Speaker 1: 0:00

So romanticism is the big trending genre right now and there are a lot of heavy hitters in the genre who are doing really well and just absolutely killing it with sales and it's very tempting to copy and paste what they're doing and it's totally fine if you want to ride certain trends. It's totally fine if you want to write to market. You know that's even preferred in many cases. But you can put your own unique spin on a trend. Enemies to Lovers is huge right now. You can write Enemies to Lovers your own way. You don't have to regurgitate what someone else has already done.

Speaker 2: 0:33

Welcome to the Fiction Writing Made Easy podcast. My name is Savannah Gilbo and I'm here to help you write a story that works. I want to prove to you that writing a novel doesn't have to be overwhelming, so each week, I'll bring you a brand new episode with simple, actionable and step-by-step strategies that you can implement in your writing right away. So, whether you're brand new to writing or more of a seasoned author looking to improve your craft, this podcast is for you. So pick up a pen and let's get started. If you've ever wondered how to balance magic and romance in your writing, or what exactly makes a book romantic-y versus just fantasy with a romantic subplot, then this episode is for you. Today, I'm joined by Jenna Maresi, an award-winning romantic-y author, writing craft expert and YouTube sensation.

Speaker 2: 1:20

Jenna's first book in the Savior series, the Savior's Champion, was voted one of the best books of all time by Book Depository, and her writing craft book, shut Up and Write. The Book has helped thousands of writers take their stories to the next level. Now Jenna's back with her second writing craft book, how to Write Romanticy, which released this October, and trust me, it's packed with everything you need to create unforgettable characters, irresistible romantic pairings and stories that readers will obsess over. In this episode, jenna's breaking down her three-part framework for crafting power couples, aka those romantic pairings that feel perfectly suited for each other, and she's sharing the five types of scenes that you need to build emotional intimacy between your characters. Plus, we talk about how to pace a romantic arc across an entire series without writing yourself into a corner.

Speaker 2: 2:08

Whether you're writing clean and sweet romanticism or planning to turn up the heat, this episode is full of practical strategies and creative inspiration. So grab a notebook, because you will want to take notes, and let's dive right into my conversation with Jenna Maresi. Hi, jenna, welcome to the Fiction Writing Made Easy podcast. I would love for you, in your own words, to tell my audience who you are, what you do and things like that.

Speaker 1: 2:30

Thank you so much for having me. It is a huge honor to be here. My name is Jenna Maresi. I am an award-winning and Amazon bestselling author of Romantasy. As well as writing craft books, I'm also a YouTuber over on the channel writing with Jenna Moreci. So if you need any writing advice and want a hefty dose of sarcasm and humor alongside it, that's what I do over on my channel.

Speaker 2: 2:51

Yeah, I love that, and so we're here to celebrate your new book that's coming out, which is called how to Write Romanticy. And so what inspired you to create a guide about this topic?

Speaker 1: 3:01

Actually, this was something I, when it comes to writing craft books, I basically have a list of topics that I want to cover, because I cover so much on my channel and after years of, you know, having this YouTube channel, people were like when are you going to release a book about it? So first I really shut up and write the book, which is basically just an overview, like a step-by-step guide, of the overall writing process, and I had a list of other topics that I wanted to cover eventually. But what had happened was actually an editor over at 10 Speed Press, which is an imprint of Penguin Random House, reached out to me and they said you know, romantasy is really huge right now and you know, we see, you know, you give writing advice. You, you know, release, shut Up and Write the Book. It was very successful.

Speaker 1: 3:40

You write Romantasy yourself. You know, the Savior series, which is my Romantasy series, is very successful. We were wondering if you wanted to work with us on writing a Romantasy guide. So it had already been on my list, but it wasn't like the next topic I was going to cover and I was still deciding what the next topic would be. And then I got this email and I'm like, well, they decided for me, you know. So, you know, I ended up signing with 10 Speed Press and everything, and they kind of made the decision easy for me because I didn't know where to go. And I'm like, okay, well, this opportunity fell in my lap.

