Write a protagonist of the opposite sex, that is.
…today’s female novelists rarely take on a male voice, but when they do, their success rate seems noteworthy. This past year’s “it” book was Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl, in which the author tells one story from both the male and female points of view.
…you will occasionally come across a Lisbeth Salander, a Maria Dmitryevna Akhrosimova, or a Ma Joad, a character with interiority and what feels like her own life off the page. Far too often, though, when you open up a book by a male writer—even a good male writer, and occasionally even a great male writer—you encounter ladies who are a variation on one or more of four themes: … Emma Bovary holds the distinction of kind of being all four at once. (And, Daisy Buchanan does too.)
(The Hairpin, Ester Bloom)
How about Cormoran Strike in The Cuckoo’s Calling? I think Robert Galbraith/JK Rowling’s use of the C-U-Next-Tuesday word feels way off. How about Mae in The Circle by Dave Eggers?
I enjoyed both novels. Five stars each. And in fairness to Dave Eggers, Mae’s sex act illustrates the bigger point he makes about social media. But I hit speed bumps with each book—which illustrates, perhaps, why I typically choose fiction where men write men or women write women.
The New York Times describes my novels as “money porn,” “a red-hot franchise,” and “glittery thrillers about fiscal malfeasance.” Through fiction I explore the dark side of money and the motivations of those who have it, want more, and will steamroll anybody who gets in their way.
Perhaps it’s because I’m a woman, but I never think twice when a female writes a male perspective – yet I can pause when it’s a male writing a female character. And perhaps I pause when the voice doesn’t ring true to me. One exception is the author John Green. To me he WAS a teenage girl in The Fault in Our Stars. I think Nancy Pickard does male voice well in The Virgin of Small Plains with Mitch, who turned out to be my favorite character. And, I think Dean Koontz does female voice well in his early books.
My favorite kind of characters to write are male and I have several in my book and forthcoming books. Ahem, it could stem back to that counselor who told my parents they thought I wanted to be a boy instead – OR it could just be that I am fascinated by the other sex’s perspective and thoughts and feelings and I want to challenge myself to write them and write them well. The stereotype is that men must be strong and hide their softness and I find that a complex mix to evoke successfully in writing them so a reader believes.
Now that’s research! I’m responding to your comment (different thread) about being in the navy. It’s one of those careers where, conceivably, you might know more about guys than guys know about guys.
A few writers come to mind who deserve special credit. Kudos to Patricia Highsmith for THE TALENTED MR. RIPLEY. John le Carre stands out for doing a fantastic job of writing across gender lines and national boundaries. But I’ve always had major trouble believing Phillip Roth’s female characters. And there are plenty of male writers (who will remain unnamed) that populate their books with female characters with new hair styles, but the same sexy body in the same attire.
It’s an interesting and durable myth that writers do a mostly bad job writing about the opposite sex. But it’s just that — a myth. I think writers of both sexes can (and have) written quite a lot from the perspective of another gender. Anne Tyler instantly springs to mind. Her male characters are just as interesting, complex and well-written as her female ones. In the mystery genre, Louise Penny has been doing a fantastic job of writing both sexes for years now.
The protagonist of my first three books, back when I was writing under my real name of Todd Ritter, was a female police chief. When I started those Kat Campbell books, I didn’t give a second thought to writing from a woman’s perspective. To me, Kat was simply a fascinating person that I wanted to spend my time writing about.
So I think I might be a bit “gender blind” in that regard. I feel that an interesting character is an interesting character, and the gender of the author has no bearing on that. On the flip side, I’ve read some truly dreadful female characters written by women and some bland, lifeless male characters written by men. In the end, it’s the talent of the author, and not their gender, that matters.
Alan, I like Kat. A lot. Just as I like writing Helen Chen in End Game. But I find myself asking my first editor–that would be my wife–“what if, what if.”
When writing women, do you do any special research?
