3rd person struggles

Okay, so, I've been writing a multi-part story in third person, and the problem I'm having is that while Stephen King manages to get through entire pages without referring to either of his characters as 'the other man' or by some awkward combination of physical features, when my characters are... intimate... just using pronouns isn't cutting it.

I've been looking for advice on this on the internet general, but am interested in how other writers here handle this. I know it's wrong, it makes me cringe, but I'm still doing it.

One thing I did notice was (using Stephen King, as he's one of my favourite authors, and I trust his writing as a good style example) was that he varies his speech with physical interactions. Check. I try and do that. But I also notice that his characters aren't having sex with each other.

I mean, how do you deal with a situation where you've got all kinds of good things happening, and you need the reader to know who's doing what?

An example:

Nate dipped his head. “Thanks.” He sniffed and wiped pool water from the end of his nose.

A silence grew wide between them, and Nate could feel Colin’s desperate need to touch him, could feel the energy churning between them, the space between them filled with all the gestures the other man wasn’t brave enough to make.

Nate looked up at him, his dark eyes catching the lowering sun. He could almost hear the other man’s pulse as Colin stared at him, transfixed.

This is one of the least problematic examples. This is 'fixed' as best I can. I don't want to throw more internal dialogue in there, don't want to drag it out any more. Love to hear how other people would deal with this.

And then adverbs. In his dark eyes catching the lowering sun, does that grate?

Another example, a more problematic one:

Hot water rained down on the two men as Nate broke the kiss and slid his hands down Burro’s thick torso, trailing his fingertips across the inside of the man’s muscular thighs as he dropped to his knees.

He looked up at Burro, the shower plastering his hair to his head, and took the man’s...


I can't just use pronouns, or it gets too confusing. Don't want to overuse names... or would that actually be preferable in these examples?

Cheers in advance,

Jase.

You could try, like, "his lover's", or "his partner's", and add those to the mix.

Yes, 'his lover's' is a good one, as it flows nicely. I like that one. And partner is one I haven't used yet (but will file for later). Unfortunately this is... non con. *slightly embarrassed smile*. So, 'lover' isn't really appropriate. This is a person who the main character knows by name, but that's it.

With the 'Colin' example, he's still a captive, so it's still not a 'lover' style situation.

Write the scene with Nate as your primary character, and Colin as "his victim", "his captive", "his plaything".

Using things like relative differences (taller vs shorter, or blonde vs redhead) is not something that necessarily needs to be avoided. Don't take King too literally, because what would he call The Man In Black if he was naked?

Okay, so am I perhaps worrying about this too much?

In both instances Nate is actually the 'victim' (although, that's a switch situation where Colin thinks he's in control and Nate's basically playing him), so I guess I'd just reverse that and say something along the lines with, 'all the gestures his tormentor wasn't brave enough to make'.

Actually, thinking about that, 'his plaything' works quite well in that context.

Loved the covfefe reference, by the way

Hahaha. I honestly thought most people's eyes would skip over that. Glad you caught it.

This sounds akin to spending way too much effort on using words other than "said" for dialogue. Pronouns and such are great but there's nothing wrong with referring to folks by name once or twice in a dense paragraph. The main thing is to make sure the reader can follow along who is doing what.

I mean if you've only got one guy and one girl in the room, pronoun confusion isn't a problem, and even then it's good to drop their names in now and then. With multiple people of the same gender, it's pretty essential.

Giving them names and giving them different short attributes (the older one; the bigger one; the blond). It's something you learn by doing, especially if you have sex partners of the same gender.

I mean if you've only got one guy and one girl in the room, pronoun confusion isn't a problem, and even then it's good to drop their names in now and then. With multiple people of the same gender, it's pretty essential.

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So, of the two ways I might write this sentence, you'd prefer the one with double instances of names?

In a sudden burst of emotion, Colin put a hand behind Nate’s head and rested his forehead against Nate’s.

or

In a sudden burst of emotion, Colin put a hand behind Nate’s head and rested his forehead against the younger man's.

I appreciate there's also reconsidering sentence structure. I'm working on it.

sr71plt said:

Giving them names and giving them different short attributes (the older one; the bigger one; the blond). It's something you learn by doing, especially if you have sex partners of the same gender.

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Any rules you live by when you determine what's appropriate and what's jarring?

To be honest, the short descriptions don't usually bother me as a reader, unless it's hair colour (I find that irritating for some reason - possibly because I've never though of a person as a blond or a brunette etc).

The key thing for me is that the descriptor doesn't have an emotional implication unless there should be one (triggering the reader's excitement by drawing attention to the younger/older man combo, or their situation).

As you say, in first person, I would mostly stick to he said/she said and names, and there there would be none of this description--which I think is why it's bugging me.

JasonClearwater said:

So, of the two ways I might write this sentence, you'd prefer the one with double instances of names?

In a sudden burst of emotion, Colin put a hand behind Nate’s head and rested his forehead against Nate’s.

or

In a sudden burst of emotion, Colin put a hand behind Nate’s head and rested his forehead against the younger man's.

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In this instance, my preference is the second, simply because the repetition of the names in the same sentence goes clunk, for me. I'm struggling with this right now in a long, two-protagonist scene. My solution seems to me both names at least once in a paragraph, but otherwise he she, his her. I'd never repeat a name in the same sentence. I've also given myself the luxury of one character also having an abbreviated pet name, but that's more for plot than for ease of reference. It gets tricky.

electricblue66 said:

In this instance, my preference is the second, simply because the repetition of the names in the same sentence goes clunk, for me. I'm struggling with this right now in a long, two-protagonist scene. My solution seems to me both names at least once in a paragraph, but otherwise he she, his her. I'd never repeat a name in the same sentence. I've also given myself the luxury of one character also having an abbreviated pet name, but that's more for plot than for ease of reference. It gets tricky.

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At this point, that's my feeling too.

JasonClearwater said:

Any rules you live by when you determine what's appropriate and what's jarring?

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Well, no, because "appropriate" and "jarring" are in two different categories. I do like to be jarring in a story. Like occasionally having a priest say "Fuck," roll off the other guy and onto the floor, and stand there putting on his priest collar so the other guy (and the reader) knows for the first time that he's just been fucked by a priest. D)

sr71plt said:

Well, no, because "appropriate" and "jarring" are in two different categories. I do like to be jarring in a story. Like occasionally having a priest say "Fuck," roll off the other guy and onto the floor, and stand there putting on his priest collar so the other guy (and the reader) knows for the first time that he's just been fucked by a priest. D)

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That's not jarring, that's just hot.