Speaker 2: 4:09

I'm gonna take it. That's right. The universe is like hint, hint, nudge, nudge. We need to get this book, I love that, and so, okay, let's back up to. Let's pretend we're a brand new writer or we're someone who's like maybe I write fantasy, maybe I write romance, maybe I want to start writing romantasy. How do you define romantasy as a genre? What are the differences between just fantasy or just romance? Talk to me about that.

Speaker 1: 4:34

This is a great question. I see there's a lot of confusion online about it. I see people saying that romantasy is just fantasy with a romantic subplot. That is not true. If you were to release a fantasy novel with a romantic subplot and call it romantasy, you will just get dive-bombed with one-star reviews. So just to clear the air, romantasy is just a book that's half fantasy, half romance. So it helps to understand what constitutes fantasy and romance.

Speaker 1: 5:01

Fantasy is a speculative fiction that either takes place in a fictional, fantastical world or it contains magic and magical creatures, or both. And then romance is a story that follows two or more people falling in love. Something threatens their love but they defy you know the odds and they end up living happily ever after or happy for now. Just to clarify it is not a romance if they don't end up happy together at the end. That is a rule of the genre.

Speaker 1: 5:28

I'm sure people can think of lots of romantic stories that end tragically, like, for example, romeo and Juliet. A story can be romantic and not be a romance. So Romeo and Juliet is actually defined as a tragedy, or sometimes a romantic tragedy. But if you want the book to be labeled a romance, it has to end happily. So Romanticy is just a combination of fantasy and romance. You've kind of got half and half within the genre and basically what we have is two or more people who are falling in love, but something, usually fantastical, is threatening their love. So some kind of you know, monster or villain, or wars between fantasy, you know worlds or realms is threatening their love, but by the end they end up being happy together or, you know, happily ever after.

Speaker 2: 6:18

Yeah, and that could be correct me if I'm wrong but for the end of a book or the end of a series.

Speaker 1: 6:21

The end of a series. It's totally fine, and this is another question a lot of writers have. They're like well, I want them to be broken up at the end of the first book. That's totally fine. You can have them estranged mid-series, you could have one of them thinking the other is dead. It's totally fine if books within the series end unhappily, but by the end of the series they need to be together and in love and everything's just rainbows and sunshine.

Speaker 2: 6:45

And I think that's so important to note because we do want to deliver on those genre expectations. And you know, this is different than just straight up romance, where we would expect that at the end of a book, at each book, there needs to be that happily ever after or happily for now, and then in a fantasy with a romantic subplot. That's very different too. So I love that you're kind of saying it's 50-50. And then the next obvious question is like well, how do we balance that? Because that feels a little hard right, it's different than just saying like I'm writing, let's say, a crime story with a romance subplot or whatever. It's like no, these need to carry equal weight. How do we do that?

Speaker 1: 7:20

Well, I think a lot of it comes down to the fantasy is usually represented in the world that the characters are living in. Even if you're writing a contemporary romanticist that takes place in like San Francisco or Italy, there's usually San Francisco is now filled with, you know, magicians or unicorns or things like that. So that would be right, exactly. So that would be what we would consider like world building elements. So usually the world and the actual dangers that the characters are facing are the fantasy elements. So usually the world and the actual dangers that the characters are facing are the fantasy elements. And then when it comes to the internal conflicts, those are usually of the romantic variety. So that's a good way to balance things.

Speaker 1: 7:54

The easiest way for me is, while I'm writing, I look at every single chapter and I make sure did the plot get moved forward? And when I say the plot, I usually mean the romance between the characters. So if you have a chapter where nothing is happening to move the romantic story forward, even if it's just the tiniest thing, because sometimes the love interests aren't even in the same chapter together but something might happen to character A that we know will have a direct effect on the romance later on in the story. So, taking a look at every chapter and thinking, how did this move the romance forward? Because usually fantasy is going to be in every chapter. It's because you're writing in a fantastical world, you know, and people are sword fighting or you know fighting with, you know magic and wands. So I like to look at the romance element and think, okay, did this move the romance forward in any way? Even if they're not in the chapter together, consequences will happen that will affect the love story as a whole.

