Guest Post and Giveaway: Twilight Hunter by Kait Ballenger

Welcome to Enchantress of Books Kait Ballenger!!

5 Rules to Create Strong Heroines

As someone who spent a good majority of her time and money in her undergraduate career studying Woman and Gender Studies, I consider myself to be a self-proclaimed third-wave feminist. One of the many ways I find myself enacting these beliefs is within my writing. In a recent email exchange with Vivianna, the Enchantress of Books, the trend of “I need a man” heroines was mentioned. I try my hardest to write heroines that are not only realistic, but strong, so I thought I would share five steadfast rules I have for writing the heroines of the Execution Underground with you.

1. A powerful paranormal romance heroine can never be entirely dependent on her man. I think an important distinction needs to be made here. Any realistic character won’t be able to do everything on their own; so there will be times when a heroine might need the help of her hunky hero. The difference is the level of her need. Does she need assistance every once in a while, or is she constantly relying on the hero? The street also goes both ways. Just like a heroine sometimes needs help, to be truly as realistic in portrayal as possible, a hero will sometimes need assistance as well. I make it a point to try and make my heroes and heroines need each other in some way. For example, in Twilight Hunter, my debut novel which releases on August 27^th, heroine and werewolf packmaster, Frankie Amato, needs the help of Jace McCannon, the hero of the novel and werewolf hunter—in other words, the help of her adversary. With his half wolf bloodline, Jace is immune to some of the weaknesses other werewolves have—an example being that Jace is not affected by silver—and unfortunately for Frankie, so is the killer on the loose that she’s working to catch to ensure the safety of her pack. However, at the same time, Jace, who is working to catch the same killer, also needs Frankie. In order to defeat the sadistic sexual sadist they’re after, Jace is going to have to shift for the very first time, something he’s never done before. That’s where his need for Frankie comes in. As packmaster of the Rochester werewolf pack, she can teach him what he needs to know. Both the hero and heroine benefit from each other’s help, rather than just the heroine being aided or rescued by the hero.

2. The heroine’s level of sexual experience has nothing to do with their personality and the way they should be portrayed outside the bedroom. I think the biggest trend I’ve seen in paranormal romance lately is heroines who are sexually inexperienced, and as a result, are portrayed as meek. Well, I’m here to tell you there is nothing wrong with virgin heroines, or heroines of any level of sexual experience or orientation for that matter. However, the level of self-confidence in a character’s non-sexual abilities, their strength as both a woman and a person, and their personality are not dependent upon their sexuality. Being sexually experienced doesn’t make a person a more powerful woman outside of the bedroom, just as being sexually inexperienced doesn’t make a person a weak, meek, or shy personality. The trend lately has been to treat these two aspects of a heroine as mutually exclusive, as if a heroine can’t be a virgin and a strong, independent person at the same time. That’s bogus. I’ve made certain to put this to practice in my own work. In Twilight Hunter, Frankie is both experienced sexually and a powerful female character. However, the in prequel novella which proceeds the first book in the series, Shadow Hunter, heroine Tiffany Solow is a virgin, but that doesn’t make her weak. She’s a badass vampire hunter who can hold her own in a fight and doesn’t need the hero’s help in protecting her.

3. No damsels in distress. I’m not saying that a heroine can never been in a position where she needs to be saved, but at the very least, she must play an active role in saving herself as well. For example, in Twilight Hunter at the climax of the novel, Frankie finds herself in the hands of the sadistic killer she’s been fighting alongside Jace. Who needs to save her? Well, Jace, of course. But is she a damsel in distress? No. Here’s why: before Jace arrives, Frankie does everything in her power to try to escape Robert’s clutches, and once Jace shows up to finish the battle, Frankie works and works until she finally busts loose from the demeaning cage the killer has placed her in. Does she run to safety and leave Jace to finish the job? Nope. She runs into battle to help Jace finish the jerk off.

4. Being strong does not mean having no vulnerabilities. This is a little like number #2 in that the trend in paranormal romance is heroines who are either super women (who never ever need the help of anyone, let alone a man, and are pretty much perfect capable females in every way, kind of like a lot of heroines in urban fantasy) or damsels in distress (who are always in need of saving). Neither of these is realistic. Just like in real life, strong female characters need to have vulnerabilities and flaws that make them believable, and so should a hero. No character in a novel should be invincible, but being vulnerable and not perfect, doesn’t mean they should be portrayed as weak. Frankie’s vulnerability: despite being the only female packmaster Rochester has ever seen, she worries about living up to the demands of that role and must constantly fight to keep her position as the female alpha werewolf over a pack comprised of many alpha males. Jace’s vulnerability: he’s never shifted into wolf form, so doing so in order to fight the killer places him at a major disadvantage, one in which he needs Frankie’s help for. Jace also has some serious emotional issues he has to sort out before he can truly embrace that half-wolf nature that he needs in order to save the day.

So what does this all mean for paranormal romance readers?

It means that when you open a Kait Ballenger novel, you can expect to see heroines who follow the above rules. In other words: I don’t write weak heroines and have no intention of ever doing so. Thanks for reading!

Blurb: 

Hunters of the supernatural, the Execution Underground are an elite group tasked with protecting humanity…but what happens when danger collides with desire?  

Jace McCannon has one loyalty: the Execution Underground. Despite his mixed blood, his hatred for the werewolves he hunts is legendary. But in his search for a sadistic killer, Jace finds himself face-to-face with a stunningly seductive packmaster…and longing for a night with his mortal enemy. 

Nothing can stop Frankie Amato from defending her kind—or catching the rogue responsible for killing women in her territory. For that, this alpha female needs Jace's skills more than she wants to admit. But as their investigation exposes evil truths, need burns into a passion that dare not be fulfilled. For to do so will have deadly consequences for them both….

Available to purchase at

         

About the Author

Kait Ballenger is a full-time paranormal romance author, wife, bellydancer, graduate student, and soon-to-be-professor. She is the multi-published, award-winning author of the Execution Underground paranormal romance series. With a B.A in English from Stetson University, Kait is currently earning an M.F.A in Writing. Kait believes anything is possible with hard work and dedication. One day, she hopes to be a bestseller and to see her novels on the big screen. Look for the next two books in her page-turning Execution Underground series: Twilight Hunter, book one (August 2013) and Immortal Hunter, book two (January 2014), and don’t forget to check out Shadow Hunter, a prequel novella to the series featured in the After Dark anthology along NYT Bestseller Gena Showalter—now available in trade paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats.

Website

      

Check out "Shadow Hunter" by Kait Ballenger, a prequel novella to Twilight Hunter. You can find my review for "Shadow Hunter" here. 

Shadow Hunter

by Kait Ballenger

Blurb: 

Vampire hunter Damon Brock's first assignment with the Execution Underground is Rochester, New York, a city crawling with the undead. But he isn't the only hunter in town gunning for vamp blood. 

Tiffany Solow is fierce and ruthless when it comes to slaying the monsters that destroyed her family-and she works solo. But being alone is no longer so desirable when she meets the mysterious hunter who wants more than just her turf. As they work to massacre the local covens, the line between good and evil blurs when they are forced to decide between their lifelong beliefs... and their new found hearts.

Available for purchase at 

   

Kait is giving away a signed copy of "Twilight Hunter"!
Have you read either "Shadow Hunter" or "Twilight Hunter"? What did you think?
If you haven't read it, doesn't it sound interesting? Make sure to add it to your WANT TO READ shelf on Goodreads.

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