My favorite type of relationship in a story is friendship. For me, platonic relationships beat romantic ones. To begin, platonic relationships don’t rely on physical attraction. We see people, friendship animals, and aliens in stories, even though they could never find each other attractive. It’s purely based on mutual respect and love. That in itself is incredibly beautiful.
The other reason is that you can have more than one friend. Having more than one romantic partner isn’t most people’s cup of tea. However, you can have two equally important friendships, you can have friends you do different things with, you can have friendships where you are a different person. Most people don’t have the same luxury in romantic relationships.
However, despite all my reasons for loving platonic relationships, it’s not easy to write them. At least if you don’t know why some friendships don’t work on paper. I’m guessing you’re struggling with writing friendship, regardless of how magical it feels. Don’t worry, I got you.
In this post, I’ll teach you how to write friendship and what to avoid.
1. Give Each Character Their Own Story
One of the biggest reasons why many character friendships fail is that the protagonist’s friends don’t feel real. If you want to write meaningful character friendships, not only does the protagonist need their own life, but so does everyone involved too.
If you’re creating characters solely for them to be friends with the protagonist, it’s going to be noticeable. The friendship will be as flat as the side characters. You can’t have the protagonist’s best friend waiting at home for the protagonist to call them when the protagonist needs support. The friends should have their own desires, goals, conflicts, and relationships that are unrelated to the protagonist.
In other words, your protagonist’s friends need their own off-camera stories. Practically speaking, that could look like the best friend having relationship problems with their spouse while the protagonist goes up against the villain.
The first and best thing you can do for your character relationships is creating each character as the protagonist of their own life. That’s the simplest thing you can learn about writing friendships.
2. Merge Their Stories
I don’t know if you know this, but every character will bring their own baggage to the friendship. You can’t be truly friends with someone if you’re not bringing your sorrow or your joy. The friendship doesn’t exist in a vacuum; it exists because two characters are, for a moment, sharing their lives. Their stories are woven together. Don’t strictly segregate character and friendship.
I know I explained it quite abstractly. Let me show you an example: The friendships in Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo feel so meaningful because they aren’t separate from the story or the characters; they merge them into one. Nina joins the Crows with her own agenda: to save Matthias. That goal is put in the mix and affects how the story unfolds and the friendship that blooms between them.
Remember earlier when I said that each character in the friendship needs to be the protagonist of their own lives. Well, now, you need to think of friendships as two or more becoming one story for a moment. Friendship is the visible magnification of parts of each character made into one thing.
3. Create Anticipation in the Friendship
Do you know why we get hooked on so many romance stories? It’s partially because of the anticipation of whether they’ll stay together. You can use the same method to write friendship.
Certainty kills anticipation. Nothing is exciting about knowing the ending. That’s why we hate spoilers. Nothing guaranteed is anticipated. Without uncertainty, the friendship becomes static.
Think about romantic subplots. Readers constantly ask, Will they end up together? That uncertainty keeps them emotionally invested. Friendships deserve the same treatment.
Your readers should wonder, Will these two still be friends by the end of the story?
That doesn’t mean the friendship has to end. In fact, many of the best fictional friendships don’t. The point is to make readers believe that it could.
Platonic relationships are just as fragile as romantic ones. Characters change. They go through difficult stuff; sometimes those experiences can bring them closer together, other times they grow apart.
Use those changes to put the friendship to the test. The uncertainty is what makes the friendship compelling.
- Disagreement matters because readers know it could have lasting consequences.
- Reconciliation feels earned because it wasn’t guaranteed.
Everything in that friendship should make the readers think about how it will end and what that means.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
You can’t outrun bad writing, no matter how good your writing is. Here’s something you might be doing that could be ruining your character’s friendship.
- Give them no personal goal.
- Always agree on everything.
- Solving conflict immediately.
- Say what they mean to each other.
- Keep the friendship the same even though the status quo changed.
- Only talk about plot.
Final Thoughts on How to Write Friendships
There are three principles for learning how to write friendships: making sure every character is the protagonist of their own life. The friendships are parts of each character’s lives intercepted. Readers should always wonder if the characters will stay friends.
If you can accomplish those three things and avoid common mistakes, you’ve learned how to write friendships.
