Turns out somebody else has already written the book I wanted to write as the paes de resistance

I've written about this here: how I want to write about the origin story of Kamasutra and how it'd be about the story of this man who really really wanted to write about sex but due to various reasons was quite inexperienced in the actual...act...so to speak, and would write hilarious recommendations because he didn't understand fully the technicalities behind the whole thing. So his knowledge would be based on second-hand and third-hand information, and it would create this whole set of comedic scenarios. It wouldn't have to be about Vatsayana, who supposedly write it, but it would be the archetype.

Turns out Sudhir Kakar has already written that story, and that novel, in the form of The Ascetic of Desire. It's sold tonnes, got a review and a first-chapter published in New York times, and everybody who's anybody has read it or heard of it. It's a small cottage industry, this sub-niche it turns out, and I'd be just another addition to the field.

Two points. On the one hand, fuck I thought I was going to be an innovator, and when I did eventually read it it would open people's minds to this new world and be genre-defining. Well that's not gonna happen. Second, clearly this is excellent news, since this validates there's a solid market out there, an appetite among the readers for something on these grounds. I don't have to be perfect, I just have to satiate the readers' desires, and I'll be golden.

Mostly good news, nothing to lose sleep over.