: Re: Dropping subtle hints about a character's sexuality I have a character who is assumed to be straight, but after a few months reveals herself to be bisexual. I don't want her to just come

@Megan928

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Personally, I think that all that's really required is that you don't lead them in the opposite direction intentionally. I have a homosexual woman in my story, and throughout, I make it clear that at the very least, she's not interested sexually in men.

Now, I generally treat sexuality as incidental in my stories, so there's no big 'reveal' scene in my book, but if one were to happen, it wouldn't be too out of left field. She never expressed interest in men, even when others assumed her to be a male character's (who she gets on well with) girlfriend.

As such, her being into women would come off more as an 'oh, that makes sense in hindsight', rather than 'oh, there's another shocking swerve gay just put in to make the writer say 'fooled you' to their readers'.

Here, the only foreshadowing is that she's probably not straight, then her reveal of being gay is... just kind of there. When it comes to the reveal, unless the story's about exploring homophobia/homosexuality's role in society, it's best to make any reveal understated too, like it isn't a big deal. It shouldn't feel like the character has hopped from the worktop in front of her friends randomly to declare 'I'M GAY'.

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