I remember an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer where they all get their SAT results back, and Cordelia gets a pretty high score. They’re surprised because Cordelia isn’t the kind of person they’d expect to score well on a standardized test. She says, “What? I can’t have layers?”
When I write my characters, I’m often searching for their layers. What is the thing that everyone just assumes about them? What’s one layer under that? What’s a layer deeper? And so on. What can their soulmate in their book know that no one else does yet or ever has about them? For some characters, it’s obvious. For others, I like to set things up and reveal slowly.
With Macon, I knew I wanted her to have a few layers that only Joanna would see. For example, Macon isn’t the player her friends make her out to be. She also doesn’t play solos for anyone, despite the fact that she’s one of the most talented violinists in the world. It’s also only Joanna that calls her Macon and not Greene, the nickname all of her friends use. Since Joanna was straight - as far as she knew - having her be the one to discover, learn, take the time to see and call Macon out on her shit was even more important because it’s through seeing all of Macon’s layers that Joanna realizes that Macon is her person, regardless of gender, and they fall in love.
Macon's Heart
San Francisco Series Book 2
Genre: Contemporary Lesbian Romance
Release Date: May 17th, 2019
Formats: Kindle, Paperback
Length: 86,450 words
