# Do men write women well? & vice versa



## Basil Sands (Aug 18, 2010)

After commenting on a thread related to good books with female leads and written by female authors I got to thinking.

Do men write women well?

In my own books I have tried different approaches ranging from a strong female Alaska State Trooper who shares the spotlight with the male lead to a more feminine supporting character with romantic interest. The reactions have ranged as widely as the character's personalities from both men and women.

So what do you folks think? Do men, especially in typically 'male oriented' fiction, do a decent job of writing women?

And the corollary question, do women do well with male characters?

What authors do you think illustrate good in either way?


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## edwardgtalbot (Apr 28, 2010)

Hmm, good question, Basil.  I think it varies by author. In my favorite thriller of all time, The Eight by Katherine Neville, she does a masterful job with a male historical character Talleyrand.  But most of the leading characters are female.

I actually think most male-oriented fiction (which is just about all I read) doesn't have very good characters, period, male or female.  There just isn't much complexity that doesn't feel like it's in there simply for the sake of showing complexity.  I still love the stuff, but usually my favorite characters are sidekicks or characters that portray humor.  I can think of some exceptions of course - Daniel Silva's Gabriel Allon character is IMO extremely well-done. Some of Frederick Forsyth's characters have been as well. Philip Mercer in Jack Dubrul's first two books. And - this may be a surprising one - Perry Dawsey in Sigler' Infected really is done well I think, though Infected isn't completely what I'd call "male fiction"

To be fair, I think characters in thrillers and suspense in general mostly are not all that well done, ones written by women as well.  And still I love to read them, I wonder what that says about me


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## mscottwriter (Nov 5, 2010)

Wally Lamb is, imho, hands down the best male author to ever write a female character. When my friends and I read "She's Come Undone", we kept checking the back cover to see if he was *really *a guy!

My second choice would be for Stephen King. His female characters are amazing, and not just 'guys in skirts'.


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## SailorMerry (Dec 18, 2010)

Some can. Scott Westerfeld and James Patterson are the first to come to mind. And Joss Whedon, of _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_ fame, is also a male master of writing wonderful and realistic (as far as fantasy goes) women. Garth Nix is also really good at writing women, and if comics count, I like the female characters featured in the work of Alan Moore. One of my favorite books is _Memoirs of a Geisha_, though based upon extensive interviews, was an insightful look into the mind of women from another time and place by Arthur Golden.

The same applies for women writing men. Tamora Pierce, J.K. Rowling, Holly Black, Libba Bray, Meg Cabot, and many, many more come to mind- heck, the best relationship advice I've ever gotten came from Meg Cabot's books.


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## SuzanneTyrpak (Aug 10, 2010)

I thought of _Memoirs of a Geisha_ right away.

I think it's important for writers to get feedback from men and women--especially if they're writing in the opposite gender's voice. When I write in a male voice, I run it by the men in my writing group. I probably read more writing by women than men--I'm trying to remember books I've read where a male author is writing a woman's voice. Usually, women don't get much play in men's books or they're written with a lot of "male" attributes: tough, no nonsense. There's a guy in my writers' group who does a great job writing from female pov, but I think he's exceptional. Maybe that's changing. I hope so. Until recently, I don't think most male writers considered writing from a woman's pov. Women's roles were limited within society--and usually not terribly exciting.

Of course, that's no longer true.


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## R. H. Watson (Feb 2, 2011)

Off the top of my head, because it came up today in  conversation, I thing Peter Høeg's Smilla's Sense of Snow is a good example of a man writing a complex female character.


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## NogDog (May 1, 2009)

Of female authors that pop to mind right now (and I'm sure there are others if I think about it more), I thought Ursula K. LeGuin's male characters in the "Earthsea" books were generally quite good, and the couple books I've read so far by Lois McMaster Bujold in the "Miles Vorkosigan" seemed to hit the mark pretty well. I guess you could say in both cases that I didn't find myself thinking, "Hmm...obviously written by a female author," as opposed to some other female authors where I probably felt the way many woman do when reading testosterone-laden action books that target men. In my case it generally fell into either thinking certain male characters were too stereotypically sex-crazed idiots without anything resembling intellect (the male version of the dumb blonde?) or the opposite: the perfect, sensitive man who is at once tall, dark, handsome and "dangerous" and yet also a fantastic lover and great communicator (the male version of the spunky, man-in-a-skirt female heroine written by men?)

Conversely, there _are_ times when I'm reading male authors where I'm wondering to myself, "What do women readers think of that female character?" For instance, I love many of Terry Pratchett's female characters, who certainly span a wide gamut of ages and types, yet I still wonder from time to time what female readers think of them -- not because I necessarily think they are deficient, I just honestly can't really claim to have a good grasp of what women think.


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## Ben White (Feb 11, 2011)

I was told, a little while ago, to make my heroes male, because guys will identify with them and girls will lust after/write slash fanfiction about them. Nobody, I was told, wants to read about girls kicking ass.

And I thought, what a load of rubbish.

Except the advice was given by someone quite successful in the publishing industry, with years of experience to back up their opinion, and so I felt to discount it out of hand would be unwise. So I thought about it. And I thought about it. And I thought about it some more. I asked people about it. I read about trends in fiction, especially fiction aimed at young adults, and I looked at all the popular YA books, and it certainly seemed as if female leads were in short supply ...

And so after doing all of that I considered what this person had told me once more and I thought, they might actually have a point.

And yet still, what a load of rubbish.

Most of my characters are female, and I feel most comfortable writing female characters. There are a lot of reasons for this, but chief among them is that I love seeing girls kick arse, and quite frankly there's not enough of that in popular media--although I tend to love the exceptions.

Anyway. I haven't really answered the question, sorry. Um ... actually, rather than 'women not writing men well' or 'men not writing women well' I tend to look at authors as being able to create good characters or not being able to create good characters. I can't remember a specific writer about whom I've thought 'they really can't write men/women', more like 'these characters are _terrible_'.

