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Date Posted: 00:16:53 09/23/24 Mon
Author: Curious
Author Host/IP: 49.196.177.74
Subject: (SFFR) Trina's Tale (SStoryman)

Warning: This Review Contains Spoilers

Trina's Tale (SStoryman) - A Review

Part One - The Author

SStoryman was one of the major Smoking Fetishist writers in the late 1990s and early 2000s. They wrote 43 (known)(5) stories between 1996 and 2006. In addition they also helped at least one other writer, AZ-Man thanked SStoryman for help with the stories 'House of Cards', 'The Elusive California Dream' & 'Pygmalion'. Similarly, SStoryman thanked AZ-Man and another writer Stogie-Man (StogieMon?) for their help with several stories published between 1999 and 2001.(1)

Thematically their output covered both start and re-start smoking stories, in some cases they reworked ideas first explored by other authors(2), other stories involve fantastic elements, for example,'Back and Forth' published in 2002, dealt with travel to an alternate universe where smoking is the norm and anti-smokers are a dying minority, while 2004's 'More than Watching'(3) involves aliens discovering the joys of smoking and sex.

While one of the more intelligent authors of smoking fetish fiction, towards the end of their career 'stock elements' started to predominate. These included 'three-in-a-bed couplings', smokers tricking non-smokers into starting and increasing amounts of sex, up to and including incest, which appeared in their penultimate story 'A Terrible Mistake' (2005)(4).

Part Two - Trina's Tale

This story and 2004's 'The Transformation of Angela' are the only known stories(5) by this author in the first person. It appeared on Lorings website in April 2000, immediately after 'Revenge'(6) and was followed by 'Cross-Cultural Experience'(7). It's first reprinting was in the 15th volume of the Noble Leaf Library and was subsequently reprinted in the 3rd volume of the 'SStoryman Anthology'.

The narrators full name is Katrina, but she prefers to be called Trina and the story covers how she became to be a smoker and what followed.

Part Three - Comments

I have to begin this section by acknowledging the comments made by Nick, the Noble Leaf Librarian when the republished this story in the fifteenth volume of the Noble Leaf Library, this is not a very good story and one has to speculate as to why the author included the elements they did. At this remove in time and with so much of the early online history of the smoking fetish missing it's not possible to be conclusive, but the author may have been trying to push the boundaries of what was acceptable. In many ways what happens is a continuation of the kind of mean spirited style that appears in 'Revenge'(6), but intensified.

The first chapter involves the protagonist being tricked into starting smoking, what is of interest is that this is done under the guise of convincing another person that the protagonist has become a smoker. This is of course similar to the backstory of Katlin Bringhurst's 2013 story 'The Smoking Sisterhood'(8) It also shows that the author was aware that this plot idea could be used under circumstances other than the one they used in their later story 'Just Practicing'.(9)

The next chapter is entitled 'The Second Round: The Bribe'. In this chapter the protagonist forces her collage roommate to start smoking by stating that she will give her money to pay for some concert tickets, but only if she agrees to start smoking. It is worth comparing this scene with it's likely inspiration, the scene in An02's 'The Deal'(9). The two scenes are superficially similar, in An02's story a mother gets her daughter to start smoking in exchange for the money needed to go on a school excursion.

In detail however they are very different. The offer in An02's story is the product of a spontaneous angry retort, from a mother who's in the latest round of a series of arguments with her daughter over the one thing in her life that gives her pleasure. What's offered is regretted as soon as it's made, only for the mother to be surprised when the daughter accepts. The offer in 'Trina's Tale', is the result of someone who's already determined that her roommate is going to smoke, seizing an opportunity dangled before her and applying the maximum pressure to ensure acceptance.

Another, related take on this idea can be found in 'Pygmalion'(10), a story by AZ-Man for which SStoryman served as editor. This occurs in the stories sixth chapter entitled 'Trouble in Paradise'. Here the offer is made by the protagonists next door neighbour. It's clearly presented as a desperate, but ultimately successful effort to save a failing attempt to get the protagonist to meet the neighbours friend, which immediately makes it stand out from the previous two as the immediate end goal is not to get the protagonist to start smoking. The scene is also a good example of the AZ-Mans long term planning in their story. While the protagonists suspicion regarding the offer is understandable, the reader will have been made privy to certain information earlier in the story showing that she is correct in being suspicious, other information is revealed during the course of the scene that will bear fruit later and drive the stories endgame. What is presented is ethically dubious, but it needs to be, because as noted previously this fact will have consequences further on.

