According to the Formula: Lessons from Romance Novels Pt. 2

Continuing from Pt. 1 - an attempt to see whether there are any Romance novel formulas that apply to the novel I'm writing intermittently about Alina and Bren...

Let me put Bren aside for now, because he is not really the love interest..

Stesha wasn't supposed to exist--well, not as such.  When I first conceived of the idea for the novel, Alina and Bren were to have parted with a promise to always be true, but the situation of their land--which was to change rapidly from a forest to an industrialized landscape due to some sort of conquest--led to such radical changes in who Alina perceived herself to be that she would not have been the person that loved Bren before he left, or whom he thought he loved.  Rather like, in The Princess Bride, how Wesley as the Dread Pirate Roberts was not the same as Wesley the Farm Boy.  But as I thought about what barriers they might encounter when Bren returns, it seemed to me that Alina should be pregnant.  And then, it seemed that for her to have latched onto someone other than Bren, she would have to be shamed into abandoning her hope that Bren would come back for her--or to have had her self-worth badly damaged.  It seemed not enough to have her jaded and cynical, or even for her to be a subversive.  So I cast her as having been damaged sexually--objectified and used.  But I couldn't leave her there.  Someone unlikely needed to be there to provide healing... and hope.

Stesha and Alina already have a Romance novel scenario.  After all, he finds her broken, and helps to heal her.  That healing involves a consummation, though it starts as physical and becomes emotional.  He teaches her to survive, and to want to survive.  And then he leaves.  And then what?  I don't have a definite formula for what happens next, but I'll try...

Scenario 1: Stesha is called away, and doesn't return.  Alina may or may not receive word that he has died.  Shortly after he leaves, she realizes that she is pregnant.  She progresses through most of her pregnancy on her own, waiting... again.  And surviving.  Waiting isn't very exciting.  She is vulnerable, and needs protection from the authorities.  Someone offers to marry her to give her legitimacy.  This is borrowed, in a way from the most recent Outlander novels, because it has the "true love" going away followed by a situation that causes her to lose hope that he will return.  But in this case, if Alina accepts and Stesha returns, Alina's relationship with Stesha, while marriage-like, is not marriage, so the new marriage would be binding.  Bren brings nothing to this party, having no rights under the new regime, which necessitates a new character.

Scenario 2: Stesha is captured or deported, and can't return.  Alina may or may not receive word that he has died.  She realizes that she is pregnant.  She progresses through her pregnancy until she can no longer hide it, at which point Bren and Stesha both return.  Tension ensues.  In a young adult scenario, she would recognize her desire and affection for both men.  The one she favors might be significantly flawed, and so unable to love her back--at least at first.  When she finally decides to devote herself to the other, the one who was previously flawed might have resolved whatever difficulty there was, causing further tension.  Either Stesha or Bren would then have to find a different path.

Scenario 3:  This one is bound to be a bit more sordid, as I am thinking of a strange combination of Lancelot/Arthur/Gwenivere and a film by Pedro Almodóvar Carne Trémula.  Stesha is called away.  Alina may or may not receive word that he has died.  She realizes that she is pregnant.  Bren and Stesha both return, and in a battle, Alina and Stesha are both wounded.  Alina loses the baby.  She mourns for the baby, and for Stesha, who has been paralyzed from the waist down.  By mutual consent, Bren agrees to help Alina to conceive.

Scenario 4: Stesha is called away.  Alina may or may not receive word that he has died.  She realizes that she is pregnant.  She progresses through her pregnancy until she can no longer hide it, at which point Bren returns.  He realizes that her current life is untenable, and that he has nothing to offer her.  He offers nonetheless.  They decide that he will help her find Stesha, and if they find for certain that he is dead, Bren will offer her companionship and raise the child as his own.  Stesha has, in fact died.  Bren must now help Alina to rebuild her own life and build a life with him.

Scenario 5: Stesha is called away.  Alina may or may not receive word that he has died.  She realizes that she is pregnant.  She progresses through her pregnancy until she can no longer hide it, at which point Bren returns.  He realizes that her current life is untenable, and that he has nothing to offer her.  He offers nonetheless.  They decide that he will help her find Stesha, and if they find for certain that he is dead, Bren will offer her companionship and raise the child as his own.  Bren stays with her through childbirth, and they rediscover their affection for one another.  He is devoted to her and to the child.  They continue searching for Stesha, having had word that he is alive.  They find Stesha, and tension ensues.  Alina must decide which attraction/affection means more to her.  Ultimately, she remains with the father of her child, to whom she is (already) symbolically wed.

