Partner just broke down how male writers need to get out of the male fantasy mindset. She’s right too. Presently she’s reading a Dean Koontz novel in which the narrator breaks down the first two characters in contrasts–the male is a struggling author. The female is incredibly beautiful and struggling with the turmoil that she is not as wonderful as her mother. Yeah, I can see the contrasts already too. I worry about that when describing my characters. In my last novel the ‘face’ of the team was in fact a beautiful asian elf with a troubled past. That past? Yeah… she’d been victimized and needed to be rescued by a man who put his life in jeopardy to save her. So, I do it too. I didn’t plan to do it that way, and as the sequel story develops I need to be mindful of who she is and how I tell her story as part of the larger narrative. So far I’ve managed to describe her only in terms of her tattoos–giving the reader no real sense of her appearance beyond that, which probably isn’t so great either.
The truth is, it is hard to write what you don’t know. Once, I thought I’d be slick and write the opposite of how I see people as a way to offer a different perspective, but that wasn’t very effective either. Writing is learning and growing, and from what my partner says, all of us male writers have a lot more writing and growing to do.
Some Thoughts:
- Turns out I was dead wrong about the Paolo Bonchero kid. He was rookie of the year. Respect then.
- To expand, I wasn’t saying Wemby wouldn’t be great. I was saying, quit making people great before they actually play an NBA game. Lewt hype happen in the proper time and way.