Love Interests

Unimportant said:

Er, not everyone's lives. Most people's, yes. Asexual people, aromantic people, hermits, some folks with dementia, the Eye of Sauron.... They're not in the middle of the bell curve, but they do exist.

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So? If you're writing about those people, fine, but very few writers do. The simple fact is there's nothing whatsoever wrong with giving a protagonist a love interest, and that the great, massive majority of epople do have a love interest. That's just how it is.

I;d also take hermits off your list. I've known a few true hermits, and every one of them at least wanted a love interest. A couple became hermits because of a failed love interest.

Depends.

Personally, I'm not a huge fan of animal stories. Is that because there's no romance in them? No, it's because they're full of animals. It's a different issue.

Now, going by the popularity of certain books with non-human protags (not just animals), there are a bunch of people who would love a book like that. Whether they want a romantic subplot or not is another question, and I don't really know the answer.

SampleGuy said:

What about non humans? If your story focus on a race of non human characters who don't have any love interests and similar human traits, will readers lose interest to your story?

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From what I understand, if your race is *too* non human and the reader doesn't get a human sense from the story, they will lose interest, simply because they cant relate.

On the subject of strange non human love stories though...

I've got a real bugger of a fix with this in my WIP.

My protag is actually a biological android, and she isn't programmed to love, but she ends up learning to and falls for this female commander who tries to help her out of her fix.

I have no idea how to handle a consciousness that doesn't initially understand the concept of love slowly coming to possess that capability, but the characters themselves want it, at least I feel they do from the way they interact on the page. Weird ass science fiction problems.

Trip F. said:

From what I understand, if your race is *too* non human and the reader doesn't get a human sense from the story, they will lose interest, simply because they cant relate.

On the subject of strange non human love stories though...

I've got a real bugger of a fix with this in my WIP.

My protag is actually a biological android, and she isn't programmed to love, but she ends up learning to and falls for this female commander who tries to help her out of her fix.

I have no idea how to handle a consciousness that doesn't initially understand the concept of love slowly coming to possess that capability, but the characters themselves want it, at least I feel they do from the way they interact on the page. Weird ass science fiction problems.

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Read some of the good Supernatural fanfics dealing with the pairing of Dean Winchester and Castiel. Angels shouldn't technically be able to love, but I've read some stories from Cas's POV that explain (probably the wrong word, but I can't find the right one at the moment) how he does very well.

Jamesaritchie said:

The simple fact is there's nothing whatsoever wrong with giving a protagonist a love interest, and that the great, massive majority of epople do have a love interest. That's just how it is.

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Look at it this way. Everyone has parents, but not every story involves a character's parents. Most people have a love interest at some point in their lives -- not every story involves that.

There's a wide variety of things people like to read about. Romance is just one of them. A reader might be equally interested in the relationship between a hero and his villainous father. What makes character relationships interesting is conflict and change; it doesn't matter whether those characters are friends or fucking as long as it's interesting.

I watched Avatar: The Last Airbender when I was a kid. Gotta say, I was much more interested in Zuko's search for his missing mother than Zuko's girlfriend.

ViridianChick said:

I watched Avatar: The Last Airbender when I was a kid. Gotta say, I was much more interested in Zuko's search for his missing mother than Zuko's girlfriend.

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Me too. I was also more interested in whether Zuko and Iroh would reconcile and how Aang would go about defeating the Fire Lord, rather than y'know, who winds up with who. In fact, given how insane the ship fights are in the Avatar fandom, yeah, starting to think I don't belong there and also starting to think I should stay far, far away from said fandom because you people are insane.

But yeah, I'm not completely opposed to romance, if it's done well. But one of the things I found disconcerting in my fandom experience is that everyone seemed so obsessed with shipping to the extent of everything else. I felt like a lonely voice crying out in the wilderness, "Am I the only one wondering what secret the bad guy's hiding? Or how the heroes will take him/her out?"

Samsonet said:

Depends.

Personally, I'm not a huge fan of animal stories. Is that because there's no romance in them? No, it's because they're full of animals. It's a different issue.

Now, going by the popularity of certain books with non-human protags (not just animals), there are a bunch of people who would love a book like that. Whether they want a romantic subplot or not is another question, and I don't really know the answer.

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Given the high number of SF and F writers on the AWWC, I'm guessing the person above was thinking of aliens or sentient fantasy beings, not animals.

Though the huge number of highly successful and famous novels, even adult novels, written from the pov of animals, or with animal characters (Richard Adams comes to mind) of one kind of another, would suggest that your tastes here are far from universal. I like animal stories myself, if the writer manages to make the character relatable without simply being a human in a fur suit.

And for that matter, animals and aliens and so on can have love stories too, though of course, the writer may make them different from the way things work for our own species. And of course, it's also possible an animal or alien will be of a species that does not pair bond at all.

The point as far as I'm concerned, though, isn't whether or not an individual story *should* have a love interest/interests included. It's how to do it (if one chooses to) in a way that is true to the characters involved and balances the expected and unexpected appropriately.

I don't really want to read a story where a love affair comes out of the blue and makes no sense at all (Huh? Ehy does she like him?), or lets me down hard at the end (but the whole thing built up to their being together, and they'd be perfect together, so why aren't they?) But I also don't want it to be such a zero tension and conflict ride that I never worry or wonder at all.

For a romantic arc to work well, you need to be rooting for the couple, but at the same time, be worried for them too. This helps if they're both interesting and developed enough you can see why they in particular should be together. An appropriately nice and attractive member of the appropriate gender and orientation who shows up for no other reason than to be a romantic partner is indeed dull.

Emermouse said:

Me too. I was also more interested in whether Zuko and Iroh would reconcile and how Aang would go about defeating the Fire Lord, rather than y'know, who winds up with who.

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I normally am one of those people screaming about ships, but damn. That whole Zuko-Iroh thing was just heartbreaking and perfect.

Roxxsmom said:

Given the high number of SF and F writers on the AWWC, I'm guessing the person above was thinking of aliens or sentient fantasy beings, not animals.

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I know. I mentioned animals because they were the first thing that popped into my head.

Though the huge number of highly successful and famous novels, even adult novels, written from the pov of animals, or with animal characters (Richard Adams comes to mind) of one kind of another, would suggest that your tastes here are far from universal. I like animal stories myself, if the writer manages to make the character relatable without simply being a human in a fur suit.

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Sorry if it sounded like I was insulting people who like animal books. My point was just that readers who will be turned off by a lack of romance and readers who will be turned off for other reasons aren't necessarily the same.