I'll leave with one of my favourite bits from As Good As It Gets:

Receptionist: How do you write women so well?
Melvin Udall: I think of a man. Then I take away reason and accountability.


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

You know, I can't think of a writer, male or female, where I thought he/she was a good writer if they couldn't nail POV for both genders.  Does anyone have an example of what they considered good fiction where the author just couldn't write realistic members of the opposite sex?

I tend to think of Patricia Cornwell as a good example, once upon a time she wrote interesting, compelling male and female characters.  Then something happened and she stopped doing that.  But when she stopped doing that, she also stopped writing decent plot, endings, and mysteries.


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## SailorMerry (Dec 18, 2010)

KerylR said:


> You know, I can't think of a writer, male or female, where I thought he/she was a good writer if they couldn't nail POV for both genders. Does anyone have an example of what they considered good fiction where the author just couldn't write realistic members of the opposite sex?
> 
> I tend to think of Patricia Cornwell as a good example, once upon a time she wrote interesting, compelling male and female characters. Then something happened and she stopped doing that. But when she stopped doing that, she also stopped writing decent plot, endings, and mysteries.


I've read some comics that had good stories, but dreadful female characters. I've generally found that comics that illustrate women to look like porn stars have similarly terrible character portrayals (and is part of why I don't read a lot of mainstream American comics).


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## Larry45 (Feb 7, 2011)

I read a lot of crime/suspense fiction, and I personally feel that a good female author  - one that builds characters who talk like a man talks, do what a man does and think like a man thinks - does a better job of building an opposite-sex character than a male author.  That is, I think women know men better than men know women.  I'm currently reading a Tami Hoag novel called "The Alibi Man," and while her main character is a tough, gritty female, the villains are a bunch of rich guys, one in particular, who think they can get away with anything.  I've known guys like that, and the way Tami builds those characters, she is right on the money with their talk, their actions, their personalities...everything.  I've read some Nora Roberts and Patricia Cornwell stuff that feature excellent male characters as well.

Of course, there are some male authors - James Patterson comes to mind - that do a great job of developing female characters.  But by and large, I really do feel that men do not understand women as much as women understand men.  And that basic lack of understanding can't help but apply not only to real life, but to literary life as well...


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## maryannaevans (Apr 10, 2010)

Arthur Golden clearly has this nailed, since I also thought immediately of _Memoirs of a Geisha_.

I once had an interesting conversation on this subject with Corbin Berensen. (He was Arnie on _LA Law_, with quite a few other nice things on his resume.) It was a chance meeting, because I don't often brush elbows with celebrities. We were both guests on the noon news in Birmingham, Alabama, along with some other guests who were far closer to me and my level of non-fame than to him and his familiar face. I remember that there were also a Little League coach and a Humane Society volunteer in the room.

Anyway, when the Humane Society lady got out of the chair next to me and took the dog in her lap, so that they could be on TV, Mr. Bernsen sat down and started making conversation. He asked me about my book and told me what kind of books he liked to read. I was a little tongue-tied, but the conversation eventually wound around to acting and book-writing, and I realized that there were some similarities. When I write a male character (or a character of a different race or an elderly character or an evil character), it's similar to an actor preparing to portray a character very different from himself or herself. I ask myself where this character has been and what his or her life has been like up to this point, then put myself in the character's shoes, asking "If I'd lived that life, how would I behave?

Of course, writers have to take this process a step further, because we have to write the dialogue, too. We have to ask ourselves, "If I'd lived that life, what would I say?" I didn't exactly come out and say that my job was harder, so I didn't insult the famous Mr. Bernsen, but I might have been thinking it.


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## R. H. Watson (Feb 2, 2011)

ScaryMerry said:


> I've read some comics that had good stories, but dreadful female characters. I've generally found that comics that illustrate women look like porn stars have similarly terrible character portrayals (and is part of why I don't read a lot of mainstream American comics).


Like you said, if you avoid the mainstream, there are comics with well-developed female characters. You probably know these but in case others don't, a couple of good ones written by men are, Y-the Last Man by Brian K. Vaughan. The story starts when a mysterious plague wipes out all the males on the Earth, at least all the mammalian males, except one 20-year-old kid and his pet monkey. The other one that comes to mind is Fables by Bill Willingham. All the characters from the world's fables are driven from their homelands and forced to live in the modern human world. Regardless of gender or animal form, they're all complicated and flawed characters.


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## Eric C (Aug 3, 2009)

I think it's true that in general terms women understand men better than vice versa; but authors are a self-selected group, the canaries in the coal mine of society, to paraphrase Kurt Vonnegut, and I think they're as a group better at understanding women than men in general.

Just one recent example: the author of the award-winning mystery, The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, is a geriatric male, whereas his lead character, Flavia de Luce, is an 11-year-old girl. Huge hit nonetheless!

To tell you the truth, I have read fiction written by women in which their male characters have struck me as ridiculous, as women in boxers.

That being said I personally put twice as much effort into making my female characters believable in my own novels. I grew up with brothers!


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Basil Sands said:


> After commenting on a thread related to good books with female leads and written by female authors I got to thinking.
> 
> Do men write women well?
> 
> ...


Ok, I'll be frank and offend. Mostly, no, because most men still don't think women are actual, real human beings. There are exceptions but the number of men who write really good women is still relatively small.

Edit: Some women write men better than others, of course. Some don't do it well at all. But I think _in general_ women do better writing men.

You wanted an example. Well, I happen to like L.E. Modesitt, Jr.'s novels. He builds interesting worlds with interesting magic systems and puts a lot of thought into the philosophy behind his work. His women pretty much suck. They're cardboard cutouts, one and all but his male characters are interesting. I read him anyway, but I do wish he could write women.


