Welcome back to yet another session of me realizing something I've been doing wrong for years. I think I need to go back and tag these entries, maybe put them into a little collection so people can learn from me screwing up over and over. :P
I was making another attempt to get caught up on Writing Excuses this past week, and listening to an episode (number thirty-six from last year) about relationships. I was paying particular attention to this episode, as I've written a lot of relationships over the years, and the general feedback I've received is that I write them well.
Yeah, maybe not.
One of the aspects of writing a relationship that the podcast talked about was the need for a conflict that works against the people who might be getting together, something to give the reader that heart-clenching feeling as it looks like things might not work out. The idea is to get the readers invested in what's happening between these people so they care about whether things work out or not, and then yank that out from under them.
I have written fifteen books, about two-thirds of which have some sort of romantic relationship. And I don't think I have ever done this.
It made perfect sense when I heard it. And it hit me like a truck. While I like writing relationships, I'm not a fan of relationship DRAMA - I like it when things work out for people, when they get together over the course of the story and all that. As I made pretty damn clear two entries ago, I like my happy endings. But by pursuing that, I have repeatedly failed to give my would-be couples much to stand against them besides their own awkwardness.
To get a little deeper, I know where this comes from - I just plain like the idea of relationships working out well. My parents got divorced when I was a kid, I've been single for centuries, and I can count the relationships I have had on one hand. So there are some serious aspects of wish fulfillment here; I know this and I accept it. But because of all that, the idea of using the story, the world, and the plot to drive my characters apart and force them to find a way to still get together somehow never occurred to me.
It's kind of a sobering thing to realize, to see that I was holding myself back like that.
I know that this doesn't have to apply to all relationships, especially those that are established when the story begins; I'm not going to delve into more STARWIND rewrites to wring some relationship drama out of Kris and Sarai. And this doesn't mean I'm suddenly going to start writing stuff where the relationship itself is the story; I think I'd be bored to tears without something else going on. But going forward, I know I'm going to look for opportunities to cause even more trouble for any characters who might be moving toward getting together. I've already started on that in my current plot-in-progress.
Granted, working on that story is like trying to carve something out of stone while constantly ducking away to make sure the stone didn't notice, so who knows how it's actually going to turn out, or if it even is. -_-
I'm curious to know what y'all think about this, since I know many of you are a lot meaner to your characters than I've ever managed to be.
Next week: IWSG. It might be just one extended whining session, but we'll see.
I don't think I've done as much to drive people apart as just throw challenges at them where they had to stick together. Maybe you're on to something there.
ReplyDeleteTrust me, I'm not onto anything. >_< Not with me continuously looking at what I've done and seeing where I screwed up.
DeleteI cringe when I right drama into relationships, but people thrive on that. In real life, it seems too telling from my teens :)
ReplyDeleteYeah, I remember those days, and I'm glad I avoided a lot of it. Not all of it. And people really do seem to want it in their books, if what I've seen is any indication.
Deleteright = write *sigh* foggy day.
ReplyDeleteI proof documents for a living. Trust me, I speak fluent typo. ^_^
DeleteI'm terribly mean to my characters, but at the same time, I do want them to get their HEAs. It just might be a long and grueling path to get there.
ReplyDeleteHonestly, I'm not great at writing relationships, and I'm not sure you'd like any of them. There's love and they persevere, but like you mentioned, I'm meaner than you are. :)
Let's see, as far as drama between my main couples--D&M deal with personality conflicts, his reckless behavior, and the loss of their child. Of course, they also deal with a guy who is in love with M, enough to instigate a manhunt for her and go to war, and his helpers who try to kill D on multiple occasions. That type of drama? Or is it more like the drama between C&J, where you can tell C is completely in love with J, but his sense of proprietary keeps him from pursing the relationship until the conflict with the war is address. It leads to him getting jealous because J has been spending a lot of time with W & with S. Still, in my mind, there's no question as to who was destined to be together. :)
Heh. ^_^ I think what I'm personally looking for is more like your first examples, where there are things actively working against the characters that causes problems with their would-be relationships. I'm not a fan of personal drama, things that could be settled with the characters having a five-minute conversation that they never seem to have. Oi.
DeleteYeah, drama in relationships, turns out, I sort of really like the totally effed up relationships, and I don't know what that says about me. Right now, on submission, I'm breaking one couple up by breaking his mind. In another, I'm effing everything up by putting one of them undermind control so there's always the question of was it him, or was it the mind control (as well as the breaking empire, murderous bloodmages and killer biota trying to do the things). But I think that sometimes you don't need drama in that part of the story. Sometimes, you need something stable. Don't fall into the trap of plumbing EVERY chance to draw drama. If you do, you'll start to write like a soap opera but with magic and spaceships. Conflict is always awesome, but if you always drive for heightened conflict, it get's predictable and boring. Do what works for you because someone else out there needs to read relationships like the ones you write.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. I don't want to make things unbelievably horrible for these people, I just need to give them some more trouble so it's not that everything's smooth sailing as soon as they get together.
DeleteAnd than you for that last sentence, I needed to hear that. ^_^