#writing romcoms

[emilyzipps]

how do you build up the tension between two characters without dragging it out or jumping the gun by rushing it?

This is a great question! I mostly write romance/romcoms so I'm going to answer this about building romantic tension, but I'm guessing it works for other kinds as well.

As always, please feel free to reblog or comment with your thoughts, suggestions, disagreements!

The first thing that comes to mind for me is to think about all of the ways they're going to show their progression into the romance--their relationship milestones--and make sure they're spread out in a way that feels balanced and good.

In a romance, the things you're aiming for as relationship milestones will vary depending on what type of book you're writing. If it's a steamy enemies to lovers story, the sex will start pretty early into the book, so the will-they-or-won't-they isn't about sex, it's about feelings. The big milestones in that case might be things like

admitting attraction

hooking up

sex

first feelings of romance (you shove them under a rug)

first feelings of romance (you admit to yourself you have them)

first time testing out if they like you as more than an sex partner

first time admitting you liiiiike them

first time them admitting they liiiiike you

love confession/happily ever after

On the flip side, a slow burn friends to lovers (no steam), it may be things like

noticing she's pretty

touching hands by accident on the bus

touching hands ON PURPOSE on the bus

lingering stares

staying up all night talking

picking her up from a date with someone else and being so sad

trying to date someone else

spending the night together AS FRIENDS

erotic hair braiding

happily ever after

Once you think through what some of those milestones will be for your story and your characters, then you can figure out how you want to spread those out throughout your story. Tension comes in the spaces between those milestones and in yearning for the next one, so you need to give space for each milestone to (a) be exciting! (b) be celebrated (or feared or repressed or whatever) and (c) get old enough that we're pining for the next one. That's why you go from touching hands by accident to being brave and terrified and anxious when you decide to do it on purpose.

With the right build up--the pining for the feel of her smooth skin against yours, the noticing how her hands look, day dreaming about her fingers, picturing yourself touching her hand a million times, barely breathing--finally touching her hand on the bus can be as emotionally resonant as sex or a love confession.

consider each milestone as a small emotional climax (sex jokes are welcome and frankly appropriate), and treat it in the way you'd treat the big story climax.

The other thing I'm thinking about is the disconnect between what they say/show and what they think. In my debut novel, the first time Alice sees Van, her inner monologue is immediately like OMG GIRL HOT!!!! THIS BUTCH IS STUNNING AND SMELLS SO GOOD I WANT HER TO TOUCH MEEEEEEEEE. What she actually says out loud is more along the lines of "hi, nice to meet you, i'm your brother's formerly secret girlfriend."

That creates tension because the reader then (hopefully!) thinks, oh wow, how long can Alice keep it together when she's such a bisexual disaster? How long can she go without revealing how badly she wants Van to jump her?

Here's a little map of our milestones and interior/exterior:

first meeting. Alice thinks: GIRL HOT. Alice says: hi i am dating your brother??

first flirt. Alice thinks: if she touches me i'm going to fucking lose it (complementary). Alice says: thanks for the ride home, your dog is cute.

first admit you like each other. Alice thinks: i want to never leave her house or her presence. Alice says: you should be really proud of the life you've built here.

first cuddle. Alice thinks: i'm going to die. i'm actually, physically going to die under this snuggie. this girl is so hot and kind and i'm obsessed with her oh my GOD. Alice says: your mom seems nice.

Those are kind of silly examples, but I hope it helps to be able to see that we're waiting for her inner monologue to match her actions, and the stakes for both get higher and higher as they move through the milestones until the moment when she (a) says what she's thinking, and (b) gets what she wants. Aka, HAPPILY EVER AFTER, BABY.

thoughts, feedback, other suggestions, questions? bring them!

[lotus-pear]

saw the labru trend and IMMEDIATELY thought of them

[mischievous-thunder]

Wade's saucy encounters with different Logan variants:

Then comes Wade's first meeting with his soulmate:

And that's the one Wade fell in love with

[nextstopwonderland]

Super important update from Fightful:

“Every night we walk out there and tell them goodnight. He is so in love.”

