When I began writing, I wasn\u2019t trying to reinvent fantasy. I just wanted to tell the kind of stories I craved but couldn\u2019t always find\u2014stories where female leads kept their strength no matter what was thrown at them.<\/p>\n
I\u2019d read too many books where a heroine could face down monsters, survive impossible odds, and walk through fire\u2026 but the moment romance appeared, her independence melted away. I started calling them \u201cpuddles of goo\u201d heroines\u2014powerful until the \u2018Man\u2019 walked in, then suddenly defined by him instead of by themselves.<\/p>\n
Mackenzie Green was my answer to that. She\u2019s flawed, stubborn, and sometimes makes the wrong call, but she owns every part of herself. Her strength doesn\u2019t vanish when she loves someone. If anything, it deepens\u2014because real love isn\u2019t about erasing who you are, it\u2019s about finding someone who respects and values that strength.<\/p>\n
Creating Mackenzie has been one of the most rewarding parts of my career. She\u2019s taught me as much about endurance and self-respect as I\u2019ve hopefully given readers in return. And if just one reader sees themselves in her and feels inspired to stand firm, then I\u2019ve done my job as a storyteller.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When I began writing, I wasn\u2019t trying to reinvent fantasy. I just wanted to tell the kind of stories I craved but couldn\u2019t always find\u2014stories where female leads kept their strength no matter what was thrown at them. I\u2019d read too many books where a heroine could face down monsters, survive impossible odds, and walk […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1559,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jskennedy.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jskennedy.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jskennedy.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jskennedy.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jskennedy.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1556"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jskennedy.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1556\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1560,"href":"https:\/\/jskennedy.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1556\/revisions\/1560"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jskennedy.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jskennedy.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jskennedy.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jskennedy.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}