Hi, all! My young adults fantasy book features 2 teenaged girls in the lead. The story is in the realm of Eragon. Do you think literary agents/publishers will shy away from it since fantasy is typically a male arena and they'll think boys will not be interested in reading about some girls? Also, do you know of any young adult fantasy books where a girl is the lead character.
Girls in Fantasy?
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1 - If your story is set in the world of Eragon, publishers will not want it, as that is fan fic. The realm already belongs to someone else and you need permission to use it. Good news - a few tweaks and a change of name and you should be right as rain
2 - Yes, fantasy has girls in it. YA fantasy with girl leads? Twilight
Not sure about YA, but in fantasy in general: Um, mine, um, oh yes, Graceling by Kristin Cashore, the Kushiel books, some of CJ Cherryh's, Sharon Shinn's and Robin Hobb's stuff. The Hunger Games. GRRM has several female POV's. Oh, wait, Tamora Pierce writes YA with female leads. Loads. It's maybe not 50/50 with male leads, but it's not at all unusual. Not trying to be rude, but maybe you need to read more widely?
2 - Yes, fantasy has girls in it. YA fantasy with girl leads? Twilight
Not sure about YA, but in fantasy in general: Um, mine, um, oh yes, Graceling by Kristin Cashore, the Kushiel books, some of CJ Cherryh's, Sharon Shinn's and Robin Hobb's stuff. The Hunger Games. GRRM has several female POV's. Oh, wait, Tamora Pierce writes YA with female leads. Loads. It's maybe not 50/50 with male leads, but it's not at all unusual. Not trying to be rude, but maybe you need to read more widely?
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In YA, there are MANY fantasy books with female leads. Have you read a lot in the genre lately?
Some books:
Graceling by Kristin Cashore
Sabriel and Lirael by Garth Nix
His Dark Materials trilogy by Phillip Pullman
Tithe by Holly Black
The Shifter by Janice Hardy
Tamora Pierce's Alanna series
Granted, these aren't all high fantasy, which I hear is a tough sell right now.
Always remember, if the story is captivating, the characters memorable, and the writing impeccable - you can sell just about anything.
Some books:
Graceling by Kristin Cashore
Sabriel and Lirael by Garth Nix
His Dark Materials trilogy by Phillip Pullman
Tithe by Holly Black
The Shifter by Janice Hardy
Tamora Pierce's Alanna series
Granted, these aren't all high fantasy, which I hear is a tough sell right now.
Always remember, if the story is captivating, the characters memorable, and the writing impeccable - you can sell just about anything.
What those above me have said. If your only exposure to YA fantasy is Eragon (which in and of itself is heavily derivative of other works and not very original), then you really need to go to your local library stat and start reading the books people have suggested. I'll add a few:
The Blue Girl, by Charles de Lint
The Dragonsong series by Anne McCaffrey
The Wee Free Men, by Terry Pratchett, and the sequels
A Wizard of Earthsea, by Ursula K. Le Guin (not a female lead, but a wonderful example of high fantasy and damn good writing.)
The Blue Girl, by Charles de Lint
The Dragonsong series by Anne McCaffrey
The Wee Free Men, by Terry Pratchett, and the sequels
A Wizard of Earthsea, by Ursula K. Le Guin (not a female lead, but a wonderful example of high fantasy and damn good writing.)
And Melissa Marr, and Aprilynne Pike, and Lisa Mantchev, and Maggie Stiefvater, and Margo Lanagan, and Justine Larbalestier...Walk up to the Border's YA fantasy section, choose a book at random, and chances are it will have a female MC! Hit up the library and get a stack of YA fantasy to read.
In fact, I just a couple of months ago sold a YA fantasy to Pyr Books with a female protagonist. So it's definitely not a problem.
(Funny thing is, I didn't actually write this book with the intention of writing a YA novel. It just turned out that way, barring a few very minor tweaks.)
But as others have said, unless you have official and legal licensing permission from the author, you can't just publish a book set in someone else's world. You'll need to remove or change everything from Eragon.
