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A lot of the Urban Fantasy that ISN'T a Supernatural Romance is a film noir homage with a hard boiled, trench coated detective who is led astray by a flirty femme fatale.
Is there a male equivalent for the femme fatale? What would he be called? Can you think of fantasy books that use a flirty attractive manipulative male character that leads the heroine into trouble? I can only think of one. (Long term boyfriends who are generally losers aren't the same thing).
This is a "just for fun" discussion topic, I'm not really looking for recommendations.
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A "homme halte"?
I made that up, it's not an actual term. But...
"Femme fatale" combines the French words for "woman" and "fatal" to mean a woman who is dangerous or deadly.
So, "homme halte" combines the French words for "man" and "halt" to mean a man who is a hindrance, i.e. using manipulation to stop the protagonist from accomplishing their goal.
Plus I managed to get the alliteration in too.
Incubus?
I'm thinking Thomas from the Dresden Files, but even then he doesn't really act that way.
Jean Claude back when Anita Blake wasn't porn.
That depends whether you are talking about the early novels or the later ones...
Seriously though, where did that come from? Is there a deleted comment that discussed Anita Blake and porn?
The OP is asking about a male femme fatale.
LKH based her books on old detective novels but with a hard boiled female detective. Jean Claude is the slightly sinister criminal male sex object that lures her astray.
What did you think i was talking about?
Ah. Got it. I just noticed the reference to porn and got confused.
I was a big fan of the original Anita Blake books and while I never begrudge an artist's vision, I missed the supernatural mysteries when they shifted to erotica.
Original Jean Claude was an inspiration for my main character's LI in I WAS A TEENAGE WEREDEER.
Well, in most UF stories, it seems to be the Alpha Male who tempts/romances/seduces/is-big-strong-he-man the heroine.
I don’t know that’s there’s really a true male equivalent for the femme fatale, just because of the “make men go astray” aspect of such characters.
Ninja edit: there’s always the “dangerous supernaturally tempting supe” who has some sort of mystical mojo when it comes to the heroine.
Typically the female starts out seeing the Alpha male Vampire as trouble, but later realizes he is a sweet guy who likes walks on the beach. Kind of the reverse character arc to the femme fatal.
I think it depends on the series. I’ve definitely read some (though of course they’re not coming to mind), that are usually the seductive evil vamp leading her astray and the rough and tumble werewolf who just wants love and so on and so on.