ABSTRACT
Marriage is a classic barrier to love. It has been done many, many times but still works as an opposing force. It is even more daunting if there are children in the picture. The challenge with this is keeping the protagonist sympathetic as people watch them fall in love outside their marriage and possibly betray their wife or husband sexually as well. The key is motivation. It could be an old love that have lost but that reappears at an inconvenient time. Passion, romance, longing, desire, these were not part of that relationship at all. Sometimes the protagonist falls in love in good faith and innocence, believing her lover is available and hers, only to discover that in fact he is married. Today most engagements can be broken with relatively minimal consequences. But they do present an obstacle to love, and depending on when the story is set, that obstacle can come with pretty high stakes.