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## SailorMerry (Dec 18, 2010)

R. H. Watson said:


> Like you said, if you avoid the mainstream, there are comics with well-developed female characters. You probably know these but in case others don't, a couple of good ones written by men are, Y-the Last Man by Brian K. Vaughan. The story starts when a mysterious plague wipes out all the males on the Earth, at least all the mammalian males, except one 20-year-old kid and his pet monkey. The other one that comes to mind is Fables by Bill Willingham. All the characters from the world's fables are driven from their homelands and forced to live in the modern human world. Regardless of gender or animal form, they're all complicated and flawed characters.


Yeah, Fables is a pretty good series. It's kind of funny, how even though the writer and artist are very rarely the same person, there really is a correlation between how well female characters are portrayed and how they're drawn. Fables, anything by Joss Whedon, and anything by Alan Moore- the women are (relatively) realistically drawn and are well-written characters. As for the more recent comics in the Marvel and DC universes... Ew. In my experience, by label alone, Dark Horse and some of the less-mainstream DC imprints (like Vertigo) are the best when it comes to female characters. That's not always the case, but in general, that's what I've noticed.


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## mscottwriter (Nov 5, 2010)

You know, I feel very comfortable writing from a male POV, but what I struggle with is writing from a perspective of a person of color.  I also am not sure about writing about someone who has a disability, such as a blind character or a character in a wheelchair.


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## jason10mm (Apr 7, 2009)

Well, I don't read female authors much, but there are certainly plenty of male authors who can write female characters that seem to align with my own opinions about how women might behave. Admittedly, like JRTomlin suggests above, I have a mildly misogynistic view of females, at least in the type of fiction that I like to read where a female who can smash up 300 pound thugs, is devastatingly attractive yet a world renowned genius in her field, and can become supermom on a moments notice rings a bit false yet is about the only counter-archetype to the usual females populating male fiction who exist merely to satiate the hero's lust or motivate him to assault castles or what not. But I think that plenty of male authors can write females just as complex as their males. George R. R. Martin springs to mind, as does Peter F. Hamilton. Martin keeps his women off the battlefield (with one or two notable exceptions well supported by backstory) to focus on the political arena and Hamilton uses technology to compensate for physical limitations, which allows women to participate in rousing adventures equal to the men. Stephen King certainly has many female fans and I'd think they'd call him out if he wrote females badly.

In the female written fiction I have read there are many male characters that are just dimwitted foils for the female leads wit, serve as trophies for her to acquire, or are so hell bent on chewing scenery and twirling moustaches that they achieve little character depth. So perhaps it is more of a function of the genre than the author? In order for the main character to shine, all the supporting characters gotta be a bit dull in comparison.


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## Tom Schreck (Dec 12, 2010)

I believe an author can write either sex in they focus on universal emotions. When authors start making assumptions that men or women think, feel and behave like such and such then we're likely to get a cliche.

Not all women are obsessed with shoes--not all men are incapable of expressing emotions.

In fact i think its most interesting when characters don't align with our conception of their sex.


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## Mike D. aka jmiked (Oct 28, 2008)

jason10mm said:


> In the female written fiction I have read there are many male characters that are just dimwitted foils for the female leads wit, serve as trophies for her to acquire, or are so hell bent on chewing scenery and twirling moustaches that they achieve little character depth.


Well, maybe they are getting back at us males for the hundreds of years of female characters being the dimwitted foils. Can't say I blame them.

Mike


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## Teagan Rand (Feb 17, 2011)

I think it depends on the character. It's easier to write about things that both genders share than about the things that are different. One thing that does sometimes come up and that can be really problematic is when authors write their grudges against the opposite sex, which is the ultimate straw-man argument.


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## anguabell (Jan 9, 2011)

There doesn't seem to be that many contemporary authors whoud would be able to raise above there personal bias and cliches as far as the "opposite sex" is concerned. There are few exceptions, though.


R. H. Watson said:


> Off the top of my head, because it came up today in conversation, I thing Peter Høeg's Smilla's Sense of Snow is a good example of a man writing a complex female character.


This is the first book that came to my mind as well. 
There are some good female characters in Galsworthy (like Fleur in A Modern Comedy). Regarding J.K.Rowling, it is difficult for me to determine whther or not Harry is a realistic character - that's probably hardly a point


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## Amanda Brice (Feb 16, 2011)

mscott9985 said:


> Wally Lamb is, imho, hands down the best male author to ever write a female character. When my friends and I read "She's Come Undone", we kept checking the back cover to see if he was *really *a guy!


I was just going to say this! I was totally convinced that "Wally" was just a nickname and that the author was a woman. I was literally shocked.


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## Randy Kadish (Feb 24, 2010)

Flaubert created Madame Bovary. Tolstoy create Anna Karenina.

When I create a three-dimensional woman character I do it the same way I create a male character.

IMHO, men and women have the same character defects - fear, greed, self-hatred, etc - and also the
same strengths - courage, generousity, self-worth.

Generally, I start creating by looking within, at myself, then by looking without, at other people.

Randy


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## Basil Sands (Aug 18, 2010)

I think many of you hit it right on the head. Write character traits that are common, and create the person within context. A writer makes the mark when their characters, male and female, seem alive on the page. One thing too that I have noticed, is that the reader's perspective on the world will also shape the sound of the character's voice and thereby build the person. Which is why every gets a different mental image of the same scene in a book.

But the task for the writer is to create a scene with enough detail to evoke certain very specific images that the reader can build upon. Then the character's reaction to those elements will help define the vitality of that person, and their sex.


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## KerylR (Dec 28, 2010)

So, what do people mean by guy in a skirt or girl in boxers?  

I completely get the idea of a two dimensional character sketch as being a problem when writing the opposite sex, but I'm not sure I get the above complaint.  What's wrong with 'tough' women or 'sensitive' men?


