How Is Our Protagonist Challenged to Improve? (& a Worksheet!)
In our story, something makes our protagonist change and progress in their internal journey. But what’s that something? What triggers them to grow?
Pin ItWrite Romance? Announcing a New Workshop!
Downloaded over 60,000 times, my Romance Beat sheet helps writers of all levels build romance stories. But how do we use this extremely popular tool?
Pin ItMore Than a Happy Ending: What Makes a Story Uplifting?
The romance genre is often called “aspirational,” but even romances with a happy ending can fail at being uplifting. What other elements contribute to an uplifting story and what can they teach us about other genres?
Pin ItRomance Love: Happy Valentine’s Day!
It’s often not easy to be a romance author, and the time around Valentine’s Day can be especially trying. A whole day (or week) focused on love and romance brings out all types of naysayers for the romance genre.
Pin ItAspirational Stories: Do They Reflect Your Hopes and Goals?
Aspiration is “a hope or ambition of achieving something,” such as we see with the #RelationshipGoals tags on social media. Not surprisingly, our hopes and goals are sometimes reflected in the stories we write or the books we read.
Pin ItCreating Satisfying Endings without Clichés
A recent Twitter thread brought up problematic reader expectations with story endings. Can we find a balance between “fulfilling our story’s promise and our genre’s expectations” and avoiding a cliché ending?
Pin ItYour Story’s Promise: Do You Need an Epilogue?
Given reviews about too-abrupt endings, readers might want a sense of closure beyond what authors deliver. Should we use epilogues—or epilogue-like endings—to breach the gap?
Pin ItA Reminder to Enjoy the Journey
Goals are good, but when things don’t work out like we planned, we can still try to appreciate any enjoyment along the way. The journey of life is what matters.
Pin ItThursday Thoughts: The Antagonist Role in Romance
A recent post by Diana Hurwitz explored the nature of antagonists in romance novels. Today, we’re taking a deeper look at our options for antagonists, especially in the romance genre, and how we can avoid creating unhealthy relationships.
Pin ItHow to Develop and Show a Healthy Romance — Guest: Bran L. Ayres
Whether we want to know for real-life purposes or for our writing, Bran’s post today helps us identify elements of healthy romances. Authors need to be careful of sending readers the wrong message. Everyone deserves to be in a healthy, loving relationship—including our characters.
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