The Age Question

I've been getting some questions about Jessica's age.  No one's complained, but I think there's been a little discomfort that she's younger than your typical "young" protagonist -- especially in view of the harrowing situations she has to face, many of which would have an adult curled up in a ball.  In answer, and to quote myself from an interview question: these are modern considerations.  People ruled empires at 15 and 16 in the past.  We aren't any different now than we were then; modern society has imposed these conventions, and they have nothing to do with real ability or actual readiness.  In fact, probably a lot of modern issues in the "difficult" teen years (that weren't an issue a thousand years ago) would go away if we let kids get the show on the road.

This isn't to say all 16-year-olds are ready to be leaders.  They aren't.  But then neither are all 30-year-olds.  :-)  And so if the talent is there, if the ability is clear, age is an arbitrary limitation.

When I began writing Star Angel I felt the hero needed to have the resilience of youth.  Jess goes through so much more than an average, fictional adult would be expected to endure, absorb, and keep going.  We find later why this is true for her.  At the outset her age may make us a bit skeptical, but by the final installment we're no longer giving it a second thought.  Only that she is who she is, that she's done what she's done, and that the reality of her accomplishments is all that matters.

I did the following on the Team Star Angel site, and I'm going to do it here.  Something that's getting a bit ahead of plans, but because this question is coming up it will probably be a good thing.  Following is an excerpt from the final book, Book Five: Prophecy.  This is Jessica, and her own thoughts as she muses over this very thing.

Here it is.

FROM BOOK FIVE:

Jess thought maybe what she’d done so far, all she’d accomplished, took the sort of perspective only a teenager would have.  Not yet weighed down by the failures and impossibilities of life, able to have the insane optimism needed to make the attempt.  To believe it could be done.  To absorb the kind of trauma such epic events entailed and move on.  Even that shocking trip to Anitra -- she found herself thinking all the way back, to where this began -- events that would’ve left an older mind scarred ... even after that she managed to fight her way through and survive.  Then slip back into normal life.  Though she seemed too young to be the hero of this crazy story maybe youth was exactly what was needed to make it work.  Maybe that sort of durable optimism was the only thing keeping the whole charade in motion.

Things failed.  But they never failed unless you tried.  Likewise, things succeeded.  And, likewise, things never succeeded unless you tried.  And so the only way was to try.  To make the attempt.  And she had.  Often terrified, often wanting to do nothing more than curl into a ball and wish it all away she’d persevered.  And, so far, the greater part of her attempts had been successful.  Success outweighed the failures and here she was, having achieved what she set out to do and, voila, the teen girl had done the impossible.