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## QuantumIguana (Dec 29, 2010)

There's nothing wrong with tough women or sensitive men, or vice versa. Now, if all the women all the women are portrayed in a certain way, and all the men are portrayed in a certain way, then it gets to be a bit of a problem. There are so many ways to write a tough character. Sometimes the tough character is written as a broken character. That's fine, there are people like that. Toughness doesn't have to be belligerance, but of course it can be. The toughest people I know are like an iron fist in a velvet glove. They know they are tough, and don't generally feel the need to display it. But when they do...

And the sensitive man doesn't have to be written as someone who weeps at every sunset. I think the key is to have a good variety among characters who have some traits in common.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

QuantumIguana said:


> There's nothing wrong with tough women or sensitive men, or vice versa. Now, if all the women all the women are portrayed in a certain way, and all the men are portrayed in a certain way, then it gets to be a bit of a problem. There are so many ways to write a tough character. Sometimes the tough character is written as a broken character. That's fine, there are people like that. Toughness doesn't have to be belligerance, but of course it can be. The toughest people I know are like an iron fist in a velvet glove. They know they are tough, and don't generally feel the need to display it. But when they do...
> 
> And the sensitive man doesn't have to be written as someone who weeps at every sunset. I think the key is to have a good variety among characters who have some traits in common.


I agree with all your points here. Some women are tough either emotionally or physically or both. Some men are sensitive. Others are on a continuum in between.

By the way, for a woman writer who in my opinion writes men very well, and writes great tough women also, is Elizabeth Moon. I strongly suggest her _The Deed of Paksenarrion_ world in which she just brought out a new novel--_Kings of the North_--with an excellent male main character. Her science fiction is also great either in the space opera mode of _Vatta's War_ or the more serious Nebula winner _Speed of Dark_.

I really do think that the trick to writing both men and women is to look at the characters as individuals. They aren't, or shouldn't be, stereotypes of 'what men are' or 'what women are' because there is no such thing.

Edit: I think the "men in skirts" is more a function of objecting to women who aren't stereotypes than anything else, but some people do go overboard in trying to make women tough. A tough woman doesn't have to be tough all the way through. She can still love her mother or her cat.


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## Ben White (Feb 11, 2011)

KerylR said:


> So, what do people mean by guy in a skirt or girl in boxers?
> 
> I completely get the idea of a two dimensional character sketch as being a problem when writing the opposite sex, but I'm not sure I get the above complaint. What's wrong with 'tough' women or 'sensitive' men?


I think the problem might be that some writers would take "She's a women, but she's tough!" or "He's a man, but he's in touch with his _feelings_" as a complete description of the character--no attempt to flesh them out further. Kind of the Hollywood producer approach to character building  "Here's the pitch. She's a tough girl, he's a sensitive guy. They fight crime!"

Actually, I read something a while ago, I think it may have been by Alan Moore, talking about early attempts at adding depth to characters in comics--it was just the addition of the word 'but', like "He's a bad guy, BUT he helps people in trouble!" or "She's sweet and innocent, BUT one of the deadliest assassins in the world!". Which can actually work, in a less sophisticated story--sometimes two-dimensional characters can be kind of fun. You see this a lot in Japanese games, comics and cartoons, very broadly defined characters with extreme characteristics, and yet they're often used to great effect and become memorable because of this.


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## mscottwriter (Nov 5, 2010)

I also think that it depends on what kind of book you're trying to write.  If you are writing an espionage thriller or a crime book, then it makes sense to write about a woman who is tougher than average.  Like in "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo".

But if you are writing an American slice-of-life novel, then a kick butt woman may not be the way to go.  As a soccer mom, I rarely, if ever, kick butt.


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## James Everington (Dec 25, 2010)

Seriously? People still seriously wonder this in 2011?

Madame Bovary
Equal Rights
The Hours
Jacob's Room
Anna Karenina
Wuthering Heights
Gerald's Game
Possession
On Beauty
Smilla's Feeling for Snow
Morvan Caller
Frankenstein
Women In Love
etc.
etc.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

James Everington said:


> Seriously? People still seriously wonder this in 2011?
> 
> Madame Bovary
> Equal Rights
> ...


All very true and a very good list. But there are also those loathsome novels you left off your list where the poor little dear can't lift a sword or just loves an abusive boyfriend. Or the other side and I'll let any guys who care to post their least favorite male stereotypes.


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## QuantumIguana (Dec 29, 2010)

I remember listening to an episode of Phillip Marlowe, and he talks about meeting with some friends and spending the evening playing charades. That's just a character being a human being, and being more than just a charicature. It's refreshing, too often, characters are identical with what they do. Soldiers, for example, are often written as being something other than regular people, but in reality, they are basically like everyone else. I'm old enough to remember Barney Miller, and what I liked about it was that the police weren't supermen, they were just people doing a job that could be alternately boring and dangerous. They had the same interests and problems as anyone else.

The "tough chick" can be as awkward on a first date as anyone else. The sensitive guy doesn't have to be sensitive all the time or about anything. The tough guy can be a whiz at changing diapers (no pun intended, but I'm not changing it!) We all have different aspects of our personality that come out in different times. What is interesting is when we see a side we don't often see, for example when we see the person in a context that we don't normally see them. The drill sergeant may be Mister Rogers when he gets home to his kids.


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## Mark Feggeler (Feb 7, 2011)

Some can, some can't.  Those that can typically are the better writers to begin with.  Note I said better, not most successful.


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## edwardgtalbot (Apr 28, 2010)

KerylR said:


> You know, I can't think of a writer, male or female, where I thought he/she was a good writer if they couldn't nail POV for both genders. Does anyone have an example of what they considered good fiction where the author just couldn't write realistic members of the opposite sex?
> 
> I tend to think of Patricia Cornwell as a good example, once upon a time she wrote interesting, compelling male and female characters. Then something happened and she stopped doing that. But when she stopped doing that, she also stopped writing decent plot, endings, and mysteries.


