She's not THE bitchiest heroine I've written. That honor goes to Peyton from The Undisciplined Bride, who had the special privilege of growing up as the kind of woman that society covets. She was beautiful, thin, rich. She was the very definition of privilege.
Sofie, on the other hand, is the product of steel grit and determination. Where Peyton was my stylish Porche, Sofie is a tank. She'll roll you over if she has to.
It's her world, we merely live in it.
That's not to say she isn't cursed, however. I meant to make her much meaner, but it just didn't work out that way. Unlike Peyton, who became a bitch out of entitlement, Sofie's bitch mentality comes from somewhere else entirely. In the end, I came to love her every bit as much as Fletcher. Not despite her so-called flaws... *because of them.*
How old is she when we meet her?
Thirty-eight. Because the wilting rose in my Beauty and the Beast is an actual person, this required my fairy tale focus on someone at a different point in her life, in this case a grown adult who is about to lose a parent. Also, her age supercharges her DGAF attitude. By the time a woman reaches her 40s, her People-Pleasing gene is worn out. She doesn't have time for your foolishness, basically.
What stands out most about him?
Sofie Vincent gets shit done. People underestimated her, but she created a TV empire from nothing but her steel spine alone. She took nothing from no one and forged her future out of sheer tenacity.
I like that. I get that. I've done it.
Nice gal or bitch?
She's not A bitch, she's THE bitch; and it's MS. BITCH to you.
Favorite moment with her?
Okay, so here's the thing. I had some key scenes in mind when I finally sat down to write the book. The one I most looked forward to was The Karaoke Scene. Lemme tell you why.
The root of Sofie's bitch behavior is that she was a laughingstock throughout her formative years. She tried so hard not just to fit in but to come out on top, but often fell flat on her face. Her mother, famed children's author Rose Thibodeau, wanted to help her daughter the only way she knew how: she put it all in her books. Every single failure was documented for the whole world to see. Rose always changed the ending where Sofie came out on top, but the very audience that book sold to was the group who knew Sofie best, her fellow classmates.
So, they knew the bitter truth behind these fairy tales. And, kids being kids, made her life a living hell as a result. This was why Sofie wanted no part of Pudgie, and had buried that identity as far into the ground as it could go. When you're already behind the eight ball, you don't want anyone to see any point of weakness. It's a vulnerability folks like us just can't afford.
My own childhood was filled to the brim with embarrassing experiences from which I could draw inspiration for the Pudgie books. One of the bigger ones involved an unfortunate audition for City Choir when I was in 8th grade.
I'm no Celine Dion by any stretch, but I love to sing. As someone with a moderate singing voice, of course I tried out for choir. That was one class I couldn't wait to take. When I learned that my range went all the way to the top of the scales, getting that validation gave me some encouragement to challenge myself even further. I decided to try out for City Choir, a group of students from all over town who were selected among their peers as the best of the best. I earned my right to audition and my teacher gave me a challenging piece of music (in another language no less,) that I rehearsed for WEEKS to get exactly right.
By the time I went for the official audition, I felt super prepared. I had performed the song daily in class around my other classmates until I knew it was as perfect as I was going to get it. I went to the off-sight campus to audition, where I and others like me performed in our own separate rooms, hidden behind a curtain for the judges.
So, there I am, completely prepared AND I didn't even have to look at the people who might be judging me. Sounds perfect, right?
Y'all... I choked. I opened up my mouth and all sound was strangled in my throat. I face-planted. HARD. It wasn't QUITE the public speaking scene from Life of the Party, but that's what it felt like. I have anxiety to begin with, and social anxiety on top of that. Air squeaked out of me like a balloon and I couldn't sing one fucking word.
After that, I never wanted to sing in public again.
Actually, that's not true. I wanted to, because I love to sing. Like, passionately love to sing. But I no longer could do it if I thought someone else might hear me.
