I’m sure nobody would even think of doing this, but just in case… A note to anyone who considers going to Amazon to purchase the books mentioned in Randy’s blog without going through Randy’s links - You should hang your head in shame. With all the free advice and teaching we get from Randy we owe him much more than the pittance he’ll receive from Amazon for our purchases.

And regarding lust vs feelings, I’ve heard it put (somewhat crudely) as men use love to get sex, while women use sex to get love.

Finally, I’ve heard some writers speculate that the popularity of the Edward character (in Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight series) with young teen girls is because he is NOT a convincing male character, but somewhat feminine. Keep your audience in mind.

I think if you want to play around with male characters maybe vary the levels to which they express each of these male traits (they’ll need other traits too of course). Give one a average ego, an average lust level, but make him totally protective of his feelings, another might be pretty quiet about his feelings, pretty sex driven, but have a small ego.

I learned this the hard way - Mrs DiscoveredJoys would come home from work venting about some colleague. I (wearing my exectutive/man/provider hats) would offer solutions. She would get annoyed that I wasn’t taking her feelings seriously. I would get annoyed that she wasn’t taking my solutions seriously.

We understand each other better now, through the simplest ‘trick’ I picked up from a course at my employers. Whenever Mrs DiscoveredJoys raises the touchy subject about somebodies actions I ask “How do you feel about that?” which sets the conversation off in a positive way. Mrs DiscoveredJoys (no fool) rapidly recognised this conversational gambit - but it still works!

I grew up with two brothers close in age, and all of their friends hanging around, and no sisters - so I usually relate to men better than other women I know.

My friends in high school who had crushes on my older brother would ask me questions and want to know all about him like he was some sort of mysterious being. And I was like “No, seriously. What you see is what you get.”

You should definitely write a book and call it something like “Writing a compelling male character”. There’s no book on Amazon that has a clear title on writing male characters. It would probably become a best-seller. I’d definitely buy one.

I hardly understand or fit the male stereotype. The inflated ego isn’t rational. I have as much of an ego as anyone else, but it doesn’t get out of hand. It’s true that I do lust; I am drawn to the female body/appearance. In terms of feelings, though, I would say I’m probably more emotional than most girls I know. And, (because it MUST be said with gender stereotypes being the way they are these days,) I’m completely 100% heterosexual.

So, I believe I match Randy’s male stereotype by about 50%. When you get right down to the psychology between male and female, we share similar biological processes. We each have the same hormones, but on average in varying levels. I think we’re more alike than we’d care to admit, but we deal with things a little differently due to gender stereotypes that are dead set and not changing anytime soon.

Of course Randy is right, there are gender norms. I think though, that in the 21st century we should be starting to break down the stereotypes instead of supporting them. I think we should go out of our way to find exceptions to the norms (while recognizing and paying our due to them). I think we should focus on finding bizarre characters who, because of their upbringing and their own personal goals/strengths, choose to boldly step out of their stereotypes and do whatever the hell they want.

Of course, that’s just me. But hell, throwing bizarre characters in your fiction is bound to upset or excite people; in either case, it will arouse interest. Great blog post.

I have a male character who is driven by honor and duty. In his “ego”, instead of dropping all of his responsibilities to follow the woman he loves, he actually chooses to let her go because he is bound by his sense of honor and duty to stay (is that a bad thing? I still don’t know lol… I just write the scenes But this man still has an ego that drives him to do something that most of us probably wouldn’t do (let the one we love leave).

I’m also tired of male authors creating women that are really men in female bodies. What comes to mind is a thirty-year-old museum curator who dangles by her finger tips—her fingertips!—from a steel girder. She’s left twisting that way for quite a while until the hero decides what to do. Really. What female curator has the upper body strenghth? Few Olympians would.

It’s also tiresome to see female blackbelts kicking the daylights out of male blackbelts. She 5′2″ 110 lbs. and he’s 6′3″ and 210 lbs. Ain’t gonna happen.

We have to take into account that a woman is probably reading a novel for escape, an emotional experience, entertainment, etc. The average woman reader (I’m guessing–no, I didn’t do a statistical study) isn’t as concerned about the male being 100% typical male. In fact, if I may make an even bolder guess, she may be interested in taking a break from reality and is pleased to spend 4-8 hrs in a world where a man (the good guy, anyway) talks about his feelings and can read his One-and-Only-Forever-and-Ever’s mind and makes sure that she is quite comfortable up there on her pedestal and has more chocolate than her hormones have any business having. And best of all, he just KNOWS when she needs a hug, one that doesn’t include any stray groping.

So now I’m in danger of stereotyping women, and I don’t mean to. And I don’t mean to say that we need to make “girlfriend” guys in our books just for the sake of pleasing readers who hope such guys exist. Personally, I find learning to understand how males work quite fascinating. I want to be as plausible in anything I write as possible, not just with male characters but in all genders, ages, occupations, cultures, geographic groups, etc. But here’s the deal: as a writer of romantic women’s fiction, I understand that my audience wants something from the story that may require a slight variation from reality. It’s fiction - go figure. This is not to say that I think men need to be improved via fiction. Because there are certain traits generally present in EITHER gender that may not exactly benefit a good story.

So my aim with male characters, for what it’s worth, is to do my best to understand how men think and operate, how they’re wired and how ego and other impulses motivate them, what opinions, needs, emotions, etc are generally inherent in the breed, and then find a balance between reality and what the story needs to keep my reader’s hopes & fears & emotions in a constant state of upheaval. I think this goes for all the elements of reality we use in fiction.

Just my two cents.

I think we have to be very careful not to only write in terms of stereotypes. From my experiences, it would APPEAR to be true that certain men don’t have “a lot going on up there,” but that’s certainly not true for all men, and probably isn’t even completely true for the men it appears to be true for.

Different people work in different ways. There are millions of different kinds of intelligence, and I’m sure you all know what I mean.

Celia Lashlie is a New Zealand author. She trained as a social anthroplogist, worked as an officer in a men’s prison, was Governor in a women’s prison, has written on prison issues (The Journey to Prison - Who goes and why.). But she has also done extensive work with teenage boys in high school, trying to work out their views on boys, men, and life.

Celia has a book called, ‘He’ll Be OK, Growing gorgeous boys into good men’ and a CD called Celia Lashilie Live, which has some of the material from that book given as a hilarious lecture to a group of women.

For a very entertaining journey in the conflict between men’s and women’s understanding of communication of feelings, along the lines that Randy has suggested above, Celia’s work is something that I am often recommending.

Yeah, this can be true. But it can also be true for women. I know women who are equally ego-driven and I know men that are much more timid. I’m sure you do too.

Boys have feelings.

Girls have feelings.

Girls share their feelings.

Boys don’t.

Which is basically what Randy said.

In my psychology course a couple years ago, we talked about gender differences and how much society has to do with it. From what my professor said, infant boys actually are more emotionally responsive than infant girls, but that role switches as they get older. So then of course the question is, is society to blame for making ‘emotions’ seem like a feminine thing, or is it just natural for men in their egos to hide their emotions, or simply not experience them to the same degree as women?

While I have no answer, there may be one out there if you look for it. Regardless, it might be something interesting to explore in a novel or short story. And as Camille said, find the balance between what reality shows and what your plot needs to develop your male character.

Thanks for the post, Randy. Very helpful indeed.
~IshanaTM