# I don't read romances. Can I write one? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 26, 2011, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031 "2011-03-26T03:33:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![overlyverbose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9dc877/32.png) [@overlyverbose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/overlyverbose)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2011, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/41 "2011-03-29T21:31:04Z")
> [@antonio107](#): > > I’ll go with this. As someone who’s tried writing both country music and romance novels, I’ll say that no matter how clever you or I may think we are, people who love these genres can spot a charlatan a mile away. Don’t ask me how. As a romance & erotica author, I can tell you how. 🙂 The biggest giveaway is overuse and misuse of cliches. Most romance authors use cliches at some point or another. That’s true of most authors of any genre - they’re kind of hard to get away from. But decent authors don’t use them every time their characters are thinking about each other, and they don’t tend to bungle them as much as a newbie. I did a critique of a fledgling author once and had to continuously convince her not to use the phrase, “Her heart was flying out of her chest.” I knew what she was trying to convey, but flying body parts were sending a message other than what she was trying to get across. Also, most books require you to do some amount of research to write them or the story is a snooze-fest. But if you don’t have any related experience to wrap into the research, it usually shows unless you’re exceptionally good at setting the scene. Building on that, you don’t have to actually _do_ everything you write. But you can tell when an author is drawing on personal experience. Regardless of whether it’s a location, a culture or the feeling the author has had during an intimate encounter, it really shows when you write what you know. For example, I used to live in South America. Therefore, many of my novels and stories are staged there. It’s unique, which is a bonus, but more importantly I’ve lived there and had experiences there and I’ve been told it shows. Yet another thing many new authors do is try to copy someone else’s voice. This is a problem in general with writing, but can fail pretty spectacularly in romance, especially because there are so many books within this genre. Plus, when you try to copy someone else’s voice, it usually comes out sounding really, really awkward, and that’s often when you get into the situation of misusing cliches. Anyway, that’s what not to do. If you do want to write a book, just keep in mind, even with romance, it can be hard to get from Point A to Point B. Also, some publishing houses have a required amount of sex you’re supposed to get into the book, depending on the sub-genre, so working that in or directing the story so the sex doesn’t seem completely unnatural or non-sequitor is much, much harder than you might imagine. Particularly if you’re writing something really racy, it’s hard to think of new ways to get tab A into slot B. Or C or…well, you get the idea. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2011, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/42 "2011-03-29T23:17:45Z")
Your advice is good, but in my research for paranormal romances (which is a combination of romance and horror fantasy), the first book I read was terrible about the setting. It was set in Paris and I never got the impression she knew anything about the city. A bit later, I visited Paris and reread the book and understood why – there was no description of setting throughout the book. I don’t mean the main character should see the Eiffel Tower every few minutes – it’d be refreshing if she didn’t – but there was no note that even indicated she looked at a Google Earth version of Paris. And certainly no details that you notice when you’re there. But the sex scenes were surprisingly good and far more explicit than I would have thought. I have to read more in the genre, but the sex scenes I’ve read are nothing like what I imagined they would be. Far less euphemistic. But I’m old fashioned. One of my attempts had an agent interested in marketing it as a YA novel, even though I wrote what I thought was the most explicit sex scene I could. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2011, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/43 "2011-03-30T06:15:28Z")
> [@](#): > > But you can tell when an author is drawing on personal experience. Regardless of whether it’s a location, a culture or the feeling the author has had during an intimate encounter, it really shows when you write what you know. For example, I used to live in South America. Therefore, many of my novels and stories are staged there. It’s unique, which is a bonus, but more importantly I’ve lived there and had experiences there and I’ve been told it shows. But make sure that your knowledge is reasonably up to date. I know of an author who writes mysteries set in Fort Worth. She used to live here, and she used some of the local businesses and landmarks. However, she moved to another state and city, and she’s using the same landmarks in current books, but many of those landmarks have change significantly or are gone altogether. Well, upon looking her up, I find that she’s either quit writing, or the Wiki entry is outdated. ---
