Head-Butting Romantic Conflicts

According to Writing a Romance Novel for Dummies, by Leslie Waigner, there are three common issues facing the hero and heroine:

Trust: Need I say more?

Control: Who needs the guy to control you—and ultimately your heart—when your skills and confidence make you a kickass [fill in the blank]?

Self-image: How could he possibly be interested in me when XX is much prettier, smarter, skinnier (the list goes on)?

The benefit of using an issue such as above is that it keeps your hero and heroine together plot wise, but keeps them apart emotionally. This helps drives the conflicts (both internal and external) while allowing the happy couple to eventually fall in love.

Does anyone have any other issues to add to the list?

Don't forget about our contest going on for SoloPlay right now. Any comment left between now and Friday will be entered to win Miranda Baker's new ebook. Of course, if you'd rather not win it - just make sure you put that in your comments too :)

Get Them While They’re Hot!

Are you one of the lucky writers attending the RWA national conference in NYC next month? If not, you can still benefit from some awesome handouts now available online. One of my favorites is Character Mining. Judging from the handout, I can’t wait to attend the workshop.

Is anyone else going to be there?

The Big “O”

From the time we’re old enough to read the magazine covers lining the checkout counters, we know the big “O” is important (not that we know what it means). But I wonder how many people actually buy the magazines for the advice.

Okay, I’ll admit I have, but they don’t tell you anything you can’t learn from a steamy romance novel. And if your husband times it wisely (i.e. you’re reading one when he’s in the mood), you’re already in the mood before you’re IN THE MOOD, if you get what I mean.

So my questions are:

Do you buy magazines that promise to tell you the 75 Sex Moves Men Crave (don’t laugh, it was an interesting article), do you buy books on the subject, or do you learn your fancy moves from novels (or none of the above)?

And if you write steamy love scenes, where do you get your inspiration (knowledge) from?

Mastering the Flashback

There's something about a flashback that always draws a writer in. We love to use them. Sometimes too much. New writers will become dependant on them while seasoned writers will realize their value and use them wisely.

But how do you write a successful flashback? They're not easy. If we're not careful, the flashback can do more harm than good in a story. They offer more problems than solutions. Why? Because they are events that have already happened. They take the reader out of the story - if not written correctly.

So how does one master the flashback? There are ways to keeping your flashback from destorying your story. Keep the flashback as brief as possible. Make sure you don't slow the action, bog the pacing or lose our readers interest. If the flashback must be long (longer than a paragraph), then transition into and out of in ways that are clear to your readers. Use signifiers that will help the transition for your readers - like a phone call, someone at the door, being shuffled in a crowd, coping a feel at a party ... you get the idea.

Verb tenses are crucial in flashbacks. If your story is being told in the past tense, then write the first few verbs of the flashback in the past perfect and the rest in simple past. For example use words like she knew, if she had to remember, she had thought ect. 

It's important not to confuse your readers, so Nancy Kress suggest that to signal the start of the flashback,  puts its first five verbs in past perfect ("had done," "had dressed," "had bought," "had come," "hadn't even seen"). After that, tell the rest of the flashback in past tense ("eyes were," "they passed," etc.). The reason for this is that an entire flashback in past perfect would be cumbersome, especially if it's very long.

Here the most important piece to remember: when you're ready to end the flashback, revert to past perfect for the last few verbs. Then use past tense to resume story time.

Have you mastered flashbacks in your novel? Did they cause problems for you? Do you find it easier to master your flashback during the revisions? Do you even think about them?

P.S. if you are wondering why Richard Armitage is in this post - its cause I can't stop staring into his eyes ;)

Twelve steps to Steamy

Whether you write YA novels or any other genre were romance occurs, there’s no emotional satisfaction if your characters meet one second and are making out (or having sex) the next. You need to build up to the moment. Tease your characters and readers. Take things slowly. And take them through the 12 steps to intimacy as originally described by author Linda Howard:

1.      Eye to body

2.      Eye to eye

3.      Voice to voice

4.      Hand to hand (or arm)

5.      Arm to shoulder

6.      Arm to waist or back

7.      Kissing  (mouth to mouth)

8.      Hand to head

9.      Hand to body

10.  Mouth to breast

11.  Hand to private parts

12.  Private parts to private part (okay, you know what I mean).

Your characters don’t have to go through all the steps in the first meeting (though they can), and the steps don’t have to be done in this order (though don’t try #12 without hitting the majority of the others first).

I personally think it’s sexier when the guy’s lips travel over the female’s temple, jaw, throat, or shoulder before finding her lips. And don’t forget the kiss can range from the brushing of his lips against hers to the deepening of their kisses. Maybe the guy leans in to kiss her (maybe he even gets as far as brushing his lips against hers) and the kiss is interrupted by someone or something else. Always a favorite trick of mine.  Also, by introducing just a few steps at a time, you can build the suspense, leaving your reader wondering whether the first kiss (or the more intimate, deepening kiss) is going to happen and when.  

But please, don’t make your reader wait too long. Nothing drives me crazier than having to wait ¾ of the book before the main character and her love interest finally kiss (as in the YA paranormal novel I recently read). What I do love, though, is not knowing if they’re going to go all the way. Obviously that doesn’t work for all subgenres of romance. If you’re reading an erotic romance, you’re expecting some action to happen pretty quickly. Heck, you’re expecting action. Period. This is why it’s important to be well read in the type of books you want to write.

Questions: do you like waiting for the first kiss to happen or get frustrated if it takes too long? Do you prefer things to get steamy pretty quickly (depending on the genre, this could be a steamy make out scene or a mind numbing rump between sheets)? And what is your favorite type of first kiss?

Writing for the Market?

This past weekend on Twitter I tossed around a phrase I heard about on a few blogs.

"Write for the Market".

I don't know about you, but writing for the market doesn't generally work. Or does it?

what if you were to take what I said about and use the following formula: Write one project for the market and one project for yourself.

Does that make a difference?

I have two thoughts. I haven't quite drank my pot of coffee yet, and I'm chocolate free for the morning, so my thoughts might be a bit scattered, but ....

This works if you are writing short stories or novellas for epublishers. But for novels? Writing about something your not passionate about, or something totally away from your genre just because it's hot - doesn't sound like a winning formula to me.

This also works if what is hot is something you enjoy writing about. If I'm a contemporary romance writer and the market is screaming for sci-fi, well ... no amount of chocolate is gonna help me then.

I'm curious. What do you think? Since this works mainly for novellas and short stories - do you use this formula? Write for the market and for yourself? You make money with your backlist, or so they say. If your backlist includes what's hot right now, then fantastic. If it doesn't - will it make a difference?