Hellooo, everybody!
I am back from hiatus. Thank you so much to everyone who showed up
for my January livestreams. I had an absolute blast. I hope you did too, and hopefully I can do
more streams with you in the future. But now it's time for some writing advice. We are officially in
the month of love, which means it's time to talk about romance. Today I'm breaking down
my advice for writing my favorite type of dialogue.
Romantic dialogue!
Flirting, banter, love confessions—all that good stuff.
I am hitting you with my best tips, and you should totally pay attention. This
is kind of my specialty. A lot of people struggle with writing romantic dialogue for the same reason
that people struggle with communicating their feelings in real life. It's fucking hard!
But it's all good, I am walking you through my ten best tips for giving your readers heart flutters
and giving your characters a silver tongue. I mean if you want them to have a silver tongue,
sometimes romantic dialogue is awkward and goofy. It depends on the character.
We'll get into that later. Let me know which tip is your favorite in the comments below.
Personally, I think more people need to pay close attention to tip number five. And tip number ten
is the easiest tip that most writers completely neglect for some stupid reason. Let's get into it.
(The sound of a pen scratching. LOGO.)
This topic was requested by one of my patrons over on Patreon, Laurine Bruder.
Laurine is one of my OG patrons. She is super awesome, and
like a lot of writers, she wanted to make sure her romantic dialogue was packing the punch it needed.
That's where I come in. While you're here, be sure to subscribe to my channel, and ring that bell.
I post new videos on Wednesdays. We talk about all things writing, publishing, fantasy, romance,
all that good stuff. We have such a great time, so please subscribe, please ring the bell. It helps
me out so much, and you'll love it here. I know I do. The first two books in my dark fantasy series,
The Savior's Champion and The Savior’s Sister are available wide. That means they're available at
all major retailers. You can get them in ebook, paperback, hardback and audiobooks.
So if you're into romance with a hefty dose of stabbing, and violence, and fantastical goodness,
definitely check them out. It would mean the world to me, I got ‘em linked below. With that said,
let's dive into my ten best tips for writing romantic dialogue. This includes love confessions,
it includes flirting, it includes banter, and a whole lot more. Number One (1): If it sounds like
you've heard it before, you've probably heard it before. This is probably one of the biggest issues
writers run into when they're crafting romantic dialogue. They rely on one liners they've heard
a million times before either word for word, or with a slight variation. I would cross a
thousand oceans to be with you. Nothing could keep us apart. Your beauty is endless. I could drown in
your ocean blue eyes. Basically anything involving oceans is probably a no go. “But Jennaaa,
it feels like everything has been said before.” That may be true, and some phrases are inevitable.
If your character is in love with someone, they're probably gonna say ‘I love you’ at some point.
I'm not telling you to reinvent the wheel. I'm telling you to avoid hackneyed cliches. A cliche
is something that's been said before by countless other characters. Which means if your character is
saying it, either they don't have their own unique voice, or you're shoving words into
their mouth that don't belong there. Either you betrayed the character, or you don't know them.
And neither of those things are good. Which brings us to, Number Two (2): Understand the character. I
mentioned this in pretty much every dialogue video, because it is vital to writing your
character's voice. The better you understand your character, the better you can craft personality,
which is going to have a direct effect on how they speak. If you've created a shy character, it
probably doesn’t make sense for their flirting to be assertive. Instead, maybe their sweet nothings
come out soft and stuttering. Maybe there’s lots of long pauses, and uhs, and ums. Maybe they can’t
communicate how they feel at all. As we already covered, an easy way to kill the romantic vibe,
is to betray your character's voice. So before you write in that swoony-swoony dialogue,
get into your character's mind and heart. It’s so much easier to dish out the romance, when
you understand how this character would dish out the romance in their own way. On the flip side,
Number Three (3): Don’t focus on the romance. I know this sounds counterintuitive, but heart me
out. Sometimes, the worst thing you can do when writing anything romantic, is tell yourself:
I have to make this romantic. You’re putting all this pressure on yourself to perform,
which typically results in the flacid peen of the writing world. Stale cliches. Instead of focusing
on nailing the romance. Focus on expressing how your character feels. That’s what romance is.
