We're not accustomed to giving women the space to express the full range of emotions and flaws that men are permitted. Anger and aggressiveness aren't part of the scale of what is acceptable behavior in women, whereas men - in reality and in fiction - are allowed a much fuller range of emotion.
It's great we have a female Thor. It's great we have a black Captain America. But those are just optics; it's optics of change... Unless you have the structural diversity, the structural change behind the scenes - more women, more people of color actually calling the shots and editing these books - those optics won't last.
I had never been a comic book person before, really, because I had no access to them. Once I had access, I thought that these are just another avenue for telling stories and delving into the imagination.
Most of the female 'superhero' role models of my childhood came from novels, and they rarely had powers. Take Dorothy, for example, from 'The Wizard of Oz;' or Laura Ingalls and her sisters in the 'Little House on the Prairie' novels.
As a writer, I find that a good way of evolving a character is through an examination of his or her defining relationships - and what's more defining than a relationship with someone you love?
Take 'Ex Machina.' Everyone said it was one of the great feminist works of science fiction. But what I found disappointing is that everything about the main female character is defined by men.
Part of the reason why my folks - why any immigrant family - wants their kids to go into law or medicine is because there's the promise of reliable work. That's a powerful idea that got hammered into my head growing up: Be this thing, or else you'll starve.
I think we worry way too much about where books should fit inside genres. In a romance, the hero and heroine are on a journey together, and no matter how awful it gets, by the end of the book they'll be in love, with the probability of a happy ending.
Finding the voice of a character, no matter who it is - from Black Widow to Han Solo - is the first and most important hurdle for me to cross in any work of fiction.
As women, we have to deal with constant threats of violence. And it's in our media and fiction, too. So we internalize it.
I love writing novels, but there is something deeply invigorating about the comic-book medium.
I feel like the character of Han Solo is irreverent. A very serious, precious story about Han Solo would not be that enjoyable.
Marriage isn't the end-point of a relationship. It's just a stepping stone, one aspect of a long-term evolution between two people who have, for whatever reason, decided to take a leap of faith and say, 'Well, hey, this is a person who I want to try with for the rest of my life.' Which is not a guarantee of perfection - far from it.
As a writer - and a romance novelist, no less - I've always found it a bit odd when characters in comic books remain in relationship limbo for years at a time.
We like to imagine that women would do a better job of ruling the world - and I'm one of those optimists - but women aren't a superior kind of life form just because of our gender. We're awesome but not perfect. We're human. Just like men.
We imagine 'the end' as a world-devastating event, but every time there's a terrible earthquake, a tsunami, an outbreak of disease - that's apocalyptic, on a micro-scale.
As creators and as readers, we need to always be pushing it - by looking for the books, looking for the artists and people and stories to support what we feel to be a better representation of all women. Of real women.
I got into comics because I wrote an 'X-Men' novel for Pocket Books, and I introduced myself to the head of recruitment at Marvel. I'd heard through the grapevine they liked the book, so that gave me the courage to go up to them and be like, 'Hey, if you ever need a writer, here I am.'
Word of mouth is the saving grace of us all. If you love something and you think your friend will love it, just talk about it.
I'd like to go back in time and haunt Robert Louis Stevenson during his years in the South Pacific.