[loucifersbitch]

When they finally make it to the bedroom, Buck shoves Tommy so that the backs of his knees hit the bed, and he falls back, bouncing a little as he lands. Tommy stares up at him, that smirk on his face, as Buck yanks his shirt over his head, discarding it carelessly to the side.

"See something you like?"

Tommy thinks for a moment, pulling Buck down to straddle his lap. "Hmm, no."

When Buck pulls back, confused, Tommy says, "I see something I love."

[pattydia]

k it’s november someone cast kyle gallner in a hallmark movie as the small town mechanic with a heart of gold and a tragic past who teaches the high powered overachieving main character (ayo edebiri) the true meaning of christmas

[kinard-buckley]

if tim is writing bucktommy as a love story/romcom we are currently at the all is lost moment - the moment where a seemingly permanent obstacle arises to halt the lovers' journey to a happy ending. it usually involves someone from one of the characters' pasts (often another woman) and misunderstanding.

[loufuckers]

oh, wait, i've had another thought, hear me out:

AU where tommy never left the 118 and buck never joined the LAFD but maddie still joined dispatch and met chimney during a call, and started hanging out with him like back in S2.

fast forward to maddie bringing buck to a 118 family barbecue and buck instantly clicking with everyone and making friends left and right. he's drinking beers and talking with eddie and tommy when he notices maddie and chim doing their little flirting but not flirting dance and tommy's like "they're always doing that. howie will not stop talking about her but he won't ask her out" and buck starts sharing stories about them dancing around each other and their buffridays and karaoke duets and because they're both hopeless romantics living vicariously through madney they come up with a plan to get them together

cue tommy and buck coming up with ways to set up chim and maddie on date like activities with them as wingmen. they go to the movies and dinner, have an entire day at the santa monica pier, hangout during trivia night at tommy's favourite bar, buck books all four of them a tour and farm-to-table lunch at a vineyard and winery, tommy even flies them all out to vegas for a weekend. and obviously through it all tommy and buck start to know each other more and more and start liking hanging out with each other

they keep coming up with these romantic ideas to finally get chimney and maddie to realise they've been dating this whole time and don't realise (or pretend they don't) that it's looking more and more like double dates and that they're the ones using madney as wingmen because they're too nervous to actually admit they're doing it more for them than for maddie and chim at this point

until one day maddie and chimney go on an actual date of their own without meddling little brothers and best friends and start dating for real and now buck and tommy realise that oh, actually they started catching feelings for each other and don't know what they're supposed to do now that they don't have an excuse to go on elaborate double dates and now it's maddie and chim's turn to get them to accept they had been dating the whole time and they have feelings for each other

[emilyzipps]

okay today was GREAT, i made my calendar, adjusted the timeline of the novel to make more sense, AND wrote 7,000 new words, putting me over the 15k mark.

Finally feeling like I'm in the groove of this new novel, and it feels excelllllllllent.

the vibe of these 7k is:

me: i'm so excited to finally have a whole day for writing!

also me: this is a great time to make a color-coded calendar in microsoft excel and annotate an entire 12 months for this WIP

[sharpace]

I'm sure everything will be fine.

Super duper loving The Magnus Protocol. My little horror heart is so full.

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[mamawasatesttube]

another addition to the list of fics i would love to see but dont really want to write: timkon "one of them has a crush on the other's secret civilian id without knowing it's them" but it's tim hopelessly pining for conner kent. he has no idea the supers have secret identities at all, let alone who they might be. conner kent is just a normal farmboy (who he happened to meet via convenient circumstances). just a normal kid who lives on a farm with his sweet old country (grand)parents and his rambunctious dog. just a normal guy! ...right?

[fictionadventurer]

This AV Club comment is making me so desperate to write a romcom, you have no idea.

[i-got-the-feels]

listen no romcom is a romcom without angst. running through the airport to stop beloved from boarding their flight? happened because of some angst. watching your crush who also liked you get together with someone else because you didn't confess sooner? textbook romcom moment filled with angst. declaring objection at your love's marriage or asking them to run away with you? angst. romcom is not romcom without angst because angst shows you care and that's the essential part of romance the com is just to make the angst bearable. as long as the angst is resolved and everything ends on a happy note it's a romcom (twenty five twenty one was never one) , don't confuse romcom with fluff

[quilteddreamz]

DCA Advent Calendar!