Speaker 2: 8:49

Yes, and I think that's so important to kind of think about balance that way. And how does the romantic piece of it affect the you know, the fantasy aspect? How does the fantasy aspect in those stakes affect the romantic stakes and really like they should all play together and affect each other? Right, that's how we get that 50-50. Exactly, and so just real quick, I wasn't planning to ask you this, but is there like one or two big mistakes that people make when they try to blend these two things together?

Speaker 1: 9:16

Well, the biggest mistake is writing a romantic subplot and then calling it romantic. That's one that I see a lot and it's also tough because some writers they're just trying to market their book and they know it's a subplot, but they see that Romantasy is so big they're like I'm going to call it a Romantasy and I'll reach more readers and they're just shooting themselves in the foot. So, honestly, that is the biggest mistake. Also, another big mistake and I'm trying to think of a tactful way towards this Romantasy is the big trending genre right now and there are a lot of heavy hitters in the genre who are doing really well and just absolutely killing it with sales. And it's very tempting to copy and paste what they're doing. And it's totally fine if you want to ride certain trends. It's totally fine if you want to write to market. You know that's even preferred in many cases.

Speaker 1: 10:01

But you can put your own unique spin on a trend. Enemies to Lovers is huge right now. You can write Enemies to Lovers your own way. You don't have to regurgitate what someone else has already done. And another big popular trend right now is Shadow Daddies, which is basically like a morally gray guy who's got dark hair and is kind of broody. There's a certain blueprint that is very specific that we see being churned out over and over again with shadow daddies, and I was actually just speaking with another Romantasy author recently who she writes shadow daddies but hers are unique to her. She's able to put her own spin on them. If you want to write a shadow daddy, you totally can, but do that. Make it unique, your own unique character. You don't have to copy and paste what has already been done in order to be popular. You can still write a trend, but give it your own unique voice.

Speaker 2: 10:47

Right. I think that's so important too, because it's easy to get hung up on things like that and say, shadow daddy or enemies to lovers equals romanticism. It's like, no, that's just kind of the way the characters are showing up and you can include that, but we still need to know what's their purpose. What are they doing here, how do they add to your story and how are they yours Exactly? I think those are two great things to highlight of. Let's just be careful we don't do these things.

Speaker 1: 11:09

Right, and I think it's also important to note. You know, I have a successful romantic series. It's not enemies to lovers. In the main male character isn't a shadow daddy, if anything. I did kind of a reverse where we see a lot of bad boy and good girl. So I did a bad girl and a good boy, you know. So just saying like sometimes people see these trends and they're like, oh crap, that's not what I'm writing. It's fine, you don't. You don't have to follow the trends to be successful, and if you do want to follow the trends, that's fine too.

Speaker 2: 11:37

Just add your own unique spin to it, yeah, and I think what a fun opportunity for us creative people right Like how do we add our own spin to something like that and how do we rise to that challenge?

Speaker 1: 11:50

So right, very cool, but for me that's that's the fun part, you know making it your own. So yeah, I don't. I don't see the appeal and just regurgitating what's already been done.

Speaker 2: 11:55

Yeah, I think so too, and I think a lot of listeners will probably agree like okay, challenge accepted, how do I do this? But speaking of characters, I know we're going to talk about this a lot today, because that is really what's at the heart of romantasy, right? It's like we want to see that romantic relationship unfold. So where would we start? Like, what are the first couple things we need to think about?