No special research, although I did take into consideration any issues a female police chief might encounter that were different from what a male one would experience. Motherhood, sexism, power struggles. But I basically thought of Kat as a human first, woman second. I suppose it helped that my agent and editors were all women, although I can’t recall any moments where they flagged me for getting it wrong.
What about you, Norb? Has Mary ever stopped you and said, “A woman would never, ever act that way.”?
Oh, yeah! Typically, I go to Cosmopolitan for a second opinion. And Vanity Fair is where I go clothes shopping for characters.
See now my husband is unique – he got the shopper gene and I didn’t, plus he hates sports and loves craft shows. It helps when I write a man, as I’ve seen the other side. 🙂 In all seriousness, I have read some truly awful 2-dimensional male characters. Most recently, Todd in The Silent Wife by A.S.A. Harrison (a female). Being in the Navy as a woman, I recall the male role there quite well and that came to play in my own novel, that included an ex-sailor.
I think the issue here deals largely with genre. I’ve had female protagonists in nearly every book I’ve written, and I’ve received some gratifying praise for the strength of those characters. Here’s the thing, though: I write thrillers. People are running for their lives while keeping Armageddon at bay. The moral dilemmas faced by my female characters are the same as those faced by my male characters, and I’m always sure to give them important tasks to perform. My primary character, Jonathan Grave, is male (obviously), but there are a lot of strong ladies on his support team.
I also write a lot of young characters, adolescents, and here’s where I’m careful to write only about boys. I’ve been one of those, and I’ve raised one, so I’m reasonably comfortable in the head space of a young man. That said, I would never attempt to write from the point of view of an adolescent female, a decision that was confirmed while reading THE HUNGER GAMES. Oh, my God, could Katniss possibly have been more clueless and self-absorbed? The whole romance element seemed contrived from the beginning, but with the revolution depending on her, all she could do was whine. She pissed me off, but that kind of angst clearly resonated with her largely adolescent female audience.
Speaking of romance, I think that’s the mine field of cross-gender writing. (I suddenly have this image of a guy writing in a dress–I don’t mean that.) I’m of a certain age, and I know that even after thirty years of marriage, I still can’t read the romance tea leaves very well.
John, you know that image you have–the guy writing in a dress? Please scroll up and check out the photo I posted for you.
Norb,
I remember when I wrote DAMAGED, and had to confront my fear about writing a male police officer, because I wasn’t a) male or b) a police officer. I spent a lot of time interviewing police officers, and trying to understand the culture of the organization. As I wrote the character, he developed his own frustrations, ambitions, and desires — and I worried no longer. I think as writers we are often mining our own experiences and observations about the men and women we have encountered, and thus it can be more about a personality type reacting to a certain situation rather than a gender-specific reaction, although there are elements of both.
John, I agree that writing adolescent characters is tricky. I am the mother of two teenage girls, and I am constantly reminded of how different their reality is from mine. I did venture into male adolescent territory with one of my books, because there was a father/son conflict that I had witnessed and understood, and I expanded it for a suspense plot. It is actually one of my favourite plots, and his character is one which I carry close to my heart.
Thanks, Norb, for an interesting discussion. Might I recommend Elle magazine as another reference for when you are researching your female characters? It has a fairly broad demographic appeal, ie. both my older teenage daughter and I enjoy thumbing through it.
I’m a week late, but I’d still like to contribute to the ghost of this conversation. I think the answer to this question is a resounding, “Yes”. Think individuality. What two people are exactly the same? We as a species are designed to make quick decisions based on limited data, which is rooted in our survival instincts. So we take this limited data and develop, or assume, preexisting stereotypes to serve as defaults. We generalize groups of people, and predetermine how we think they look, act, and think such as- Men are masculine, and women are feminine. But again, what two people are exactly the same?
I think it’s safe to write as a character of a different race, social group, or sex. The key to making them relevant is to make them relevant. Give them substance. There’s no one thing that all women would avoid doing, so there are no pitfalls to avoid. You can’t write a character wrong, because you are their creator. And rest assured that any character is in some way believable as long as they are presented as a complete being, and not simply as a two dimensional collection of stereotypical traits.