I Found The Perfect Actress To Play Valentine, Except She’s A Tattoo Artist

So those of you who’ve read my books Flex, the Flux, and Fix will know that the beating heart of the tale is one Valentine DiGriz – the kinky, outspoken videogamemancer whose pixellated superviolence saves wimpy Paul on any number of occasions.  She’s both pretty and sexy, she’s quote-unquote “overweight” and yet is unashamed of her body, she dresses stylishly…

So when people ask me, “So if you could have any actress play Valentine, who would it be?”, the answer has traditionally been, “No one I know of.”   Unfortunately, most of the actresses with the right frame to play Valentine are comedians, and come off as a little goofy for the role.  (Though, I mean, Valentine gets off all the best one-liners in the books, so on the off-chance that Melissa McCarthy has dropped by my blog, hey, email me.)

But I did find the perfect person to play Valentine, even though I’m pretty sure she has no acting skills.  This would be Kelly Doty, the should-have-won artist who got screwed out of the finale on Ink Master, Season 8:

Unfortunately, the videoclips I can find don’t quite show off Kelly’s range of sarcasm, which mostly comes off when she’s dealing with the other tattoo artists.  But if you love Valentine and you’re like, “This woman isn’t snarky enough!”, well, Kelly’s mastery of the dry shot is well in-pocket when it comes to critiquing the other drama queens at Ink Master.  (Nor can I find videos that show off her astonishing array of outfits.)

Now, there’s the small issue that she’s not an actress.  But that’s counterbalanced by the fact that nobody is currently beating down my door to make a movie about my trilogy (though there’s some faint glimmers of hope deep in Hollywood), so if I’m casting my imaginary dream girl then I guess I can surpass the imaginary hurdles needed to take a tattoo artist into an actress.

Anyway.  You wanna know who I’d want to get to play Valentine?  Someone like Kelly Doty.