It’s a display of affectionate feelings. And in this case, the display is verbal.
Put yourself in your character’s shoes. Does their love interest make them feel nervous? Does
the love interest make them feel free, safe, at home, or horny? Say that! Okay, you can probably
find a classier way to say the horny part, but you get my point. Allowing your character
to state how they feel in their own voice, will not only help to nail the romance, it will also
ensure that the moment is genuine and authentic, which is super important if you wanna tug at your
reader’s heartstrings. Number Four (4): Know what flirting is. The definition of flirting
is trying to attract someone in an amusing way. The key words here are attract, and amusing.
Flirting is about evoking someone's interest in a way that should make them laugh or smile. They
should be happy or entertained. Flirting can be expressed in a variety of ways. It can be
playful or cheeky. It can be funny or teasing. It can be sexy or seductive. Again, this will depend
completely on your character’s personality. But you still need to have a basic knowledge of what
flirting is supposed to achieve, especially if you want this dialogue to be effective.
If your character is supposed to suck at flirting, you can basically disregard this point. But if
your goal is to make the love interest and your readers swoon, remember: attraction and
amusement. If you don't have those two qualities, the flirting doesn't work. Which brings us to,
Number Five (5): Know what flirting isn’t. The big point writers often miss when writing flirtatious
dialogue, is the amusement factor. If it’s not amusing, it’s not effective flirting. Flirting is
not supposed to be forceful, demeaning, intrusive, or condescending. A lot of writers translate
sexy flirting into something domineering or scary. Or they write playful flirting as something
patronizing. If your love interest is calling the main character ‘sweetheart’ over and over again,
even though she’s repeatedly told him how much she hates it, it's not flirtatious, it's just
creepy. It's not hard to determine the difference between sexual pursuit and force. One is welcomed,
the other isn't. And it's equally easy to see the difference between playful banter and patronizing
language. One makes the character laugh, the other pisses them off. Number Six (6): Read the room.
It doesn't matter how romantic your dialogue is, if it's ill timed it is a total boner kill.
This is one of the reasons insta love is so widely hated. A love confession that comes too soon isn't
swoonworthy. It just makes you cringe. If you're going to write a love confession, make sure the
characters have already established a connection based on trust, friendship, vulnerability and
respect. I've made a zillion videos about this that go into a deeper explanation, you can check
‘em out on my romance playlist. But even if the connection is established, it's still possible
to bring the flirting at the wrong time. If your characters are fleeing for their lives in utter
terror, raunchy flirting isn't gonna make any damn sense. How the fuck can you get hard when you're
bleeding profusely? Is this a kink? As for love confessions, these are best saved for climactic,
dramatic moments in the story. This is why we see love confessions on the battlefield,
or right before a character goes off on a dangerous mission. These scenes carry impact, and
thus they have a deeper effect on the reader. But your book doesn't have to have extreme stakes in
order for you to make a memorable love confession. Maybe the characters are curled up in bed together
after months of separation, and the love interest whispers into the main character's ear ‘I love
you.’ Maybe the love confession is made onstage at their high school reunion, in front of all their
former bullies. These options create a hell of a lot more intensity than a love confession in the
tampon aisle in the middle of a Walgreens. Trust me I've read some stupid shit. Long story short,
where you placed the dialogue matters just as much as the dialogue itself. So look for moments
that carry impact and weight. Number Seven (7): Keep it simple, stupid. Have you ever
read a long rambling love confession that went on forever? Pretty shitty, am I right? For starters,
romantic monologues aren't necessary. You don't need pages upon pages to get your point across.
Either your characters hearts flutter or their genitals tickle, it ain't that deep. Additionally,
if your love or lust confession is endlessly long, you're likely falling into cliche territory.
There are only so many original ways you can say ‘I love you’ or ‘I want you’ before you start
repeating lines like, you had me at hello, or you complete me. And lastly, it's not realistic.
Readers need to believe the romantic connection and a lengthy monologue completely kills it.