Speaker 1: 12:19

Okay. Well, when it comes to characters, one of the biggest mistakes I see, not just in romanticism, but people writing any kind of romance where two characters specifically not only need to fall in love but end up together and be happy together is you'll see a lot of people be like well, I wrote this. You know the princess. She's supposed to fall in love with the prince from the neighboring kingdom, but she has way more chemistry with a thief. So now I'm going to, you know, redo my whole outline so that she falls in love with the thief and make it make sense. And these can be happy accidents and everything. And there's nothing wrong with you as a writer if this happens. But it makes the writing process way longer because now you have to redo your outline, you have to go back to the drawing board. Typically, when this happens, it's just because you didn't craft your characters with the intention of them being well suited together. And if you do that from the beginning, then you don't have to re-outline and, you know, re -plan and create a whole new love interest. So you know, character creation is my favorite part, but if I'm creating love interest, I add an extra step, so it's not just. You know what do they look like, you know what's their history, you know what's their family life. I add extra steps of how can I make them well-suited to be together. I have three things that I recommend people take into consideration at a minimum, and one is to make them compliments to one another. This is especially helpful if you want to write opposites attract, which is typically what we see a lot in romance in general, you know, like the grumpy sunshine or the golden retriever and the black cat. This is where that kind you know kind of falls in you know to place. So basically, what I think about is how could I make them like two puzzle pieces that fit seamlessly together? And the goal is to make them more entertaining as characters when they're on the page together. They don't necessarily have to make each other better people, especially if you're writing, you know, a villain romance or something like that. They just need to be the most entertaining when they're on the page together. That's where sort of the emotional chemistry will come from and also it'll make readers want to see them together because they're fun to read about on the page. So I like to think about maybe one character's an extrovert, the other one's an introvert. So the extrovert kind of brings the introvert out of their shell and gets them having fun and enjoying life, whereas the introvert provides a calm, you know, place for the extrovert, you know, allows them to be vulnerable and have some peace Just thinking about things like that. The next thing that I like to consider is making them equal, and a lot of people freak out when I say that because they're like well, it's supposed to be a goddess falling in love with a farm boy or something like that. I'm not saying they need to be the same or they need to be a goddess falling in love with a farm boy or something like that. I'm not saying they need to be the same or they need to be equally hot or equally intelligent or equally powerful. The idea is they need to bring an equal amount of strengths and an equal amount of weaknesses to the relationship, or I usually say an equal amount of benefits and baggage.

Speaker 1: 14:55

We see a lot of romance stories. I'm trying not to name specific books. I'm sure people can think of some off the top of their head where one half of the pairing is like you know, god's gift to the world, and then the other half is just kind of lame, you know, like just like a dishrag of a human being, and writers sometimes do this so that they can imagine like. The reader can imagine themselves like I'm an average, average person and I could get this wonderful babe. But really readers are just like what do they see in them? Like what's right? Why are they attracted to each other? So that's what I mean about equality Make sure that they're both bringing an equal amount of strengths and weaknesses to the relationship of. This will make the relationship a lot more believable and it will make readers you know able to root for them Exactly.

Speaker 1: 15:39

And then the last thing is to give them common ground. I talked about opposites. You know how opposites attract. That's totally fine. Characters can be opposites on the surface, but when it comes to, like their deep you know integrity or their morals or beliefs, they need to be the same. So you typically need to give them some kind of moment of vulnerability where they share, you know, a problem in their life or they share something that they're really passionate about and the other person's like oh, I get that, it doesn't. They don't have to be dealing with the same thing, but they need to be able to bond over something deeper than just the surface level stuff. So that's what I like to do when I'm creating what I call a power couple, a couple that readers are going to root for, to end up together, yeah.

Speaker 2: 16:20

I love that, and especially because it's not like you just need to do these things because I said so. It's like there are actual reasons why, if you do these things, they result in a power couple that we root for, like you said. So just to be clear, because I know someone is probably thinking this do we need to do all three of those things or is it a pick?

Speaker 1: 16:36

and choose, I recommend doing all three of those things, or is it a pick and choose? I recommend doing all three of those things because it's great if the characters complement each other, but if one of them is just amazing and perfect and the other one's kind of a turd, readers aren't going to be able to be like. Well, at least they're better when they're together. Because I definitely recommend having all three of these things, yeah.

Speaker 2: 16:56

Okay, great, Perfect. So let's pretend we've made this like really great power. Couple readers are shipping them, we're rooting for them. What's next?

Speaker 1: 17:07

Well, I mean oh my gosh, this is yeah, you're like, don't get me started, there's a lot of stuff.

Speaker 1: 17:11

I know I'm like how do I reign this in? And you know, obviously, in how to Write Romanticy. I list all the step-by-step process. But if we're looking at the romance specifically, say that we've already outlined the story, we've already figured out the structure. I like to focus on emotional intimacy and physical intimacy and figuring out where. You know we want to go in those two directions.