(Funny thing is, I didn't actually write this book with the intention of writing a YA novel. It just turned out that way, barring a few very minor tweaks.)
But as others have said, unless you have official and legal licensing permission from the author, you can't just publish a book set in someone else's world. You'll need to remove or change everything from Eragon.
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This is called fanfiction. As others have said, it is currently not publishable. But there are authors who have written fanfic and "filed off the serial numbers" as it were. Change the world into a creation of your own before you pursue publication. Or write something else
What, girls are only allowed in the fantasy realm of playboy???
Of course you can have female leads. From visual media- Buffy, Xena, Elektra, 1/2 the X Men (give or take), Alias (okay, not fantasy, but Jennifer Garner ftw!)
Oh, and Chaos Titan- Kelly Meding- has a female lead and has been signed on for more books. We've also got Gary Clarke, aka Celine Kiernan who has a female lead in her first book and also signed a major multibook deal.
Anyone telling you girls can't have a lead role is hatin'
Of course you can have female leads. From visual media- Buffy, Xena, Elektra, 1/2 the X Men (give or take), Alias (okay, not fantasy, but Jennifer Garner ftw!)
Oh, and Chaos Titan- Kelly Meding- has a female lead and has been signed on for more books. We've also got Gary Clarke, aka Celine Kiernan who has a female lead in her first book and also signed a major multibook deal.
Anyone telling you girls can't have a lead role is hatin'
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Paul
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sneaky_squirrel
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Female Lead? Heresy to the ancient code of fantasy writing, burn the document before it spreads!
I actually don't see why males wouldn't be interested, I think they would be even more interested than if the lead were male.
I actually don't see why males wouldn't be interested, I think they would be even more interested than if the lead were male.
Liosse de Velishaf
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I don't think they'd always be more interested, but I don't see why the wouldn't be either.
Depends.
Are they revealing the secret "girl things" that seemed to exist only as legend and rumor, decades ago, in my hormone-addled fourteen-year old boy-mind?
If there is even a hint of a smell of a nuance of a wisp concerning the sacred consuetude of "Girlhood", boys may be interested. Doubly so, if the girl they are pursuing hands it to them and says, "Read this, and call me when you're finished."
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sneaky_squirrel
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I haven't read many novels, but I figured a female lead would make different decisions than a male as well as have different solutions.
My bad - when I said "in the realm of Eragon" I meant the tone of the novel and that it's high fantasy as opposed to urban fantasy. Like Eragon, my story is set in a pseudo medieval time and Eragon is the only recent novel like that that I know of. Most fantasy seems to be set in modern day times (such as Twilight) which mine is not. My book's world has NOTHING to do with the world set by the author of Eragon. Sorry about the confusion!
Thanks for all the suggestions on recently published YA fantasy books with girls in the lead. It would be really awesome if some of them are set in "ancient" pre-medieval times. Like one poster said, high fantasy books aren't selling too much these days. If there are SOME selling, that means there is hope for me to get my novel published. I've got a lot of reading to do! Thanks, everyone!
Thanks for all the suggestions on recently published YA fantasy books with girls in the lead. It would be really awesome if some of them are set in "ancient" pre-medieval times. Like one poster said, high fantasy books aren't selling too much these days. If there are SOME selling, that means there is hope for me to get my novel published. I've got a lot of reading to do! Thanks, everyone!
I believe I cover these bases - not just 'cause me and my mommy think so!
I actually met a published author who read it and loved it and gave me a great recommendation letter. If only if I can get the lit agents to actually read the novel! They read the first 5 pages and tell me it's not compelling enough to ask for the rest. I'm trying to read those pages with a discerning eye and figure out how to get some spark in there...
Well, if it's a high-fantasy dragons 'n' knights series you want, then I'd say go for Tamora Pierce--any of her Tortall mini-series (Song of the Lioness, The Immortals, Protector of the Small) should be helpful.
