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Anyway, today I was on le Twitter, and I had my regular conversation with +Valeryinblack , who I have to say gives me a lot of discussion ideas. I give full credit for the idea to them. So, Valeryinblack asked me what I thought of friendships within YA fiction. I, of course, gave my answers but I also thought I should use it for today's post. As I said, all credit goes to @Valeryinblack.
I'm starting with the idea of friends. I think that an author correctly representing the friendship dynamic between characters is rare. In general, if the friendship isn't vital to the plot, the author just… doesn't put much effort into developing it, deepening the relationship or even presenting it in detail.
Sometimes audiences want more than a romantic relationship. Sometimes the romance thing isn't the only dynamic they want to see. Sometimes they want to read about friendships or family relationships. Personally, the more depth there are to relationships and the more variety within those relationships, the more I like a book.
If the friendship IS integral to the plot, one of three things happens if the author isn't really trying to push the friendship for development:
1) The protagonist realises that their friend has loved them this whole time and they suddenly also love their friend. NOT bad writing just a very bad cliche.
2) The protagonist neglects their friend and/or they fall out.
3) The protagonist and friend have an idealised, perfect friendship where they never disagree and that never develops.
When an author DOES get it right, though, it's like a breath of fresh air. You get a real friendship with non-wooden, human conversations. They disagree but they stay together. One friend might do something bad by the other friend, but not horrific, and they work it out. In books, if friends have an argument, usually authors just have them go 'wanna be my friend again?' 'okay'. THAT DOESN'T HAPPEN. What might happen is a short period where they're trying to work everything out between them again, trying to feel comfortable together again. And then they gradually settle into friendship again.
All I'm trying to say is that authors need to put more thought into the relationships they create in their books. They must be complex and real.
So, yeah.
What are your thoughts ? Let me know!
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