I’m not a Romance writer, but I do write about humans and their relationships. The people in my tales sometimes fall in love, and while they don’t always have a happily ever after, most do. An aspect of my writing that would disappoint a dedicated Romance reader is the profound shortage of smut.
I think of sex the way I do violence. Both occur in real life. I’m like every other author in that I want my characters to live. However, while I have been graphic in the past when the story demanded it (Huw the Bard, Julian Lackland, and Billy Ninefingers), their stories follow the events that change and shape them. Some of those events are traumatic, while others are moments of joy. I would likely write some of those scenes differently now, nearly twenty years on.
When I first have a glimmer of an idea about who the characters might be, I make a small outline of what their personality is, noting their likes and dislikes. This always evolves and changes as I lay down the first draft.
When I first know two characters are developing either antipathy or an attraction, I find writing the subtler nuances of those emotions difficult. In real life, we are sometimes repulsed by a person. It seldom happens, but when it does, I feign geniality but offer nothing beyond pleasantries. Nor do I encourage further communications beyond that chance encounter at a party or, as sometimes happens, in a work environment.
When I’m building the first draft of a story, the characters’ emotions seem to come out of nowhere and feel forced. This gets ironed out in subsequent drafts.
For me, the hardest part is writing subtle foreshadowing. I try to show the gradual connection as it grows between two people, but it often takes two or three drafts to get it right.
I have many friends who write Romance. I read their work and enjoy it. I’ve also attended many workshops given by Romance writers and learned a great deal from them.
I love books on the craft of writing. Two books in my writing craft library that have seen heavy use were written by Damon Suede, who writes Romance. He explains how word choices can make or break the narrative.
As a reader, I have found his viewpoint to be accurate. As a writer, I have found putting it into practice takes work.
In his book Verbalize, Damon explains how actions make other events possible. Crucially for me, he reminds us that even gentler, softer emotions must have verbs to set them in motion.
So, emotions are nouns and need strong verbs to push them to action. Matching these nouns with verbs is key to bringing a scene to life.
This is where my writing experience becomes work. I open the Oxford Dictionary of Synonyms and Antonyms and delve into the many words that relate to and describe attraction. Or I can go online: ATTRACTION Synonyms: 33 Synonyms & Antonyms for ATTRACTION | Thesaurus.com
I make a list of the words that I think will fit my characters’ personalities. Then, I have to choose the words that say what I mean and fit them into the narrative. Sometimes, this means I will rewrite a sentence two or three times before it says what I intend and flows naturally.
My Billy’s Revenge series (Huw the Bard, Billy Ninefingers, and Julian Lackland) began from one accidental novel. That novel was spewed onto the page, and the relationships developed without preplanning. Thanks to my inexperience and a predatory publisher, that book had a rough life, but fortunately I had retained the rights to my book. It was unpublished, dismembered, and over the next ten years, the three character threads were separated into their own novels instead of jammed into one.
For me as a person and as a reader, true Romance has an air of mystery, of something undiscovered. It has to be a little bit magical, or I can’t suspend my disbelief.
Writing adventures for my people is easy. When two characters are gravitating toward one another, injecting the feeling of magic into that attraction is the tricky part.
When a beta reader tells me the relationship seems forced, I go back to the basics and make an outline of how that relationship should progress from page one through each chapter. I make a detailed note of what their status should be at the end. This gives me jumping-off points so that I don’t suffer from brain freeze when trying to show the scenes.
As I am rewriting the scenes involving a developing relationship, I want to avoid weak phrasing. I look at the placement of verbs in my sentences. When a scene feels weak, it is usually my phrasing that is off. As I revise each scene, I try to ensure that the reader will experience events as the characters do.
Harold felt attracted to Gertie. This is a scene that indicates attraction, but it is narrated. That makes it weak, telling. What did Harold’s experience of attraction feel like? Maybe a small wish to know her better? Pounding pulse?
Bystanders narrate their view of events, but characters experience the events. Reading their thoughts and emotions as they do is far more compelling than hearing a bystander talk about it.
It’s true that some stories need an all-seeing narrator. Even if a tale is told in the third-person omniscient voice, readers want to live the events with the characters.
I think this is why many authors gravitate to a first-person point of view. I confess I do enjoy stories with unreliable narrators. They offer their opinions and shade the truth, and sometimes outright lie to us. They’re more interesting because of that.
I think our characters have to be a little clueless about romance, even if they are older. They need to doubt, need to worry. They need to fear they don’t have a chance, either to complete their quest or to find love.
Romance writers have it right: overcoming the roadblocks to happiness makes for great love stories. This is why I read in every genre. I try to learn what I can from the masters, seeing how they use their words to write their scenes and construct their stories.
Romance is drama, but it isn’t the entire story.
Adam Savage of Mythbusters fame said something about drama and creativity on a recent podcast. He was talking about Stanley Kubrick’s creative process. His opinion was that Kubrick is best at recognizing the moments where a story could create drama.
Attraction and antipathy are two sides of one of those points. That place is a point where the smallest emotions can grow and create friction until they catch fire. And recognizing those places with strong emotional potential is crucial to creating a great novel or short story.
Yes, my first drafts are pretty uneven and flat, but I hope my beta readers can spot those missed moments. That way, I can illuminate them when the manuscript is in revisions rather than making my poor editor suffer.
Artist: Albert Bierstadt (1830–1902)
Each chapter is comprised of one or more scenes. These scenes have an arc to them: action and reaction. These arcs of action and reaction begin at point A and end at point B. Each launching point will land on a slightly higher point of the story arc.
We see Avril taunting Sallah for her matronly body and move out again to see Avril tying a cord to Sallah’s crushed foot and forcing her to make the navigational calculations for Avril’s escape. We move close up and hear the interaction, Sallah pretending to do as Avril asks but really setting her enemy’s doom in action. The camera moves to the wide view again, and we hear the interaction with her frantic husband on the ground. We are caught up in her determination to seize this only chance, using her dying breaths to get the information about the thread spores to the scientists on the ground.
Life in the Realm of Fantasy 