Ayaan’s gone. I had to give her the boot.
Ayaan was supposed to be the teen girl who took Lyra in under her wing and showed her what a peer friendship could be like.
She did well in her initial role in my previous drafts. She lived overseas, where Lyra traveled, and she became a cultural guide. Ayaan, a quiet and introspective teen, was confident in herself, even as she chafed against the limited role of women in her society.
But Lyra no longer travels overseas. She stays in the U.S., so there’s no explicit need for a cultural guide.
Ok, I thought, but there is still a need for a cultural guide of a different sort–a girl about Lyra’s age who shows Lyra what “normal life” was really like. I naturally assumed I could recast Ayaan in that role.
Turns out I was wrong.
Ayaan simply didn’t fit. As I tried to write the scene where the two girls first meet, it wasn’t coming together. Every idea I had seemed wrong for Ayaan’s quiet character. Ayaan wouldn’t jump up on stage and belt out show tunes. Ayaan wouldn’t go on a vandalism streak. But those were some of the things I wanted Ayaan to do.
Ayaan refused. She had too much dignity to do what I asked, she told me.
So reluctantly, I had to fire her. Call it creative differences, if you like.
I auditioned a few other characters, but finally settled on Yasmine Smith, who has a different, more gregarious, open outlook on life than Ayaan. A third-generation American, Yasmine hated being saddled with an Arabic name while a devastating war rages in the Middle East, so she anglicized it to Jaz. Now we’re talking. Now I have a character ready to take her world by storm, and to drag Lyra along for the ride.
I’m pleased to welcome Jaz, but I’m sorry to see Ayaan go. She was a great character. Maybe one day, in another book, we’ll cross paths again.