Are you an aspiring romance author? If yes – then it is the perfect time to talk about romance – especially romantic dialogues. There are all sorts of dialogues in a romance novel, such as love confessions, banter, and flirting.
Here are some of the best tips that you can use for writing romance.
So, pay attention to the following aspects of writing romantic dialogues.
Understand Your Character
The first tip is to understand your character because the better you understand your character – the better you can create their personality and the better you can write their dialogues. The way you understand the inner workings of your characters will directly affect their speech.
For instance, if your romantic novel includes a shy character – it probably wouldn’t make sense for them to flirt with another character or to be assertive. Instead of being assertive, it would make so much more sense if they were to stutter their sweet nothings.
When confessing their love, there will be loads of long pauses. Depending on their level of shyness, they probably cannot communicate their feelings at all.
What we are stressing is that before you write a swoony dialogue – it would be so much better to get into your character’s heart and mind. In other words – it will make your job as a romance writer easier at the time of dishing out romance when you know how the character would dish out the romance in their own way.
Avoid Focusing on Romance Alone
Of course, you are writing a romance – but – you should know how to cut the pressure and not entirely focus on the romance. Here is the thing: sometimes, the worst thing to do when writing a romance novel is telling yourself that you have to make things romantic.
If you get obsessed with the romantic aspect of the novel, you are only putting all of the pressure on yourself as a writer to perform with your words. If you do so – the only thing that you achieve is a stale cliché. And we all know that stale clichés are boring and that no one wants to buy them.
What to do instead?
The thing is that instead of focusing on how to nail the romance – you should focus on how your characters feel because this is what romance is. Romance is essentially about displaying affectionate feelings, and in the case of a book – the display might be verbal.
Put yourself in the shoes of your character and feel the things that they would be feeling. Does their love interest make them feel free, at home, or safe? It all comes down to one rule, which is to allow your characters to state how they feel in their own voice, as this will not only help with nailing the romance but also ensure that the moment is genuine and authentic, which is important if you want to tug at the heartstrings of your readers.
Hire an Editor – No Exceptions
Book editors aren’t only for professional writers but they are all the way important for aspiring writers as well. Even if you are planning to self-publish your romance, you can hire one of the best freelance romance editors so you can make the manuscript go through a fresh pair of eyes who can go through your romance with a fresh perspective.
As an aspiring writer, you might get fully immersed in your work to the point of overlooking plot holes, mistakes, and other areas that could do with improvement. Editors, with the help of fresh eyes, can offer you valuable insights into the things that you might have missed while working on your manuscript.
Also, you can avail yourself of objective feedback. The thing is that if you ask your family or friends for feedback – they might be reluctant to tell you what they really think about your book. This is why you need to hire a romance editor who will objectively identify the areas in your romance novel that could do with some improvement.
Lastly, by hiring an editor, you can get quality assurance as the editor will ensure your manuscript meets the standards of your ideal readers.
Understand Flirting
If you want to write a romance novel, you should know what flirting is. In its essence, flirting is about attempting to attract someone in an enjoyable way. The key focus of flirting is attraction and amusement.
Flirting includes stirring someone’s interest in a way that should make them smile or laugh. The character who is at the receiving end of flirting should ideally laugh, be happy, or feel entertained. There are countless ways to express flirting.
Flirting can be any of these:
- Funny
- Teasing
- Playful
- Cheeky
- Seductive
Again, as mentioned earlier – the way you depict flirting in your novel will depend on the personality of your character. However, you will still need to have a basic knowledge of what flirting is supposed to achieve – especially – if you want the dialogue to have its desired effect.
So, if your focus is to make the character’s love interest, as well as your readers, swoon – you should remember that attraction and amusement are the two qualities that can make fliting work.
Understand What is Not Flirting
Speaking of flirting, you should also know what isn’t flirting. Often, when aspiring writers work on their flirtatious dialogues, they miss out on the amusement factor. If the flirtatious dialogue isn’t amusing, it is not effective flirting.
While writing a flirtatious dialogue, you should know that flirting isn’t supposed to be intrusive, condescending, demeaning, and forceful. Many aspiring writers translate sexy flirting into something that is intimidating or scary. Or – they might make the mistake of presenting flirting as something patronizing.
For example, if the female character has repeatedly told the male character that she hates being called a sweetheart, but he still calls her a sweetheart over and over – it is far from flirtatious. Also, you should know the difference between force and sexual pursuit. It is also equally easy to see the difference between patronizing language and playful banter.
