JANE TAYLOR: ANTIHEROINE

by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

If you look around the internet, you can find a variety of definitions for 'antihero' or 'antiheroine,' some of which are rather involved. For simplicity's sake, I'll go with the one from Webster's Eleventh: "a protagonist or notable figure who is conspicuously lacking in heroic qualities." There. That sounds like a good person to hang out with, doesn't it?

Hanging out with characters in books - for some readers, that's what it's all about. You'll hear certain readers say, upon occasion, "I couldn't stand X book because I hated the main character." Just like some readers don't like books written in first person or don't like books written in present tense - or the opposites of those things, or any number of variables - there are readers for whom, unless the protagonist is someone they can cozy up to, someone they'd want to be friends with or even emulate, all is lost. It's valid. Hey, it's important for people to know what they want in books and there are times when the lack of likability in a main character is problematic for even those of us who don't mind or even embrace unheroic characters; some stories, after all, depend on reader sympathy to work.

Of course, if we made likability the sole criteria for protagonists and their books' worth, some pretty notable characters would need to be thrown out, Scarlett O'Hara and Ebenezer Scrooge among them - the former is a self-absorbed witch-with-a-B, while the latter is the Grinch in a top hat.

But for those of us who like variety, in our reading and our writing, thankfully there are those who embrace the antiheroic.

I've written more than my share of problematic characters in my time and none more so than Jane Taylor from my debut novel, THE THIN PINK LINE. At the beginning of the novel, Jane thinks she's pregnant. When she experiences positive reinforcement for this from others, and when her live-in boyfriend doesn't seem too bothered, she's thrilled. So when it turns out she's not pregnant, not wanting to lose the feelings she's found, she figures she'll just get pregnant...quickly. And when that doesn't happen in time, and for one reason and another, she decides to, oh, you know, fake an entire pregnancy.

OK, I admit it: Jane is spectacularly antiheroic. In fact, she's the most self-absorbed, misguided, borderline-sociopathic character I've ever created.

And yet, for some - by no means all! - readers, she works. Yes, for those who insist on likability, she's never going to work, despite some authorial sleight of hand: 1) shifting the mirrors, so that her family's even worse than she is and her coworkers aren't much better; 2) investing her with a best friend who readers do love and who loves Jane unconditionally, despite that he's the only one who sees all her warts clearly, knowing her better than she even knows herself.    

I didn't create Jane Taylor so that people would want her to move next door to them. I didn't create her so she'd give readers a warm, fuzzy feeling inside. And I certainly didn't create her so that anyone would try to emulate her by trying on a fake pregnancy of their own. I created Jane Taylor because I thought she was interesting, also because I thought it would be fascinating for me to see just how she manages to pull off - if she manages to pull off! - the insane task she's set herself.

Because that's the thing, isn't it? For those of us who don't mind problematic protagonists? Sure, it's nice if some protagonists are heroic. But not everyone has to be a role model. In the end, as a reader, I simply want characters who are interesting. I simply don't want to be bored.

If you want to check out just how crazy Jane is, so you can judge for yourself, for the next 24-hours-ish, THE THIN PINK LINE is just 99 cents!

So, how about you? Who's your favorite antihero/heroine?

Lauren Baratz-Logsted is the author of over 30 books for adults, teens and children. Visit her at www.laurenbaratzlogsted.com or follow her on Twitter @LaurenBaratzL 

Premise and Publish

by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

This cycle at GBC, we're talking about where our premises come from and the changes in the publishing climate. Being the Type A personality I am, I figured I'd tackle both.

"Where do your ideas come from?" is one of the most frequent questions writers get asked. My typical answer is: The Idea Fairy. Seriously, though, my ideas come from everywhere: from things that happen to and around me, from the news, from things that happen to other people. Something happens and lightning strikes in the form of: "I think there's a whole novel in that!"

A few examples:

- My debut adult novel, The Thin Pink Line, 22 books ago. Finding myself pregnant after 10 married years in which I never thought I'd be pregnant, rather than writing the predictable story that you'd think would result - married woman finding herself pregnant after 10 years and what ensues, told in an earnest fashion - my crazy mind said: "I know! I'll write a dark comedy about a sociopath who fakes an entire pregancy!"

- My most recent YA novel, Little Women and Me. My daughter and her best friend had just read the original Louisa May Alcott novel and we were discussing what they thought of it. What they thought lined up with my own memories of the book: that is was great but that That Thing That Happens To Beth was upsetting and that The Boy Next Door winding up with the wrong March sister was annoying. So I decided to write a novel about a contemporary teen who time travels into the classic novel only to discover that in order to get back out again she'll need to change one of those things.

- The Sisters 8 series for young readers, which I created with my husband and daughter. We came up with the idea for this when we were snowbound in Crested Butte, Colorado, back in December 2006. Well, if you were snowbound for 10 days with no TV, what would you do? You'd probably brainstorm a nine-book series about octuplets whose parents go missing one New Year's Eve!

- Finally, there's The Bro-Magnet, the ebook I released back in December about an ultimate man's man who's been Best Man eight times when what he secretly longs to be is a groom. Here's how that one came about: My husband, Greg Logsted, is a novelist by night and a window washer by day. One day he told me about washing some guy's windows with his crew and how every time he goes to this guy's house, the guy says, "Let's go skiing sometime"; "Let's do this"; "Let's do that." It occurred to me that this was not the first time in the 28 years I've known him that I'd heard something like this: some guy, barely even knowing my husband, wanting to bond and become buddies. This particular instance happened right around the time the word "bromance" entered the lexicon strongly - you'd hear people applying it to TV shows like "House" or films like the Sherlock Holmes version Robert Downey Jr starred in. Suddenly my brain went poof! like it always does when I have an idea for a new book. Those ideas always begin with "What if...?" In this case, it was "What if there was an ultimate man's man, a guy that other guys actually fight over to get him to be Best Man at their weddings, but he secretly longs to be a groom?" And of course the hero of this book would be THE BRO-MAGNET.

So that's where the premises for a few of my books have come from.

As for the current publishing climate, the other day Joe Konrath let me take over the megaphone at his popular blog so I could talk about my experiences with e-publishing and you can find that post here.

So how about you all? Where do your premises come from and what do you think of the new publishing climate?

Be well. Don't forget to write.