Why I Hate the Term Third Act Break Up AKA More about The Third Act Breakup

I had a few questions about my rant about third-act breakups, so I thought I’d do a follow up post. Language and terminology are important and it’s very easy to assume everyone knows what a thing means when you’re steeped in the industry — I’m as steeped as a well used teabag lol — so I wanted to clarify a few things.

Firstly, I’ve never used the term ‘third act breakup’. I just saw it bandied about and thought ‘is that what they’re calling it now? That’s dumb’. Why dumb? Because authors can take that literally and think it means that the characters in a romance novel actually have to break up.

Which isn’t true.

I prefer the term ‘black moment’ or ‘dark moment’. This is the moment of despair, when the characters believe that they can’t have the person they love or that love isn’t possible for them. That’s not the same as breaking up.

I’ve written a lot of black moments where the characters don’t break up, because it’s not right for those characters. Some have children and they can’t actually leave without leaving their kids. Some are married, which then involves divorce proceedings.  Also, sometimes the black moment doesn’t last very long. Some characters storm out in a rage then realise what they’ve done in half an hour. Some take a few days to come to their senses, some have months. I never do it for years and very rarely do my characters actually break up per se.

A ‘dark moment’ is called that because it’s an emotionally dark time. It’s about more than just ‘breaking up’. It’s about one character becoming brave and saying ‘I love you’, and the other character refusing to accept that love. Usually they refuse because they’re afraid of being hurt, of being vulnerable. This is where they revert to an old pattern of behaviour that has protected themselves in the past.  Maybe they go cold and hard, detaching from their emotions. Maybe they get very angry. Or maybe they say nothing at all and walk away.

Often they’ll give the other character reasons about why they can’t love them in return. “I’m trying to protect you’ ‘I’m not capable of loving anyone’ ‘I can’t give you what you want’ etc etc.

These reasons though are excuses for the fact that what the character actually feels is fear. They’re afraid to be loved and to love in return because deep down they don’t feel worthy of love (the reasons for this are generally given in their backstory). They want to stay safe and protected from pain.

Usually, I have the character who made the declaration of love in the first place be in a position of strength, because this is a turning point for them and also a challenge. They’ve taken a big risk and spoken their truth, opened their heart to their loved one, and it’s been rejected. So now, they too have to choose: will they go after the other character and beg? Or will they understand that their loved one has to make their own choice and they have to let them make it. They have to trust in the person they’ve come to love that in the end, that person will choose them.

Either way, they’ve taken a massive risk and it’s going to hurt.

This is the dark moment. When one character has risked everything and chosen love and been rejected. While the other character has chosen to stay safe and protected from hurt, even though it’s keeping them from happiness.

Both need to be strong.

Because one has to choose to put their love for the other before their fear and accept the pain and vulnerability of love, while the other has to be strong enough to let them make that choice.

It’s a challenge and a test. A challenge to a way of thinking and a test of their resolve.

This is why you need this moment in a romance.

If a character’s beliefs about themselves are never challenged, then they’ll never have to reflect that maybe those beliefs are holding them back. They’ll never have a chance to put someone else before their own fear. They’ll never have to compromise. They’ll never have to actively choose to trust someone enough. They’ll never have to choose love.

And they have to learn how to choose love. They have to learn how to put another before themselves and their own fears. They have to learn how to compromise, because that’s what a long term relationship is all about.

If you never give them a moment when they think ‘I will lose this person if I don’t change’ and have them actively make the choice to change, to put love before their fear, then I’ll never believe they’ll be together for ever.

Because what happens when you have kids and no time for each other?  What about when you’re in midlife, your job sucks and you’re staring mortality in the face?What happens when the kids leave and you’re on your own again with your partner? What happens if an unthinkable tragedy hits and you lose your kid? Your parents? A close friend? Will your partner be there for you? Can you trust that they’ll stick by you, that they’ll choose the relationship you have with them, that they’ll be willing to do the work to stay with you, through all of that?

That’s why, if I don’t see them make a choice to put their relationship before everything else, I will never believe they’ll be together for the rest of their lives. Because as I said before, a happy ending isn’t static.

I need to see them choose love because a marriage, a partnership, loving someone means choosing them and that relationship over and over again.

And you know, this is why writing romance is one of the most difficult genres to get right. Because writing believable human emotion is very, very hard.

They say a happy ending is a cop out.

THEY’RE WRONG.

You try writing a book about two characters who fall in love and you’re supposed to convince people that they will be together FOREVER.

Quite frankly, it would be easier to kill one of them lol!

Thank you for coming to my rant.

I’m always happy to answer questions if anyone has one. Leave it in the comments if you feel so inclined and I’ll answer it. :-)