Writing Who They Want To Be

A funny thing happens when you get older, suddenly, books that you enjoyed you no longer do, suddenly you take a critical eye to the main protagonist - another white dude who is rude but so smart and talented everyone puts up with him - getting to fuck three different women all with some no strings attached deal. You can feel the author vicariously living out through the pages of their book. Wish fulfillment characters aren't inherently bad, but they do tend to easily fall down the rabbit hole of cheap character archetypes and authorial projecting. Hey, that's great and all that your protagonist gets to have sex with three women who are suspiciously attractive by modern societal standards, tell me more about how the author is frustrated sexually or is living out his erotic fantasies through his book. I don't need to read that, it's usually dull and trite at best and sexist at worst, and frankly, I don't pick up sci-fi or fantasy to read about how one dude wishes he was banging three gals at once. I pick it up for, you know, imaginative worlds and characters and the like.

My suggestion, as always, is to read more women authors.