"Outgunned": A Tribute to Meljean Brook's "The Iron Duke"

"Outgunned": A Tribute to Meljean Brook's "The Iron Duke"

Detective Inspector Mina Wentworth and Rhys Trahaearn from Meljean Brook's "The Iron Duke." This was inspired by the scene in the lift, when Mina "fires back" at the Iron Duke, even though she was "outgunned."

I enjoyed "The Iron Duke" a lot on my first reading, and then grew to like it even more on repeat readings - my favourite kind of book : ) I think I didn't like it that much on my first reading because I didn't really fall in love with Trahaearn. With repeat readings, though, I think I understood why he did things better, and re-interpreted what seemed like 'autocratic jerk' on my first read as 'autocratic but that's because his past has rendered him so socially inept that that's the only way he knows how to behave.' I really loved the second in the series "Heart of Steel" as well too - I loved it on my first read, but haven't re-read it yet [1].

Although all of the books and novellas in Meljean Brook's "The Iron Seas" series are good - especially the world building. And I am rather obsessed with her Guardian Series as well.

Reference-wise: I used a picture of Lee Da Hae as a reference for Mina, based solely on the description of Mina being pretty and having a round face. And I very, very loosely based Rhys on Jonathan Rhys Meyers (because when I was reading "The Iron Duke" I couldn't get past the name and kept picturing a darker, giant Jonathan Rhys Meyers in my head.) I tried to make his nose longer and more hawk-like than Rhys Meyer's though, to fit the description of Trahaearn in the book.

This picture took me ages to paint because

   (i) there's a hand in it, and
   (ii) I tried to make it so that they were looking at each other. And clearly gave up.

Still have no clue how to systematically paint the light and pupils or whatnot in the eyes (I guess the eyelids/eyeshape might matter too) to get the effect of making the eye look where I want it to look.) That's a study that needs doing.
 
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[1] This is because it's not as angsty, and 70% of the time, I want to read angst. I like to blame L. M. Montgomery and the 'Anne' series for this.  But I loved Archimedes as a hero. And I was laughing from the outset of "Heart of  Steel,"with the Capitalized Phrases in the letters between Archimedes and his sister.