If I'm belting out a song in my car and I ease up to a traffic light next to other people, I STOP SINGING. I don't even want people to KNOW I'm singing, even if they can't hear me.
In fact, this is why I don't dance. I don't do *anything* to draw attention to myself because I can never, ever be center stage like that again.
Oddly, public speaking isn't that difficult, but dancing or singing? Fuggetaboutit.
I realize what a stupid phobia this is, believe me. During a conversation about this very thing with my bestie, I said that if another friend of mine ever knew that this was one of my phobias, he would DRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGG me to a karaoke bar and make me confront my fear.
Hence, the Karaoke Scene was born. I *knew* that if I had my hero do this for Sofie, it would be a pivotal moment in her life, virtually reclaiming a victory once snatched right out of her vulnerable, teenage hands.
If I did it right, it could also be a pivotal moment between the two lead characters.
To me, there's nothing sexier than power reversals in relationships. No one person can have all the power all the time, and it is in those moments of submission where we are vulnerable enough not only to love someone else, but to risk being loved in return.
For Sofie, she would have to trust him more than she feared failing. Speaking from personal experience I can tell you that both are equally terrifying. Needless to say, *I* haven't been to a karaoke club, and I made damned sure I never made a peep around any friend who might get the idea to drag me. The thought literally makes me hyperventilate. Balls out terror, y'all. I'm not even close to kidding.
So, I did what I always do. I put it in a book. As one of the Pudgie stories that Sofie loathes, she tried out for city choir in front of an audience and face planted just like I had. Her mother wrote it a little differently, of course, giving her a much needed happy ending. But her classmates knew the truth. Worse, Sofie knew the truth. And she hadn't yet recovered, just like I haven't. And Fletcher decided he was going to do something about it, to help her claim a victory of our own.
That being said, you'll have to read the book for that whole scene because the scene deserves everything leading up to it to be told properly. But here's a meaty teaser:
He kept her in the dark about where they were going all the way to Long Beach, where he finally pulled into the parking lot of a crowded karaoke bar. “Oh, no,” she said automatically. “No way.”
“Why not?”
“Um, hello? I don’t want to make a fool of myself. Again,” she added for emphasis.
“It’s a bar full of strangers. You’ve never seen them before and you’ll never see them again. What do you have to lose?”
“A little thing called social media. Ever hear of it?”
He laughed. “That’s some ego you have there, Ms. Vincent. You think the whole world is going to stop and watch what you’re doing?”
“Have you read Pudgie?” she countered.
“Have you?” he shot back. “What do you think Pudgie would do if she was in this car right now?”
Sofie rolled her eyes. “Knowing the way my mother wrote her, she’d probably race you to the front door. But Pudgie isn’t in this car right now.”
He leaned closer, capturing him in that gaze that invited no argument. “Isn’t she?” Sofie swallowed hard.
“When are you going to get it through your head? Pudgie doesn’t exist. You’re stuck with Sofie.”
“Yeah, well I got news for you. Sofie isn’t in this car right now. She’s stuck on that stage. Pudgie moved on. You didn’t. And you never will until you face your fears.”
She grew angrier by the minute. “I told you. I’m not scared of anything. You have no idea what I’ve had to face to get to where I am. This town is littered with the corpses of those who thought they were strong enough to take it but couldn’t stand up under the strain. I’m the one that persevered. I’m the one that made it through. Me. Sofie. Fearless, tenacious Sofie.”
“Hum,” he pondered. “Sounds like someone else I know.”
She knew he meant Pudgie. “Oh, my God. Just turn around and take me home. Better yet, get out so I can drive my own damned self.”
“Okay, Sofie,” he relented as he gave her the keys. “But I want you to think about something. You have done nothing but bitch and moan how Pudgie isn’t real. You tell me over and over again her stories were fairy tales. You want to blame Rose for that. But I blame you.”
“I beg your pardon?!”
“Face it. Rose wrote Pudgie to do the things you never had the courage to complete.”