Speaker 1: 17:33

A lot of people make the mistake of only focusing on physical intimacy, which is great. If you're writing erotica, that's what erotica is for. It's all about the sexy times. But this is romanticism, so they need to actually fall in love too. So you don't want to strictly focus on the physical stuff. The emotional intimacy is what gets romance readers invested in the ship, so that's where I like to put most of my attention. And then, when it's time for spice, then it's like okay, then I'll dive into that.

Speaker 1: 18:01

But I like to say that there are five things that you want to focus on, five types of scenes that you want to include in the story in order to breed emotional intimacy. I won't go into all five of them because we will be here for hours, but the five types of scenes are friendship, respect, vulnerability, trust and unity. My two favorite ones are vulnerability and trust, so I'll cover those. Vulnerability is kind of like what we already covered. You need to give your characters a moment where they're vulnerable together. I recommend giving each character their own vulnerable moment, but basically it's usually the character is sharing something that they're ashamed about, sharing something dark from their past, or sharing something that you know they're struggling with, and the other character needs to be there and actually you know, empathize and sort of lift them up and you know, hear them, and usually this moment has them thinking like changing their opinion of them, or it breeds sort of an emotional connection between them. If they're enemies to lovers, this might be a moment where they're like, oh, he's not as bad as I thought he was, or something like that. And the trust moment this is another point that sometimes worries writers, because they hear trust and they're like well, my character is a villain and they're lying and stuff. I don't mean that they need to be 100% honest with each other, because sometimes that doesn't work in romanticism.

Speaker 1: 19:17

For trust, I like to write what I call a save-a-life moment. It could be that one character literally saves the other's life. It doesn't have to be that extreme. Not all books have life or death stakes, but ultimately, what a save-a-life moment is is that one character needs to put themselves at risk for the other. So if you're writing a book with low stakes, it could be that you know, if one character is up to get in trouble at work and they think they're going to get fired, their love interest steps up and takes the blame instead. You know, so they're putting their job at risk for the other person and again it could just be that one of them literally saves the other's life and they put themselves in, you know, in danger in order to do so. But having that kind of moment in the book, it really changes the dynamic between the characters, especially in Romanticy.

Speaker 2: 20:01

Yeah, and that's such a great way to think about it. So you said there are five types of scenes you recommend each character has each type of scene, and I'm just hearing listeners thinking like, okay, so that's 10 scenes, and then I also have to balance the fantasy elements. So does that mean that these type of scenes need to be built around this trust building, or is it more of, like the trust building happens in a moment within the scene, like how do you think about that?

Speaker 1: 20:24

Well, these scenes can overlap. For example, in my book, the Savior's Champion, the moment of friendship is the moment of respect. They're one in the same. So you don't have to have 10 types of scenes, you can also have as many of these as you want. If you want to have a million moments of friendship, you can totally do that. And friendship just essentially means, you know, flirting, laughing together, bonding, you know that's.

Speaker 1: 20:44

Another problem we see a lot in romanticism is that the characters don't seem to like each other, and I understand that if they're enemies first, they're not going to like each other, but at some point they need to like each other and you just need to show that. You just need to show them, maybe like poking fun at each other. You know that sort of thing. And and these scenes could be, you know, really small, like a moment of friendship could just be a couple lines of dialogue, yeah, so there's no need to be overwhelmed by the number of these because, again, they can overlap. They could be really, really short.

Speaker 1: 21:13

But what I like to do is, while I'm outlining my novel I know there are pancers out there, so some people are going to go with the flow I like to outline. While I'm outlining, I just like to, you know, take a look at the different scenes that I have in the different chapters and make sure that I'm able to pinpoint those moments throughout the book. And if you're not finding them within the outline, then take a look at the scenes that you've already crafted you know scenes that are, you know, fantasy specific and see if you can sort of wedge a little moment in there. And most of these moments that I'm covering, you know, friendship, respect, vulnerability, trust and unity. Most of them are dialogue related. So it's usually really easy to kind of wedge a bit of dialogue into a scene.

Speaker 2: 21:51

Yeah, I love what you said, too, about it could be a few sentences, because I know as writers, we overthink a lot of stuff, right? So what I think will be helpful for people listening is no, you don't need to build an entire scene around each of these things. You can, if that suits you and your story, but it can be as simple as one or two lines, like Jenna just said. So don't overthink it.

