Strong Women and Likable Characters

I was thinking about the fictionalized strong woman, recently. I consider myself to be a fan and supporter of strong women and humbly count myself among their number. I even have a Facebook group dedicated to strong women, so strong women—real and fictional—are near and dear to my heart.


The other day I was watching the movie Leap Year, and didn’t find the lead female to be particularly likable. I thought she was determined and spirited, but did I like her? Having seen it before, I knew by the end she'd be likable. Same with several Meg Ryan characters, notably Kate in Kate & Leopold, or Kate in French Kiss. And even Kristen Bell in When in Rome, Katherine Heigl in The Ugly Truth, or any number of Rom-Coms. Which right there is saying a lot. These strong women characters are so often portrayed in the romantic COMEDIES! (Okay, maybe I just notice it the most in Rom-Coms, when viewers are expected to root for the couple to end up together.)

I was wondering if I'd be able to tell when the gal in Leap Year became likable. What happened in the movie that made her relatable to me as a viewer? I think it was when she was running to make the train, in the rain, and fell down the hill and got covered in mud. This bedraggled woman showed me her humanity. She was torn down to the worst physical representation of a strong woman, and she broke down, but she still pulled herself together and moved forward. That made the respect I felt for her blossom into full-blown admiration, and from there I grew to like her.

Isn’t that what we do as strong women? It isn’t that we’re never down, never afraid, never broken. It’s that we get back up and move forward, often by ourselves, and make whatever has happened work for us. 

I just realized that a common factor in the movies I mentioned is that the women don’t have that bevy of girlfriends they can turn to for help and encouragement. These women are on their own, by their own design, and they deal with life on their own. They fall in love in spite of the men, and they don’t let the fact of that love get in the way of being strong. We like them by the end, and feel like they deserve the love of the man. But is it because of their strength, or their humanity and flaws?

This brings me to another question. Why does the strong woman have to be likable? How many times have you said, “Now there’s a woman I love to hate”? I’ve said that about plenty of male characters, and the actors who portray them. But women? At the moment, I can’t think of many. Mags Bennett in Justified. Cruella DeVille in 101 Dalmatians. I know I run into it more in novels. I like to think I’ve written a couple strong women villains, myself. (Angelisa in Last Second Chance, and Tawnia in the Bonnie Isles Trilogy.) But they're villains, not anti-heroes. Why aren't we expected to like strong women characters in movies and on TV?

I think we’ve been trained for it as a society. This great article by Caroline Siede on BoingBoing.net talks about this training as it relates to female politicians, specifically Hillary Clinton, and I won’t try to say it better than she does, or again, but I strongly recommend reading the article—whether you care about the politics of it or not.

I also challenge you to watch movies and read books while keeping your eyes on the female characters, and try to identify specific characteristics—not just physical traits. If she’s “strong,” what makes her strong? Do you like her? If not, why not? If she’s “weak,” how do you feel about her? Do you like her, or just feel sorry for her? Consciously look for the plot device that's designed to help you come around to liking her. See if you can recognize the manipulation. (Yes, the art of a good storyteller is in manipulation, so I guess I'm asking you to look at the "man behind the curtain.")

I would love it if you came back and engaged in a discussion with me about the likability of strong women. Do you see a disparity in how we look at men vs. women? Should we "get over" the bias against strong women?

In the meantime, I’m going to continue creating strong women characters, and challenge myself not to force them to be likable.

(Full disclosure: Most of the links in this post are Amazon affiliate links, and any purchases you make after clicking through on them will net me a tiny kickback.)

New Facebook group = What makes a Strong Woman?

I had something of an epiphany while I was at my sister’s house, after the Writer’s Conference. At the conference, I learned that I need to interact with people in my genre more, but I didn’t want it to be just about me, you know? I was trying to figure out how to encourage more interactions with people who, like me, enjoy a good suspenseful read with a strong female lead. Then it hit me: I could start a Facebook group for and about Strong Women in Suspense. 

It’s off to a pretty good start. We’re already up above 25 members (which was my 3 month goal) and having some lively discussions about what makes a strong woman, in life and in fiction. We’ve shared some inspiring stories of current and historical strong women. We’ve shared inspirational memes and held each other up to the light.

We’ve even shared a blog post from a man who is suggesting tips for dating strong women. After all, the group shouldn’t just be limited to women. There are men out there who encourage, support, and inspire strong women, and it was never my intention to be a hen party of women bashing men. (So by all means, if you know a man who wouldn’t be threatened by this group and would, in fact, contribute, invite him!)

I like to write my female characters as strong women. Maybe they won’t always start out as strong women, but by the end of their story arc, they will be. My stories may even have more strong women than weak, or I like the word undeveloped better. 

In my latest novel, I had two beta readers (out of four) say the teenage girls didn’t react realistically to the situation they were in. Part of me rebelled. How was the story supposed to move forward if all they did was scream and huddle together? Then I realized I was having a knee-jerk reaction to the perceived suggestion that my females were too strong, and I took a step back to look at it objectively.

I knew my girls were strong, especially the heroine, so what the beta readers were really telling me was that I hadn’t convinced them by showing why and how they could be so strong. Which led me to consider the kinds of things that make us strong.

First and foremost, education. In my book, Kylie is the daughter of a veterinarian, and her (single) mother brought her along when she’d go to special trainings, like disaster preparedness. In a small town where there isn’t a big hospital and most of the emergency crews are volunteer, it made sense to me that a vet, who has a base of medical training anyway, would want to be ready in the event of a tornado or a wreck on the highway. Janie isn’t the sort to just let Kylie sit in the car and wait. She was exposed to these clinics, and learned alongside her mother how to handle a crisis.

Second, I think, would be a loving and supportive family. Kylie’s dad only recently came back on the scene, but her mother was always there for her, as were her grandparents. She always had someone to look up to and receive love from. They encouraged her to be her own person, and even let her make her mistakes, but they were always there to love her.

This third element isn’t something every woman has access to, but Kylie grew up around animals that were larger than her. She learned to respect that size, but also not to let her fear of it control her. She gained confidence through the knowledge that she could work with a creature who outweighed her by hundreds of pounds, and bend it to her will. She learned that to give in to fear was to get trampled, hurt, thrown, and broken, and she learned to control her fear—not to say she never felt it, she just never let it control her.

I guess that could break down to learning about fear in general. I had a friend once who told me there are two kinds of people in the world. Those who are afraid and shut down, and those who are afraid and do it anyway. She and I were in the latter category, and so is Kylie.

What do you think makes women—or anyone—strong? What experiences have made you strong?