I’ve been thinking about tropes. Most tropes can be good, but some are rather overused and always seem the same. A unique take on any trope I find is good, but using the same tired form of the trope is never good.

The damsel in distress trope is one of my favorites, since it appears in my books on a regular basis. I should hope that there is at least some uniqueness to them. Quite often I try to make the damsel in distress rescue themselves. Of course I can’t always successfully have them rescue themselves.

One of the worst use of the damsel in distress is found in the Princess Bride movie. I’ve never read the book so I can’t say whether it is a bad in the book. I actually liked the movie, but I dislike Buttercup. Throughout the movie she exhibits no real character. You could replace her with a dog and pretty much have the same movie. There’d be a less kissing, but it would still be pretty much the same movie. Pretty much from the beginning of the movie she does nothing. She’s invariably somebodies prisoner and does absolutely nothing to free herself.

On the other hand in Ella Enchanted, the book not the movie, Ella is amazing character. To a degree she is a damsel in distress because of her curse. In spite of this she’s a very strong character. She is constantly fighting against the curse and when she’s captured by ogres (only in the book, the movie failed completely) she has overcome them by the time the Prince shows up and rescues her. In fact in the book she rescues the Prince and his troops, since the ogres have a rather impressive power, which she learned to use.

I used the damsel in distress several times in my book. The first time I hid the fact that there was a damsel in distress and you can only find it out if you read what is written on my website. The prologue to Stretching Their Wings, some of which can be read on my website, shows that there was a damsel in distress in the area. Two if you look closely. My favorite is when a half orc who can lift a ton is the damsel in distress. He makes an excellent damsel in distress since he’s the biggest and strongest character in the book. In this case I turned it around a couple of chapters later and he rescued the person who rescued him.

If you’re interested in my writing I recommend that you visit my website. There you can read some of my writing (it hasn’t been edited) for free. I also recommend that if you find it interesting you get a copy of my book Trapped in a Curse. The fact of a dyslexic does show through even after it was professionally edited. Even so it’s a good book and I read it (well editing it) many times. Sometimes I had problems editing it, because although I had written the story I still got caught up in it. I sometimes have the same problem with Stretching Their Wings when I try edit that. I still hope that people will find my book and like it.