Popular romance stories such as Jane Austen’s Pride and the Prejudice or Anna Todd’s After series provide passionate, romantic love stories that we, as readers, dream to be the subjects of. In as much as love is a difficult emotion to comprehend, when it is accompanied by romance, a feeling of exhilaration and mystery makes love even more intense. The complexity in love makes writing romantic stories much trickier. It requires certain techniques. In this article, we have included some important techniques and tips that a writer might consider when it comes to writing love stories.

Choose your niche

The love and romance genre has a multitude of subgenres. A compelling love story that captures readers’ hearts is often written within a certain subgenre. To produce a successful romantic story, as a writer, one should be well-versed in their chosen niche. Whether you favour historical or contemporary romance, you should carry out intensive research about your genre so that you will be able to deliver a successful love story.

Add conflict

What is a romantic story without some challenges? Everyone loves a good conflict. Conflict is an integral part of any kind of story, but especially a romantic story. It is the heart of the story as several scenes and themes tend to arise from the conflict. Conflict makes a love story more interesting to read. This is brought about by the anticlimaxes that leave readers in anticipation. A well-defined conflict will make readers indulge and fall in love with the story. It is important however as a writer to properly structure the conflict within your love story. The conflict of your story can be about lovers separated by distance or it could be about forbidden lovers like in Romeo and Juliet. A properly established conflict makes a good love story great.

The main characters should be interesting

Readers enjoy falling in love with characters, and they also hating them. To achieve this, main characters need to have unfolding well-written backgrounds as these influence the events that will take place in the love story. For instance, one of the main characters might have a rough childhood which influences their perspective on love and relationships. This character might be afraid of love or even hate love and as a result, this perspective of love will shape the character’s journey in love. 

Readers will go through the motions with the character from being afraid of love, to falling in love. Another example can be of a character who experienced love through his or her parent’s relationship. These characters will grow up with certain expectations of love and may find themselves disappointed with the romantic experiences they have. 

A properly structured background for the main characters is essential in how the love story will play out. It is also important to note that the main characters are not perfect. As a writer, do not be afraid to highlight the flaws of your main characters. Their imperfection will make them more relatable to readers. The complexity of the main characters is the essence of the main characters. The fact that they can make mistakes and still love and be loved is what makes the story special.

Don’t be afraid of clichés

Clichés are overrated, but they can be fun too. They are overused because readers love them! People want to read the first few pages of a book and immediately get an idea of the storyline. They can relate to romantic tropes such as falling in love with the boy next door or a billionaire falling in love with a poor waitress. A good girl falling in love with a bad boy, or the player and taming him. These tropes are relatable since they make imagined love stories come true through the main characters’ love stories. Romantitropes exist for a reason and the ability to use them properly will lead to a genuine love story.

It is quite challenging to write a love story. It requires a lot of knowledge about the subject and techniques to write it. These tips are guiding steps to writing a romantic, love story. Perhaps to write a successful love story, one should be a bit of a hopeless romantic themselves.

References

• Jordan (n. d). How to write love stories: 7 romance novelist’s wisdom. Retrieved 1 May, 2022 from https://www.nownovel.com
• Lewis (2020). How to write a Genuine Romance. Retrieved 1 May, 2022 from https://www.thenovelsmithy.com
• Masterclass Staff (2021). How to Write a Romance Novel: 5 Tips for Writing a Successful Romance. Retrieved 1 May, 2022 from https://www.masterclass.com