Another Book Question

[kriadydragon]

I have an original story idea at the top of my writing list, but a part of me is hesitant because it features a child (around eleven years old) befriending a male adult who's around thirty, and I'm a little worried that some might perceive that as creepy.

Has anyone read stories about a little kid befriending an adult? And I don't mean the usual little kid and his/her elderly mentor/teacher/whatever. I mean male adults between the age of twenty-five and thirty-five.

For the record, what I have in mind I feel will work but I think it will help knowing that other authors have ventured into such territory and made it work as well. In other words, I need something that will shut my paranoia up.

Comments

[ga-unicorn.livejournal.com]

Personally, I think that if you just write it as friendship then those who don't look to slash every male relationship they read or watch will just see it as friendship. The determined slasher will always see that potential. I once had a long (2 hour wait in queue at a convention) discussion with a slash fan who insisted that she couldn't "see" any close, intimate male relationships that didn't involve homosexuality. I couldn't get her to budge from that position, no matter what argument I came up with.

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

The child in my story is actually a girl. Though it is the people who see any kind of friendship as something that will turn romantic that worries me. I can see people jumping to conclusions with my story and crying foul because of it.

I feel bad for people who can't view friendship as anything more than a precursor to romance. It makes me wonder what their RL friendships are like :P