by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
I have something of a celebrity crush on The New York Times‘ Jodi Kantor because she’s hot and tough as nails. She has a very specific personality that I would like to adopt — in some way — for my novel’s female romantic lead. And, yet, I am well aware that it would be very easy to for me to slip into a characterisation that would belie my real thoughts — I know Ms. Kantor probably wouldn’t be thrilled to be anywhere near someone like me.
So, I have to be careful.
I want to make my female romantic lead smart, attractive and tough, but I don’t want to make her so much so that it’s unbelievable that she would fall for someone influence by, well, your favorite loser, me, so she comes across as extremely cold and unlikeable.
As such, I may make the character a muddled mixture of Ms. Kantor and someone like, say, Alexa Chung. Or something. Some sort of hook that will allow me an in to soften the character some so *I* like the character. I don’t want my need to be mischievous on this issue blind me to the fact that, well, readers have to actually like the female lead and want her to hook up with the hero.
Yeah, I guess you could say I have issues.
