Petticoats & Parisols...or...Swords & Shields?

The past week was wonderfully productive. After writing out an outline for XIII's first book, I am pleased to announce that for the next month, I will plunge toward a disastrously high word count of 50,000 words. I realized late last night that if I did not give myself a cruel deadline, I would never put my story into descent prose, dooming XIII to remain in note-outline form for all eternity.

So...
After looking over my notes, I realized my protagonist's sister was interesting, but because of limited "screen time" came across as a trope character. As one of the few female leads, I wanted her to do more than just fill a slot in my protagonist's family. I wasn't sure exactly what I wanted, but I knew I did want to stay away from stereotypes: Warrior Queen, Maiden in the Tower, Priestess-Healer, Crazy Feminist Man-Hater etc. She needed to be believable, not a joke of herself.

To remedy this, I decided to split the novel between brother and sister, giving them separate but intertwined plot lines. But the sister still seemed a stereotype. In a last desperate effort, I wrote her as a male character, in the first person. After two or three scenes, I surveyed my work, changing all pronouns and names to reflect feminine gender. And that was when I discovered to my amazement-horror that the sister was suddenly fascinating and complex. Traditional masculinity displayed through dominance, decisiveness, logic and rationale, mixed with her mild femininity and innocence, all turned the little sister into a driving force of the novel.

I'm not sure what this says about my sensibilities, but I can say that I am very pleased with the results. Thoughts?

So say we all.
Bri

p.s. Thanks to Jocelyn, Charlie, Martin and Pam for the great brainstorming sessions in the wee hours of the morning.