Creating Females Characters

Female Characters

Reading the blogs of Kate Elliot, an author, I came across an eye-catching article, “Writing Women Characters as Human Beings.” Given that I wrote about a female protagonist in Baggage burdens. I felt obliged to see Jill measured up.

  As one might suspect from Kate's title, she begins with an arching recommendation: “write all characters as human beings in all their glorious complexity and contradictions.” After offering a couple of disclaimers, she elaborates on her foundational statement.

Kate’s first suggestion is to create opportunities for women to talk to each other. They like to talk, a lot. This becomes especially true if the protagonist lives in a hard shell patriarchal society. Kate goes so far as to suggest the story should have many female tertiary characters, those that do little to advance the story.

Throughout Jill’s life women are important. Because of Jill’s father’s drunken behavior, Jill naturally gravitates to females. It starts in high school. Robin is her best friend. After Jill runs away from Dave’s place, Jill goes to Gramma Maxwell for help. While Jill only knew Josey, her grandmother for two months, their time together leaves an indelible mark on Jill. For the short time that Jill lived in her grandmother’s Brampton mansion, Jill took in two female renters. Mary, owner of the bakery in Camrose, becomes so close to Jill, that Mary is like a mother. That relationship becomes more important when Jill moves into a very conservative, rural setting. Jill accepts Rebecca, a farming neighbor, as godparent to her children. Ann, Mary’s sister, opens the door to Jill joining Ann’s church and the Sunday school staff, all females. Here Jill’s talents are treasured. She blossoms like the first spring flower. Ann also introduces Jill to Jill’s cousin, Julie. Julie turns out to be a lifeline to restoring a connection with Jill’s grandmother and restoring Jill’s self esteem.

Another suggestion from Kate is to have secondary female characters as energetic participants advancing the plot. In addition those secondary characters should also exist for themselves. I read that to mean that they also have a life of their own with their own goals. It also means showing some of their negative traits. In Baggage burdens. these conditions are present. Mary, Jill’s Camrose employer, has an uncanny knack of siphoning the latest news from her bakery customers. That glorious know-it-all image she willingly sacrifices for her husband when his health suffers. While Josey’s paramount interest is her family, she is an energetic church participant and successful business investor. Julie, Jill’s cousin earns the trust of both Josey and Jill, but then Julie finds she must break faith with each of them. Amber, Jill’s second child, loves her parents, brothers and sister but also has a passion for art.

Do any of the female characters of this novel sound like you want to meet them and know more about them?

One might ask, what about the males? They are the subjects of the next blog. Expect to find them complete with glorious complexity and contradictions.