A simpler scenario would involve only Stesha's return, or only Bren's return.  If only Stesha returned, he would probably have to be damaged physically and emotionally, meaning that Alina would have to nurse him and be patient with him, while also raising their child.  If only Bren returned, their relationship would probably remain celibate, and he would be like a brother to her, helping her raise the child.

According to the Formula: Lessons from Romance Novels Pt. 1

I have read a somewhat disturbing number of Romance novels recently, particularly since I am a literary snob and until recently avoided the genre on principle.  While I was pleasantly surprised at how much of a brain vacation the novels could be, but only because I mananged to find some fairly intelligent examples (there's a lot out there that isn't worth the digital ink it's printed with--and that goes for every genre), I still found myself wondering what this foray could teach me about plot, and story more generally.  After a while, I became very tired of the Regency marriage plot, because: formulas.  But formulas themselves can be instructive, especially when you're stuck.  And let's face it; I'm stuck.  I never quite envisioned the Alina and Bren novel/trilogy(?) as a Romance novel, but I do want it to have an awful lot to do with relationships, expectations, and what happens to naive love in disastrous circumstances. It can grow, yes.  But after a separation, with the circumstances completely changed, is it reasonable to expect it to rekindle, come together, etc?  I pose that different circumstances call for different kinds of love.  With people who have been together, and who remain together, and who are committed, this means that love can grow and adapt to fit the circumstances.  This is hard, but it happens.  Heck--in many ways this is what marriage is meant to do.  But when one half is committed to pursuing his own thing, and the other stays to hold down the fort (as the world crumbles)--well, expectations need to be readjusted.  And that is more or less what I want to communicate.  And yes, it is about the nature of love.  With puts me squarely into the Romance genre, at least in terms of purpose (though often what we really have is the nature and power of sex/attraction, but that's an entirely different topic; or maybe it isn't...)

So trying to see whether the formulas I've seen in Romance can get me unstuck, I want to try an experiment:  imagining what my novel(s?) would be like if they were Romance novels.

I'm not sure that the first installment/backstory would exist, except to explain Alina's disposition.  She was--well, not exactly spurned, but certainly given the message, though she might not have gotten it at first, that she was not the most important thing to Bren, even though he was the most important thing to her, and though she was willing to sacrifice so that they could be together.  Rather, he selfishly left her behind so that he could pursue his own identity.  We might or might not blame him.  I mean, it's hard to give yourself to someone else if you don't feel particularly whole.  Nevertheless, given her loneliness, and subsequent events, she might just possibly get bitter.

If Bren is the male love interest, this bitterness would be something for him to overcome.  Except that he becomes cynical and jaded and hopeless but still desires her... and yet finds her untouchable.

Scenario 1:  Bren realizes while he is away that he is desperate for Alina, returns, and tries to win her back, but finds her untouchable, damaged.  He courts/woos/seduces her--breaks down her barriers gradually to thaw her with his charm and good character.

Scenario 2:  Alina and Bren are thrown back together and react with mutual hostility, though remembering their past and what they have been to one another.  Their hostile interactions are thus fraught with sexual tension, and by acknowledging their desire they come, gradually, to acknowledge the feelings that still exist between them.

Scenario 3:  Bren returns to find Alina already engaged to someone else, probably from convenience.  While he does his best to support this, feeling that he has failed her, at the last minute he realizes that he can't live if she is with another, and intervenes.  She has realized her continued attraction to Bren, and is released by the other man, who is perhaps relieved to be out of the way.

Scenario 4:  Bren has done horrible things and been a bad, promiscuous, exploitative person while he was away, but he realizes that this was all because he wanted Alina so badly and he is now prepared to do anything that he can to win her over.  Meanwhile, she must be resistent, but able to make allowances because he was away from her, and men do these sorts of things, after all...  She will probably succumb physically, but reserve her affection until he declares absolutely that he loves her and will be satisfied with her alone.

The fact that both of the characters are supposed to be basically virtuous and that they both really do want to be married throws a wrench into several of the Romance scenarios that I have seen.  Also, any scenario involving Alina and Bren reconciling would either have Alina giving up, and acting from desperation or necessity rather than love, or would change the main point:  that love has a chance of surviving upheavel when the lovers are together, but changes shape when one has grown differently from the other, as Alina in particular has done.

To be continued...