Is your protagonist male or female?
I wonder if most of the main characters in novels are the same sex as the author.
There are examples of famous writers have failed when they have based their novel on the opposite sex.
There are also famous authors who have intelligently avoided the pitfall of writing about the opposite sex.
‘The Professor’ by Charlotte Bronte is based upon her experiences in Brussels, where she was a teacher in 1842. Much of the same subject matter of The Professor was reworked from the perspective of a female student into Brontë's later novel Villette, which attracted MUCH HIGHER critical acclaim.
Jane Austen wrote about men in situations she was most familiar with. In her personal encounters with men. In situations when both men and women were present. But she knew little of what men spoke about in the absence of women. Austen avoided pitfalls by writing about what she knew.
You ARE really lucky! I live in the centre of the city and so I never get to meet any cousins or so. I have a brother so it is tough luck(though he is a nice young one)!
But I do take some help from my school girls! :)
I am with Neeraj on this one. I always seem to write about males. I might take snippets from my siblings to help me if it is a girl am writing about with in the story.
Hmm... Till now, my main character has always been male. I feel, ...., sort of awkward writing about girls, sort of , well, I can't explain the feeling. I can describe a boy, a teenager's feeling at length, why even a adult male's but it is really hard to write what you haven't experienced. I always pitch it what I know...... hmm... I dunno, this is a different question! But I always believe that the story always contains part of the writer's spirit! :)