I teach an introduction to fiction writing course for Closing Credits, and today I’d like to share some of the tips I give students when it comes to writing a love interest. It can be tricky to make a romantic partner for your protagonist believable to a reader, but it’s essential if you’re going to avoid something tropey and boring.
5. Know the Difference Between a Sex Fantasy and a Romance
There is absolutely nothing wrong with writing porn, and many great writers have done so. That said, a love interest who exists purely for your hero to bang is not compelling. Ideally, a love interest should be one of the most developed characters in your book, with hopes and dreams and motivations all their own that may or may not include your protagonist.
There was a pretty terrible local book I reviewed that made the cardinal mistake when it comes to a love interest. It was a political thriller, and the love interest goes from soldier to sex kitten the literal second the hero sweeps her legs out from under her in a takedown. That’s the sort of horndog fantasy a high school sophomore would come up with, like the woman was simply waiting for a bit of manly violence to turn into a nymphomaniac. Don’t do this.
4. Understand The Tension Between Your Character’s Flaws and Your Love Interest’s Virtues
We’ve already talked about how important it is to write a flawed main character. Failings are what move the plot forward and give your hero something to overcome. A lot of bad love interests suffer from perpetual blindness to these flaws.
A love interest who adores your main character no matter what is unrealistic and narratively dull. Even people who have been happily married for 50 years still have things about their partner they wish the other person would work on. Watching a romance naturally develop between two characters will require being honest about how your hero occasionally fucks up the life of the love interest, and that love interest expecting reasonable amounts of change to avoid future damage. Know what’s wrong with your protagonist, and make it affect their partner’s life.
3. Settle on the Chemistry Formula
Romantic stories come in several categories such as enemies to lovers (and vice versa), star-crossed lovers, shared adventurers, the healing partner, fake relationships that blossom into real ones, and love triangles that may include some or all the others I just mentioned. Knowing the basic form that this relationship will take will give you a solid map for progressing. While a skilled author can maybe switch things up halfway through, it’s best to keep focused on one type of relationship.
2. People Are Not Trophies
This should not need saying in 2023, but a relationship is not a reward for a hero’s journey. A union or reunion may be a happy ending, and plenty of romance novels do that, but it has to be because the story actually got the characters there.
Remember that the phrase “your princess is in another castle” implies that the princess is off doing something. If all the love interest does is wait around, they might as well be a lamp.
Side note: If the love interest is the only woman in your story, go fix that.
1. Love is Epic
The difference between a love interest and a sidekick is that at some point, your hero cannot exist without the love interest. The level of affection has to transcend a mundane relationship and involve extraordinary effort on the characters’ parts.
Always ask what makes the love interest indispensable to your hero. There is plenty of beauty, money, and power in the world, and the hero may gain that from a variety of characters. However, the love interest has something that is essential to their very existence. It may be an understanding, a brilliance, or a loyalty that the hero has never felt. Whatever the love interest has, it should be of epic necessity to your hero. Otherwise, they are just another character.
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2023.
