I’ll comment on the [LDS] readers’ reaction to murder and mayhem vs. curse words. I read lots of sf and fantasy throughout most of my teens and twenties, and still have a shelf full. I married a man who has filled bookshelves with fantasy novels. So I’ve seen a lot of the genre, though I don’t read much of it anymore. I am very bothered by brutality and especially by violence against women. If you can create a world where magic works, why can’t you create a world where women don’t get raped? Bad language doesn’t bother me, however.
But I don’t write to the author and complain. I simply throw the book across the room and never read anything by that author again. My husband has recommended that I read a few of his fantasy books, and after several hit the wall (and one I threw away—he still doesn’t know that but I am not having a book with a rape description that graphic in my house ( Household Gods by Harry Turtledove and Judith Tarrand if you’re curious about which one)) I have learned to ask him, “do the characters even talk about an intent to rape?” If he says yes, it goes back on the shelf. It surprises me how often he says yes to that question. Maybe his taste in fantasies runs to more violent fantasy novels then the stuff I used to read.
For my part, the thing that bugs me is that it seems like the way a lot of books (not just fantasy) depict evil men is by showing that the only thing they want to do is rape somebody. It happens a lot in fantasy, and I think you have a point—as I consider it, it’s an over-used convention. It seems that there are a LOT of books out there where the author puts a woman in danger of being raped just so that a hero can show up and save the day.
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