Speaker 1: 22:10

Right. And also there are certain scenes that, especially in fantasy, that just lend themselves to these types of you know situations already happening. So, for example, in the Savior's Champion, there's a scene where my main character, tobias, saves another man's life, which there's nothing romantic about that. The other man is not his love interest, you know. He's just saving this dude's life, but his love interest witnesses it and that for her is her moment of respect. She witnesses it and she's like, oh wow, he risked his life to save someone else. That's super sexy, you know. I really respect him for that. So that was a scene that I had to include in the story for non-romantic purposes, but it totally served a dual purpose and ended up, you know, being a scene where the main female character develops respect for Tobias. So yeah, you can have a scene in your book that doesn't seem romantic at all but it'll serve toward furthering the romance between the characters.

Speaker 2: 23:03

Yeah, I love that you said that, because that could happen when you're outlining, when you're drafting, when you're editing, and it's just kind of like, how do you use all the pieces? You have to give readers what they want, which is that developing chemistry and you know emotional connection and things like that Right, but so that's the intimate part of their chemistry. Do you have any tips for writing like the physical growth or like the physical? What do we want to call it arc?

Speaker 1: 23:27

Yes, I think the very first thing that writers need to determine is how far they're willing to take the physical element, because some writers they want to write clean or sweet fiction and, especially in rom romanticism. A lot of people think that means their book is not going to sell. Your book can still sell if you write clean or sweet. It's totally fine. I read clean and sweet romanticism all the time. I see it selling like crazy all the time. So don't feel like you have to write smut and spice in order to sell a romanticism book. Just stop freaking out about it. People are always freaking out about them. Like, calm down, it's fine.

Speaker 2: 24:01

Yeah, I'm going to pause you because I want to say that again Smut and spice do not equal Romantasy, although Romantasy can include that, just like romance can include that.

Speaker 1: 24:11

So keep going Exactly, and so that's just something. I emphasize it in the book. I emphasize it all the time. It's like, if you don't want to write that stuff, it's fine, don't worry about it, but if you do want to write that stuff, that's fine too. You know, you've got to determine what you're comfortable with and also what is best suited for your audience. So, for example, if you're writing young adult romanticism, maybe not so much smut, not so much spice I refer to. If you do want to include spice in a young adult book, I spice, I refer to it.

Speaker 1: 24:41

If you do want to include spice in a young adult book, I like to call it an emotional sex scene, which basically means that you're not talking about the parts, you're just saying like their bodies, you know, and twined, and they, you know, they felt this deep connection with one another, and you're talking about how they feel and how this moment is progressing, the relationship, and not so much describing genitals.

Speaker 1: 24:58

So that's something that you have the option for a young adult, but we don't want to go too smutty with that.

Speaker 1: 25:04

But if you're writing adult, you're welcome to smut things up as much as you want, or you can write clean and sweet. But basically, like I was saying, you want to make sure that you pinpoint exactly how far you're willing to take things and once you have that destination, I like to make sure I show every little bit of physicality that leads up to that. So, hands brushing against one another, you know, the first time they embrace, the first time they hug, the first time that they almost kiss, and then someone walks into the room and ruin it, I like to make sure that I show everything leading up to that, because that's going to get readers frothing at the mouth for like, finally, like, let them finally kiss, or whatever, whatever destination you've created, let them finally have sex. You know, just make sure that you're showing every piece of intimacy up until that so that when they finally bang, it's like the big bang, it's very right, it's very exciting. Or if you're just leading up to a kiss, when they finally kiss it's super exciting.

Speaker 2: 25:59

Yeah, and like. That's what readers love too. You know we love the building emotional intimacy and physical intimacy, regardless of how far we're taking it at the end of the line. So I think that's super smart and I know that a lot of writers sometimes they'll be like I just feel like I'm showing the hands too much or the hugging too much, and it's like I don't know that there's a too much.

