Where Are All the Plain Women?
At Polaris, we had an interesting panel on this topic. (Ok, with one panelist and a small handful of participants, it was more like a discussion led by Kenneth Tam. Let me share the description for this particular panel before I get into my musing and ranting:
"There are a lot of popular female characters out there these days, and what do they all have in common? Sex appeal. Charlaine Harris, Kelley Armstrong, Patricia Briggs, all of them have successful books, even series about women who are desired. Is it because books are less fun without sexual tension? Is it wish fulfilment for the reader? Or are there other reasons? Come discuss why you wouldn't want to read about an overweight ugly octogenarian who uses wisdom and intelligence to help change the world. Before anyone gets smug, make a list of your favourite male protagonists who fail to get the girl. Not a long list, now, is it?"
Firstly, I'd like to point out that I had a good laugh over the mention of Patricia Briggs in the write-up. I assume they're referring to her Mercy Thompson series, but for anyone who hasn't read it, Mercy is never written as a beauty. She's supposed to be rather average looking, actually. She's a mechanic, for Pete's sake. I mean, we all know how glamourous they are. She is physically fit, but considering the lifestyle she leads, both with her job and her tendancy to hunt down creatures that go bump in the night, she'd have to be. The same holds true for any hero or heroine of an urban fantasy. Let's face it, to kick a werewolf in the head, you have to be in pretty good shape. Being in good shape doesn't automatically make someone ridiculously hot, though.
Of course, we could all think of examples where a character's attractiveness becomes absurd and becomes distracting (*cough*Anita Blake*cough*). One of my annoyances with Jim Butcher's Dresden Files series is that every woman is super hot, including his buddy Michael's wife, who's had something like twelve children. But for every over-the-top example I can come up with, I can think of just as many characters who aren't described as being particularly attractive in the book, but when it comes to the cover art or even just reader perception, they suddenly gain about a billion hotness points. Which, I guess, is where we fall into the area of reader wish fulfillment.
So what do you all think? Are characters in books all really really ridiculously good-looking, or do most authors tend to keep their heads about that sort of thing? Would you rather read about pretty people or someone who's average?
And, uh, for the record? I'd kind of like to see a book about overweight ugly octogenarian who uses wisdom and intelligence to help change the world. Just sayin'.
"There are a lot of popular female characters out there these days, and what do they all have in common? Sex appeal. Charlaine Harris, Kelley Armstrong, Patricia Briggs, all of them have successful books, even series about women who are desired. Is it because books are less fun without sexual tension? Is it wish fulfilment for the reader? Or are there other reasons? Come discuss why you wouldn't want to read about an overweight ugly octogenarian who uses wisdom and intelligence to help change the world. Before anyone gets smug, make a list of your favourite male protagonists who fail to get the girl. Not a long list, now, is it?"
Firstly, I'd like to point out that I had a good laugh over the mention of Patricia Briggs in the write-up. I assume they're referring to her Mercy Thompson series, but for anyone who hasn't read it, Mercy is never written as a beauty. She's supposed to be rather average looking, actually. She's a mechanic, for Pete's sake. I mean, we all know how glamourous they are. She is physically fit, but considering the lifestyle she leads, both with her job and her tendancy to hunt down creatures that go bump in the night, she'd have to be. The same holds true for any hero or heroine of an urban fantasy. Let's face it, to kick a werewolf in the head, you have to be in pretty good shape. Being in good shape doesn't automatically make someone ridiculously hot, though.
Of course, we could all think of examples where a character's attractiveness becomes absurd and becomes distracting (*cough*Anita Blake*cough*). One of my annoyances with Jim Butcher's Dresden Files series is that every woman is super hot, including his buddy Michael's wife, who's had something like twelve children. But for every over-the-top example I can come up with, I can think of just as many characters who aren't described as being particularly attractive in the book, but when it comes to the cover art or even just reader perception, they suddenly gain about a billion hotness points. Which, I guess, is where we fall into the area of reader wish fulfillment.
So what do you all think? Are characters in books all really really ridiculously good-looking, or do most authors tend to keep their heads about that sort of thing? Would you rather read about pretty people or someone who's average?
And, uh, for the record? I'd kind of like to see a book about overweight ugly octogenarian who uses wisdom and intelligence to help change the world. Just sayin'.