The Love Interest and The Love Rival

Lady Ice · May 30, 2012

Mharvey said:
In my current WIP, I'm experimenting with my first ever love triangle.

The way I plan to handle it is that while the main character and the love interest are like best friends from the start, his feelings for her don't really kick into overdrive until she starts opening up and being with the second person, one who is sorta more naturally sexy and appealing to the reader, if I did my job right. He's the snarky, confident hot one (read: fangirl bait) while the MC is kinda the shy, calm "boy next door."

The MC's logic for never pursuing a relationship is that, if he doesn't get what he wants from the story, he's dead before he turns 18 and he didn't want to put her through that. But as the book develops, he starts having hope that he may yet live and, when he sees the other two together, it's a painful reminder of what he might have had. I'm hoping that's enough to get him on the reader's side... but TBH, I'm not sweating it if it isn't. As long as the reader feels the love interest should be with one or the other, I've got them sufficiently invested in the conflict.

I think your way would get sympathy.

The main danger of a love triangle is as others have said- readers may lose sympathy for the protagonist if the protagonist seems torn between the obviously nice guy and the complete bastard. There has to be something in both guys that she finds attractive and something that she finds is a drawback, otherwise it's not really a conflict but just delaying the inevitable.

Writing a successful love triangle is hard, I think, especially as the two love interests are normally complete opposites, but if it's done well, the pay-off is very good.

quicklime · May 30, 2012

Lady Ice said:
I always find this a hard character to write. When I'm reading books, I never really go for the love interest. I always want the love rival, or even someone off the love-radar.

How do you deal with writing love interests, or indeed, love rivals? A love rival has to be likeable enough for the MC to have a conflict but not so likeable that we feel cheated when she ends up with the love interest.

dunno, because romance isn't usually my genre, but I just wanted to add that "Win a date with Tad Hamilton" and "Bridget Jones" were a couple of my favorite romance movies, because the antagonist actually had a lot going for them....especially "Tad". It is much more satisfying to see a real choice than the "and she finally decided not to marry the complete asshole" where you spend half the story wondering if the girl had some sort of head injury or why the hell this is even a dilemma for her in the first place.

E. B. Pike · Jun 2, 2012

I tried to pull off a Pride & Prejudice-style love them in my last novel, where the first Darcyish guy seems like a jerk, but the other Wickhamish guy seems super nice. Then, over the course of the novel, I tried to flip it, so you're rooting for the Darcyish guy instead. But some beta's have told me they were disappointed because the Darcyish guy was "too" much of a jerk --so they never really warmed to him. Sighs. Love interests and love rivals are so tricky!

Lady Ice · Oct 10, 2012

E. B. Pike said:
I tried to pull off a Pride & Prejudice-style love them in my last novel, where the first Darcyish guy seems like a jerk, but the other Wickhamish guy seems super nice. Then, over the course of the novel, I tried to flip it, so you're rooting for the Darcyish guy instead. But some beta's have told me they were disappointed because the Darcyish guy was "too" much of a jerk --so they never really warmed to him. Sighs. Love interests and love rivals are so tricky!

It is hard. Getting those characters right is crucial otherwise the romance falls apart.

JC Emery · Oct 10, 2012

When I started working on my book back in 2009 I had it all planned out-- or I thought I did. I had my MC have a romantic interest in one guy and then the rival neatly fell in love with her best friend.

Several versions later and I still had it in my mind that Girl E ended up with Boy M. But then I started writing and saw something different. As much as I tried to avoid it, Girl E developed a crush on Boy L. Boy L wasn't having any of it, but his actions showed that he did care. The more I wrote, the more I plotted, the more I saw the value in Girl E and Boy L.

So as a writer what have I done?

I've given up. lol Girl E gets to make her own choice. I just write the characters as they are. It's not my place to tell her who she should or is going to love. She's so well developed now that I trust whichever choice she makes is going to be the right one for her story. It's her life after all, not mine.

ccarver30 · Oct 11, 2012

Lady Ice said:
I always find this a hard character to write. When I'm reading books, I never really go for the love interest. I always want the love rival, or even someone off the love-radar.

How do you deal with writing love interests, or indeed, love rivals? A love rival has to be likeable enough for the MC to have a conflict but not so likeable that we feel cheated when she ends up with the love interest.

Anyone thinking of Stefan/Elena/Damon here??

Wilde_at_heart · Oct 11, 2012

Lady Ice said:
This is what I try to do. That way it's more about the character choosing what they want from life rather than purely picking man A or B.

I must confess, I love love triangles. Actually, one of my favourite books has a sort of love square, as she has three men to choose from.

Exactly - one lover will offer security, the other excitement for example, but the latter will be fickle or non-committal.

One theme I like to explore as well is fantasy and the illusions people have about others or themselves, such as the old 'love at first sight', where one represents the fantasy and the other is more grounded in reality.
On top of that, people rarely project their 'real selves' a lot of the time, which can feed into the illusions people have about them. The 'nice guy' could be just a front for someone who is very controlling, or the 'jerk' might be a protective mask.

Lady Ice · Oct 11, 2012

Wilde_at_heart said:
One theme I like to explore as well is fantasy and the illusions people have about others or themselves, such as the old 'love at first sight', where one represents the fantasy and the other is more grounded in reality.
On top of that, people rarely project their 'real selves' a lot of the time, which can feed into the illusions people have about them. The 'nice guy' could be just a front for someone who is very controlling, or the 'jerk' might be a protective mask.

This is totally true, particularly the myth about the "nice guy". Nice guys can get away with more because if they do something bad, they can never think of it as being bad because they're "not that type of guy".

The Love Interest and The Love Rival

Lady Ice

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quicklime

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E. B. Pike

Lady Ice

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JC Emery

ccarver30

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Wilde_at_heart

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Lady Ice

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The Love Interest and The Love Rival

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Nicole Castro

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