**WARNING: SPOILERS OF VAMPIRE DIARIES, VAMPIRE ACADEMY AND GEORGINA KINCAID**
I love Vampire Diaries (the TV series, not the books. I didn’t like the books). But I hate seeing Elena divided between Damon and Stefan. And let’s not talk about the fact that they are brothers! Ew!
Come on, how can one be that undecided? I once saw a quote from Johnny Depp, so perfect:
I have to say I agree with him.
Though, between us, I would pick Stefan. Yes, yes, I’m a self proclaimed bad-boy kind of girl, but hey, Stefan had his bad-boy phase too ;)
Anyway, I wouldn’t be in that situation. Oh, noes. If I ever had to choose between two guys, I would have chosen none of them. Erin Presson Ladd had a blog post on Sarah Enni’s blog about this very topic, Love Triangles: when the best choice is none. I couldn’t agree more.
There were several books that I almost gave up reading because the heroine couldn’t make up her mind. Oh, come on!
I asked what people thought of love triangles yesterday on twitter. Among several great answers, Mason T. Matchak gave me the following one:
@Juliana_Haygert I think love triangles are great as long as they’re part of the story, not the entire story. And keep angst minimal. ^_^
— Mason T. Matchak (@MasonTMatchak) June 13, 2012
So true! I can’t take anymore whiny heroines whose main problem is which one of her hot guys she should kiss today … I think it’s okay to have other guys, but don’t make your ENTIRE manuscript about this drama.
I prefer “love triangles” like the ones Richelle Mead writes. Following the thoughts of a post my NA sister LG Kelso wrote, on Vampire Academy Rose has a love situation with two guys, Dimitri and Adrian. Rose is a kickass heroine who knows what she wants and who she loves. She doesn’t need any man, but she—as any normal female, I guess—would like to have a love life and she knows exactly with whom. Though, when destiny puts Dimitri away from her grasp and she can’t bring him back, she tries to move on. That’s when Adrian enters the games. As LG points out on her post, this isn’t a triangle. It’s just different lovers at different points of the heroine’s life.
Same goes for the Georgina Kincaid Series. Georgina can’t be with Seth, the main reason being that they can’t touch—not without taking away years of his life. So she ends up giving a try with Dante, whose soul was already tainted and didn’t deserve to live a long life (judging? me? noooo!). But we know Dante isn’t a match to her. She’s with him to occupy her mind. A distraction. And there’s Roman too (secretly *swoon*). Georgina would love to move on with Roman, but ultimately, he isn’t the one she loves and she doesn’t even let their relationship to take off.
Being undecided between two guys is very, very different than having relationships with two guys in different parts of the story. It’s just like life. When you break up with a boyfriend/girlfriend, you mourn (or not) then move on. It’s a choice: a choice to keep living and be happy, not a choice about who you’ll kiss today. Sometimes, this new relationship doesn’t work either, and once again you move on. And sometimes, that moving on step brings you to your first lover. Or it takes you farther away.
While outlining and then writing DESTINY GIFT, I never intended it to be a love triangle. Never. I always knew with who Nadine would end up. In fact, it wasn’t about who she would end up with at all. In my mind, the second guy wasn’t there to put tension on Nadine’s relationship. He was there to aggravate the other problems, the ones that label this manuscript as paranormal. And I did plan it to be a trilogy since the beginning.
However, I let my mind blank a few days ago and started studying other options for the sequels, to see if I could come up with even better ideas. One of them involved an event that would bring Nadine and her love interest apart. While on the pursue of her “destiny” in the story and solving the paranormal problems, she would get closer to the other guy. But you see, it would be a lot like Rose, Dimitri and Adrian. It wasn’t that she fell in love with both at the same or couldn’t choose between the guys. It would be my heroine trying to move on with her life. Well, I won’t tell you if she would be like Rose and end up with Dimitri, or would stay on the alternate path, otherwise I would give away part of the trilogy ending ;)
If I end up choosing this new idea for my sequels, I really hope to escape the “love triangle” analogy.
Now I hand the microphone to you:
What’s your opinion and thoughts about love triangles?
Cheers,
UPDATE: the lovely Jessa Russo wrote a blog post inspired on this one. You should check it out too, because she speaks the truth! ;)