They can be as patrician and angular as traditional heroes and heroines, but they can also be softly rounded. Color of skin is usually dark and often likened to food, such as coffee or honey. Coffee when mixed with cream ranges from black to blonde and this gives a huge variety of areas to draw upon. New words to describe color have cropped into the reading vocabulary were tanned used to be the only version of dark. Words like sienna, palomino and peanut butter have joined wheat, straw and porcelain.
Hair is another area that is as varied as the weather.
Elaborate designs of braided hair and in a few cases even baldness can be done. Hair styles don't so easily become undone. They don't usually flow like curtains or panels to hide expressions, although this is not totally out of the question. There is also hair that is fine and flowing and needs little or no relaxation to it. These African-Americans may be the most difficult to describe since they have many of the features of traditional heroines.