I Want to Create Heroines

 
Back in 2002 when I decided I was going to start writing again–really writing, this time–I looked at the world around me and decided that I wanted to write about heroines.
 
Why? A couple reasons.
 
First, at the time, Harry Potter and a lot of very similar male leads of very similar YA novels seemed to have the hero thing covered. This is still true today.
 
Second, and more importantly, at the time, my little girl was about 6 months old. I wanted to write something she could read (eventually). I wanted to write about girls and women who were, in the parlance of Joss Whedon's Firefly/Serenity, Big Damn Heroes. Because that's what I want her to grow up to be.
 
My daughter is over nine years old now. She's been waiting impatiently for GoSH1 for about a month. When I finally hand her my Kindle with an ebook draft, I expect she'll finish it, all 60K-ish words, in one marathon, stay-up-late reading session.
 
It's possible she reads faster than I do. Since early December when I gave her a copy of The Girl Who Ran With Horses, she's read that book twice. Plus reading all seven of the Harry Potter novels (for the third time). Plus reading the entire 18-book series of The Warriors. Plus a lot more.
 
She definitely reads books faster than I could ever hope to write them. Even if I had gotten more stories and novels done between 2002 and now, she would have already read through them.
 
I'm looking forward to hearing what she thinks of my three new heroines in GoSH1 (I'm almost finished, I promise!), and I'm looking forward to thinking up new adventures for them. And I'm looking forward to creating even more heroines: good, bad, and angry.
 
-David
 
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