I've been meaning too, really.
The problem is I can't find the right picture to post. See, I've been obsessing over finding the right look for a new hero I'm working on and I know just what I think he looks like, but I can't find the right picture and it's driving me nuts.
I discovered once before that sometimes stories don't work because one or the other of the main characters is wrong. They may be good looking, smart, clever, and experts in their chosen profession, but they're just not exactly right and that's why the story doesn't seem to gel.
So I have this story all plotted and I know everything that needs to happen, but it's just been sitting around doing nothing because the scenes I wrote with the hero and heroine were just too...nice. The hero was a gentleman. Very wise as well as handsome. Powerful, sophisticated...you'd like him. Really. The heroine, in fact, had no reason not to like him.
Therein lay the problem. When there's no conflict, there's no story. When two people meet and really hit it off...that's not a romance novel. Two people need to meet like oil and water, or preferably oil and a lit match. They need to leave each other scorched and spent, not giddy and grinning [at least not a first].
So, I'm off to find the hero that my heroine doesn't find genteel and admirably heroic. She can't look at him and think, 'Wow, he's got it all together.' She needs to look at him and think, 'Oh, please. This guy?'
I'll let you know when I find him.
7 comments:
Hmmm...is your heroine flawed, or is she close to perfect too?
She's just killed someone...by accident and she's freaking out about it. I think a hero who can piss her off will bring out more of her flaws than one who is too well-mannered.
Oooh, my kind of gal!
Personally if I was freaking out, I'd probably b pissed off by someone who was too well-mannered....
"She's just killed someone...by accident..."
Interesting. That would be a nightmare to overcome.
Hi Annalee! How's it going?
Jen, you're right - maybe the problem is the heroine isn't freaked out enough to be pissed off by how nice the hero is...?
I dunno. Wasn't trying to tell you what to do with your story, just sharing my knee-jerk reaction to the set-up as you outlined it here. (tho it might be fun to play with a too-perfect hero...)
The knee-jerk reactions are usually the ones that are spot on. The problem with this story is I really, really want to write it. I've wanted to write it for years and I just freakin' can't. No matter what I do, it doens't seem to work, yet the whole plot is there just waiting to be fleshed out. It just seems to me the characters are the part that's not working, but I can't seem to find the right people for the job.
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