Today I added somewhere between 600-700 words to the new Spider-thief story. Still slower than I would like, but words are words. (And I've learned in the past that as long as I'm getting some new words with every writing session it's better not to worry so much about the quantity because it will even out. Eventually.)
The words from today finished up the final scene of the story, and continued to fill in the middle with my MC putting herself in danger in order to make certain she sees her alcoholic father before disappearing for an indeterminate length of time. Needless to say, stuff is about to hit the fan.
I have always liked writing strong female protagonists. (Though I have also written and sold a few strong male protagonists as well.) But I dislike writing women who are strong/smart/successful only because the men around them are weak/stupid/failures. To me that only reverses the inequalities that are frequently objected to in the male-centric SF/F/H. And, while there is sometimes a place for putting the shoe on the other foot so to speak, I don't find it very satisfying.
I like all my characters to be interesting and that means all of them have to have something to contribute. (And I should point out that I have no trouble reversing tropes, as evidenced in BRASS STARS.) It is never interesting to have a character (of any gender) seem smart/strong/successful only by comparison to the other characters. The challenge, of course, is in finding a balance between characters so that they complement each other.
Then again, that's part of the fun.
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