Presenting the totally spectacular idea of an calendar!

Don't get me wrong. I'm a big fan of chocolate, but I've personally always wished advent calendars had a bit more to them. You get me? Yes, I could buy those pricy luxury ones, but you never know if you'll end up liking them.

I want something written. A book, with chapters that release every day leading up to Christmas. But to my knowledge, something like that doesn't exist.

Until now!

Introducting, a book advent calendar! Because if I couldn't find one, I was going to make it!

Whats inside? Oh a whole bunch!

A complete, Christmas themed story containing 12-13 chapters. The chapters will be released every other day leading up to Christmas.

In the perfect world I would like to do 2 stories - each with 12-13 chapters - alternating release days leading up to the 25. However writing that many words seems impossible given the time crunch I would have to do. To make it easier on myself I am aiming to only complete one story. However if I have time I will include a second one.

This project will take a lot of work; I'll need to write around 25-50k words between Nov 10th-Dec 20th alone- 50-75k if I do a second . It will be a bit time-consuming, so I'll likely drop off the face of the earth for the time.

I may commission a few artists (If my wallet will allow it) to add a cover art and little pieces to the chapters. I wish I could guarantee, but we will see how the time goes leading up to December.

If you would like updates on this project, subscribe to my new newsletter on Ao3! I know posts often get lost or can be hard to find. The newsletter allows easy access to all the information you need.

So if you end up liking the project and want to buy me a hot chocolate, my Kofi and will be tucked below this line. Regardless of whether anyone donates, you still will be getting this for free. No pressure.

Kofi

[lizhly-writes]

It was here that Mu Qingfang made a mistake.

The color of the steel-stemmed snapdragon depended on qi.  It was poorly researched as to what kind of qi caused what color, but it was known that there would be a color change upon taking in a different type of qi, whether it was replacing its current source or adding an additional one.

This meant that merely picking up a flower -- letting the plant take in faint traces of qi through the skin -- was enough to cause a slight color change.  So did giving it to someone else.  

There were some stories about what that color change meant.  The most common one he’d read about was the idea of the color change signifying feelings.  At some point in time, there was a village that used the flowers during courtship. Lovers would exchange flowers and watch them change colors.  The stronger and more vibrant the change, the stronger the feelings between them.

It had been some purely sentimental dross that Mu Qingfang had utterly forgotten about up until the stem of flowers he’d inserted in Shang Qinghua’s hair turned an extremely bright and eye-catching red.

[blindmagdalena]

Do you think Homie had any attachment to Becca? I get that he was just using her as a tool to get closer to Ryan, but in scenes with him in her house he looks really strange to me. Like, he smells her clothes? Demands breakfast? And, if I remember correctly, he suggested on making popcorn and watching a movie after Ryan fell asleep. Just imagine Becca with that thousand yard stare while Homelander puts his arm over her shoulders, bringing her close and rests his head on hers. A husband and a wife, if you will. That man is delusional.

attachment isn't really the right word imo. he most certainly had a vision for her, though. it was his dream come true! a wife and a son with all his EXACT same powers waiting for him in a curated little suburbia, just like they had in all his favorite childhood movies!

it was basically a movie set.

it was perfect.

except it wasn't. because she wasn't his wife. she was butcher's.

and i think the scene you bring up (where he's got her clothes) illustrates that perfectly. he's being a creep in this scene. he's rawdogging her milk jug, he's going through her belongings, he's smelling her clothes. he's building a narrative in his mind where this is his life. getting familiar. getting comfortable.

and then he finds the pictures of her and billy, and the illusion is shattered. he's angry. all of this SHOULD be his, and yet he's having to compete for it!

tbh i think he would have pursued becca a lot harder if stormfront hadn't entered the picture presenting as ideal wife/mother material, sharing her perfect sob story about outliving both her husband and child, and how she needs to fill that void now. wonder where she can find a husband and child. winkwink nudge nudge.

but yeah 100% delusional