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Heroes/ines in Contemporary Supernatural Fiction

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becroberts:

--- Quote from: Richelle on September 16, 2006, 07:47:02 AM ---A lot of the female voices are starting to sound alike, so I like Jim's freshness a lot.  Makes me wonder if I really could even pull off the book I was talking about in the other thread with a male narrator.
--- End quote ---

Agreed. And most of them have much flashier cars, too.  :)

How about this: try writing a scene from a male POV but don't mention anything gender-specific, then give it to someone to read and ask them to identify the narrator's gender.

I prefer to write men, myself. I do so mostly in the third person and haven't yet had any complaints of feminising the narrator - of course that may change if I ever succeed in getting my books published! How much having a cross-gender author-narrator matters varies with the plot and what the author chooses to emphasise; if a female narrator spends a lot of time complaining about period pain, it will probably sound more realistic if the author is female.

fjeastman:

One of my favorite authors is Robert B. Parker.  He's been writing the Spenser series for, oh, 30 years now.  First person, male POV, hardboiled crime fiction.  Though Spenser has gotten a little less hardboiled now that he's getting older.

Parker's newest series is with Sunny Randall, a female P.I.  First person POV again.  I think he "pulls it off", but he does so differently than female authors do.  Different places of focus, different means.  I'm not a female reader, though, so I don't know how true it rings for a female reading audience.  He certainly has been sticking to themes of "strength" and "self-reliance" with the character. 

I hope when my current project is complete I'll be able to shop it out.  It's first-person, male protagonist, set in the southeast, and features some strong Native American - particularly Muskogee, Cherokee, and Navajo - mythological elements.  (I'm male, living in the southeast, and am of Muskogee heritage.)  It's hardboiled supernatural thriller/crime without much in the way of romance or sexy vampires. 

There IS kissing by Chapter 2, though!  And murder.  Murder is first, then the kissing.

--fje

becroberts:

--- Quote from: fjeastman on September 16, 2006, 08:58:23 PM ---
Murder is first, then the kissing.


--- End quote ---

As it should be.  ;)  (Unless it's leading up to necrophilia in which case I'm not sure I want to know!)

JDuncan:
The light, comic, tone and female protaganist does seem to be pretty prevelant these days.  That whole sarcastic, butt-kicking female lead has made it into a few genres the past couple years.  Of course it's likely a trend that has peaked and to try and write that would mean near impossibility getting published. 

I have attempted a little different approach with my novel, and have alternating first-person pov's between the male and female mc's.  It's certainly a challenge to write more than one first-person pov in the same story and make sure you keep the characters clearly defined.  That has probably been my biggest challenge in writing this story, and I hope it works because I kind of like writing this way, even if it tends to be viewed as kind of a no-no.

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