Writing A Series: Heroines

Here's Part II of what I affectionately call How a Pantser Writes A Series Proposal And Somehow Sells It Without Having Any Idea What She's Doing.

You will quickly see that while putting together a proposal for the Mystery Men minsieries I had no idea who the heroines of books #3 and #4 would be. Oh, the proposal included potential heroines for each story, along with plots and backstories. Those potential heroines just didn't end up being the actual heroines in either book. As yesterday's post showed, neither did the plots.

The heroine in LOCKED AND LOADED (Book #3) is Maddie. In Book #4, THE BIG GUNS, the heroine is Sela. Maddie is a WitSec participant whose identity and whereabouts have been leaked by someone within WitSec and she's now in danger. Sela is the assistant to the Recovery Project's nemesis, Trevor.

Maddie: When I originally wrote GUNS AND THE GIRL NEXT DOOR (Book #1), I had talked about three WitSec ladies whose identities were leaked and said they were all dead. Then I went back and killed off two and didn't mention the third. It was while I was writing GUNNING FOR TROUBLE (Book #2) that I realized a the perfect heroine for Adam for Book #3 would be a tough, had-to-fight-to-survive woman on the run from her past and from a person who thought getting money for her information was more improtant than keeping her alive. The is-Maddie-dead-or-not a thread throughout GUNNING FOR TROUBLE. By the time I got to the halfway point of writing the book, I knew who Maddie was, how perfect she would be for Adam, her background and issues, and the entire plot of LOCKED AND LOADED…but I didn't really have a clue before then.

SELA: She was an even bigger surprise. I never intended to have an assistant for Trevor who played any sort of role in the series. I had completely written GUNNING FOR TROUBLE when I realized an assitant for Trevor might work well in the final book and edited the book to add Sela here:

Trevor didn't bother with sitting at his desk because Russell wouldn't be staying long. If he harassed Sela again, he wouldn't even be allowed in the building. Good executive assistants were hard to find and Sela Andrews was exceptional. Trevor wasn't about to start a new employee search and waste his investment in training her simply because Russell couldn't control his temper.

That is the only role Sela plays in the series until she pops up again in LOCKED AND LOADED. That time I knew she was the perfect heroine for THE BIG GUNS and for Zach. She also plays an important role in making Trevor, a guy who is not so nice, seem human. Or at least I hope she does. But she didn't start out as any of those things. When I wrote the initial proposal, I had this in the proposal for THE BIG GUNS:

On the run and in trouble, Sela has many secrets, including the one she can't disclose to Zach no matter how much she grows to care for him – her participation in the Witness Security Program.

This is the only mention in the entire proposal of WitSec. As you know by now, the entire series turned out to be about a WitSec conspiracy but this is the only thought I had about WitSec when I wrote the original proposal and, honestly, I had no idea where this backstory was going to fit in with the series. I then started writing the first book and decided WitSec was the key plot point. I didn't give Sela a thought until the moment after GUNNING FOR TROUBLE (Book #2) was done and realized I wasn't sure how the series was going to end. Then Sela-the-corporate-assistant appeared and Sela-the-WitSec-participant was gone from my mind, and I added that one paragraph (above) mentioning her.

I always knew who the heroines for Holden and Caleb would be. Some aspects of the stories changed as I wrote, but Mia and Avery were clear in my head, especially the former-lovers aspect of Avery and Caleb's relationship and the collision course feel of Holden and Mia's. I'd like to pretend the heroines for Zach and Adam were as clear from the start, but they weren't. Part of me thinks I had to "get to know" the guys before I could figure out who would work best for them as heroines. Despite the delay and all the changes, I do think Sela and Maddie are the right ladies for these men. I just took the long way getting there.