That's not to say you can't write a love confession that's a couple paragraphs long,
but if you're nearing an entire page or god forbid several pages, you're losing us. The vages are
drying real quick. Quite often a simple ‘I love you’ or ‘I want you’ gets the job done. I'm just
saying. Number Eight (8): Realism is the antidote to cheese. “But Jenaaa, what if readers find my
dialogue cheesy?” This is a valid fear, but the easiest way to eliminate the cheese factor is to
make your readers believe what your characters are saying. And realism in romantic dialogue can be
achieved in multiple ways. First is staying true to the character's voice, and second is keeping it
simple, both of which we've already covered. Third is aligning your character with your intention for
this romance. If you want your love interest to be a smooth Casanova, you need to create a character
who would realistically be a smooth Casanova. If you've created a character who's the biggest, most
insecure geek at school, no one's gonna believe he can spit mad game. Make sure the characters
you've created align with your intention for this romance. You're in control after all. And lastly,
is character self awareness. Yes, I realize that your characters are not real people, but try to
think about how a real person would realistically act in their position. Maybe it's in character for
your love interest to say something cheesy, and maybe after the fact they say: God, that was so
cheesy. This could totally work, and maybe that's why the main character likes them in the first
place. Ultimately, honesty and believability go hand in hand, and that's definitely the
case in this situation. Number Nine (9): Sexy is subjective. Technically romance as a whole
is subjective, but I'm focusing on sexy right now because that's where all of you are fucking up.
Sexy is in the balls or the vag of the beholder, so to speak. So if you're writing sexy dialogue,
you need to take that into consideration. That's not to say you should cater your sexy dialogue to
all of your readers because as we already covered that's impossible, since sexy is subjective. But
the sexy dialogue needs to translate appropriately for your target audience. Say your main character
is a naive, inexperienced prince, and his love interest is a rugged but gentle warrior. Given
these character types, I expect the prince's sexy talk to reflect his inexperience. But I expect
the warrior's sexy talk to be a combo of tender and powerful, strong but sweet. So if you start
saying shit like “Take that dick you filthy slut!” Readers are gonna be confused. On the flip side,
if your book is about the notorious bad boy getting with the new girl in town.
I'm gonna expect his sexy talk to be raunchy. Not hopelessly romantic, like “Hold me closer.
I never want to be apart.” When you crafted this story, you created certain expectations. And while
I love a good subversion, this ain't the time for it. That's not to say the good girl can't have a
naughty side, or the bad boy can't have a heart of gold, but you need to set your readers up for
that. Let your readers know what they can expect ahead of time and then deliver on that promise.
And last but certainly not least, Number Ten (10): Adjust accordingly. The most common complaint I
hear about writing romantic dialogue is that it's overwhelming. You know what you want your
character to say, you just don't know how they should say it. Everything you've come up with is
cliche, it's too generic, or it just doesn't fit the character. First of all, take a deep breath,
you can get through this. And second, it's actually super simple. Write the general idea
of what you want your character to express and convey, and then adjust the wording to fit their
voice. Say you want your character to say ‘you're so beautiful’ but that doesn't fit them at all.
They're way too closed off, and definitely not remotely smooth. Simply take ‘you’re beautiful’
and put that into the words of a closed off, unsmooth character. “You look n-nice. I mean,
your hair is shiny…and…your hands are good…or something. God, forget I said anything.”
This conveys the idea. It's obvious this character finds their love interest attractive, but it's
also obvious that they got marbles in their brain and they have absolutely no idea how to express
it. Say your character is fiercely confident and kind of flowery and poetic. Even flamboyant,
‘you're so beautiful’ could instead be written as “My, aren't you ravishing? A sheer delight for the eyes."
Again, it's the same message, different voice. One that perfectly suits your character.
So that's all I got for you today. A huge thank you to Laurine Bruder for requesting today's topic.
If you'd like the chance to have a video dedicated to you, or if you want access to tons of other
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wonderful, I love you. The Savior’s Champion and The Savior’s Sister are available in ebook,
paperback, hardback and audiobooks. So if you're in the mood for something romantic, something
kinda dangerous, something kinda magical. Pick up some copies today. They are linked below,
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