**Author:** ![overlyverbose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9dc877/32.png) [@overlyverbose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/overlyverbose)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2011, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/44 "2011-03-30T17:21:43Z")
> [@Lynn\_Bodoni](#): > > But make sure that your knowledge is reasonably up to date. I know of an author who writes mysteries set in Fort Worth. She used to live here, and she used some of the local businesses and landmarks. However, she moved to another state and city, and she’s using the same landmarks in current books, but many of those landmarks have change significantly or are gone altogether. Well, upon looking her up, I find that she’s either quit writing, or the Wiki entry is outdated. Very good point. I’m pretty big on researching any location I use in a book or story, even if I’ve lived there. It sucks when you read a book and think you’ll recognize names and places, and just wind up going, “Huh? Where? Hasn’t that been gone for 10 years?” ---
**Author:** ![ministryman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f6c823/32.png) [@ministryman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ministryman)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2011, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/45 "2011-03-30T18:00:36Z")
> [@The\_Seventh\_Deadly\_Finn](#): > > I’m a mid-career freelance journalist who wants to take a crack at writing novels. Is romance writing a good way to get my feet wet? > > With no disrepect toward romances, it does seem that a lot of the “themes and tone” portion of the task is decided by the conventions of the genre, which would let me concentrate on trying to write compelling scenes, establish good pacing, and learn the other technical aspects of putting together a good story. > > A second potential advantage is that there is a large, if not terribly lucrative, market for romances, such that if I crank out an acceptable one, I might be rewarded for my efforts—even if the pay only works out to about a dollar an hour. > > Finally, I feel like this might help me avoid a personal tendency to be so self-critical and perfectionist that I give up. If I’m working on a 55,000-word mass-market romance, I’ll have no illusions about this being The Great Novel For Which I’ll Be Remembered. Plus, if it works out, I’ll have a confidence-building first novel under my belt. > > However, I’m a guy, and I don’t have any special love for the genre. Have any other Dopers gone the romance route? Any thoughts or recommendations? Can you write a letter to Penthouse? Then you can write a romance novel. It’s a soft-core porn letter, with action and adventure tossed in. Your Muses are _Romancing the Stone_, _Jewel of the Nile_., and _“As Good As It Gets”_ “I think of a man and take out reason and accountability”. Don’t bother turning the flames on me; My friend’s wife has an 8 foot bookcase full of this stuff, and all I see is boy-meets-girl-who-becomes-a-damsel-in-distress-who-is-then-rescued-by-boy-turned-hero-who-proceeds-to-have-the-kind-of-sex-that-only-your-parents-have. ---
**Author:** ![overlyverbose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9dc877/32.png) [@overlyverbose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/overlyverbose)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2011, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/46 "2011-03-30T19:54:39Z")
> [@ministryman](#): > > Can you write a letter to Penthouse? Then you can write a romance novel. > > It’s a soft-core porn letter, with action and adventure tossed in. > > Your Muses are _Romancing the Stone_, _Jewel of the Nile_., and _“As Good As It Gets”_ > > “I think of a man and take out reason and accountability”. > > Don’t bother turning the flames on me; My friend’s wife has an 8 foot bookcase full of this stuff, and all I see is boy-meets-girl-who-becomes-a-damsel-in-distress-who-is-then-rescued-by-boy-turned-hero-who-proceeds-to-have-the-kind-of-sex-that-only-your-parents-have. No flaming, but have you ever tried to write a full-length novel? It isn’t as easy as it sounds. And the sex isn’t the type your parents would have, or at least not in the novels I’ve written. God, I hope my parents haven’t done that! Also, I’m not sure that being married to someone who knows someone who reads romance novels = knowing everything about them. I will admit that, for some of the novels, that’s pretty close, but certainly not true of all of them. ---
**Author:** ![Apollyon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/apollyon/32/4238_2.png) [@Apollyon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollyon)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/47 "2011-03-31T00:51:54Z")
> [@overlyverbose](#): > > I did a critique of a fledgling author once and had to continuously convince her not to use the phrase, “Her heart was flying out of her chest.” I knew what she was trying to convey, but flying body parts were sending a message other than what she was trying to get across. Owwwww… \*zombie \*romance novel! There’s a twist. “She swore her love was eternal. He didn’t realize she meant it!” 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/48 "2011-03-31T01:27:27Z")
