Columns: Tag – Romantic Fiction
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Writing is Easy...
Alissa Baxter
Alissa Baxter is our featured writer this week and since allaboutlove is publishing all three of her books we asked her a bit about herself.
Writing Quips and Tips
The lessons of the Olympics for writers of romantic fiction
What lessons do the Olympics hold for writers of romantic fiction? Or, indeed, for writers of any kind? If you think this an idle question asked simply to cash in on the world’s current obsession with the events going on in Beijing, you’d be wrong.
Writing Quips and Tips
Romantic Fiction Writing - How to find ideas
Characters generate their own stories Some writers of romantic fiction regard ideas as the gems on which their fortune will be based. I believe, on the contrary, that ideas are a dime a dozen, available in such profusion that you’re never likely to run short of them. If this proposition sounds ludicrous to you – if ideas, or the lack of them, are the stumbling block in your creative path – then this short series of articles is for you.
Writing Quips and Tips
Romantic Fiction Writing - How to find ideas through daydreams
Daydreams as a source of ideas
We’re discussing four different sources of ideas that you, as a writer of romantic fiction, can milk at will. Ideas that, elaborated and complicated, will give you original stories that’ll form the backbones of your novel. In this piece, I’d like to tease out how much of a creative engine room your own day-dreaming can be.
Writing Quips and Tips
Romance – Why People Read It
People write romance for all kinds of reasons. But if you’re considering starting your first love story, it’s a good idea to know why people read them.
Writing Quips and Tips
Romance - Why Write It
If you think Romance is a lesser form of fiction, go off immediately and read Pride and Prejudice.
There are many kinds of genre fiction, but nobody accuses Ian Rankin or Ruth Rendell of being lesser writers – simply because they write Crime. Genre fiction has certain expectations and constraints. But what else you do with it is up to you – and your talent.
Writing Quips and Tips
Short stories by course participants
Two of our Preparation for Romance Course participants have written short stories, which are being featured on the allaboutlove site.
Love Bites
Seduction and the spinach leaf
We all know how hard it is to achieve the two seemingly incompatible goals of seducing someone with food whilst, if not actually losing weight, at least clinging to a body that can play a role in the seduction process too. Of course these are not issues that come up in the writing of romantic fiction but in living out that life of romance they are all too real. So what does one do when the obvious solution to the second goal - to live on a diet of green leafy vegetables – is most certainly not going to help you achieve the first, ever so slightly more important goal?
Writing Quips and Tips
Online romantic fiction writing courses
Sign up for one of our online romantic fiction courses. You have until 14 February to take advantage of our special launch prices.
Writing is Easy...
Gail Gilbride-Bohle
Gail Gilbride-Bohle is a dedicated reader of allaboutlove.net, and a keen writer of romance. She has written several short stories, some of which can be found on our site. She has completed our Preparation course, our basic Romance Writing Course and is busy with our Advanced Guide. With our feedback, she has already written five chapters of her first novel.
As an incentive to other would-be writers, we are introducing her to you here – perhaps you will identify with her triumphs and her struggles, as she tries to make herself the best writer she can possibly be.
Watch a novel grow
The world of the novel
My story takes place largely in Johannesburg, South Africa, although it must be said that I plan never to mention that city in the book. It will be clear, though, that it lies some distance from Paris, and therefore Europe, requiring an overnight plane trip to get there. But in every other respect the city in which my story takes place is as urbane and sophisticated as any other in the world.
Writing Quips and Tips
Writing a book - the secret
I sometimes imagine all the unfinished novels in drawers. All the characters who will never finish their journeys; the stories that will never draw to an end.
Perhaps that in itself could be the starting point for a story. (Just an idea.) But why is it that so many people start out on their first novel with such enthusiasm, put so much effort and time into it, and then …?
Watch a novel grow
The birth of my heroine
I start in this blog to build my heroine, Juliette Irving. I want her to be energetic, intelligent and likeable (and sexy, of course). But I need to know a fair number of things about her background that I’ll never reveal in the novel… Secrets, even lies, and reasons for pride and doubt.
Writing Quips and Tips
Why read romance?
Romance readers are passionate, not just about love, but about the books they choose.
And this isn’t because they can’t find any other books. Romance readers are loyal to their genre, and specifically choose to read these books above all others.
If you’re about to embark on writing your first love story, it’s a good idea to know why people read them.
Watch a novel grow
Delving deeper into my heroine
So far I know only the bare bones of my heroine, Juliette. Here I take one more step into exploring who she really is what she does in her spare time, what her relationships with her friends and family are - above all, what her strengths and weaknesses are…
Writing Quips and Tips
Likeable doesn’t mean passive
Characters in romances must be likeable. I think we all accept that. Hard to pull off an insufferable character in such a character-based novel.
Your reader must be drawn to read on by caring what happens to your characters. Your plot depends more on changes of attitude between your two lovers than on great sweeping events. But Richard and I have been mentoring a new romance writer and it struck me that, in making characters nice, it’s easy to be tempted into creating a heroine who is too passive.
Writing Quips and Tips
Characters - beyond the cardboard cut-out
A friend of mine is a fine writer, whose first book was a great success.
His characters were beautifully drawn and tugged us into a poignant memoir. But he had always longed to write a novel. I couldn’t wait to see it.
When he showed me a draft, I couldn’t believe it. The characters were cardboard stereotypes.
“But where are the kind of characters you had in your first book?” I asked.
“But that was non-fiction. This is a novel. I have to make them up.”
But you see, you don’t. You can, but you don’t have to. If you work from real life, think of a real character and … lie. Change them to suit your story.
Writing Quips and Tips
Dialogue is real speech – only better
Everyone recognises good dialogue when they see it. But few people can write it…
Writing Quips and Tips
Dynamic dialogue lifts a book from the slush pile
You’ve written a really crucial dialogue that will end your characters’ marriage, but it seems … flat, unreal or, worst of all, dreary.
What’s wrong with it? It will change your characters’ lives. Why doesn’t it affect the lives of your readers?
Here are a couple of quick hints that will lift a plain or dreary dialogue and give it dynamism:
Writing Quips and Tips
Theme, plot and action - so what’s the difference?
“I want to write a story about the inhumanity of men toward women.”
“O-okay. If that’s your thing. But what’s your plot?”
“That’s my plot.”
This was a conversation Richard and I had with a student in one of our writing circles. And I think it’s a common misconception – that a theme somehow constitutes a plot.
Another is that, when you’ve actually got the plot, you’re set to go.