Speaker 1: 26:21

You know, this is what readers like. Right, If anything, there might be a too little, and that's exactly. And that's what. When, like clean and sweet romance writers get a little nervous, like, oh, I feel like there's too little physical intimacy, Again, just hands brushing against each other is very exciting for readers, so don't it's again. It's fine if you don't want to write. You know the sexy times, but you can't have too much kissing or too much caressing or too much holding. That like that's what readers want to read.

Speaker 2: 26:47

Yeah, and I love the term you said readers are like frothing for it. That's exactly how it feels. Right, right Enough, let's get us to the end. But okay, so that's great. So we talked about kind of how to think about the romantic pairing. We talked about how to then have that romantic pairing go through this emotional and physical connection building in this arc. Any other things that are like top of mind before we talk about series.

Speaker 1: 27:10

Going back to both physical and emotional intimacy, I recommend that everyone create what I call an intimacy destination, and this is basically the biggest moment of either emotional or physical intimacy within a book. So, for example, usually around the climax there's some kind of grand gesture where the main relationship you know reaches a new level. That's the intimacy destination. And typically an intimacy destination. It doesn't have to be one of these things, but it's usually either a first kiss, a first time having sex, a first time saying I love you or some kind of proposal or something like that. So I like to recommend that everyone create some sort of intimacy destination, know that it's going to happen either right before, during or after the climax of the book. And then everything needs to kind of lead up to that.

Speaker 1: 27:59

And writers who are writing you know more smutty and spicy kinds of books that makes them nervous because they're like well, I don't want to wait until the end for them to have sex. This book is going to be filled with sex. That's totally fine. The intimacy destination could be them finally saying I love you. They could be, you know, knocking boots, the whole you know book, and then at the intimacy destination they realize I'm in love with this person. It's more than just a physical thing. Or it could be that they were just sort of having like, very like, dirty, raunchy sex the whole book, and then now, at the intimacy destination, it's their first time making love or something like that. Or, you know, it could be a marriage proposal. So don't think that you have to cut down on the smut if that's the route you're going. The intimacy destination is just a new level of physical or emotional intimacy between the characters.

Speaker 2: 28:43

Yeah, it's kind of like the stakes have been raised and maybe slightly changed, right, and, as you were saying, all that I just kept thinking of volume dials, because it's like you have the emotional layer to play with, you have the physical layer to play with and then how you combine those two things creates a lot of different results. So I think that's super cool, and I know that when listeners are hearing you talk about this, they're going to be like, oh my gosh, we need to get this book to hear all these little shortcuts and things. So we'll talk about that later. But I know the other thing you wanted to mention was how to pace this over a series, because that's a common question, right?

Speaker 1: 29:21

Exactly, I think. When it comes to pacing, the first thing I like to mention is every single book within the series needs to have a new intimacy destination, and that makes a lot of readers or a lot of writers nervous because they're like well, where else is there to go? That's why you kind of want to sort of spread out the different levels of intimacy. So maybe their first kiss is the intimacy destination in book one. The first time they say I love you is the intimacy destination in book two. The first time they have sex is the intimacy destination in book three. You can pace it out however you please, but be thinking about that while you're writing book one, Because if you have them, you know, hit every single base and get married in book one. You don't have a lot of room to grow in book two, three, four. So be thinking about that right from the start.

Speaker 1: 30:02

Additionally, we have to take into consideration the fact that in different books in a series, you know they might not be happy together. They might end book one hating each other. You know we see a lot of romanticist books where one character betrays the other in the first book, so they hate each other by the end. And the character who did the bad thing is going to try and win their partner back in book two. So it could be that, you know, book one ends kind of tragically or sadly, and the intimacy destination in book two is them getting back together, you know, and them reestablishing their connection. So that's definitely something to take into consideration.

Speaker 1: 30:38

It's also worth noting that we see a lot of romanticist books where we sort of have the love interest fake out, where the main character is in love with, you know, person A, and then they meet person B in book two and it, you know, and we have a little bit of a love triangle. Who will they choose? And then maybe person A in book three betrays them, and so now it's very obvious we're going to go with person B, something like that. So again, this is something that I would recommend figuring out before you write book one or while you're writing book one, because you don't want to write yourself into a corner and now you have nowhere to go.