Agree about Patricia Cornwell on all counts. However, I can name loads of writers who right what I consider good fiction who don't do great with characters of both genders (in some cases not of either gender). The problem here is the definition of good fiction - as far as I'm concerned, good fiction is something that I can't put down. Which means early Clive Cussler is good fiction and Jane Austen isn't. But of course Cussler doesn't do female characters worth a darn and his male characters are not deep either, while Austen is a master at characterization (within certain limits of her era).

You see my point. It's all in how you define good fiction.I've read books that I thought were excellent, that I would recommend to others who are huge thriller fans, that had mediocre writing, mediocre characterization, and had a lot of cliches. I suppose if the definition is a book that "most readers" would consider good, I agree that you have to nail your characters.


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## Basil Sands (Aug 18, 2010)

mscott9985 said:


> I also think that it depends on what kind of book you're trying to write. If you are writing an espionage thriller or a crime book, then it makes sense to write about a woman who is tougher than average. Like in "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo".
> 
> But if you are writing an American slice-of-life novel, then a kick butt woman may not be the way to go. As a soccer mom, I rarely, if ever, kick butt.


Good point. In my book 65 Below the main female character is an Alaska State Trooper, of Korean ancestory, and I tried really hard to have her be similar to many actual female cops I know and still want to be feminine in the eyes of the man she loves (while kicking bad guy butt). Totally made person and everyone said she was a favourite character. In the book that followed, Faithful Warrior, the female lead is an FBI technical analyst, not a butt kicker, who is very feminine and was entirely based on a real person in a similar job and folks thought she was a bit too Barbie-ish.

I still scratch my head on how to get it right. Guess you can't for everyone.


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## QuantumIguana (Dec 29, 2010)

The poor little dear who can't lift a sword is real, there are a lot of people who can't use a sword. But that character might not be all that interesting, and if all the female characters are "poor little dears", than it's a problem. But you can have a PLD and make her interesting. A PLD who couldn't lift a sword, smiles sweetly, but is so very good with a dagger can be an interesting character.

Now, the character who stays with an abusive lover is unfortunately real, but even less interesting than the PLD. Such a character would be a poor protaganist.


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## Thalia the Muse (Jan 20, 2010)

I don't think a person who can't lift a sword is automatically a Poor Little Dear. There are more ways to be strong/tough than muscle power -- The Usual Suspects is a fun little illustration of that.


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## QuantumIguana (Dec 29, 2010)

Now I'm trying to imagine Kaiser Sosay as a poor little dear. But characters who are a lot more than first impressions tell you are so much more interesting, the person who is more dangerous than he or she looks, the football player who secretly loves poetry, all interesting.


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## bobdev (Dec 7, 2010)

One reviewer of my psychological horror novel WALKING WOUNDED (which will be Kindle-ized next year) started her review with, "Robert Devereaux writes like a woman . . ."

I have never felt so complimented!


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## R. H. Watson (Feb 2, 2011)

QuantumIguana said:


> Now, the character who stays with an abusive lover is unfortunately real, but even less interesting than the PLD. Such a character would be a poor protaganist.


Of course, I'm immediately thinking about how to make that person an interesting protagonist.


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## QuantumIguana (Dec 29, 2010)

R. H. Watson said:


> Of course, I'm immediately thinking about how to make that person an interesting protagonist.


It would work if the protagonist at the end dumped the abusive lover, that's not uncommon. But it would be a real challenge to have a protagonist who stays with an abusive lover. I realize you don't have to wrap up all of a character's problems at the end of the book, but such a protagonist might feel like fingernails on a chalkboard, the reader might be screaming at the character to dump him. The book would seem to have to be at least semi-tragic.


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## Emma Midnight (Feb 19, 2011)

I think in general women tend to be more interested in how men think than men are interested in how women think. Women tend to think about relationships more. I mean, how many times have you heard of a man being surprised when the woman tells him the relationship isn't working? Happens all the time.


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## Joseph Robert Lewis (Oct 31, 2010)

It's a question of whether the author really cares about characterization to begin with (versus plot, for instance). I think it depends a lot on genre and stereotyped expectations for that genre. 

I've heard authors of men's fiction defend their leering heroes and compliant ladies with statements like, "This is real. This is how I act, and how the women I know act." 

So I think there are a number of self-fulfilling cycles within the genre pools.


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## Brian Arthur Levene (Feb 19, 2011)

_--- edited... no self-promotion outside the Book Bazaar forum. please read our Forum Decorum thread._


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## Aaron Pogue (Feb 18, 2011)

This is an issue I've thought about a lot. I started out writing high fantasy (when I was in high school), and my experiences were based on the pop fantasy of the late 80s and early 90s, so it shouldn't be too much of a surprise to know that my first novel came with a whole host of rugged, adventurous, capable fellas, and a handful of damsels in distress (and not really much of anything in between).

When a female friend criticized that, I first defended it as genre convention, and then accepted that I couldn't write female characters, and then spent about five years writing novels with virtually no female characters at all.

Life experience is a great teacher, though. Marriage and some years actually paying attention to the women in my life helped, and I finally outgrew that. I've had several people tell me my new female protagonist is a very well-written woman.

But then just this week I read Patrick Rothfuss's _The Name of the Wind_ (traditional high fantasy), and one thing I loved about it was his portrayal of the female characters. Because it _is_ that same damsel-in-distress model for nearly every female character in the book, but within the narrative he clearly establishes that the story is being told from the point of view of the 15-year-old boy placed in the position to be a storybook hero, and he (an older incarnation of the narrator) explicitly calls out the stereotype as being true from the narrator's POV but not a terribly accurate portrayal of women in real life.

It's an example of a male author not even _trying_ to write a good (realistic) female character, and it's brilliant.


