Okay, so I have a bit of an issue here. As some of you may know, I'm still working hard on WotW (Basically rewriting since I changed and added so much after the first round of beta) I have a female character and she spends most of the book plotting and trying to find a way to become the elected queen over her peer. She and her peer grew up together and studied and everything. However, he had always been kind, if not a little annoying, and as time went by it became for my MC nothing but a desire to win, to beat him, to prove herself better. However, as the story progresses, she ends up trying to shed some of that fierce competitive side of hers and discovers that maybe she disliked her peer because she wanted to and made an enemy of him when there was no need for it. She always had a tender side and rather thoughtful but I'm at the part where the two are putting their differences aside, apologizing, and admitting that maybe they took things too far and they should put an honest effort into having a friendship (As they never had a real reason to hate one another) Knowing this, I am worried some people might read this and be like "Oh wow, the female character falls in love with the guy. What a rip. How cliche" or something of the sort. It's not entirely true but at the same time I can't deny she is changing her feelings (or rather, figuring them out)
It feels a bit YA to me - is it meant to be? Other than that - I don't think you'd need to write this character any differently than you'd write a male character who falls for his rival, would you? Do you think it's significant that this is a female character?
I would say you should have a gradual change in either the MC or the rival so they release they can be friends after all. Or have central to the plot a revelation which shows there has been a misunderstanding between the two characters, so the MC sees that her rival is not the person she thought he was.
@GingerCoffee That's what I feel I'm presenting. @BayView It's just an annoying fear that somehow I'm "womanizing" my female character >.> Just silly jitters over what I normally read on people's reactions. It's not meant to be YA but it's hard to condense something in a few paragraphs so you can still get the gist of it
Oh wow, the female character falls in love with the guy. What a rip. How cliche. More seriously, sounds like a badly written woman. Maybe have her viewpoint suddenly change when she sees something that contradicts her opinions/morality, like Javert (minus the suicide).
@Dagolas That's what I'm worried about. A lot of her chapters at some point deal with how she feels and deals with people and how she admits to herself gradually that she is slowly becoming something she never intended. So, it makes sense when she tries to change. I'm afraid, though, that people will think like "Oh, it took a man to fix her" and I'll be "WTF? No! This isn't some social justice shit"
Why does she ever have to dislike him? People can compete with others without disliking them. The part of this that seems somewhat negatively "womanizing" to me is (1) the idea that it's bad to be competitive and (2) the idea that she has to dislike whoever she's competing with.
It's just the relationship I set up with the two. She is constantly reminded she is a woman and her chances of being elected are zero while her peer tends to poke fun at her and rile her to try and win. And that's the thing, she only imagined herself disliking him because of how competitive and "lost in her own bubble" she got. She stopped thinking outside of her need to "prove" herself. Maybe I'm just seeing red lights where there are none.
Nah, they grew up together and he always considered himself her friend. He's just a flippin' nuisance half the time. It's society and precedence remembering that she is a woman and just a token candidate to show "anyone can be in power"
Eh....the vibe I'm getting is that she refused to be disrespected or condescended to, and now she's "maturing" to a state where she no longer expects respect. I'd rather see her demand and get respect before they become friends.
Yeah, the more you say, the more I'm with ChickenFreak - this guy doesn't sound like a great catch. Honestly, it would be refreshing as hell to read a book with a female MC where there isn't a romantic subplot, so if you're setting these guys up to be rivals, maybe you could leave them as rivals? They could both mature to have a grudging respect for each other and agree to cooperate or whatever, but do they have to fall in love? And if they do, what changes for the male character that allows him to fall in love with the woman? Having just her change and mature, and having the evidence of her changing and maturing be that she's now in love with the guy she's been competing against? That's been overdone, in a not-very-favourable way.
That's kind of what I'm planning for the next chapter. There's a fight scene between her group and literal nightmare. I wanted her to kind of try to break free of the nightmare by challenging her worst fears and kind of grow from that as she realizes the strong and intelligent woman she is was constantly hidden by her need to be recognized when she (and her peer) always knew she was.
Here's what I think, people are imagining what your story is and what they would write. It's normal, we all do it. What you have to do is write the story, don't worry about how it sounds until you get something on the page. Then have people read it and see how they react to it. Is it believable, cliché, close but with flaws? Otherwise you are just getting people's opinions as to the story they would write.
@GingerCoffee You're very right. I knew no one would fully get it until they read the actual script. However, I still found the discussion useful. They, just from what I wrote, saw different angles on how the situation can be viewed. And I think that gives me a few insights on ways to look at the situation and create the impression I want rather the one I might be unconsciously placing.
In my opinion it is cliche, but there's a reason why people love seeing characters who hated each other grow to understand and like each other. I like it, too. As long as their falling in love is well done and engaging, I wouldn't worry.
Honestly, I don't think she'll ever fall in love romantically with him. I don't intend any real romance between the two but something more of a partnership.
I think it's a great idea. I've only read your description as a woman discovering the side effects of the pursuit of power or an unhealthy amount of attention to proving to be just as good. I can't even think of a work that deals with that besides the minor role of Goneril and Regan in King Lear (just the pursuit of power).
But that's the best part. @BrianIff Thank you? I think, lol. I know of King Lear but nothing about it I doubt it's the same subject but who knows? :3
Does it need to be a female character? Is gender really that big of a thing for this story? There are lots of stories with ambitious characters, right?
I didn't mean to imply the question or the replies weren't helpful. It just that some posts seemed to be growing your original idea a tad further than your outline went.
@BayView Without her, the story is almost a sausagefest ;p And yeah, she's female. I wrote her as a woman and that'll never change. Especially for the reason "Does it have to be a woman?" Because with that logic "Does it have to be a man?" There's lots of lore and backstory that explains why the female status in society is such a way and it reasonably ties in to why she wants to be elected and why her personality is so driven and cold. Oh, I didn't mean to infer that you thought the discussion wasn't helpful. You're right, of course, everyone is painting the story with the little info I gave. It's up to me to make sure the character development is smooth and makes sense. I was just worried about stupid things, really :3