All characters are different and make different decisions based on their personalities. Gender is a small part of that. And may not even make much difference, depending on the character.
!! Urban fantasy / paranormal romance is. Most other fantasy - that is, most of the genre as a whole - is not. Seriously. Read more.
Women read fantasy all the time. An entire imprint (Luna) was launched to capitalize on the fantasy/romance cross genre. I'd even say Urban fantasy exists primarily due to women readers.
As for the YA...
When I do school visits and books signings, half the people who bring me books are boys. The Shifter is for the MG market, so middle school boys are reading girl protags in fantasy, no doubt about it. Boys asks a lot of questions about the book, and they sit right up in the front row.
I was at a panel for a popular Canadian author several years back (I forget who) who wrote for boys. He said that boys will read girl characters, as long as there was a strong male figure they could also relate to in the story. (I have one, so this holds true for my book). They also prefer more action and a faster pace, especially at the beginning.
And here's another interesting thing I've had several middle school media directors tell me. If a book is getting a lot of attention, like Twilight, from the girls, the boys will ask for it to see what all the fuss is about. And many of them are getting just as hooked and asking for the rest. Love it or hate it, Twilight isn't something you'd associate with middle school boys, but they're reading that too.
As for the YA...
When I do school visits and books signings, half the people who bring me books are boys. The Shifter is for the MG market, so middle school boys are reading girl protags in fantasy, no doubt about it. Boys asks a lot of questions about the book, and they sit right up in the front row.
I was at a panel for a popular Canadian author several years back (I forget who) who wrote for boys. He said that boys will read girl characters, as long as there was a strong male figure they could also relate to in the story. (I have one, so this holds true for my book). They also prefer more action and a faster pace, especially at the beginning.
And here's another interesting thing I've had several middle school media directors tell me. If a book is getting a lot of attention, like Twilight, from the girls, the boys will ask for it to see what all the fuss is about. And many of them are getting just as hooked and asking for the rest. Love it or hate it, Twilight isn't something you'd associate with middle school boys, but they're reading that too.
This is something I've seen too. I used to work as a reading specialist in an elementary school, and boys were happy to read a well written female protagonist. It seems like a lot of them had a low tolerance for slow, overly descriptive beginnings in any genre where girls (in general) were more likely to slog through and see if things got more interesting.
Still mystified by Twilight though. The family I used to nanny for had a 12 year old boy who read the entire series and loved it. He even has a Twilight poster in his bedroom. The family I nanny for now has twin 12 year old boys. One liked the books and read them all. The other despises them and teases his brother mercilessly about it.
My novel has two FMC's and two MMC's. I've gotten love from both male and female readers over it, so it seems to be a good balance.
Personally, I can only enjoy a female lead character if she's useful and proactive in the plot. Luckily, that's happening a lot more now than it used to.
I got the impression that she meant there's a lot of urban fantasy swamping the market right now, so most popular fantasy books on the shelves are set in modern times. Which I'd agree with; epic fantasy, which I also write, isn't as prevalent as it used to be on the shelves.
On the writing site I've been at for a couple years, there are eighteen badly-written urban paranormal fantasy-romance stories for every one badly-written epic fantasy story. It's what the teenagers read/write, so I expect there'll be more published for them, in a self-fulfilling print cycle, until the next new thing breaks in and starts its own cycle.
Personally, I can only enjoy a female lead character if she's useful and proactive in the plot. Luckily, that's happening a lot more now than it used to.
I got the impression that she meant there's a lot of urban fantasy swamping the market right now, so most popular fantasy books on the shelves are set in modern times. Which I'd agree with; epic fantasy, which I also write, isn't as prevalent as it used to be on the shelves.
On the writing site I've been at for a couple years, there are eighteen badly-written urban paranormal fantasy-romance stories for every one badly-written epic fantasy story. It's what the teenagers read/write, so I expect there'll be more published for them, in a self-fulfilling print cycle, until the next new thing breaks in and starts its own cycle.
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