Writing outside your genre

No need to regret this based on my comment. I LOVE F/f and have written several....including one that takes place in a schoolroom and several with age reversals. I'm OK with caning too, though it's not my favorite implement. I guess it's just the British M/f Headmaster/schoolgirl caning thing that I was really referring to as a theme I hate. Just switching that scenario to F/f already makes it more appealing.

I'm going to check out your stuff. Good F/f is a lot of fun.

Ya know, I've always had issue with the "write what you know," in part because I don't in my professional work. In writing training materials and textbooks, it was an advantage to not be an expert. I interviewed experts--people who had all the knowledge but not the ability to put it into language that non experts could understand. So my writing became about translating to the uninitiated. Even now with my arts writing where I do have a great deal of knowledge, I constantly have to challenge myself to write for the person who does not, to help provide a vocabulary for those who do not. So my philosophy was closer to "write what you want to know."

Writing can be a process of discovery for the writer. Ideally as a writer you are constantly learning--something new every time you put pen to page (metaphorically).

--All that said, one of the reasons I started this topic is that my experience with fiction is really limited. Does that philosophy still apply? Especially with spanking fiction. I've never been caned--could I write a convincing caning story? Should I stick with those implements I have personal experience with? I have a pretty well-developed philosophy about adult Spanking--the situations I would allow myself to be in and those I would not. Do I stick within that narrow niche?

It's why this thread has been informative to me, though I'm not much closer to answers for me.

Speaking of writing outside your areas of expertise...

For reasons that are unknown even to me I have been inspired (and this inspiration hit shortly before this thread began) to write a story that is outside of my expertise in a number of ways -- it is set in a British boarding school in about the late 70s (when boys' schools were beginning to admit girls, but corporal punishment was still in full swing, as it were), features a caning, and includes pot smoking, none of which I have personal experience with.

I tried to "do my homework" and research somewhat, but would anyone be willing to review the story for me prior to publication to let me know if I've fouled up any of the details in ways that would distract a reader from the story? Thanks!