: Re: The problem of the throwaway boyfriend In the first 10% of my novel, my MC has a boyfriend. MC is accepted into the Space Corps (or he's summoned to fight Troy - the particulars don't really

@Bryan361

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You've suggested that the particulars of their separation don't matter, but it is specifically those particulars that hold the opportunity to sow doubt and hope into the otherwise obvious path.

Amp up the intensity of the couple's feelings for each other during that first 10%, while diminishing the apparent scale of the forced division. Then, as that division increases in distance, scale and prospective length, it will be a surprise to your readers as well as to your characters.

It is this misleading initial harmlessness of the division which sets the reader up for the sucker punch; then the sudden amplification which draws hard on the tension strings. The reader and the character should come to hopelessness together only when faced with further amplification of the division, which should happen as soon as both have bounced back from the initial blow.

If you feel that you are dragging out the breakup, then you probably are. Time passage in the story does not need equivalent page passage, and agony is agony whether short lived or eternal. Hurt your readers by hurting characters, but don't torture either of them.

Keep Writing!

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