Wednesday Women: Randa Florez et al. by Kieran York

Today in the Wednesday Women, Kieran York and her leading ladies, among them Randa Florez from her latest release Astray. My apologies for being late today--tons of snow have messed with my schedule this Wednesday. But here's Kieran's blog now:

WOMAN I’VE WRITTEN

First, my appreciation to Barbara Wishes for inviting me to participate in Word Affair: Wednesday. It is a great honor to be among all the amazing writers.

As a Sapphic writer, my objective is creating believable, sometimes enticing female characters. I want them to belong to both the reader’s and my world. I want to know their desires, dreams, character flaws, and achievements. If it works, I can draw out their intimacies of living. I want them to breath and their hearts to beat.

To demonstrate my objectives in fictionalizing women, I’ll explain that I love knowing about people and women in particular. All women are fascinating. So the females in my literature are developed from real life, from combinations of real life, and imagination. They are based on my knowledge and experience.

Fictional characters often locate me without any enticement. They are just there – and probably have been hiding out with me for most of my life/their lives. They are characters waiting for their ‘call to plot’ within the queue.

In Sapphic literature, I’ve selected three of my most popular main characters. Naturally, artist Danielle O’Hara from Appointment with a Smile needs to assist me when talking about Appointment. She is nearly always mentioned. A question often asked is if there are similarities between me and any of my main characters. My answer is nearly always that Danielle is pretty close match. We have one another’s vulnerabilities.  

Danielle’s first person story flows through the eyes of an artist. She is nearing sixty years of age, and her love life is extinct. Her career – likewise. She finds it is never too late for her love of art, or her romance.

The Royce Madison Mysteries: Timber City Masks, Crystal Mountain Veils, and Shinney Forest Cloaks, are about an enforcer in a small Colorado mountain town. She is courageous, kind, and I’m told many women fall in love with her. It’s been interesting writing Royce. I see the development as the series moves along. A fourth mystery is planned to be published later in 2016.

Astray (published February 2016) is a suspense novel with one of the most fascinating Sapphic characters that I’ve written. Randa Florez is a newspaper crime reporter. Life alone requires an enormous amount of self-exploration and research. When attempting to decipher evil within a malicious soul, it is incomprehensible.  

Randa considered: If I was truly able to locate the message of others, I must decode myself. It was the human face filling itself with language that most intrigued me. Just as there are parts of the vast heavens above that I can’t see from here, there are also parts of my reflection lost from my vision. So often life was a cavernous, maze-like chamber.

Randa seeks to understand evil. Conflicted with her own obstacles, she always felt torn apart by being split between two worlds: Hispanic and Anglo. With her parents separating when she was born, Randa became a member of two heritages – she never completely belonged to either. Randa’s youth was one of being bullied by both communities. She felt to be abandoned.

Her character is complex. Although she reflects benignity with each of her missions/assignments, her personality is also stalwart. She is insightful, competent, and yet she is unable to trust completely. She never belongs completely – even to a woman she loves.

As a writer, I approach my main character with concerns about how the character impacts the plot. And how does the plot fit the character. In the case of Astray, there is a simultaneous interweaving of Randa’s exploration and the heart of a killer. Plot allows Randa to peer into the soul of a deranged, brutal killer. Randa’s search to discover evil takes her through a dangerous circuitry of horror.

In my experience, there are many main character requirements. There is her hunger for purpose. Another component is intensity. For me, character development needs self-disclosure as well as self-realization.

These are a few of the ingredients. There are many, many more. I want to have a glowingly symbiotic relationship, or an electrifying romance with my main character. I want her to be my leading lady. And if I’ve written her as she should be written – she will be my leading lady. And the reader’s leading lady.

A Word to my READERS from my leading ladies: From Danielle, Fleur, Bryana, Kelly, Olivia, Vicky, Royce, Beryl Trevar, Megan and Randa – thank you! Thank you for spending time with us. We appreciate you more than you’ll ever know.

A Word for my fellow Sapphic AUTHORS: I’m proud to be a part of this glorious wealth of literature that we’re experiencing. We’re all trying to make our art finer, friskier, and as exceptional as it can possibly be. Our destiny becomes an attempt to elevate literature. Our hearts are covered over with words – they are our gifts.

~Kieran York  

Kieran York is an author/poet with Scarlet Clover Publishers. She is a graduate of Fort Hays Kansas State University, and attended Mexico’s University of the Americas her junior year. She is originally from Kansas, and currently lives with her schnauzer, Clover, in the foothills of Colorado. She enjoys music, art, literature and her antique typewriter collection and her guitars. Sixteen of her Sapphic books of prose and poetry have been published. She was a Lambda Literary Award Finalist; Rainbow Honorable Mention for poetry; and Finalist in the Poetry category of Golden Crown Literary Awards. Her mysteries have all been Amazon Hot New Releases and on the Amazon top 100 Best Seller Mysteries. She has been a reporter and reviewer for newspapers and taught poetry classes. She wrote and performed songs with a regional woman’s band. She is a member of Lambda Literary Society and Sisters in Crime.

For additional information, please contact Scarlet Clover Publishers, LLC; P.O. Box 621002; Littleton, Colorado 80162.

Her websites are: http://kieranyork.com and www.scarletcloverpublishers.com

You can find her on her Amazon Author’s Page: www.amazon.com/author/kieranyork/

or on Facebook: Kieran York or Kieran York Author