We all have our vices. Amid a litany of horrors, one good thing to come out of 2020 for me was a romance novel addiction. Before I’d dealt with a lock-down, having young children during a pandemic and the most stressful year of my career, I thought I was largely above the smut. But I needed a coping mechanism to make it through the flaming, poop-filled dumpster of that year, and meth seemed like a bad idea. So I decided to start reading books that always have happy endings.
I soon learned not all romance novels are trashy. I found I prefer the ones with roughly one climactic (pun intended) love scene and not a bunch of sex. I even like Christian ones, too, with no sex at all but lots of furtive glances. I like contemporary rom-coms and historical (but they have to be British) ones. I try very hard not to ready any of the kinds that have a man with his shirt half open draped over a woman with a heaving bosom on the cover. At least not in public.
I’ve read enough of them by now that I think I’m ready to write my own. Based on what I’ve read, here’s what you have to include in a romance novel:
How the main characters smell - In historical ones, the men often smell of leather and the women of some kind of flower, regardless of the fact that pretty much everything in England smelled like body odor and horse shit 200 years ago.
The main characters’ eye color - If their eyes are blue, they will always will be described as “pools” at some point.
A meet cute - They can’t meet in a normal way, like through mutual friends or on a dating app. It has to be dramatic! More than 40% of the time, this involves physically running into each other. “His strong arms gripped her tightly to keep her from falling.” You get the idea. For the enemies-to-lovers tropes (see below), it’s usually in a competitive arena: a horse race, interviewing for the same job, trying to buy the same real estate or publish the best book. Not surprisingly, books by published authors often involve characters who work in publishing. Write what you know, I guess.
Sexual tension - This is THE BEST part of romance novels. When you’ve been in a long-term relationship, it gets those fun, new-relationship brain chemicals flowing again without you ever having to go to the trouble of committing adultery. In Christian romance novels, there’s often some heavy accidental hand-touching, or, if it’s really edgy, a breathy whisper in an ear. In secular ones, every time the couple gets closer to rounding the bases with the blood pooling in their crotches, there’s an interruption. These interruptions usually include:
- A precocious child
- A cute pet
- Someone they don’t want to know about their relationship showing up
- The “we shouldn’t be doing this!” pull-back
- A random noise that shakes them out of their horny reverie.
And don’t forget about one of the key elements of romance novel sexual tension:
Gazing at each other’s lips - This is how you know characters want to kiss. Does this happen in real life? Maybe in the heady new relationship phase? I’ve been with the same man for 16 years, and the only time I think I ever gaze at his lips is to inform him that he has food stuck on them.
Why they aren’t together - Two people who just meet and start happily dating does not 300+ pages fill. There has to be a reason they can’t be together right away. The most common include:
- They hate each other (admittedly, the enemies to lovers trope is one of my faves)
- Some deep-seated issue about how they’re not meant to be in a relationship. This can range from daddy issues to past hurts to “maybe I or a close family member has/have a terminal disease.”
- Work is too demanding
- They don’t want to ruin their friendship
- One of them is hiding something big, like their real identity
- Different social classes (a duchess and an impoverished baron’s third son?! Scandalous!)
- Rarely, although I think it’s the most common in real life, one of the main characters is dating someone else. That person is either a complete douche canoe or really sympathetic. There is no in-between.
How they get together -
- Fake dating - they have to pretend to date each other for some preposterous reason: to get match-making relatives to leave them alone, to look good and stable for a promotion at work, to make an ex jealous, to get an inheritance, etc. And you’re never gonna’ guess this: when they’re fake dating, they develop real feelings for each other!
- Forced proximity - Oh no! We have to go to our mutual friends’ wedding, and there’s only one hotel room available that we have to share!
- Sudden, redeeming epiphany about the character’s character -
OMG, I had no idea he had such a soft spot for his aging grandparents!
She’s only pushing me away because of her insecurity!
- Sudden, redeeming epiphany about the character’s hotness - Most common in the friends-to-lovers trope - one character sees the other without their shirt on, and the character has the realization their friend is a sexual being and they want to be sexual with that being.
The MISUNDERSTANDING
Everything is going well toward the end of the book. If it’s not a Christian romance novel, the sex scene has probably happened. (If it is Christian, there might have been a verbal declaration of love, possibly a kiss, but no handsy business except shoulder grasping.) Then BAM. The misunderstanding. This almost always involves poor communication and/or keeping things from each other:
“You were just using me to get back at your ex?!”
“You were just using me to write your magazine article?!”
“You’re really a wealthy duke?!”
“I can’t do this because the insecurity from my traumatic childhood has resurfaced!”
“You’ll be better off without me! It’s for your own good that I leave now because I am damaged goods/have a possibly terminal illness/can’t give up the career I love!”
“We ruined our friendship with fornication!”
The happy ending
In a 2020 world, this was what I needed. Consistently. Not prize-winning literary fiction books about the breakdowns of families or generations of inequity or man versus the horrors of nature. Not nonfiction ruminations on politicians, societal issues and how we’re all fat and anxious. I was living through awful things. I didn’t need to read about more of them. Just give me buzzing electricity between rival book editors or the earl and his governess, thank you, consummating (or not, Christian romance fans) in an ending where everyone is happy and in love.
I’ve been addicted ever since. So read your sad books, drink your gross whiskey or take your PCP. At least my coping mechanism doesn’t make me fight cops naked or hurt my liver.
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