In truly unpirate-form, we parlayed about what we’d be blogging about this week, This Week of Love. (Since when do pirates plan?) And I committed myself to writing about great romantic gestures, the kind that makes us fall in love with the hero even though he doesn’t say “I love you.” I know, the topic bored me too.
And then I was reading this lovely article about my beloved Jack (no, not mine), and this highly educated lady laid out the simple formula to me: about what makes any romantic hero sexy.
What, what? you ask.
“It’s a mystery.”
No, no, don’t leave in a huff. I’m not trying to be obnoxious. Much. But there are the obvious things: handsome, noble, in possession of a sense of humor as well as a modest fortune (or at least a job), and the ability to not frighten small children (since that would be handy later.) But then there is The Mystery.
As Marnee pointed out, we love to solve a mystery, whether we realize it or not. And I’m pretty sure Lisa has also opined on heroes with that sense of SOMETHING, but you can’t pinpoint what. You don’t know; it’s a mystery.
Think how boring Mr. Darcy would have been if he’d really been that pretentious jerk. It would have been so easy to loathe him; and yet the more we’re around him, the more we sense a bit of mystery about him. Something that makes us think he’s not quite as he seems, there’s something there beneath the surface if we’re willing to look.
I know we’re not exactly rule-followers around here; and I know that the first rule is: drink rum, then write. But one of the close followers to this rule is: Show, Don’t Tell. Which if anyone has had a gander at my WIP can tell you is easier said than done. I’d say the flipside to this all-important rule is: Show, But Don’t Show Too Much. Show us the 10% to intrigue us, and let us figure out the other 90. Readers want to fill in the blanks *and* we want to be right, so letting us fill in what we don’t know about a character by virtue makes us right. (For a while, at least.)
I think the problem with why Betas aren’t as valued as a sexy Alpha is that Betas don’t have secrets, and thus we know too much about them. Think of Will Turner, another pirate favorite. In the first film, he was Beta-Beta-Beta. He couldn’t have been more Beta if he’d been coached by Opie himself. The handsome blacksmith who nobly faced danger to save the woman of his dreams, with some help from the incomparable Jack Sparrow. The problem was that at the end of that movie: Will Turner was still a Beta—and he was still a blacksmith.
In the second movie, he went a bit more willingly into the danger to save his love *and* his father; and he was slightly more pirate as the movie raged on, but in the end, as he watched his fiancé kiss Jack on the deck of the Black Pearl, all I saw was betrayed blacksmith. You know, the Nice Guy Who Finished Last.
But with the beginning of the third movie, Will had developed this interesting new personality, compliments I’m sure of his loose-lipped fiancé, and he was far more Alpha than Beta in this flick. He was secretive, hurt simmering in the depths of those almost black eyes, and kept his agenda close and his enemies closer. Will was swoon-worthy before he tied on that scarf, simply because he got a bit of mystery about him.
Think about it. Aren’t your favorite romances filled with heroes whose backstories are kept close to the vest, but once revealed (at least partially) make you swoon that much harder for the hero it reveals? No one wants to go on the first date with a guy who reveals all his broken relationships and inability to commit before the dessert is even ordered. (It’s happened.) There is a certain sense of reward you feel as someone who has earned the right to know these secrets, if they’re not revealed until later in the game. That sense that he doesn’t trust just anyone with his darkest secrets; that he trusts you to keep them safe.
Do you like your men mysterious or forthcoming? Any movie or book “dark secrets” you can recall that left you totally floored and made you love the hero even more? Which Will is better: the first film or the last? Anyone have trouble with showing instead of telling like I do?
