Use Stakes of Livelihood in Romance and Your Readers Will Feel Another Level of Tension
Capitalism corrupts absolutely, but it makes for a hell of a narrative stake for your protagonists to duke it out with. Despite its prevalence in our daily lives, though, it’s not always the simplest thing to plot, so let’s talk about the ways in which you can ensure your readers feel the heat without having to give them an economics lecture.
Want to learn about the 10 other narrative stakes, and get extra recommendations for the books that absolutely nail it? We’re leading our first workshop – What’s At Stake: How Unputdownable Novels Keep You Hooked– July 30th! RSVP now.
When livelihood works
Destitution consequences
The natural place to start with livelihood is establishing a situation wherein which the character’s quality of life is at stake. In practical terms, how will the events of the story threaten this character’s ability to eat and have a safe place to sleep? Losing this job or failing to secure this marriage should directly result in a worse way of life than their status quo at the start of the story, and cannot be easily remedied.
A good example: Love, Theoretically by Ali Hazelwood*
The status quo for our heroine, recent STEM grad Elsie, is pretty bleak. That she’s adjuncting full-time is bad enough (IYKYK), but she’s also had to supplement her income by offering herself as a fake girlfriend. Things get even worse when the (hot) brother of her current client is also on the hiring committee for her dream job (but also, the only job in her field in the area that can offer actual benefits and stability), and he thinks she’s lying to his brother about her identity. And she can’t immediately reveal the fact that she’s his brother’s fake girlfriend because of the reasons she was hired to be his fake girlfriend in the first place!
Though it doesn’t matter to her at first that the (hot, I cannot stress this enough) older brother of her fake dating client hates her, it matters a LOT when that hatred (and then the subsequent un-hating) might mean the difference between health insurance and burning out from another year in adjunct hell. Navigating this relationship might mean the difference between her affording her insulin (let’s add another log to the fire: she’s also diabetic!) or not.
Consequences outside the self
Like we talked about with reputation stakes, the easiest way to up the stakes of a situation is to add a dependent or five into the mix. When it’s not just the livelihood of your protagonist being risked by their actions, but the livelihood of others. Bonus points if the others are unable to fend for themselves, because of age, ability, or societal circumstance.
A good example: Duchess by Design by Maya Rodale*
Adeline Black, a broke aspiring dressmaker in Gilded Age NYC, accidentally knocks the broke English Duke of Kingston off his course. Kingston has arrived in NYC to woo an American heiress to save his crumbling dukedom and his mother and sister, who because they’re women in an elevated social class can’t really make money for themselves.
What really works about this book is that in order to save his family, not to mention his tenants, from destitution (because running a dukedom is expensive, even if they’re thrifty!), he can’t pursue the girl of his dreams. Does he choose love… or livelihood? HIs journey in pursuing one and falling into another is our compelling narrative engine.
Dream job consequences
Livelihood doesn’t have to have utter financial destitution as a consequence to have meaning, though, because while capitalism corrupts absolutely, work we care about still matters. It still means something to have a job at stake when the character truly cares about their job, or they’ve wanted it forever, or they’re incredibly talented, and this might be their only shot.
When livelihood doesn’t work
When the security itself isn’t comprehensive, or there isn’t enough hinging on their income or their ability to provide security, livelihood stakes fall flat on their face. Basically: when there seems like an obvious (and favorable) alternative to their current plight. Another job, a whirlwind inheritance not mired in debt, or a free room to crash in. It has to be more than their pride that hurts to fail; we’re looking for empty stomachs, loss of shelter, loss of opportunity and future as far as consequences go.
If Elsie doesn’t get the job she’s going for, she’ll either have to stay in Burnout Central (aka Adjunct Hell) to the possible detriment of her health, or move away from her community (which she can’t really afford). (Love, Theoretically)
If Kingston doesn’t marry a rich heiress instead of Adeline, his ancestral home he can’t sell because of nonsensical British peerage will literally fall to ruin, his mother and sister will be out on the street, and he might end up in debtor’s jail. (Duchess by Design)
At the start of their books, none of these characters have a viable alternative to their current course of action. The stakes work because no matter how doomed their adventures seem, they must pursue them anyways, because what other choice to they have?
Resolving livelihood
The most successful and satisfying conclusion to a romance with livelihood stakes is often the secret third thing. As in: the characters begin with a false binary- unhappiness but stable, or unstable but happy (for now). The story is about opening up their eyes to the secret third option, where they can find stability (though it may be more difficult than their original plan) and lasting happiness. I won’t spoil Duchess by Design, but that’s a great example of this resolution.
Otherwise, it’s a straightforward successful venture. The satisfaction is attained with a plan coming together- it’s the journey that makes the destination worthwhile.
A word of warning: don’t pull the financial equivalent of the accidental pregnancy trope, because you don’t have a better idea to resolve everything than to provide a convenient deus ex machina inheritance or rule change, with brand new information delivered in the eleventh hour that didn’t exist prior to that. Watching characters struggle and fail to find new ways out, only to bring Prosperity Batman into things in the denouement, will not leave your readers sated.
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Want to learn about the 10 other narrative stakes, and get extra recommendations for the books that absolutely nail it? We’re leading our first workshop – What’s At Stake: How Unputdownable Novels Keep You Hooked– July 30th! RSVP now.
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