BADLANDS

oh boy, buckle up. I've got THOUGHTS on this topic lmao

Grace would never give a straight answer. If someone asked her what her most toxic trait is, she'd make a joke out of it. She would dodge the actual question and either 1. list some of the reasons she's amazing or 2. give a dumb, fake answer to get a laugh. There's no way she'd ever actually admit to her own most toxic trait. The whole thing would make her uncomfortable and so she'd have the topic changed and the asker distracted before they even noticed she was doing it.

But! If you're asking ME, the answer is simple: Grace's most toxic trait is her own hypocrisy. Does Grace know this? Deep down, absolutely.

HERE'S THE THING. In the past, for almost every single other one of my OCs in almost every other book, I've assigned them a star sign AFTER they were created. I get 15k words into writing them and then, from there, I go "oh they're a Leo" or "oh they're a Cancer." But with Grace, I outlined her character as a bona fide Libra Woman before I ever started writing this book.

I knew from day zero that she was going to be a beautiful blonde paradox. Libras are my favorite sign -- I collect them like Pokémon. They fascinate me. I think they're exactly as neurotic and anxious and loyal as Virgos but with this reckless sense of chaos that could only ever come from an Air Sign. They're the best liars in the zodiac. They're going to look you straight in the eye and they're going to bullshit you. Maybe that means they'll cheat on their partner, maybe it means they'll cheat at board games, maybe it means they're gonna tell you a crazy story that paints them in a better light than they deserve but in some way, some shape, some form, a Libra is going to bullshit you and so the idea of writing a strong-willed journalist who is fucking OBSESSED with getting the story and getting the truth and then also making her a Libra who utterly cannot face herself and her own choices fascinated me. I really, really wanted to write that character and that's how Grace came to be Grace.

Because at work, with Polaris, when it comes to getting the story for Badlands' residents and getting to the heart of matters, she is an unstoppable force. She refuses to believe the stories she's given by the police or by the mayor and she digs until she finds the REAL truth. It is her fucking CALLING. She does not stop until she finds out what really happens and then screams it from the rooftops. She is excellent at her job because nobody cares more about the truth than Grace and nobody can see through bullshit like Grace.

BUT. On the other hand, in her personal life, she is a disaster. She is lying CONSTANTLY, mostly to herself (but there are some Big Lies right there in the first 35,000 words of the book that she is telling to the people closest to her.) Grace demands honesty from everyone else in the city but she cannot give it to herself. She doesn't give it to Vee, she doesn't give it to Ivy. (She DOES give it to Milo and there's a recurring theme of him being the one person she simply can't lie to but we can talk about that another time.)

So what's Grace's most toxic trait? It's hypocrisy. (Technically it's also "dishonesty" but I think, in this case, they are kind of the same.) Grace holds everyone else to a different standard than she holds herself AND DO NOT THINK FOR ONE SECOND that she is not 100% aware of it. There is a bitter (albeit buried) self-awareness within Grace that I have observed in every single one of my beautiful, problematic Libra friends and I think it's very clear in her narrative that she struggles with it. She doesn't LIKE lying, she doesn't feel good about it, she feels guilty every time she does it but to Grace, it is REQUIRED for self-preservation and so she does it anyway.

She has built a living AND a reputation on the fierce, never-ending quest for truth and justice but there's nobody on the planet who lies to herself more than our Grace Rhodes, Local Libra Woman.