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## Nell Gavin (Jul 3, 2010)

mscott9985 said:


> Wally Lamb is, imho, hands down the best male author to ever write a female character. When my friends and I read "She's Come Undone", we kept checking the back cover to see if he was *really *a guy!


That was EXACTLY the example I was going to give! Another example is "Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All" by Allan Gurganus.

If I were to encapsulate, I think I would say that badly-written women (by men) are very Stepford, usually. Badly-written men (by women) are soap opera types who emote their feelings to each other over coffee.


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## SpecOps (Feb 20, 2011)

Sure-- it's fiction.  Wally Lamb writes women as well as anyone.


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## Bob Mayer (Feb 20, 2011)

Jenny Crusie and I wrote three books together. She wrote the female lead and I wrote the male lead. To be honest, her character did some things I still don't get. That's the way the male-female relationship is. But I think men can write female characters and women can write male characters. It's fiction.

_--- edited... no self-promotion outside the Book Bazaar forum. please read our Forum Decorum thread._


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## Guest (Feb 21, 2011)

Emma Midnight said:


> I think in general women tend to be more interested in how men think than men are interested in how women think. Women tend to think about relationships more. I mean, how many times have you heard of a man being surprised when the woman tells him the relationship isn't working? Happens all the time.


While women might tend to think about relationships more, and look for those aspects in fiction more, I don't think men are less interested in how women think. In fact, there's evidence from psychological studies that demonstrates that men are better able to grasp the interests of women (who need a much better handle on what they themselves want because they are most often the ones doing the choosing).

I've never written a story with a male protagonist. Women are just perpetually more interesting to me. Not saying I won't ever, but this is what I've gravitated toward thus far.


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## Iwritelotsofbooks (Nov 17, 2010)

As a member of a male female writing team, we've found Lacy writes men a lot better than Kevin writes women.


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## Jon Olson (Dec 10, 2010)

I think men often write women characters that are generically attractive -- thin, single, man-hungry. It's a nice fantasy, but not much like the women I know, or at least think I know. But it's hard, because women often write men that way, too -- thin, hunky, woman-hungry. Truth and variance is tougher. I think Jonathan Franzen's Freedom does a pretty good job of portraying wildly differentiated women characters.


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## Tom Schreck (Dec 12, 2010)

I sometimes wonder if a reader sees a male name and then assumes they can't write as the opposite sex. I've heard there a plenty of men writing romance and erotica under female names to counteract exactly this...


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## JenniferErickson (Dec 3, 2010)

A good male friend once recommended a fantasy series to me.  I went out and got the first book.  In chapter one, the strong female lead gets gang-raped by, like 20 men. Then, a few hours later, she makes love to the guy who saves her, and of course, the sex is wonderful!  No mention of intense emotional and physical pain, or anything like that. The author was male, but not all male authors are that clueless.
I love reading about a strong heroine, though.  And there are different kinds of strength that a woman can have.  She doesn't necessarily have to be tackling bad guys and cutting off their balls with swords.  She could be the matriarch holding the family together, or the mother saving her child, or the successful career woman.  In my latest novel, I write about a woman who is in love with her emotionally abusive boyfriend. Yes, you heard me.  She's one of those...But my intention in doing this was to show how an intelligent, strong woman could delude herself in matters of the heart. Then, as she starts to get a little bit a perspective, the ass-kicking begins (mostly his ass).


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## Thalia the Muse (Jan 20, 2010)

I can think of at least one acclaimed novel about a woman who stays with an abusive lover -- Sophie's Choice, by William Styron. Although whether Sophie is a well-written female character has been a matter of critical debate.


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## Ben White (Feb 11, 2011)

JenniferErickson said:


> A good male friend once recommended a fantasy series to me. I went out and got the first book. In chapter one, the strong female lead gets gang-raped by, like 20 men. Then, a few hours later, she makes love to the guy who saves her, and of course, the sex is wonderful! No mention of intense emotional and physical pain, or anything like that.


Oh, FAR OUT. That's the sort of thing that could get you to take up book burning as a hobby.


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## Carolyn Kephart (Feb 23, 2009)

foreverjuly said:


> I've never written a story with a male protagonist. Women are just perpetually more interesting to me.


Interesting. 

I wrote my novel with a male protagonist and mainly male secondary characters because you guys simply amaze me. I couldn't make you up...but I tried anyway! (According to most, I got it right.)

CK


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## Carol (was Dara) (Feb 19, 2011)

Basil Sands said:


> After commenting on a thread related to good books with female leads and written by female authors I got to thinking.
> 
> Do men write women well?


I think it depends on the author. Robin Hobb (one of my favorite fantasy authors) does an awesome job of writing men IMO, even though she's not one. On the other hand, I let my hubby read her books and the first thing he said was, "You can tell a woman wrote these". Whatever that's supposed to mean.


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## Guest (Feb 22, 2011)

Carolyn Kephart said:


> Interesting.
> 
> I wrote my novel with a male protagonist and mainly male secondary characters because you guys simply amaze me. I couldn't make you up...but I tried anyway! (According to most, I got it right.)
> 
> CK


Haha, you're definitely overthinking it. That's our trick.


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## Carolyn Kephart (Feb 23, 2009)

foreverjuly said:


> Haha, you're definitely overthinking it. That's our trick.


Rofl.

For the record, it was my Hub, a quintessential man's man, who suggested The Ryel Saga's new cover (based on the prime mover of the story, who's all girl). We'll see if it's an improvement over the dude-with-sword design. 

CK


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## SpecOps (Feb 20, 2011)

I see a lot of romance novels have Navy SEALs or Green Berets or some other high speed type of hero.  The reality about special operations is that it's 99% boredom and 1% excitement.  Also, a big difference between SEALs and Special Forces.  SEALs tend to be younger, in better shape.  Green Berets tend to be older and use their head more than their body.


