Greetings! John insisted on giving me credit and a forum for helping him with
the story. He wanted me to be a co-author, but I did not feel right about that.
I finally gave in to "major contributor" status and given the first word in how
the book was created.
Yes, “I am not Suki” is homage to Leonard Nimoy’s first autobiography.
Over the years I have accused John of being a privacy fanatic. Then this came
up and I believe I have surpassed John in privacy fanaticism.
John and I are good online friends and have met in real life a few times. No,
ladies, we have never dated each other nor have we been intimate, other than
online play. We did “meet” in an online chat room and a lot of the action in
the sex scenes was inspired from our online play. He is still unattached at the
time of this writing.
I AM attached, guys and gals, I have a boyfriend now and we are exclusive. John
and I are still the best of friends. He and my boyfriend have not had the
opportunity to meet, but I am sure they will get along great when they do.
Some of the things I helped John with were "cleaning up" his condo, which
resulted in multiple story changes, like his winning a lottery so he could have
maid service (ask him about that). I provided the general banter between the
ladies in the story, just the general way it would go and he tweaked the details
to make the dialog fit. He based Trish and Sam off of several women he has
known and I flavored them with past friends of mine who were similar.
We both wanted Trish to be nicer than the way she started out. After John
convinced me to listen to the Tammy Bruce show a few times I suggested he make
Trish a little more like Tammy, except still hetero. She stopped being a
“victimhood feminist” and became more of an empowerment feminist.
Also, I helped with a few of the "rules", because he is self-admittedly clueless
about them, or ignores the ones he knows. I noticed he seemed to be working
around them so they would not come up and I massaged that a bit.
Suki went to school in Charlottesville at my request, because I wanted to go to
UVA, but never got there. I have a MS in Chemistry from a different school in
the mid-Atlantic. John backed down some of the education he had initially given
Suki. Her education is a combination of what John and I both think would be
cool and complimentary to the couple's chemistry. What he had before was just
too incredible. Not impossible, too unlikely.
Suki's list of languages was a lot longer in John’s earlier drafts. We both
know one or two people who speak seven languages and that is what he had for
Suki. I thought a shorter list would be more realistic. Somehow, giggle, her
languages are the ones I wished I had learned.
I think he captured the atmosphere of 2008/9 Crystal City perfectly. If I had
written down my visit in 2008 I would have described it in much the same way.
She does not speak any Asian languages from a combination of John's experience
and mine with some immigrant parents wanting their children to assimilate. Both
of my parents are from Eastern Asia and spoke only English at home. They also
had me teach them what I learned in English classes when I came home from
school. John's father never spoke Italian at home, his mother never spoke
Spanish or Latin at home either.
He was trying to avoid details about his character's son, but wanted his
character to be based on himself. I saw no way around having him add some
details. Especially since they are close in real life, I thought it would help
to show that the father was a good-guy sort of parent. Having his son located
on another continent kept the interaction and details down.
John needed some help with Suki's initial awkwardness, which became the
not-quite-polished way she was in the beginning of the story and evolving into a
true beauty. I think I added the book bag and John worked the rest. John had
her clumsy at first, but that did not go along with her activities.
John’s character is a lot like him, but he was not describing himself that well,
so I helped with that. In reality, his eyes are that random hazel and usually
green, rather than a mood projecting color change. He is a very good dresser
and the things his character wears in the story are pretty close to what he
wears in real.
Independent acquaintances of ours asked if either Suki or John were based on
John Galt, from Ayn Rand's novel Atlas Shrugged. Neither of us has read the
book, but after looking at a description of the character we decided that Suki
should have read Atlas Shrugged but she did not really like John Galt. I do not
see the resemblance, other than both characters staying out of the limelight.
Something I noticed was Suki not using contractions before they spent the night
together, but she did after. John did not think of the Commander Data tie. Not
sure of that might be brought out more or left as is.
I DID notice another Mark Twain reference that John had but he did not realize
using. See if you can find it. He mentions in the narration the ones he put in
on purpose, during a dialogue between John and Suki after an evening with John’s
friends.
We are both Loveline fans. John has not been listening much since Adam left the
show. He was having trouble with Suki’s background and thought of the sexual
experimentation angle. I came up with the brutalization element. It is not
meant to show my bi/homosexual community in a bad light at all, nor the D/s,
BDSM communities either. It is something that still happens too much in most
communities. I hope people can focus on the couple and not their own personal
agendas.
I browsed a bit of the Reaseon.Com/blog (Hit & Run) and have modified my views
some. In case my boyfriend is reading this, no it will not be marriage by
contract if YOU ever ask me, it will be in a house of worship with ‘government
paperwork’. I have not posted to the blog yet, but I might soon.
The scene where Sam is freaked out about her dreams and has to talk to Trish did
happen to me in college. Trish plays me in the discussion and we had Chinese
food rather than pizza. That friendship did not last much longer.
I do like the character Suki so much that I might play her online some. John
mentioned that I could long before I ever thought of mentioning it.
I might add some more to this later, but for now this is what I remember that
made it into the book.
Thank you for reading,
NotSuki
Edit 24 March 2009: I finally set up an e-mail address in case people want to discuss, SukiCrystalCity@gmail.com and I can chat on AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) as SukiSiteNotSuki
Please respect what I have said above and view my Bebo/AIM profile before jumping into an IM session? If I am on those screen names I am looking to play or chat about John's book. John's e-mail is below if you wish to contact him.
This item has been reviewed by DiscreetDomCC@gmail.com and is posted without
revisions.
24 March 2009