Tropes Do Not Make A Story

Romance writers love 'em. The good old trope! Unknown baby, forced proximity, you name it! Romance writers seem to think a story needs these to make a story work. Ahh, my good friends, that is far from the truth. In fact, too many of you romance writers are ruining your stories with these tropes.

What? Are we using the wrong tropes? That must be it, right?

Actually, no. The reality is that you are either basing the entire story on a single trope and just wearing the reader out, or throwing in far too many tropes at us and really killing us. 

Let me explain.

First of all, we need to remember the definition of a romance. This is a story about a relationship to a HEA or a Happily Ever After. Simple As That. It means that the plot of the story, the central story arc focus on the relationship. It doesn't matter if it is a RomCon, Historical, Romantic Suspense, Inspirational or Romantasy, M/F, F/F, M/M, it is about the relationship. Do you notice I am not saying anything about the tropes here? 

To build the story arc, we add in conflict. That comes in with the GMC, or the Goals, Motivations and the Conflicts of the characters. In other words, what they want, what is driving them and what is standing in their way of achieving it. What stands in the way of their relationship is the central conflict of the story and it has to be something more than a simple "we have to get over ourselves" moment.

BTW, have you noticed...still no mention of a trope???

Now, if you want to throw a spin into your plot, sure, you can toss in one (and yes I mean ONE) trope but only if it needs it. I always like to think of it like those cooking shows.

A little bit goes a long way.

Don't buy into the myth that it is the trope that sells the story. It is the writing and how you use it. I promise. 

Don't Quit Writing When Things Get Tough

You are going to have bad days. I can promise you that! Everyone is going to have those days.

You will have days when you have every intention of writing that next chapter of getting a ton of pages written and yet, when you sit down at the computer, all you get is a blank screen staring back at you and taunting you, daring you to even come up with anything worthwhile to write. 

You will have days when you open your email and all of those queries you sent out that you knew would be favorable came back as "So sorry but NO!" 

You will have days when every life problem jumps in your face at the exact same time when you have all of the great ideas about your story and you can't even get near a piece of paper to write the ideas down.

So, do you quit? 

NO!

Just know good and well that tomorrow things will likely get better. Don't fight life. It will get in the way every now and then. I know it is frustrating right in the moment and there will be the temptation to scream and give up, but it is not worth it. Take a deep breath and relax. You will find time to jot those ideas down. You may find some time to get to that computer to at least get something written. It might not be much, but it may be something. 

Authors - Avoid getting sucked into the social media trap

We all get it. Social media can get addicting. And, before I go any further, I do want to say, there are a lot of good and positive things to be said about social media and what we can get out of it. We can stay connected. We can get some great advice from intelligent people. For me, as I am writing this, I can sit and enjoy someone who is walking around Walt Disney World in the sunshine while I am in the PNW where it is gloomy. 

HOWEVER...

For authors, this can be one of the worst places to hang out. 

You might be saying, "But Scott, this would be great for getting new readers and publicity!" Sure, it is a great place, but of course when you are out there, you also get a ton of people who just hate everything. You can say something totally positive or constructive and they will find some way to spin it in a direction that will ruin it for everyone. 

I think what is more discouraging is that single comment alone will ruin the flow you are in when you are writing. It might even be a single 3 star review, you know that simple "meh" review that is neither positive or negative will become the worst thing in your life ever.

And here is what will often happen. You get sucked in. You will want to respond. You will want to interact. And they want you to. 

So don't!

Just delete them. Block them. And do like I do. Turn up the volume to the parade that is coming down through Frontier Land right now and enjoy the music and keep on writing!

What Is NOT in right now!

OK, so you want trends? I can't give you those. What I can tell you are things that people are not really buying right now, or if they are, you dang well better bring something TOTALLY amazing. 

Mafia Dark Romances are going out of style - This is according to my 20 year old daughter who is a voracious reader and lives on BookTok! Can  you spin it? I think so, but you better bring something new.

Romantasy? - Right now, there is really only one big name author who has the market going. Another is trying hard to hold on but the readers on BookTok (thank you daughter) has said they don't care about the new books). At this point, everyone has done nothing but copy previous book stories, plots and trope. WE ARE EXHAUSTED!!!!!

Historicals - These are just a plain hard sell right now. Bridgerton killed the market. Readers today, I hate to say it, are not intellectual (yes, I know that sounds bad but they like easy fast reads with not a whole lot going on). I personally think that if you do Historicals it needs to be in WWII and more of a women's fiction spin but...

Women's Fiction - Sorry but mentioning Colleen Hoover is probably not the best approach right now. I am not saying she is a bad author, but... the drama she brings might not be what you want to attach to your stories. People want stories for their book clubs that they want to talk about. Do they want drama. NO, and I say that out loud! Oh, and here is a hint. Not every husband has to cheat on their marriage to get the story going.

New Adult - College kids sleeping around is a thing. I get it! But does this really make a great story? Um no. I wrote about this once before. What is the take away? If you want to do something like this, make sure you have a real message here. 

Now, here is my list of things I still do not like:

• I don't like band/rock star stories
• DO NOT pitch me duel POV stories
• If it is a time travel, the time travel MUST be integral to the storyline
• Don't pitch a Christmas story unless you are already an established Harlequin, Tule, or Hallmark author.
• Don't tell me your story is one thing and then change it when you submit. BE HONEST!