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## Carolyn Kephart (Feb 23, 2009)

SpecOps said:


> I see a lot of romance novels have Navy SEALs or Green Berets or some other high speed type of hero. The reality about special operations is that it's 99% boredom and 1% excitement. Also, a big difference between SEALs and Special Forces. SEALs tend to be younger, in better shape. Green Berets tend to be older and use their head more than their body.


The 99% makes for great fiction. _From Here to Eternity_, _Reflections in a Golden Eye_, and _Tunes of Glory_ come immediately to mind.

[Edited to note that all were stories that became movies. I haven't read _Tunes of Glory_, but plan to now thanks to Wiki.]

CK


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## Basil Sands (Aug 18, 2010)

JenniferErickson said:


> A good male friend once recommended a fantasy series to me. I went out and got the first book. In chapter one, the strong female lead gets gang-raped by, like 20 men. Then, a few hours later, she makes love to the guy who saves her, and of course, the sex is wonderful! No mention of intense emotional and physical pain, or anything like that. The author was male, but not all male authors are that clueless.


Was this some kind of S&M manual?  Sounds like the author should be slapped a bit.

I think it is usually obvious, as in this case, when an author is basing their characters on some fantasy image that wholeheartedly not based on experience or event a modicum of research. But, there is always a market for crap out there so the stuff keeps getting made by and sold to idiots. It's a self perpetuating cycle.

I imagine that author doesn't have many lady friends.


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## easyreader (Feb 20, 2011)

For a man to understand a woman is breaking the genetic code or perhaps unlocking the secret of the universe.  A man just has to respect a woman and treat her as a somewhat alien creature who could destroy us with their death ray.  Surrender is always the best route.


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## Basil Sands (Aug 18, 2010)

easyreader said:


> For a man to understand a woman is breaking the genetic code or perhaps unlocking the secret of the universe. A man just has to respect a woman and treat her as a somewhat alien creature who could destroy us with their death ray. Surrender is always the best route.


Or as a current semi-popular you-tube character is known to say when approached with such a difficult question:

*I'm Old Gregg!!*


_
If that didn't make sense...don't worry...it doesn't_


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## Whatever (Feb 21, 2011)

I believe so.  She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb.  Every female friend I have says he caught the point of view of a woman perfectly.


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## Jenni (Feb 20, 2011)

I've been told I write likable men and not so likable woman. Not exactly sure what that means, but I do find myself struggling to write the female protagonist. 3 of my 4 full length romantic suspense novels the protagonist was the hero, no the heroine. My current WIP the protag is female and my first beta reader struggled with her likability factor in the beginning. 

Other than in my own writing, I don't pay attention. If I don't have a character issue when reading, it doesn't matter the sex of the author, it's just well done.


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## Jenni (Feb 20, 2011)

Whatever said:


> I believe so. She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb. Every female friend I have says he caught the point of view of a woman perfectly.


Well, now I have to go buy the book and read it!


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## coffeetx (Feb 12, 2011)

Ben White said:


> I'll leave with one of my favourite bits from As Good As It Gets:
> 
> Receptionist: How do you write women so well?
> Melvin Udall: I think of a man. Then I take away reason and accountability.


hahaha....Ok when I saw this thread I have to admit this was the very first thing that came to my mind. It's one of my favorite movies and this scene is probably the most hilarious. I had a feeling that someone would have thought the same thing!


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## maryannaevans (Apr 10, 2010)

Wasn't there also a scene where Helen Hunt asks, "Why can't I have a normal boyfriend?" and her mother says something like, "Honey, this is as good as it gets."

Wise words...


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## Bob Mayer (Feb 20, 2011)

A female assassin and a housewife must track down the secrets of the men who were in their lives in order to save their own-- that was what started me on Bodyguard of Lies.
I remember when we first started recruiting women into covert ops.  Helped with cover in foreign countries, but also they brought talents that were needed:  language, perception (guys can't find anything in the fridge if it isn't in front) and a host of others.


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## Dan Holloway (Dec 18, 2010)

One of the highlights of my writing life was receiving a review for Songs from the Other Side of the Wall from the CEO of Yuricon, who publish lesbian fiction saying "Dan's writing is convincing - Szandrine is mature for her 17 years, but still 17. Her poetry, songs and writing ring absolutely dead-on true for her personality and age...a great read. Thank you Dan, for being brave and sending me this book. And for writing women well. " 

I think the key is not, as too many writers who don't carry it off think, seeing people as universals - "we're all human" - we're not - but neither are we "men" and "women" - the key is that we are all individulas - forget labels and write the character would be my answer.

Which writers do it exceptionally? Elfriede Jelinek writes men very well, as does Val McDermid; I think Murakami writes women exceptionally


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## *DrDLN* (dr.s.dhillon) (Jan 19, 2011)

I think women write fiction that involves lot of emotions better than men.  And men write better the nonfiction where lot of scientific facts and logic is involved.

It has to do with right and left brain dominance, IMO.


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## Gordon Ryan (Aug 20, 2010)

Basil, I thought your Alaska State Trooper in _65 Below _ was quite well written and maintained her position of authority against the strongest male counterparts. Positioning her against SEALS and Marine Recon macho men gave her quite an obstacle to overcome.

A female book reviewer for Meridian Magazine, Jenny Hansen, who has reviewed hundreds of books over the years, gave me perhaps one of my most enjoyable lines in her review of _State of Rebellion_.

_". . . Fast and enthralling. Dialog is real. Presents a truly strong female character who is still feminine. _ 
*--Jenny Hansen, Meridian Magazine *

What more could a male author, trying to depict a strong, yet feminine female lead, ask?

Gordon Ryan


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## Zackery Arbela (Jan 31, 2011)

One could make the argument that you basically write what you know...that goes for gender as with anything else....


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## *DrDLN* (dr.s.dhillon) (Jan 19, 2011)

Zackery Arbela said:


> One could make the argument that you basically write what you know...that goes for gender as with anything else....


