Wattpad Rants

Forbidden Romances

As requested by @fangirlingisnowajob on my Q & A chapter, here are the do's and don'ts of a forbidden romance that could help you or someone else when writing about a similar situation.

First of all, to write one, you need to break down the event. Why is the romance forbidden? If you're writing a book that takes place in modern day, there's not a lot of logical explanations for the relationship to be "forbidden," unless it's not a heterosexual romance or the characters are of two different ethnicities, like if the families are against a gay couple or they do not approve of a black man with a white woman, or something along those lines.

If it's a fantasy novel, however, or it takes place in the past where caucasian's were seen as the superior race, then there's a lot you can weave into the story, just make sure you do plenty of research. Now that you've come up with a logical explanation that readers can easily catch onto, it's time to figure out if there's a solution or they part ways. To avoid a cliché storyline, do not pull a Romeo and Juliet where the two characters die and everyone regrets the mistakes they've made. How can you possibly create all this tension and buildup just for them to die? Plus, the families might not even care if they die or not, I mean it was already forbidden in the first place.

To make the romance even less cheesy, avoid glorifying and romanticizing touchy subjects like suicide, abuse, or mental illness. Do not drive your characters to the point of suicide. There is nothing romantic about having two characters kill themselves to create a statement about their love for each other, aka Romeo and Juliet.

Avoid the whole running away to a faraway land storyline as well. Because if they run away together to somewhere where their families or whoever's holding back can't find them, then, well, your story's pretty much done.

But really, if you want to write a good forbidden romance, ask other people what they think about your ideas and choose what you think is best. Maybe you'll scrap the idea, maybe you'll jazz it up a bit, it doesn't matter, as long as you're satisfied with the outcome. You're the author to begin with, right?

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QOTD: Book/books you hate? I didn't really enjoy The Young Elites, Shatter Me, and The Elite.