I like to pay attention to the way that other writers deal with certain common events in stories. One of them is the problem caused by more than one suitor. Fairy tales have one way of dealing with extra men… But it seems a little drastic in real life. 

L. M. Montgomery, author of the Anne of Green Gables series, wrote two other series where men were accepted as possible husbands, and then basically abandoned. Emily of New Moon gets rid of a character named Dean, who was well worth ditching, and Pat of Silver Bush gets rid of ?David? I forget. Bright Island by Mabel Robinson, a book I was assigned as summer reading in 6th or 7th grade has a very nice guy who gets left behind by the heroine. He is really too old for her and she wants her childhood friend. D. E. Stevenson hints at complications in her books about Mrs. Tim of the Regiment. 

Louisa May Alcott claimed that people wrote to her with unhappy comments about how the romance in Little Women between Jo and Teddy ended. Jo(sephine) marries Mr. Bhaer and opens a school for boys where they are allowed to run around and be active. Teddy marries her little sister Amy, and they have a rich and gracious life, part of which is to assist, monetarily at least, at the school Jo runs.

… intimidated by the threats, denunciations, and complaints showered upon me in consequence of taking the liberty to end a certain story as I liked, I now yield to the amiable desire of giving satisfaction, and, at the risk of outraging all the unities, intend to pair off everybody I can lay my hands on.   

From An Old Fashioned Girl   Louisa May Alcott

It’s a long time since I read either Little Women or Little Men, so some details are hazy, but I think that all of Jo’s sisters and her mom help out at that school, in various ways and at various times. Very familial. But it is also clear that Mr. Bhaer is the right man for Jo. She would have run rough shod over Teddy, and she would, emphatically, not have lived that gracious life that he is happy living with Amy. 

I’ve also heard that, after the movies about Harry Potter came out, some people wanted Harry and Hermione to get together instead of Hermione and Ron. They also thought Ginny was a mistake for Harry. That’s really movie talk, and it is the same mistake as the one above, with Little Women. The most important man and woman should get together, and never mind the reality of married life. 

In the case of the Harry Potter books, both Harry and Hermione need people who deeply entrenched in the wizarding world if they are going to live happy adult lives in that setting. They didn’t grow up in it so they are going to have a hard time without help. Further, Harry and Hermione are always going to be struggling with different kinds of limelight. Ginny has much more understanding of Harry’s troubles, and has much more interest in Harry, himself. In the books, there isn’t real chemistry between Harry and Hermione. Ron is the one who has what Hermione lacks, and in the book where they find snake teeth to fight with, they are clearly in love with each other. 

What brought this all to my mind is the frivolous indie book epic that I’ve been reading. I’ve already said the name is a state secret because the book has some problematic areas. But the protagonist, who is like a big midwestern farm boy stuck somewhere, marries a little, sharp, girl and she promptly has a baby. He states early on, that he likes girls like that (who can also cook) and he tends to jump in mud puddles and chase frogs with her. (He’s very young.)

A new character with more “traditionally womanly” characteristics has entered the story and people in the comments are complaining about her not being the wife. This is ridiculous. She is not the frog chasing type. Not. She is not the hero’s type! Should I say that again?  I can’t figure out why people even want this change to happen except that the new person is a bigger character than Hero’s wife. Of course, they are also unclear on how they think it should happen, except the for ones who simply think the guy should commit bigamy. 

That’s another weird thing. The Hero is portrayed as someone who totally committed to his wife. His Only Wife. I get that it’s a fantasy of some kind but the reason I think about these weird comments is, that it shows so clearly how people cannot see what might make a good marriage. Even when you do your best to arrange such a thing it takes time and effort over all the years. Best not to start by marrying off a guy who likes mud puddles and avoids the limelight to someone who has an unwavering passion to unite warring clans and lead them to something better. 

As a sidenote, the epic author has fallen into a different trap that I’ve seen. His hero marries promptly, but the secondary men characters who find girls that they like, don’t get married right away. There was a whole series on Project Gutenberg Australia about cowboys in the American West, written by Bertha Muzzie. It was all about the Flying U Ranch and the Happy Family (Capital letters supplied at all places in the sequels) that lived there and the hijinks. But as I say, only one marriage took place although the question of other cowboys getting married occupies a lot of space in some of the other books. Very odd. 

Emma Lathen thought there was a whole dynamic of **students in grad school who coalesce around one married couple (and their baby if they have one).** It is part of the story in Pick Up Sticks. I actually did witness that a few times in real life in my academic career. There’s something about the second set of people getting married that creates complications in story arcs.

I say all that, but it is also true that there is a whole subset of independent writing, where three or four sisters or brothers or earls or swashbucklers each get a story written about them: Book 1 of the xxx series, Book 4 of the yzq series. They have titles like The Effervescent Daughter, The Bubbly Son, The Different from Those Others Daughter, etc. Honestly, I’m not trying to write those.