All the Other Shoes
Writing is hard. Writing well is harder, but so very worth it.
I'm focused primarily on my biography series these days, but I have some fiction ideas that I think about when I get the chance. I've been reading some of my never-finished and unpublished work, too. Some of it is good, and makes me think I should go back to it sometime. The Eyes of the Enemy was put on hold twice, but still got finished and published. Maybe a couple of these other two stories can, too.
But some of what I read makes me cringe, either at something I did that I've learned not to do or at something I did that I haven't figured out yet. And something else, too - it's made me realize how nearly two years in Trump's America have changed me.
I'm a straight, white, cis-gendered man, and in America that means I'm the default setting. I could write every character as someone exactly like me, and that would be considered okay. And of course I've done that before. When you're just starting out, you don't know any better. I've been trying ever since Liberty Girl to do better, but I will always have gaps and blind spots. It's all about walking a mile in another person's shoes, but there are a whole lot of shoes out there.
In one of the stories I started a couple of years ago, my main character is recovering from a concussion, and so I asked a friend who'd had one before what that was like. I try for an "immersive" style with my point-of-view characters, so I wanted to know how the concussion affected their vision, what they felt, and so on. I was reviewing that manuscript this past week, and something suddenly occurred to me.
I can't recall ever reading a story where a female main character was having her period.
I mean, I'm not looking for graphic detail or anything, but we're talking about something that takes up a good-sized chunk of a woman's life, that can affect how she feels physically and what her moods are. You'd think someone would have mentioned it somewhere, even in passing or in a roundabout fashion. What's up with that? Are they worried about drawing the ire of conservative book-banners, or of grossing out potential male readers?
It just made me curious. Obviously, those are shoes I'll never be able to walk in. My migraines - which definitely affect my mood and thought process - are probably the closest I ever get, although I don't know exactly how close that is.
Writing good characters who are not like yourself is hard, but so very worth it. And more interesting, too. Can you imagine a world full of people just like me? I wouldn't be able to handle it.
I'm focused primarily on my biography series these days, but I have some fiction ideas that I think about when I get the chance. I've been reading some of my never-finished and unpublished work, too. Some of it is good, and makes me think I should go back to it sometime. The Eyes of the Enemy was put on hold twice, but still got finished and published. Maybe a couple of these other two stories can, too.
But some of what I read makes me cringe, either at something I did that I've learned not to do or at something I did that I haven't figured out yet. And something else, too - it's made me realize how nearly two years in Trump's America have changed me.
I'm a straight, white, cis-gendered man, and in America that means I'm the default setting. I could write every character as someone exactly like me, and that would be considered okay. And of course I've done that before. When you're just starting out, you don't know any better. I've been trying ever since Liberty Girl to do better, but I will always have gaps and blind spots. It's all about walking a mile in another person's shoes, but there are a whole lot of shoes out there.
In one of the stories I started a couple of years ago, my main character is recovering from a concussion, and so I asked a friend who'd had one before what that was like. I try for an "immersive" style with my point-of-view characters, so I wanted to know how the concussion affected their vision, what they felt, and so on. I was reviewing that manuscript this past week, and something suddenly occurred to me.
I can't recall ever reading a story where a female main character was having her period.
I mean, I'm not looking for graphic detail or anything, but we're talking about something that takes up a good-sized chunk of a woman's life, that can affect how she feels physically and what her moods are. You'd think someone would have mentioned it somewhere, even in passing or in a roundabout fashion. What's up with that? Are they worried about drawing the ire of conservative book-banners, or of grossing out potential male readers?
It just made me curious. Obviously, those are shoes I'll never be able to walk in. My migraines - which definitely affect my mood and thought process - are probably the closest I ever get, although I don't know exactly how close that is.
Writing good characters who are not like yourself is hard, but so very worth it. And more interesting, too. Can you imagine a world full of people just like me? I wouldn't be able to handle it.
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