Speaker 2: 31:14

Yeah, and I already can imagine you're going to say like it doesn't have to be perfect, it's just a guideline of you know where do you want this to go, and it can change, but it's better than ending up in a corner, like you said, and it's hard, exactly.

Speaker 1: 31:23

Exactly Everything is open to change. That's another thing people worry about. They're what if I veer from my outline? I'm like everyone veers from their outline. Yeah, that's very normal. That's just a part of the writing process. It's fine. It's a guide. It's not set in stone. So it's fine if you veer. It's just here to kind of help give you a direction.

Speaker 2: 31:42

Yeah, I love that so much. Okay, so we talked about again characters, we talked about writing in a series, and we can, of course, go into more detail if listeners get your book. So let's talk about where do we get that? I know you have a pre-order bonus. Tell us about that. Give us all the juicy details.

Speaker 1: 31:58

So right now it's available for pre-order all over the place. I have a link that you can share. But, yeah, you can pre-order it pretty much everywhere. And, in terms of the pre-order bonus, if you pre-order the book, you have the opportunity to receive a free digital workbook. That is sort of the step-by-step process of creating the power couple. So everything we discussed about compliments and common ground and things like that, it's a little guidebook that helps you create that, so you can build the character profile but also, you know, build these characters side by side. We've got extra pages just in case you're writing a thruple or a polycule. So, yeah, as soon as you download the digital workbook, you can start working in it. You don't have to wait until October 21st for you to be able to use it, and I've already had a lot of people talk to me saying I really love this workbook. I've already figured out my character, so it's really exciting.

Speaker 2: 32:42

Yeah, I love it and I love thinking about each character individually and couple together. I think that's a super smart way to go about it, so we will put all the links to that in the show notes, as well as where to find you on your YouTube and all the fun things like that. Any last like parting words of wisdom, parting advice, inspiration that you want to share with listeners.

Speaker 1: 33:02

Yeah, sure, I know we covered a lot of rules and stuff like that in this episode. I think the number one thing to keep in mind is, first of all, these rules are just to kind of. They're not actual rules. You can ultimately do whatever you want. This is just to try and help you, you know, secure an audience who will really be obsessed with these characters, obsessed with this book. That's the idea is just trying to create a really loyal audience who they're just in love with the romance that you've created.

Speaker 1: 33:29

But the number one thing I like to remind people is this is supposed to be fun. You know we write romanticy because it's fun and it's exciting. It's the best of both worlds. You have the magic and you know creatures of fantasy, but then you also have like the swoony stuff of romance. Like, just remind yourself, this is supposed to be fun. So try not to stress out too much. At the end of the day, it's a book about, like, dragons and kissing. Okay, it's not that deep and I don't mean that in, you know, like a diminishing way. Obviously, I write the genre. I love the genre. There's depth to the characters and everything like that. But I just mean the process is supposed to be fun. So if you're not enjoying it, I mean obviously there will be moments where you know that are less fun to write. There are going to be lulls in the process, but ultimately the idea is to write something that you're excited about. Okay, so if you're taking it too seriously, you're doing it wrong.

Speaker 2: 34:17

Yeah, and that's what tools like Jenna's book and her YouTube channel and this podcast ideally help you have more fun while doing it. So we both hope you're having so much fun, and thank you, jenna, for coming on the show. I'm so excited to get a copy of your new book and share it with everybody.

Speaker 1: 34:31

Thank you so much for having me. It was an absolute blast.

Speaker 2: 34:34

All right, so that's it for this episode of the Fiction Writing Made Easy podcast. Head over to savannagilbocom forward slash podcast for the complete show notes, including the resources I mentioned today, as well as bonus materials to help you implement what you've learned, and if you're ready to get more personalized guidance for your specific writing stage, whether you're just starting out, stuck somewhere in the middle of a draft, drowning in revisions, or getting ready to publish, take my free 30-second quiz at savannahgilbocom forward slash quiz. You'll get a customized podcast playlist that'll meet you right where you're at and help you get to your next big milestone. Last but not least, at and help you get to your next big milestone. Last but not least, make sure to follow this podcast in your podcast player of choice, because I'll be back next week with another episode full of actionable tips, tools and strategies to help you become a better writer. Until then, happy writing.