Behind the Heroine: Brynn Adler

Brynn was a challenging but fun character to write, and I credit most of it to the fact that she’s harder than most of the heroines I’ve written lately.  I like inner strength and a level of toughness in all of my heroines, but Brynn has more than that.  She’s a little cynical, maybe even a little cold, and I didn’t want that to be her overwhelming trait.  So sometimes it felt like walking a tightrope!

In Cry Sanctuary Brynn was introduced at pretty much the lowest point of her life.  Her orderly world has been upset, her five year plan has been destroyed, and oh yeah, she found out her sister was a werewolf when she got kidnapped to be used as leverage.  And because Brynn is not used to the role of damsel and victim, it’s hard to say what upset her more–being kidnapped and terrorized, or being kidnapped and terrorized soley as a means to an end.  Brynn Adler does not deal well with being a disposable commodity, and much of her discomfort in Sanctuary Lost can be blamed on the fact that the bad guys aren’t out to get her, they’re out to hurt her sister by things–and people–Abby loves.

Brynn and Abby have a very specific relationship dynamic, even if they don’t see it themselves.  In fact, in Sanctuary’s Price (book #3, due out in October), their best friend Dylan sums it up rather neatly:

Dylan is a smarty, which is one of the reasons I love him to death. But more on that later.

Donna and I like to make playlists for our characters, songs that they’d listen to or songs that fit the place they are during the book we’re writing.  So I took a screenshot of Brynn’s playlist, which is a bit of both:

(Yes, for anyone who follows me on twitter, putting this together is why I had my random Natalie Imbruglia karaoke dance break yesterday.)

If I had to pick one song from that list, it would totally be Deftones, Change.

Random Facts About Brynn:

• She loves Pop Tarts. A lot. Nothing is ever so bad that it can’t be helped by Pop Tarts.
• She’s addicted to HGTV.
• She spent four months as a vegetarian to make one of her hippy boyfriends happy.  Eventually she chose steak over him.
• In college she took archery as an elective but couldn’t hit the target.
• She decided she wanted to be in government when she was seventeen, and has spent the years since as a vocal, active liberal with strong feelings on gun control.
• …and now she’s involved with an ex-Special Forces badass with a grenade launcher in his closet.

Here’s your chance!  Got any questions about Brynn? Want to know what makes her tick? Wondering how she’s going to handle tripping over Joe’s weapons?  Wanna know what’s in store for her?  Ask!  I’ll answer!  (Okay, I might answer cryptically, but I’ll answer.)

Cry Sanctuary & Sanctuary Lost are available now.