Saturday, July 6, 2013

Whining and Dining: More Female Archetypes for SFR Authors By Maybelle

[The Galaxy Express is excited to present a series of posts by a Very Special Guest. Her name is Maybelle and she's here all the way from sweet home Alabama to give us her take on archetypes in science fiction romance. This is the ninth installment of a ten part series. Maybelle's posts will go live Saturday 9 am EST).] Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8




I’m glad to see all y’all sticking with me for so long! Well, we got four lady archetypes down and four to go. Today’s abductees will probably be recognizable to you, since you live on Earth and all.

Type 5f: The Whiny, Helpless Abductee Who's Scared of So Much Stuff It's Sickening (aka the Waif): In literary decades past, the Destined Mate was known to fall into this archetype, but just like the spare heir used to stick around the home planet and get on everybody’s last nerve, these days the Destined Mate is a different sort. These days she’s Cranky Pants, and ole Whiner is stuck in secondary character roles.


You know this woman—and she ain’t always a woman, mind, but she was on my trip. Whatever bad happened to you, worse stuff happened to her. Whatever was going on in your life before the napping, her life was more mixed up. She can’t do nothing for herself but complain and snivel, and everything is somebody else’s fault.

She didn't want to be kidnapped, she wants to go home, she misses her mean family and her dog, she's scared of the alien men's wieners, you name it. Your Martian captors might get frustrated with Whiner at first because she cries all the time, but damned if she don’t end up with the best-looking, most muscle-bound of the space men aside from King. Space Hunk dotes on her and basically thinks she's the sweetest thing since Uranus cookies. (Apparently they taste better than they look.) Space Hunk ain't the King, though. He's just some widowed with two small children five sunburst General of All Galactic Armies.

Well, bully for him. Now he’s got three kids.

Type 6f: The Control Freak Friend of the Destined Mate Who’s Only In The Book So the Next Book Can Be About Her and the King's Brother, Pick One (aka the Librarian): You may think a Control Freak would try to organize the galaxy once she gets there, but not in this book. She was only at that séance because she worried her good friend the made-over shrew was going off the deep end.

Control Freak’s the one who figures how to hack into the spaceship computers and learns the alien men ain't gonna chop you up for food. She also keeps her cool in the face of tragedy when certain people are running around screaming and cussing after they find out what kind of ugly ass space man they’re getting assigned to. The King of the Galaxy eventually lets Control Freak go free because, hell, she's so boring (in this book) that nobody wants her as a mate except that short, hairy Scottcardian brute with the runny nose that hates everybody different from him. Which thank God your ugly ass space man is better than that.

Control Freak never has any excitement, even when getting kidnapped by aliens. How sad is that? Do her a favor. Get her drunk on Talaxian ale, call up one of the King's brothers, and get her laid, setting her up for her own book, where she'll suddenly have a much less boring personality. As for you, well, you had a great personality to begin with, and sleeping with the King’s brothers didn’t change a thing about you.

Earth friends, we are almost at the finish line. Come back next week for the last two archetypes!
 

About the author

Jody Wallace writes sf and fantasy romance as herself, contemporary as Ellie Marvel, and obeys the whims of Meankitty the rest of the time. Her archetype is probably the Freaky Librarian. Maybelle's archetype is open to interpretation. FMI www.jodywallace.com & www.meankitty.com.