Is authenticity something we can control?

[anthrodisiac]

It comes across as if the author wanted to write it. I wouldn't go so far as to say 0 motivation other than that.

But unless the author is being forced against their will, of course they want to write it, otherwise they wouldn't. But they could be writing it because they want to grab cash by trying to jam into a suddenly popular topic, and their only real motivation is trying to profit on a fad. Is that authentic?

My point is that it's an extremely hard thing to pin down, whether an author is writing from a place of authenticity. The term is so slippery when applied to "something that is authentic to the author, not the story" that it's purely a vibe people get from the story, and it's rarely about the author themselves, but how the reader interpreted the story. One reader might felt that it was the author being true to themselves, and another might feel that the author is a shill. Same exact story, totally different interpretations.

 

[anthrodisiac]

Can fiction ever be completely authentic? Aren't we really talking about plausibility/realism?

The OP was more about an author being authentic, not the story. True to themselves, as it were.