Where the Canon section looks at what Mrs. Rowling established, here I look at how fan fiction authors have handled relationships. This is not only fiction, but fan fiction.
It is really really hard to resist the temptation to explore the holes in Mrs. Rowling’s world building. As part of that, it is really really hard not to put the characters in totally unrealistic and impossible interpersonal situations, because these situations allow exploration of some of the interesting holes. Things like contracts, veela, life debts, and even to some extent the trace are hard to fully play with unless you deal with adult situations. Thus many authors will pick a particular pairing for a particular story not out of wish fulfilment, but because that particular story needs a relationship shaped a particular way, and not every set of characters available can fit without distorting one or both.
- Common Pairings — the recurring ships and the motivations behind them
- Representations of Lily and James — how fan fiction distorts Harry’s parents
- My Approach — my own philosophy for writing relationships in fan fiction