That is not the case in 'Trina's Tale', it is simply a way of showing the narrators increasing extremism regarding smoking, just how extreme is revealed in the next chapter.

The final chapter prior to the epilogue is entitled 'Round Three: Forcing It Down'. In this a former smoker, one of the narrators sisters is drugged, restrained, and subjected to psychological and physical abuse to get her to resume smoking. It leaves a bad taste in the mouth that not even the upbeat epilogue can remove.

Part Four - Conclusion

As stated earlier, it's clear the author was tying to push the boundaries of what was acceptable, the narrators story is one of increasing extremism, starting with her being tricked into taking up the habit and ending with someone being tortured to get them to restart. It paints smokers in the worst possible light, unlike several of the authors earlier stories(11), there is no way this can be spun as a 'positive' story.

While the issues above all render this story one this reviewer definitely considers not worth reading, there is one other overarching issue, a plot element that crops up in other SStoryman fiction that is worth discussing at this point. This is the idea that, as in this story, no matter what is done to someone to get them to start smoking, once they start smoking they no longer see what got them started as wrong, even if it clearly was.

The story is like several others I've covered a clear example of what not to do. While this story did not derail the authors career a later attempt to push the boundaries 'A Terrible Mistake', which I would consider this a close second to as one of the worst stories from this author, destroyed it.

Part Five - Chapters/Episodes

1. The First Round: The Sting
2. The Second Round: The Bribe
3. Round Three: Forcing It Down
4. Epilogue


Notes:

1.'Turkish Delight' (1999): "Thanks to AZ-Man and Stogie-Man for their support, ideas and encouragement.", 'Revenge' (2000): " Thanks to AZ-Man and Stogie-Man for their help and encouragement.", 'Cross-Cultural Experience' (2000): "Thanks to AZ-Man and Stogie-Man for their support, ideas and encouragement.", 'I Want You Back' (2001): " Thanks to AZ-Man for his ongoing ideas, support and encouragement"
2. 2001s 'Just Practicing' is response to 'The Play's The Thing' by An4, 'Worth Sacrificing For', another 2001 story was most likely inspired by the fiction of AZ-Man, 'Losing It' published in 2002 and 2005s 'Ellie' are both based on stories by author An02, specifically 1998s 'Weighty Problems' and 1995s 'Miss Vicki' and finally 2004s 'The Transformation of Angela' is a superior reworking of the 2003 story 'Proposition for Jill' by Tjhcmp1. Reviews of 'Just Practicing', 'Worth Sacrificing For' and 'The Transformation of Angela' can be found in volumes 5, 7, 16 & 25 of the Noble Leaf Library, all of these stories can be found in the 'SStoryman Anthology' as well as volumes 19 & 28 of the Noble Leaf Library.
3. This story appears in volume 7 of the 'SStoryman Anthology', a review can be found in volume 10 of the Consolidated Smoking Fetish Fiction Review.
4. This story appears in volume 8 of the 'SStoryman Anthology', a review can be found in volume 1 of the Consolidated Smoking Fetish Fiction Review.
5. If anyone knows of others, please let Nick, the Noble Leaf Librarian know, even if they are incomplete.
6. This story appears in volume 3 of the 'SStoryman Anthology', a review can be found in volume 19 of the Consolidated Smoking Fetish Fiction Review.
7. This story appears in volume 3 of the 'SStoryman Anthology', a review is forthcoming.
8. This story is available on Amazon. A review appears in volume 27 of the Consolidated Smoking Fetish Fiction Review.
9. This story appears in 'An Anthology of An02', a review can be found in volume 15 of the Consolidated Smoking Fetish Fiction Review.
10. This story appears in volume 16 of the Noble Leaf Library and the 'Anthology of AZ-Man', a review can be found in volume 26 of the Consolidated Smoking Fetish Fiction Review.
11. I'm thinking here of 'How Could She Say No?' and 'Converted' here, both stories can be found in volume 1 of the 'SStoryman Anthology'.

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