In a post on CrimeReads, Elissa Grossell Dickey offers advice for creating a compelling love interest in a suspense novel. “As authors, we want our work to invoke that emotion in our readers, driving them to solve the riddle of our story—and a compelling love interest is a crucial piece of that puzzle,” she says.
Grossell says a love interest provides some or all of these elements for your protagonist and story: support, stability, balancing strengths, complimentary or contrasting back story, and a shred of doubt. So how do you fit all these pieces together? Grossell shares her tips:
- Ask the right questions. Ask what your protagonist needs and how the love interest can provide it. “Perhaps your MC needs a love interest who will push them out of their comfort zone in order to uncover the secrets they’re seeking to reveal,” Grossell suggests.
- Make a list.: Make a list of your main characters’ strengths and weaknesses, and another for your love interest. Do they complement each other? A perfect match isn’t realistic, but they should align.
- Create a character arc. Give your love interest a character arc of their own.
- Write their back story. You probably won’t use too much in your novel, but take some time to free write the love interest’s back story. The more you know about them, the more authentic they will feel on the page.
- Plant some clues. “f you want to plant a seed of doubt about your love interest, use one of your revision passes to sprinkle in some subtle clues, whether it’s hinting at time unaccounted for off the page, or adding an ambiguously ominous statement,” Grossell writes. “In the end, your love interest might be the real deal—after all, you’ve spent all this time crafting them to perfection—but your readers won’t know that for sure.”
