  Mystery
This week: Beware of Essie! Edited by: Arakun the twisted raccoon  
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Quote for the week: Where there is mystery, it is generally suspected there must also be evil.
~ Lord Byron
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| ASIN: B07N36MHWD |
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Has a fictional character ever annoyed you so much that you didn't finish the book? That has happened to me a few times, in spite of intriguing, fast moving plots and great action scenes. I gave up on those books because of a character type I call "Essie". I gave her this name because several words beginning with the letter "S" describe her personality: sanctimonious, self-righteous, selfish, spoiled, and stubborn. A few other words describe her as well, but I can't use them here!
Since all of the novels I stopped reading because of Essie were best sellers, I thought it was just me until I read these reviews by other readers:
"The main character was so bossy and ridiculously stubborn and just got in my nerves the whole book. I would have left her behind in the very beginning."
"As a woman, I was offended that the author had the audacity to attempt to foist off this harridan as a strong-willed woman."
"I thought she was one-dimensional, unkind, disagreeable, unsympathetic, and totally self absorbed...kinda what you'd expect in the antagonist of a novel, not the protagonist. I couldn't get past my dislike of the main character to determine whether I found the rest of the story engrossing or not."
As the last review points out, Essie was the main character of these novels, the person readers were supposed to cheer for and support. While a realistic protagonist will not be perfect, she probably should not make the reader want to throw the book across the room. When developing your main character, imagine spending a week with her. If you couldn't handle her for seven days, your reader probably won't care what happens to her enough to keep reading. I disliked the Essie characters in all these books so much that I started cheering for the bad guys!
Essie appears most often in romantic suspense thrillers, but she has become the scourge of other genres as well, including mystery, fantasy, sci-fi, and action/adventure. She is often billed as a "tough, independent woman," but she behaves like an immature child. Morally outraged by every little thing, Essie criticizes each move the male lead character makes. One Essie character turned her back on a male friend who was a cop in one of America's most crime-ridden cities because she learned he had shot three people in the line of duty. In her words, "I had no idea he was so violent."
Essie spends the entire story insisting she doesn't need the male character's help, but since she actually has no idea what she is doing, she inevitably goes off and gets in trouble. Just once, I'd like to see the hero leave her to her own devices, but of course, her risks his life to rescue someone who wouldn't have needed rescuing if she hadn't been so foolish and stubborn. At this point, his best bet would be to let the bad guys take her hostage. In a couple of hours, they would have been begging him to take her back!
Essie probably evolved as a backlash against the "damsel in distress" another literary trope who is just as irritating. Ironically, when Essie puts herself in danger she becomes a damsel in distress. Somewhere before the end of the book, if you can stick with it that long, Essie and the hero end up kissing. Some writers (and readers) apparently believe that people who are attracted to one another show it by constant bickering. Maybe they do occasionally, but real people usually outgrow it by about 6th grade.
One reason Essie is so annoying is that she gives strong women a bad name. Come on, writers, your stories deserve a better protagonist than this disgusting caricature of a strong woman. Tough, independent women are everywhere, and they don't act like Essie. If you need a model for a strong female character, just look at the women you know. You probably won't have to look beyond your own family, or if you are a woman, maybe even yourself.
Something to try: Write a mystery story with a female detective based on a woman you know.
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| |  | Invalid Item
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#1809912 by Not Available. |
| |  | Gun Hands (18+)
Miss Marple she ain't. P.I. Nita O'Day is way more a lady of action.
#1906190 by TomVee  |
| | | Invalid Item
This item number is not valid.
#1588184 by Not Available. |
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Mystery: June 19, 2013 Issue [#5735]
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