jimhines

By now, I assume most of you are familiar with the Fake Geek Girl phenomenon, in which women’s geek credentials are repeatedly challenged, because everyone knows girls don’t like geek stuff. (Isn’t that right, Big Bang Theory?) It gets even worse if the woman in question is traditionally attractive, because even if we acknowledge the possibility of the occasional female geek, we all know she has to be ugly and socially maladjusted, right? Fortunately, we have men who tirelessly volunteer their time to challenge and harass these wannabes.

Because do you know what would happen if we let Fake Geek Girls into the inner circle of geekdom? PURE, UNMITIGATED GIRL-COOTIES!

Well let me tell you, Fake Geek Girls have nothing on the Fake Writer Girls. You know the ones I mean. Those women who think they can write stories and books that are just as good and important and serious as the ones written by us men. It’s almost like they don’t even understand that their work is inherently inferior, because GIRLS!

One of the best ways to spot a Fake Writer Girl is by looking for Mary Sues, those unrealistically competent, know-it-all, oh-so-special characters who are the Best at Everything! They’re nothing but silly, estrogen-fueled wish fulfillment fantasies. Like a girl could ever be an active, competent character. Oh, those wacky Fake Writer Girls and their ridiculously super-special heroines. If only they could write realistic, heroic protagonists like Ender Wiggin, James Bond, Eragon, Lazarus Long, Clark Kent, Kvothe Kingkiller, Legolas…

And don’t get me started on how they’re ruining science fiction and fantasy with their romance cooties! Urban fantasy? Paranormal romance? Why don’t they care about the history of our genre? SF/F stories should be about spaceships! and swords! and fighting! and yes, the occasional hooking up, but only when it’s nubile young women throwing themselves at manly protagonists!

It would be nice if these Fake Writer Girls could just stay in the romance section, because we all know romance isn’t a real genre. I mean, sure, romance makes up 55% of all fiction sales, but a real man wouldn’t be caught dead reading that stuff, so it doesn’t count. Besides, ALL ROMANCE NOVELS ARE JUST FORMULAIC, UNIMAGINATIVE HACKWORK! (On a totally unrelated note, I just remembered that I have to write a review of this awesome book I read last week. It’s just like Lord of the Rings, except instead of a ring, it’s a cursed dagger! Brilliantly original stuff.)

You might laugh, but Fake Writer Girls present a real threat to real writers like me, writers who write while also being guys. Just look at this report from VIDA that shows how lady writers are stealing review space from hard-working men! They took 33% of the book reviews in The Atlantic, 36% from Harpers, 26% from the London Review of Books, 19% from the New York Review of Books, and 34% from the New York Times. And they want to take even more review space away from real (i.e., male) authors! Why can’t they be happy getting slightly more than half of the reviews in Romantic Times and leave the rest to us? Why do they have to hurt men’s careers with their Fake Writer Girl Agendas?

Here are just a few known Fake Writer Girls, authors whose work you definitely should not immediately go check out and buy and read and tell all of your friends about.

Please feel free to suggest others in the comments. Because the more you know…

Known Fake Writer Girls

• Jaime Lee Moyer – Wrote a perfectly good book about vengeful ghosts, then ruined it with relationships and romance!
• Seanan McGuire – Prolific and popular. Stole multiple spots on the NYT Bestsellers List from deserving boy authors.
• Nalo Hopkinson – Her first book was Brown Girl in the Ring. Yeah, right. Call me when you write Brown Alpha Male in the Ring, amirite?
• Elizabeth Bear – Not only does she sneak relationship-cooties into her work, I’ve even seen her brag about doing it!
• Laura Anne Gilman – Sure, she’s been an editor as well as a Nebula-nominated author, but she also wrote some books for Luna. Romance! Fake Writer Girl! Unclean!
• Nnedi Okorafor – We all know she’s an award-winning novelist, but she’s also writing a Disney Fairies book. Need I say more?
• Kameron Hurley – Not just a fake writer girl, but a militant fake writer girl who actively blogs about girl stuff like sexism in addition to writing books.
• Mary Robinette Kowal – Her work has been described as Jane Austen with magic. That’s another dead giveaway right there. And if that’s not enough, she also plays with puppets!
• Alethea Kontis – She’s doing fairy tale retellings. Hmph. Fairy tale books are only worth reading if they’re written by a man!
• Tansy Rayner Roberts – That’s right, even Australia has Fake Writer Girls!!!
• Amal El-Mohtar – Yep, Canada too!
• J. V. Jones – Sure, she was writing grimdark fantasy decades ago, but do we really have to mention her when we talk about grimdark fantasy? Can’t we just talk about the men?

Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.