Since I’ve started writing romances, I’ve heard no end of times that the category romance is easy to write for. Not from the people writing them, but the people reading them, with the addendum “I’d write one myself, but I don’t have the time. After all, how hard can it be?” So after three attempts at writing one, I think I have the answer.

Romance writers come at the task from different directions. A story, in order to be successful, has to have two forms of conflict – internal and external. And by “conflict,” I don’t mean two people arguing, then making up, arguing and making up over and over again. Or even coming to blows. I mean the things that are stopping them getting together. If they meet, sleep together, fall in love and marry, there’s not much of a story. It’s what happens to stop them that makes it really interesting. The conflicts can come from inside and out. There’s “I’m not worth loving, so nobody will love me,” (internal) and there’s “Shit, that monster attacking me wants to kill me. But he’s so hot!” (external).

Most people (including me, ten years ago) who want to write romance tend to start with the external. It’s easier to write, easier to visualise and much easier to make a story out of it, or it is for me, anyway. If the protagonists are constantly running away from the bad guys and getting shot at, a story is much easier to keep rolling. But it’s not a romance if they don’t have that external push and pull, as well. It took me a few attempts to learn that one. More, to learn that a romance that stays with the reader is the one with more internal story than external. Memorable characters with real problems, not contrived ones, people the reader can care about and root for, whatever their situation.

I write paranormal romance and historical romance. In both there are built-in conflicts, but the more I write, and the more I read, the more important the internal story becomes, for me at least. And it’s hella difficult to get right. For most of my career I’ve been interested in instalove and the conflicts that engenders. What if you instantly fall for the most unsuitable man around? What if he falls for you? How do you know it’s the real thing, and how do you cope with the seismic shifts in your life? I’m still interested in that, but the falling in love process is also beginning to have an insistent pull.

I’ve read Mills and Boon Moderns (Harlequin Presents) a lot, even more in the past couple of years. They’re short, easy reads, and they have a comfort feeling about them. There are well-worn tropes, beloved of the reviewer – secret babies, big misunderstandings, revenge plots and so on. The hero is always alpha, a leader, and the heroine a Cinderella type. These are, as successful Modern author Penny Jordan explained to me a few years ago, fairy stories set in modern times.

But the tropes are there because the authors have to make the inner life far more important. In the 50,000 words they’re allotted, they have no time to set up elaborate fantasy worlds or the nuances of history (which is why the historical romance authors are allowed a slightly longer word length). It’s the core, the basis of romance – what internal forces are driving the hero and heroine apart.

Because I started from the other end, the complex worlds and the detail. I still love writing that, I guess I always will, but I thought it would be good for developing my skills to strip that all away and work with the internal life of the characters only.

I tried to write one earlier this year, and ended up with a story that had bombs and violence in it, as well as the love story. Well, I just couldn’t resist. I’d planned this story set in Naples and New York, and nobody could have been more surprised than me when the mob showed up and started throwing firebombs. But it seemed such a good way to develop the story that I couldn’t resist. Now I have a 75,000 word story that wouldn’t fit in the Modern line, and I don’t know what to do with it. But writing it was a blast. Oh yes, and it turned out a bit hotter than I’d planned, too. The two protagonists couldn’t keep their hands off each other.

So I’ve started again. This time my protagonists are more Modern-ish. A heroine who is the daughter of a wealthy man, forced to marry another wealthy man because of a business deal. How hard could it be?

The answer is, very.

But I’m not doing this just to sell a book. In fact, the chances of selling a book to the line is really low, because of the thousands of queries they get every year. I’m doing it to force myself to concentrate on the internal conflict, and to improve my writing in general. If a writer isn’t constantly trying to improve, maybe she should ask herself why. I’ve built a reasonably successful career, but there is no way on earth I want to write without trying to improve what I do. There is always, always room for improvement. If I were writing books just to make money, I might as well give up and start flipping burgers, because the hourly rate is so much better!

The tropes are there, because they’re not as important as what is going on in the heads and hearts of the protagonists. When a Modern fails, it’s often because the inner lives aren’t believable, or just don’t work. The eternal virgin, the magic vayjayjay that converts a hardened philanderer into a one-woman man, the sexy tycoon (I’ve met a lot in real life, but sexy doesn’t describe most of them, to put it mildly), the I’ve-been-shafted-by-one-woman-so-all-women-are-worthless trope. When used skilfully, they can be shortcuts to an exploration of inner feelings, and when the hero and heroine finally lay aside their preconceptions, it can be a great read. When used to provide a quick thrill, they usually fail, or provide a ho-hum read.

Working to make these people special and specific, individuals instead of types, is hard, especially when there are no frills in the way, details of scene and setting, to distract. I’m loving it. I don’t know how successful it will be, and God knows I have other stories to write, but I had to get this one out before I started on the next.

Which is one that I’m looking forward immensely to writing, and dreading at the same time. The last Richard and Rose book in this cycle. I really need a clear head for that one. Meantime, if you want a failed Modern romance about a millionaire, a woman trying to start a new life for herself and the Italian mob, I’ll keep you posted. I’ll start submitting it soon, and we’ll see if it can succeed on its own.

The process has given me an immense respect for those authors who keep writing the stories and, for the most part, keep them fresh and new. I still don’t know how they do it. That doesn’t mean I’ll be getting softer in my reviews. I’ll still be telling it like it is, saying when a story doesn’t work for me and why. It’s given me new insights, which I hope will help me develop as a writer.

And I should mention that I have a new Cougar story coming out at the end of December. Sunshine on Chrome. It’s part of the Cougar Challenge series, something I’ve so enjoyed working on that it’s almost shameful. I’ll probably write something about that, sometime, because the trope has a grip on me and I have a feeling I’ll write more.