Archive Tag:characters

Drabble 71 – Finifugal

Finifugal
Scheherazade by Sophie Anderson

When I was a kid, I never questioned that so many stories my family told me were about young girls also named Melissa. It’s not an uncommon name; surely there were all these girls, just about my name, running around and having adventures somewhere out there.

I got a little older and started reading stories myself, and found that there were far fewer little girls having adventures in them than I’d been led to believe. Lucy and Susan got to participate, but not to the extent that Peter and Edmund did. I loved Millie, but Christopher was the star of the show. So many girls my age relegated to background roles, love interests, kidnapping victims.

Except Lyra, of course, who lied so well it became part of her name. Lyra who got to be the hero, who befriended armored bears and witches and traveled through dimensions because she was smart and capable and rash. Lyra was everything, even if I, myself, was nothing like her.

I savored His Dark Materials and hoped it would never end. It did end, of course, but the beauty of it was that I didn’t understand it at all. I’m still reading it, still processing it, still finding new things to appreciate. There are still stories to be found even in a text so intimately familiar to me.

Anyway, here’s a drabble.

Drabble 54 – Cosseted

Cosseted
Otavalo Fabrics by Mor

I’ve always been a character lover before a story lover–that’s not to say I can’t like both, only that a plot might make me pick up a book, but nothing but a good character will keep me reading. So while some people might have heads full of plot threads, I have bits of character just waiting for homes.

I’ve written about one before who still needs a story to tend to. There’s also a woman who owns a perfume shop with a sharp tongue and a knack for guessing your favorite scent with a glance, but it’s more than a knack. A detective who stumbles upon answers by pure luck and faith. A werewolf who only feels beautiful as a monster.

So many stories to tell, but I’m an impossibly slow writer. I worry that I won’t ever get them all down and they’ll die off, sick of waiting for me to get to work. I should probably stop writing this and start writing them, instead.

Anyway, here’s a drabble, a temporary home for a bratty prince.