There is no yes/no answer. I have off the topic question: How did you add red color in your signature profile. I tried but must be doing something wrong. Thanks.


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## SCPennington (Sep 29, 2010)

Interesting forum. I love getting into the heads of both my male and female characters. Though the males are often more fun. But I've noticed that the male writers in my group tend to stick to their male character points of view and leave the female characters as _distractions_ who don't really add much weight to their plots. Along this conversation line, though, one of our members introduced a bit of as fun site called Gender Genie. {I don't think I'm allowed to give the url on Kindleboards, but if you Google _Gender Genie_, the site should come up.) You insert a snippet of your ms into a dialogue box and the Gender Genie predicts the author's sex. Anxious to test the site, I inserted a male character's scene. The genie said the writer was male.

Being a 62 year old mother and grandmother, I was elated.

Sharon


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## Julia444 (Feb 24, 2011)

This really depends on the author for me; I've read books with opposite-gender POV that worked just fine; I could forget that the hero was a man and the author was a woman or vice versa.

However, some authors really don't pull it off.  I'll give two examples:

First, I read SATURDAY by Ian McEwan.  I recommend the book, because in many ways it was fascinating--like being inside someone's brain in a stream-of-consciousness sort of story.  However, without spoiling anything, there is a scene in which a woman is treated badly, in a physical sense, and let's just say that the assumption of the author is that she would get over it quickly--almost immediately.  I'm convinced that a female writer would have suggested that it would take her a great deal of time to get over the incident.

Another example is HOW TO BE GOOD, by Nick Hornby.  Again, a neat book, and a writer that I admire--but I often found his female narrator to sound inauthentic--that is, not reacting the way I would expect a woman to react to certain events.  I could feel his maleness within the female voice, and it was distracting.

I would still read books by both of these authors, but those are two recent examples that stand out.

Julia


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## pixichick (Mar 1, 2011)

I would say it depends on the man  Robert Parker's Sunny character is pretty good. I thought he did a great job with her.

_--- edited... no self-promotion outside the Book Bazaar forum. please read our Forum Decorum thread._


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## easyreader (Feb 20, 2011)

Tell me if the girl chained to the tree in the middle of the woods in Lost Girls isn't realistic?  Or if Clyde Edgerton in Rainey doesn't capture his protagonist well?
A writer can write people.  Yes, there are gender differences, but there are people differences too.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Could someone please shoot this idiotic thread and put it out of its misery.


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## Moissanitejewel (Mar 17, 2011)

Yes, they can. I became friends with a writer through some writing sites and they have been picked up for publishing. That author wrote a story so great, I chatted with them for some time. It was a different type of romance, sweet but not overly sexual with muscle chests or anything. It had plot, feeling, one of my favorites. It wasn't until one day I used the 'she', and found out it was a 'he'.

Painted me red.


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## APStephens (Jan 2, 2010)

For me, at least, when I was in my teens and early 20s I tried to avoid putting in too many female characters into my work. I guess when you are younger, one might have a hard time understanding the opposite sex. So when I would write females, they would come off a bit like tomboys or one-dimensional. 

Now that I am older, I understand women better and have an easier time writing them into my fantasy tales. That, and when you are married and have a female editor, etc., it comes easier to write these specific roles and I can always ask questions if I need to know how a woman would react or what a woman might do in a particular situation. 

And it also comes down to practicing your craft, studying the people around you, and asking questions.


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## Bailey Bristol (Mar 22, 2011)

Generally, I would say "no". Sorry, fellows! But a notable exception is ARTHUR GOLDEN, author of MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA. I can still recall my incredulity at discovering a MAN had written it. The depth of understanding of the female responses, fears, hopes, was quite remarkable. I kept flipping back to the "about the author" blurb to reaffirm that yes, the book had actually been written by a man.

So now I will not say it's impossible for a man to write women well. But in my experience, I would have to say Athur Golden was a stellar success among a gazillion stunning failures in that particular regard.  BUT! BUT! BUT! Never, not even once, has that kept me from enjoying the magnificent stories of all my favorite male authors who have kept my Kindle brimming with great, awesome reads! Thank you men. You still rank among my heroes.

Bailey


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## Stephen T. Harper (Dec 20, 2010)

My next book is going to be a detective story, told first person pov from the female lead.  Not only female, but a very quirky and funny female with a lot of problems.  I will say that as a writer, getting into the head of the opposite sex deeply enough to narrate 1st person is an amazing exercise of your imagination and skills as a story teller.  It's a real world story, so you think you know your way around , but you really need to stretch to find the authenticity of a voice that simply couldn't be your own in real llife.  Writing this character has been an amazing experience and the most fun I've had writing in a while.    

I tested out the first three chapters with a writers group of 6 women, and me... and it it went over very well.  Their praise for how real she seemed to them was probably the best compliment I've received.  I felt like I had passed a big test, because honestly, as a male writer, it can FEEL right, but you can't KNOW until you hear real feedback from real women.


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## DanDillard (Mar 10, 2011)

Sure, except in romance novels where everyone is "less than realistic?"... I think many times a character that is written from that outside perspective might be more realistic. Our perspective of how the world sees us is filled with uncertainty.


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## J.C. Fiske (Mar 27, 2011)

This topic made me laugh. The first thing I thought about is, "As Good as it Gets" when the receptionist asked Melvin, "How do you write women so well?" To which Melvin replies . . .

"I think of a man, and take away reason and accountability," 

Ouch! I'm sure the same could be said for a woman writing a man though.


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## The Real McCoy (Oct 8, 2010)

In the UK there are plenty of male saga writers who not only write good female characters they write books for women under women's names, and quite successfully. I think the Bronte Brothers started it back in the 19th century, well, all except Branwell. He thought it was a bad idea and look where it got him.


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