The biggest problem I had when asked to compile a
list of kick-ass heroines that should be read, was narrowing it down. There has
been an explosion of great female characters in recent years, and the ones I
name here are just a few of them.
One of my long-time favourites has to be Lt Eve
Dallas of the NYPSD (New York Police & Security Department) in the
future-set police procedurals by JD Robb.
This series now numbers over 50, including novellas and short stories. Dallas
is a tough, damaged and gritty heroine, ably assisted by a cast of great female
characters, and Dallas’s impossibly rich, impossibly handsome (and impossibly
sexy) husband, Roarke. The first in the series was NAKED IN
DEATH, published in 1995.
The first novel by Seeley James featuring ex-athlete, Pia Sabel,
was THE GENEVA DECISION, now
part of James’ Sabel Origins set. A former soccer star, Sabel takes over her
father’s private security company and is soon joined in the series by unstable
military veteran, Jacob Stearne, who might or might not be receiving divine
guidance from the winged god, Mercury. (Or he may simply be bonkers. You
decide.) Either way, the books are great fun and well worth reading.
One of my favourite kick-ass female characters is
a sidekick rather than the main protagonist in her own right. Lee Child first featured former army
Master Sergeant and military police operative, Frances Neagley, in BAD LUCK AND
TROUBLE. She’s cool and dry, rarely impressed and sometimes scary
(according to Reacher himself.) She has made half a dozen outings in Lee’s
work, and even one in my own Charlie Fox novel, SECOND SHOT. How come?
Because the real Frances L Neagley is a huge mystery fan who regularly bids to
be a character in authors’ books in charity auctions at conventions like Bouchercon.
And I guess, shuffling my feet awkwardly, I should
put in a mention here for my own kick-ass heroine. A former Special Forces
trainee turned bodyguard, Charlie Fox was described by Paul Goat Allen at the Chicago
Tribune as “Ill-tempered, aggressive and borderline psychotic, Fox is also
compassionate, introspective and highly principled: arguably one of the most
enigmatic – and coolest – heroines in contemporary genre fiction.”
If the character of Frances Neagley suffers from haptephobia
(fear of being touched) then Harry
Bingham’s DC Fiona Griffiths of Cardiff Police has far stranger
hang-ups which lead her to identify more strongly with the dead than the
living. Her first appearance was in TALKING TO THE DEAD,
which was turning into a two-part Sky TV drama starring Sophie Rundle. A great
and unusual heroine who can kick some serious ass when required.
By contrast, Lori Anderson in Steph Broadribb’s DEEP DOWN
DEAD is a single mother bounty hunter, who by a combination of
circumstances has to take her young daughter with her to collect a fugitive
from out of state. As you might expect, trouble ensues, and Broadribb gives her
tough heroine added depth by adding ferocious maternal instinct into the mix.
Ex-cop turned Chicago PI, Georgia Davis, is the
heroine of five novels by acclaimed author Libby Fischer Hellmann. Tough, smart, principled
and tenacious, Georgia first appears in a cameo in Hellmann’s Ellie Foreman
series novel, A PICTURE OF
GUILT, but plays a larger role in AN IMAGE OF
DEATH, then steps squarely onto centre stage in EASY
INNOCENCE.
I have long been a fan of the late Robert B Parker’s spare style of prose and
sharp action scenes in his Spenser and Jesse Stone series. With Boston PI Sunny
Randall, he combined everything I liked most about his first two series, but
with a female protagonist to root for. She’s as smart and capable as Spenser,
and still surrounded by a wonderful cast of subsidiary characters, but perhaps
with more emotional depth. The first book in this series is FAMILY HONOR.
I was already reading Rachel Amphlett’s Dan
Taylor thrillers before she began her modern spin on the police procedural with
SCARED TO
DEATH, featuring Detective Kay Hunter of Kent police. Hunter is as
driven as you would expect, but her resilience is also tested as she fights a
personal vendetta against her as well as the villains of each particular
instalment.
Another memorable subsidiary character is that of
DI Roberta Steel in the Aberdeen-set DS Logan McRae crime thrillers by Stuart MacBride. Steel has a major role to
play in all the Logan McRae books, right from COLD GRANITE
onward. She’s politically incorrect, a chain-smoker, foul-mouthed and
over-the-top, and you can’t help but love her for it. Clearly, MacBride did
too, because he wrote the spinoff standalone NOW WE ARE
DEAD featuring Steel in a leading role.
And finally, one of my all-time favourites is Kinsey
Millhone, the heroine of the alphabet series by the late Sue Grafton. Millhone is prickly, fiercely
independent, and a skilled and methodical private detective in the fictional
Santa Teresa, a thinly disguised Santa Barbara in California. The ending to the
first in the series, A IS FOR
ALIBI, still blows me away, years after I first read it.
Zoë Sharp is the author of twelve books in her
award-winning crime thriller series featuring ex-Special Forces trainee turned
bodyguard, Charlotte ‘Charlie’ Fox. Lee Child said: “If Jack Reacher were a
woman, he’d be Charlie Fox.” Sharp has also written a joint novella with
espionage thriller author, John Lawton, numerous short stories, and two
standalones, the latest of which is DANCING ON
THE GRAVE (July 2018) which is her take on the Washington Sniper
attacks, set in the English Lake District. Find out more at www.ZoeSharp.com.
Dancing On The Grave by Zoë Sharp
ZACE £9.99 mmpb ISBN: 9781909344402 ebook ISBN: 9781909344396
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