I will be reading again as time goes on. Congrats Memeber9458 for this beautiful piece of written art

Yes, this is one of the best western on Lit. Five Stars. Thank you for it.

I've read a few of your other works but I'm only slightly embarrassed to admit that this one made me cry a little bit

My mind is blown. This may be THE best Western story I've ever read, seen on heard about! The pace, the action, the twist-THE TWIST! This isn't a story, it's a free vacation through space and time and I'm so grateful you felt like sharing it!

I literally only clicked on this story to get off, but this shit is absolutely beautiful. I really really enjoyed how complex their stories are. Also, the sex stuff is written so detailed and naturally. A lot of lesbian scenes are written very frankly, but I think you did excellently in capturing their chemistry.10/10 amazing

This was a great, romantic story. [So says the older, straight white guy.]

I loved the twist in the middle. I did *not* see it coming.

I also found your "epilogue" placed before the ending to be rather a nice trick. Giving us some sense of their future to make a romantic "happily every after". The benefit of what you did: if you have a strong ending, why water it down afterwards with an epilogue? (If you don't have a strong ending then perhaps you ought to rewrite that part.)

-- Scurvy

I've paid for lesbian western novels that weren't half as good as this.

I enjoyed this story! I found it both thoughtful and romantic, and I'm a guy! I like the way you write, and I think that you have a real talent for drama. Thanks for an unexpected but very entertaining story. Sorry I'm not a listed member but since I did like the story I'll I.D. myself as Douglas Jones

This is supurb. I keep coming back to it, time and again. It is epic and yet romantic… and credible, which is saying a bit for literotica. The best compliment I think I can give is that I want this to have been a true story. Bravo, we’ll done

This is a wonderful story , I would love it more if I knew it was true , I fell in love with both of the beautiful brave ladies

A gem of surprising depth and breadth; gets better with each reading!