I’ve been asked why I write a male character, many times.
And I’m not alone in writing a character of the opposite sex. My good friend, New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Michael Prescott writes primarily female characters. Tough, strong, witty, smart female characters, like the star of his Bonnie Parker series. He’s got millions of copies in print, so clearly, whatever he’s doing, it’s working.
Is there a barrier to thinking like someone of the opposite sex? I guess it depends on the person. People are all different from one another, but in many ways men and women aren’t all that different at all.
Of course that depends a lot on upbringing, religious beliefs, their station in life, whether or not people have been cossetted and loved, raised strong, or been abused. Those things can happen to males and females, depending on where you live and what religion you belong to. But people are people, and the tiny shoot of green in their souls will handle even terrible experiences, all according to who and what they have become as individuals.
In this short story, Cyril Landry stands up for the little guy on the racetrack backside.
As an author, I just see people as people. I take into account their experiences. For instance, my character Cyril Landry was a Navy SEAL. He grew up on the horseracing circuit in a trailer with his brothers and sisters. There were aspects of Cyril Landry I understood to begin with, and parts of him that became real as I wrote him. And since individuals are individuals—he is what he is.
What’s nice for me (and I suspect this is the case with both male and female characters who write opposite-sex protagonists) is there’s just the tiniest bit of separation there, which, conversely, makes a writer feel unfettered. I can go all the way with a male character. There aren’t the bonds on me that came from kindergarten and grade school and high school and yes, Catechism; all the little signals that tell a child they need to conform to a certain norm.
In many ways, it’s a relief to write a male character. There are not as many “shoulds” and “shouldn’ts”
Which is a big reason why I enjoy writing the opposite sex. Cyril Landry lives.
