I finally put up the blurb on my home page for Dragon Blues (which will be available within a week!). A member in one of my writers groups read it and said that my heroine, a martial arts expert who’s killed two abusive men, reminded her of Dexter from the TV show. Though my heroine isn’t a serial killer, both she and Dexter only kill men who deserve it.
That made me glad for two reasons. One, that I succeeded in making my heroine a sympathetic character. Two, it gave me a blog topic for today.
These last two years or so, I’ve noticed that there are more heroines who kill. One of my favorites is Gin Blanco from Jennifer Estep’s Elemental Assassin urban fantasy series. Gin is an assassin for hire, but her targets are mostly monsters and she has a “no pets, no children” policy. That makes me like her right off the bat.
In Enemy Lover by Karin Harlow (aka Karin Tabke), her hero is a former special ops sniper who’s become a killing machine. The heroine is just as dangerous. But I was rooting for both of them. And I was for sure rooting for the really bad guy to be killed.
Other characters acting badly that we like are rakes. I have no idea why, but we especially like it when the rake reforms for the heroine.
Jewel thieves. We like them, too. Not breaking into jewelry stores in the local mall, but stealing from the obscenely wealthy. Usually a crime in which no one is hurt. Except insurance companies. I don’t know about you, but it’s hard for me to feel sorry for insurance companies.
In real life, I want anyone who hurts children, pets or women to be hurt themselves. In fiction, I want them to suffer. Or just to be killed.
What fictional characters acting badly have you admired or thought were very well done?
