Cassandra Clare: Love Triangles and Forbidden Love, Creating and Maintaining Romantic Tension in YA Literature

Cassandra Clare is the bestselling author of The Mortal Instruments and The Infernal Devices series.

A strong theme of forbidden love runs through her books.

Readers go where the tension is, but readers also love romance. The path of love does not run smooth.

Love can be forbidden in several ways: by family, by society/taboo, or it can be unsuitable or dangerous in some manner.

Don't be afraid to create really big obstacles because it creates higher and higher stakes for your characters.

"The bigger the obstacles, the bigger the love needed to overcome them."

Love triangles are extremely popular. It's been part of our storytelling culture for hundreds of years.

Some pitfalls of the love triangle:
*Epic language, like "I will always love you."
*Indecision
*Having a love V, rather than a triangle because two characters don't have any connection.

"The kind of love story that is fun to live, is not fun to read about."