I remember once having a talk with someone I admired very much. The subject of how he fell in love with his wife came up. I had just been through a divorce at the time and had self-doubts about having what it takes to have the type of relationship I dreamed of, and so I had asked.
He answered as much as he could, but, in the end, he didn't say all that much. He said respectfully, "It's my relationship, and it's private."
I've always believed I could have that for-now-and-forever one-true-love I'll-die-without-you type of love. I'll admit that's what I first liked about the first romance I read,
On The Night Of The Seventh Moon by Victoria Holt. It didn't matter what they did, or what their lives were like, the heroine and hero loved each other and wanted only each other.
When I finally found that one love I looked for, I understood why my friend had said it was his relationship and it was private. In many ways, if I had gotten a more in depth answer from him, it wouldn't have helped me in my own search for romance.
However, it does help in my writing.
I think that's the real crux of why I like writing about relationships. There's this freedom in exposing something that is difficult to relate to another human, because of the thousand and one little subtleties that we don't always grasp ourselves. Along side that, love relationships are totally human and totally naked. It's the most honest thing that we can write about because falling in love means trust, and trusting someone with that much of our souls, dreams and energy is a frightening thing. Love strips us to our very center, all the pretenses we put on tossed aside. My Wonderful Husband(TM) once said that no one can truly know who they are as a person until they've loved someone mind, body and soul.
In order to produce the nakedness needed to show off an intimate relationship, you need to remember a few things.
- Get past the mundane. It isn't just the ordinary we celebrate. It's how each relationship is extraordinary in its ordinariness.
- Look what you're avoiding straight in the eye. If you feel avoidance, so will your Heroine/Hero, too. No one is 100% gung ho on everything; we all have little quirky evasions. Decide what the couple you're writing about are avoiding in their heart-of-hearts, then use it as an undercurrent for your novel. Make them confront their self-image.
- Get Beyond Expectations. Real life does numbers on our expectations all the time, sometimes in small ways, sometimes in major ones. Your characters expectations should be made clear, too. The reader may see through them, or not, as you desire. But, without illustrating them as a set up, the bursting of the bubble via reality will not have the emotional resonance you need to tell the "truth" about your characters.
- Show me the spark. I could give a whole blog post dedicated to this one. Without letting me experience the spark plugs firing, why should I care?
- Love your characters and love how they love each other. Write them with love. After all, isn't that what the romance genre is all about?
