Essays on writing desire, slowly
These are notes on the slow part of romance: the distance, the delay, the line a character almost says. I write them as a reader first and a writer second, with a pencil in the margins of Austen and Wharton. Everything here stays on the near side of the bedroom door.
How to write erotica that trusts the reader
How to write erotica with literary craft: desire as character, point of view, restraint, consent on the page, sentence rhythm and knowing where to cut away.
6 min read
Writing longing: how to keep two people almost together
A craft guide to writing longing in fiction: distance you can measure, obstacles the characters own, the near miss, objects and rituals, and time as pressure.
5 min read
Slow burn romance: what it is, why it works and how it is built
What slow burn romance means, why readers will wait two hundred pages for a first kiss, how the structure holds together, and the shapes it most often takes.
6 min read
Ten slow burn romance novels and what each one teaches a writer
Ten of the best slow burn romance novels, from Austen and Gaskell to Sally Thorne and Emily Henry: the kind of slow burn each is, and what a writer can learn.
6 min read
How to write a first date scene that changes something
How to write a first date scene that moves the story: what the date must do, a setting that pushes back, subtext under small talk, the turn and the ending beat.
6 min read