Reimagining the Princess

(Yep. We're talking more about Silhouette.) : )

When I was creating the character Silhouette, I wanted to stay as far away from the usual princess clichés as possible. And that was another thing that I've learned in the writing world: clichés. Clichés are things (like phrases, sentences, ideas, etc.) that have been used over and over, to where they're far from original anymore.

Growing up, I've read a lot of fairytales, as well as a lot of renditions and parodies of fairytales. And I've also seen those things done in movies and TV.
So, much of this was incorporated into my writing. And every time my professor would come across what they thought was a cliché in my writing, they never hesitated to point it out in their written feedback. Seeing that kind of feedback was questionable the first time I got it, but as I kept learning and improving, it all started to make sense. Clichés can be hard to avoid, but maybe... just maybe, you might be able to get away with using a couple--but the main goal is to strive for originality.

So, going back to my character Silhouette:
I wanted to avoid the following clichés:
1. Being locked away in a tower
2. Having some kind of prince/male character rescue them from evil, AND
3. PRETTY MUCH TRY NOT TO COPY DISNEY'S FORMULA

Speaking of Disney, I grew up watching Disney movies. I remember having a shelf full of VHS tapes of Disney movies. (And yeah, that means I grew up watching The Little Mermaid, which is one of my all-time favorite Disney movies, aside from Beauty and the Beast.) I was always fascinated by how much effort it took to bring a princess story to life--I was always interested in how curious Princess Ariel was when she would swim to places like a sunken ship and collect treasures to bring back to her grotto. I was always interested in how smart Belle was, and her love of reading. So, when creating Silhouette, I wanted to make her interesting; I wanted to see what was special about her.
This leads me back to when I had that experience at the Texas State Aquarium in Corpus Christi, Texas. I saw something special in a dolphin's eyes, and I knew... I just knew that my story was looking right at me: a story about a dolphin princess.

It was then that I began thinking about the story. I was envisioning a dolphin princess, who was forced to flee from a terrible evil, living as a human and not knowing of her past, until unfortunate circumstances send her back home, and then she's forced to confront the evil. As you may probably already tell by what I've just explained in my blog so far, I've put a lot of thought into this book, because again, we're trying to avoid as many clichés as possible.

So, of course, reimagining the princess can seem hard, seeing that there are many princesses from movies, TV, and books. And one may argue "Yeah, well, Silhouette is kind of like Ariel the mermaid" or "Doesn't she remind you of (so-and-so)?" And to be perfectly fair, they're probably right. But is it a crime to say that I let things inspire me to write? Whatever the case may be, clichés can be hard to avoid, but in the end, you have to write from the heart.

TO BUY MY BOOK: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/dolphin-princess-veronica-gonzalez/1129202183

Veronica Gonzalez