The way authors write these female characters is self insert at best and misogynistic at worst.
Sometimes the best and WORST advice is to write what you know. I mean, I could write an entire epic with a FL as an IT security analyst, but who on God's green earth is going to think, "Yeah, she's really, really interesting, this smuttery is fire"? Hell, I'm bored just considering it.
I mean sometimes it works there’s some fics out there where the author writes the mc in their same work field/ niche and I find it interesting. Theres one on here where the MC is a smut romance webtoon artist. I mean any field can be smutty if you play your cards right.
Nah man... I'd read that shit in an instant. If doctors and lawyers and secretaries and generic office workers make the cut.... Why not an IT nerd?
Because the interesting tech nerds are coders and hackers.
Could you actually envision Ember Hale, regular old IT auditor, being interrupted by billionaire CEO, Liam Moretti, as she concludes her vibe-coded python script that is reporting on scans of NAS data for any PII, tearing her Skynet tech support T-shirt to reveal her pale, vitamin-D deficient flesh while growling, “Mine!” as he clamps his lips on the sensitive skin of her exposed neck? I can’t even perceive the plot conflict, a villainous CFO who is siphoning off profits to support his bouffanted mistress in Miami so the daring main characters must thwart rampant fraudulent activities- so thrilling I am waiting g for the next episode with heart palpitations! Eeeeeezzzz. lol
LOL
I'd actually read a romcom alla IT Crowd, or maybe a female rage version of an IT worker similar to Office Space.
Or.. Ever read Good Work Today? Imagine a boss like that, but for a cybersec team in charge of audits and compliance.
I'd read the shit out of those stories （´∇｀''）
I don’t often just dump on a character, but the author flubbed this MC hard. ML is well developed, multi-faceted, and endearing. A little goofy, but strong and forthright, but her? I’ve read 17 bloody chapters and she is as dull as dirt with her “yer mah lil’ bruhther” dipshittery. I rarely don’t not care about how a story ends, even the bad ones, but I really just hope that she stays in her little boring town that she loves in her little bookstore with her little life and her little pangs of regret and fades into her boring demise as she watches everyone else live with vigor and joy and anger and fear and curiosity. She has an opportunity and she is just waiting to be convinced that it’s worth it to take a chance. Zzzzzzs….