Writing For Love

Have you ever thought about writing a love story? Have you ever read a romance novel and wondered if you could write one? Do you have a story you want to tell, but don’t know how to begin? Have you ever wondered if a newcomer can break into the romance market?

These are some of the questions Vanessa Grant asks and answers in the third edition of Writing Romance (Self-Counsel Press). This edition is published more than a decade after the first one in 1997 and includes new chapters on writing for the burgeoning Christian and erotica markets. (Though it’s difficult not to chuckle at the irony of bringing those two together as very different parts of the market that have, nonetheless, grown in popularity for similar reasons.

One of the things I like least about this book is probably what has made it so popular throughout it’s publishing history: established romance novelist Grant deals less with the airy-fairy aspects of writing for the romance market and more with the nuts and bolts business end of things: plotting, computers, various aspects of research, editing, dealing with agents (or not). And though Grant -- herself the author of 30 romance novels, according to her bio -- keeps things focused on the romantic business at hand, there’s practical advice here that would likely benefit all types of writers of book-length manuscripts.

However if your preferences run to something more specific, Self-Counsel sends word that they’ve also recently released updated editions of Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy by Crawford Kilian and Writing for Children and Young Adults by Marion Crook.