: Re: How do I convey that a relationship is platonic? I've been toying around with the idea of writing a novel. The story revolves around two characters, one male and one female, and the perspective

@LarsenBagley300

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Readers expected my protagonists to fall in love when they meet. Maybe I did too, but I knew it was a cliche and didn't want it. It turned out as I wrote that the male character had sparks with a secondary character, who he met before he met the female protagonist.

I've learned that the way to telegraph attraction most strongly, in addition to the dialog, is what he notices. He notices how she smells. He notices that her hair is done differently. Et cetera. He thinks things like 'WHy should I care if she doesn't notice me?'

When he meets the female protagonist there were no sparks. I wanted it platonic. He doesn't notice her hair. He doesn't notice much about her. But when he does, it's neutral (and it leans toward unflattering). She's short. She looks like a kid. Her shoes are clunky. He doesn't give any thought at all to whether she thinks about him.

She, conversely, doesn't think about him. She doesn't notice that he's tall, or exotic - because he's such a fish out of water that it's more obvious to her that he just - isn't at all helpful to what she needs (her goal). No sparks.

They become friends through shared purpose.

Would this series of relationships work if he hadn't met the secondary character first? I don't know. I do know the readers expected the two protagonists to fall in love in the beginning of the book. And that when he meets the secondary character first, they expect him to like her. (oddly, they don't care what she thinks, but that may be a PoV issue.)

Answer: I think you communicate it through what he notices about this girl, and what she notices about him. They don't notice anything remotely physically attractive. They notice the other things.

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