MY TOP TIPS FOR WRITING ROMANCE. – Black Velvet Seductions

As I have said before in blogs, romance is the bestselling fiction genre, so it makes sense to write something that a lot of people want to read. The thing is, romances are harder to write than you might think and I would like to share some tips for avoiding the most common mistakes in writing a romance.

Read romances. You would be surprised at how many people who think they can write a romance and don’t actually read romantic stories. If you’re not interested in reading this genre, it’s going to come across in your writing.

Most romances do follow a formula. From my own reading experience, this is what I have found a lot of readers expect from this genre:

Awareness & attraction, desire, need climax and aftercare.
A heroine loves and sympathizes with the hero.
A believable conflict that keeps the hero and heroine apart. Something more than a pointless misunderstanding that could be cleared up with a quick phone call.
A happily-ever-after. Not necessarily marriage, but it should be clear that they’ve resolved their differences and are going to stay together.

That’s about it in a nutshell.

There should be an emotional payoff. Romance readers want to feel the emotion of their characters. There may be dark moments, but the ending should be positive. If you kill off your heroine at the end of the story, it sours the romance element. There also may be a sacrifice, the hero and the heroine has to make, for the sake of love. It is good if it is nicely balanced.

Pace the story. Your characters need to be doing something. You want to keep the reader turning the page if there is a lot of navel-gazing you risk boring the reader.

Stay in your character’s point of view. It is very irritating for a reader when you’re head-hopping from one character to another and back again. It is also lazy to use the omnipotent voice to push things along.

From the first page to last, ultimately romance stories are about relationships, and that should be foremost in your mind. Wander off on subplots can be massively irritating to some romance readers.

Even in the soft sensual romances, the reader needs to have a sense that your two main characters are physically attracted to each other. Romance stories are about sexual love relationships, even if your characters never do more than a kiss. Physical attraction is an important part of your characters’ journey.

I hope this helps. I look forward to reading my next romance submission.

I would love to know what you think. If you have anything you would like to add or share, I’d love to hear your comments here on the blog, the BVS Facebook page, or my Facebook page. We have a twitter page too, and we are always happy to follow people that follow us.