Ravensveil Press

You want a romance. But … you don’t want to write a romance story. You just want to add a romantic element to your story. Most stories have them. Science fiction, fantasy, westerns … even mystery and horror aren’t immune to the pull. When you have two people with a certain kind of chemistry, you have the makings for a romantic subplot. Now the question is … is writing that romantic subplot going to be good for your story?

The short answer is yes. If you have two characters with the kind of chemistry that lends itself to romance, then you’re going to do well writing it. Readers like to see things hinted at and carried through. It’s generally good storytelling. It doesn’t mean you have to. I’m sure you can think of stories that hinted at romantic tension but didn’t carry it through, and were good, whole stories.

Like any kind of plot element, though, you want to do romance well. I’d say you especially want to do romance well because, in my experience, it’s the plot element that gets the most criticism when it’s done poorly.

But before we get into it, let’s discuss why you may not want to ignore the romantic subplot.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one: Write what you know.

I’ve always hated that advice. If you ask me to cite the worst advice to give a writer, it’s that. No hesitation. That is the worst advice I’ll ever hear someone give a writer. I say that because the first time I remember someone telling it to me, I was maybe sixteen or seventeen, and even then, I could smell the bullshit wafting up from where it landed flat at my feet.

“I’m writing about a fantasy world that doesn’t exist,” I wondered at the time. “How am I supposed to ‘know’ about it?”

For me, telling an author to write what they know is about as useful as telling someone to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. It seems like good advice, but if you actually try doing it, you’re going to find yourself lacking. In case you’re not in the know, the “bootstrap” proverb originated as a way to describe absurdity. If you sit down on your rump and try to lift yourself by tugging on the loop over the heel of your boot, you’re not going anywhere (Curzan).

At the same time, if you just “write what you know,” you’re going to end up writing a memoir and maybe some non-fiction books about your job.

No, really. What is “Genre”? The answer is … //shrug// … ?

Hear me out. Genre is one of those aspects of writing that is both easy and hard to define because, with Genre, maybe more than any other writing concept, context matters.

We’ll start simple and get a dictionary definition. I went with the Cambridge Dictionary because it was fast and easy. By definition, Genre is a style, subject, type, or model. When we’re talking about writing, there are four literary Genres: Poetry, Drama, Fiction, and Non-Fiction. I like to call these the “Academic Genres” because they were how my Professors discussed Genre in college. So, poetry is going to be works like The Raven or She Walks in Beauty. You know, poetry. Drama would be Shakespeare plays, A Streetcar Named Desire, or Avengers: End Game. Fiction would be Frankenstein or Jane Eyre. Fiction stories. Non-Fiction would be memoirs like I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings or non-fiction books like Devil in the White City.

And right about now, you’re looking at me and saying, “What about Horror or Science Fiction?” To which I say, exactly! When we’re talking about Genre, context matters. Most people aren’t going to think about defining only 4 Genres. Most people hear Genre and think about styles within a specific type of art. If I sit here and tell you that the 1980 movie Airplane! is a Drama, you’re going to argue with me. It’s definitely a Comedy. Aliens has its dramatic moments, sure, but it is definitely a Sci-Fi/Horror movie. Outside of Academic discussions about literature, we don’t discuss Drama as the Genre that encompasses all Performance Media. Most people think of Drama in terms of movies like Terms of Endearment or The Shawshank Redemption.

So, we’re going to define our context for Genre. We’re going to look at Genre in the context of Fiction.