“Fuck you,” she spat. “I created a career out of nothing, asshole. Do you know how hard that was for a woman? Much less a woman who looks like me? I broke down every door they tried to lock me out of. I made it on my terms and did every single thing they told me I couldn’t do.”
“And yet, a bar full of drunk strangers scares the piss right out of you.”
His logic was pissing her the hell off. “I don’t have anything to prove to you.”
“No. But you have something to prove to yourself. And until you do, you’ll never make peace with Pudgie.”
He got out of the car and walked towards the club. She sat in the passenger seat, practically frothing at the mouth. Who did Fletcher Sullivan think he was, anyway? If it wasn’t for her, he wouldn’t have had two dimes to rub together. And he thought he could judge her?
Though she held the keys in her hand, she didn’t move one muscle towards the driver’s side. She sat and fumed, waiting for him to come back to the car so she could yell at him some more.
Only he never came. After about eight minutes (and 49 seconds,) she finally wrenched the car open and stalked towards the club.
The joint was packed. She surveyed the crowd until her eyes finally found the tall pain in the ass currently working as her assistant. He sat alone, but there were two beers in front of him. That arrogant jackass knew she’d come find him.
It only made her angrier as she approached. She opened her mouth to berate him, but he interrupted her calmly. “Oh, good. You’re here. We’re up in ten. After that drunk group of frat boys sing ‘I Want it That Way.’”
“I told you. I am not singing.”
He took a lazy sip of his beer. “You came all the way in here to tell me that?”
She glared at him. “What is wrong with you? I told you. I don’t want to humiliate myself in front of strangers.”
“And I keep telling you nobody cares about that as much as you do.” He pointed to the stage, where a couple attempted a duet very badly. “Nobody in this crowd is expecting Whitney Houston. They simply want to see people have a good time. Believe it or not, Sofie, people default to being on your side.”
She sat next to him. “That’s easy for you to say. Look at you. People want to get close to you. They want to know what you’re about. People have been running from me since I was a child.”
He shrugged as he took another sip. “Might have something to do with that giant, blinking neon ‘Fuck Off’ sign you wear like a goddamned tiara.”
“Because I don’t want to get close to anyone,” she growled in frustration.
“Then why do you care what they think of you?” he countered. She sputtered in response as the drunk frat boys took the stage. He pushed the beer towards her. “We’re next.”
What do you love about her?
She's a prickly human, much more thorn than rose, but I like that about her. I get it, because that's how I am. When you've been hurt a lot, you put up a lot of walls. That line about the Fuck-Off sign is basically how I live my life. I repel people rather than risk them hurting me. But if you're one of the few people who actually get in, I will move heaven and earth to take care of you. That's Sofie in a nutshell.
What do you hate about her?
That she doesn't jump Fletcher sooner.
If you went out together, where would you go?
Well, it probably wouldn't be a karaoke bar.
Who inspired her?
You're lookin' at her, folks.
Who might play her in a movie?
There's really only one person I could cast in my mental movie for this role.
She's one of the few women of size in our industry for one, but that she makes the kinds of movies I would like to make just seals the deal. From Spy to Life of the Party, she's not afraid to tell Fat Female Positive stories in all their many shades.
It is my hope she'll work with me to make this one a reality. I plan to have a script in hand and pitching her prodco by the end of the year. If you read the book and you love it, and you love Melissa, do your girl Ginger a favor and slide her a copy. ;)
Do you have a special song that reminds you of her?
I mean... come on.
Any "Easter Eggs" planted with this character?
See the karaoke debacle above. Almost every single Pudgie story is a story from my past. Even the release date is a special date for me, because that was when I met my best friend in 1980 and my first husband in 1987. There is so much of me in this girl, it's a surprise her name isn't Ginger.
Where can we find her?
See you back here tomorrow, when we talk about my Cogsworth, who changed the whole story the minute I figured out which character he was going to be. It's a fascinating story. I hope you check it out.
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