Who is Yas? Strong yet open-minded rebel.

Motivations

The motivations and significance of Yas come from books and television shows and movies that I grew up with. I loved storylines that presented female characters as other than the sidekick who turned to their male counterpart when the going became rough.

A particular irritation was the Golden Gate bridge scene in the James Bond movie ‘A View to a Kill’ where Bond’s female companion was stranded, in stiletto heels, on the bridge supports while screaming for help.

In contrast there were characters such as Wonder Woman and Colonel Wilma Deering from Buck Rogers in the 25^th Century. Yes, they still bowed to their male counterparts in some situations, but for the most part these characters broke the mold of how starring females were presented at the time. They were independent, able to get themselves out of trouble (and more importantly not in it to being with) and were able to be more thoughtful and compassionate in the process.

As a side note, I’m not going to age myself by giving any time periods here, you can probably come up with a rough guess based on the references!

How I decided to introduce Yas

Fast forward to me starting to write the first Word Guardians book and I knew I wanted the lead character in the first book to be a strong female. Strong, rebellious, yet sensitive and open minded. And I figured that a way to bring all that together was to write a storyline where she pretty much figured out she knew what life was about, and then had all of that questioned through a series of events with her best friend, Sam (I’ll talk more about him in a later blog post).

So, giving away a few details from the first book, The Battle for the Peacekeepers, she’s strong minded, not interested in being popular, and is different to others at her school. She also has a strong belief that there’s no magic in the world whereas Sam begs to differ. His dad has disappeared and he’s holding onto the belief that he’s stuck in a realm.

Yas reasons this out as Sam refusing to accept the possibility that his dad may not be coming back, so treads carefully trying not to encourage his optimism while also not delivering what she thinks has actually happened. All of this combined is what draws Sam to her (you’ll have to read the book to see how their friendship develops).

So, who is Yas?

Very quickly, Yas is presented with irrefutable truth that magic and realms do exist. Now, she could have handled this a different way, but she’s tired of dealing with secrets in her own family and not having anyone to talk to. Ultimately, her open-mindedness, inward questioning and humility enables her to confess that she was wrong to Sam. It galvanises their friendship and starts the duo on their adventures together.

Finally, how Yas handles the climax of the battle in the first book is also testament to her character. She’s conflicted, yet sure headed enough to intuitively know what she needs to do when the moment comes. As a reader too, you get to understand some of her inner exploration as she reaches this point and the ethics that I mentioned in The Worlds of the Word Guardians) also play into this.

So, hopefully, I’ve explained who Yas is and the significance of her character while also not giving away any spoilers. If you’d like to learn more about the book series, please check out the link below.