> [@Apollyon](#): > > Owwwww… \*zombie \*romance novel! There’s a twist. “She swore her love was eternal. He didn’t realize she meant it!” 😛 The world is ten steps ahead of you. [From 2010.](http://www.amazon.com/Hungry-Your-Love-Anthology-Romance/dp/0312650795) [From 2009.](http://www.amazon.com/Breathers-Zombies-S-G-Browne/dp/0767930614) [From 2004.](http://www.amazon.com/Love-Eats-Brains-Zombie-Romance/dp/0975295527) [Heck, here’s Amazon’s zombie romance novel page](http://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF8&keywords=Zombies&rh=n%3A23%2Ck%3AZombies&page=1). ---
**Author:** ![Apollyon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/apollyon/32/4238_2.png) [@Apollyon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollyon)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/49 "2011-03-31T01:50:51Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > The world is ten steps ahead of you. _sigh_ Ain’t that the truth. 🙂 > [@](#): > > [Heck, here’s Amazon’s zombie romance novel page](http://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF8&keywords=Zombies&rh=n%3A23%2Ck%3AZombies&page=1). I should have realized that if there’s a market for _Pride and Prejudice and Zombies_ and _Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter_ there’d already be an undead romance novel sub-genre. Now I can’t decide whether I want to know about the sex scenes or not… 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/50 "2011-03-31T02:09:11Z")
> [@Apollyon](#): > > I should have realized that if there’s a market for _Pride and Prejudice and Zombies_ and _Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter_ there’d already be an undead romance novel sub-genre. Of course there is. Although that’s usually about ghosts or vampires, not zombies. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 11:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/51 "2011-03-31T11:37:05Z")
Genre seems to be far more difficult to write than it looks from the outside. Any genre. I am currently hammering out a Weird Western story. (Started by wondering why the Lone Ranger uses silver bullets, decided that the Cavendish Gang are a pack of werewolves who slaughtered the rest of his patrol, and the Tonto character is a deceptively youthful looking shaman who also happens to be a skinwalker and so understands the seduction of shape-shifting. I want to have the Tonto character say, upon seeing an elephant [the Lone Ranger character is visitng a travelling circus to learn about handling dangerous animals from thier lion tamer] “Funny, I remember those being much hairier beasts.”) Anyway, I am not a reader of Westerns, and the expected pacing, vocabulary, and feel are eluding me. So far it sounds like it’s being written by a fifty-year-old in Connecticut who is mocking cowboys. I reckon. I may need to complete it as a Weird Tale rather than a weird Western , but I was hoping to have it play out as a sagebrush pastiche. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/52 "2011-03-31T12:59:43Z")
Jim Butcher, author of the successful Dresden Files series of supernatural detection, [explains how _he_ got published](http://www.jim-butcher.com/jim). He began writing fantasy when he was 19 & wrote 4 or 5 pretty bad novels. > [@](#): > > I wrote the first Dresden book for a writing class. I wrote the second one for the next semester, then started on the third one. I submitted the manuscript for the first Dresden to several agents and editors and got rejected and/or ignored pretty much unilaterally. The rejections varied from standard form letters to actual letters that were vaguely encouraging as they crushed my hopes and dreams, to one downright insulting rejection. > > That took about two years… He started going to conventions to meet agents & publishers. After a long time, he was accepted by an agent who was able to sell his first book; the publisher was impressed that he had already completed more books in the series. > [@](#): > > Bottom line, you have to put in a lot of work to get your writing quality up and running. And you have to keep on writing the whole while. Then you have to learn the market, both on the business end of things and on the reader end, so that you can put together a good picture of who you should go after. Building contacts at conventions and so on doesn’t hurt. Lots more advice at the link. There’s more to getting published than sitting down & whipping out a novel in a genre you don’t read. Have you written _any_ fiction? ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/53 "2011-03-31T15:28:50Z")
> [@](#): > > Anyway, I am not a reader of Westerns, and the expected pacing, vocabulary, and feel are eluding me. So far it sounds like it’s being written by a fifty-year-old in Connecticut who is mocking cowboys. I reckon. Surely it can’t be any worse than Rex Stout’s attempts at Westerns. Don’t get me wrong, I adore the Archie and Nero stories…but I don’t know whether _The Mountain Cat Murders_ and _Red Threads_ deserve shelf space in my personal library. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/54 "2011-03-31T16:47:40Z")
> [@Lynn\_Bodoni](#): > > Surely it can’t be any worse than Rex Stout’s attempts at Westerns. > > Don’t get me wrong, I adore the Archie and Nero stories…but I don’t know whether _The Mountain Cat Murders_ and _Red Threads_ deserve shelf space in my personal library. It can indeed be worse. Much worse. And don’t call me “Shirley.” ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031/55 "2011-03-31T19:31:24Z")
😕 😕 😕 Would you prefer to be called Laverne? 😃 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-read-romances-can-i-write-one/576031.md?page=2)