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Along the lines of this discussion, I’m wondering if anyone here has struggled with portraying true femininity in their stories. In most of my books, I find myself putting a sword or a bow in a woman’s hand in order to keep her engaged in the main conflict (particularly the climax). Otherwise, she’s on the sidelines. While I certainly don’t believe that women learning to fight or being in politics or the workplace is against true femininity, I still struggle with “warrior women” as my go-to identity for female characters.

I guess my question is: how can I keep women engaged in the main conflict of a story (particularly fantasy stories where wars, assassinations, and political intrigue abound) without constantly placing them in male roles? For instance, in a fantasy series I’m working on, the female MC winds up being trained as an assassin and forced to kill a political leader. After escaping that situation, she’s a key player in the war that follows. She isn’t, like Eowyn, the victim of failed masculinity, but simply desperate to achieve her plot goal (becoming reconciled with her family). She isn’t a harsh, unfeminine sort of character (she’s actually quite gentle and compassionate when not relentlessly driven on by her goal), yet I still struggle with the fact that I’m forcing her to be a warrior just to keep her involved in the plot. The same goes for other main female characters, while ones that take more traditional female roles are side characters.

Do you guys have any thoughts on this?

@karthmin @princess-foo @seekjustice @kelly-lundgren