Writing Stack Exchange
Writing Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [romance]

This tag should be used for questions that deal with the genre "romance", either the historical version that is mainly concerned with heroic prose and verse narrative or the modern genre that is concerned with the romantic relationship between characters. Please use the [relationships] tag when asking a question about showing romance between characters as part of their development.

This tag should be used for questions that deal with the genre "romance", either the historical version that is mainly concerned with heroic prose and verse narrative or the modern genre that is concerned with the romantic relationship between .

Please use the tag when asking a question about showing romance between characters as part of their .

94 questions
32
votes
17 answers

How do you write boy & girl protagonists without turning them into a love story?

I've played with the idea of a multi-book fantasy story for years, where a female and male protagonists' lives intertwine with one another, the series running from 12-22 years old for them. There will probably be a time for them where they will…
B.M. Corwen
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27
votes
14 answers

Non-trope happy ending?

This is in the idea stage, but I was wondering... In stories involving multiple protagonists (4 or more) that make and end relationships, date each other, etc. during the course of the story, the typical happy ending happens when everyone has found…
Tom
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26
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11 answers

How do I stop my characters falling in love?

So I'm writing a short story based in a WW2 American military base camp stationed in Germany. It's about A Jewish Soviet soldier that, with the help of an American soldier and a series of coincidences, switches his identity and slips into the…
brandi
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26
votes
11 answers

How to prevent "they're falling in love" trope

I have two characters, the male being sort of a jerk, but lightening up later in the story, and the female is...very hateful. But a person who read the first chapter asked me if they were going to get together. I mean, I planned that for way later,…
Kale Slade
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18
votes
6 answers

Why is young adult romance now being written primarily in the first person?

My recollection is that when I started reading romance novels in the 1980s, the majority (perhaps 60%) were written in the third person. This included some "young adult" romances with characters in their early 20s. I stopped reading them until…
Tom Au
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15
votes
10 answers

Choosing between two people in a romance?

So, my dilemma is as follows. I have a romance project with the MC trying to choose between two women who he cares for very much. Each has broken his heart, but are willing to make amends and provided justification for their misdeeds. In order to…
Kale Slade
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13
votes
8 answers

How do I write LGBTQ+ characters for a romance story, as a non-LGBTQ+ person, without using potentially offensive stereotypes

So today, some of my friends challenged me to write a short story and gave me a number of prompts from which to write, most of which were admittedly not great. There was one, however, which worked for me. It is a nice, short story about a dude who…
Chromanyx
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13
votes
6 answers

How do I write a romance that doesn't look obvious

I'm writing a story, it's not focused on romance, but that's an important part as well. The point is that I have two characters and I ended up ("accidentally") seeing chemistry between them, they have a good dynamic. With that, I really want to know…
Ana Clara Moreira
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12
votes
4 answers

How to tease a romance without a cat and mouse chase?

So, my story doesn't have a romance subplot until way later in the series, but I think that there are elements of the romance very early on. A little background info: The story is set in a fantastical world where humans are the dominant race, and…
Kale Slade
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11
votes
5 answers

Is It Okay to Write Chapters of a Story Out of Order?

I'm writing the chapters of my story, and I wanted to know if I can skip a chapter that I don’t yet know the details of, and move on to other chapters that are already developed Let’s say I’m on chapter 4, but I haven’t developed chapter 6 yet, so I…
stories of the world
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11
votes
2 answers

How do I write a believable romance subplot?

Sexuality is a large part of who we are as persons and it influences many decisions we make. Sadly, I don't know how to make a romance subplot believable. Are there any good guidelines to creating characters' love-story arcs? Any good articles…
Borgel
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11
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9 answers

How do I handle an unequal romantic pairing in a world with superpowers?

I am writing a story that revolves around a number of characters that have superhuman abilities living amongst normal people, akin to they myriad superhero comics or many urban fantasies out there (e.g., The Mortal Instruments, many shonen manga).…
user2352714
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11
votes
8 answers

How do I write sexual tension between two characters?

So. This is one of my first projects, so I have to ask this. The story takes place in a dystopian future, where a young man and a young woman meet each other. They then try to overthrow the tyrannical government, but that doesn't really matter,…
DarkYagami
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9
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4 answers

How explicit should a YA novel be?

For a romance YA novel, how explicit can it be? Are there certain descriptions or words that shouldn't be used?
Ralph Gallagher
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8
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3 answers

How do I introduce a character with two identities?

In my story, there is a person with a superhero identity, and I want the character to meet the main character without there being any action involved. I need a way for the two to meet by chance. I need the characters to have some type of…
Khole
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