Lindsay Townsend: The Romance of the Everyday

When it comes to writing romance, I am in love with the everyday. Again and again, I actively seek out fiction and romance that deals with so-called ‘ordinary’ people.

Why?

Because to me a hero or heroine is more striving and heroic if they win through after many trials and adventures with their own skills, wit and effort, not because they happen to be born into a class or position.

Because a hero is more beautiful to me if he is not massively handsome but that feeling, true emotion for the heroine, makes him ‘pretty’. (I also like this theme the other way round – I love the part in Jane Eyre where the heroine goes down to breakfast after accepting Mr Rochester’s proposal and she looks, even to herself, glowing and pretty, ‘truly pretty’ as Mr R tells her.)

Because if the hero or heroine has tons of money or special powers that they can use at the snap of their languid fingers, where is the tension?

Skill impresses me and has a poetry of its own. Watch anyone who is really good at something – a potter with a wheel, a farrier, a shepherd, a dustman dealing with wheelie bins – and there is an elegance, a romance. I love to celebrate skill in the romances I write and I always have my warrior have a gentler skill as well as their fighting. (I don’t admire a fighter who can do nothing but battle, because how can such a person create a life and a relationship if they only destroy?) A warrior as strong protector, yes, a warrior fighting for kudos, OK, but a warrior who is a glory-junkie and no more? No thanks.

We live in a complex world and I like to write romances that reflect this and celebrate whose who heal, who create, who build, who make.

So I write about knights but mainly younger sons, who have to make their own way and who don’t have everything handed to them – I do this in A Knight's Enchantment and A Knight's Captive - and knights who are scarred or grieving and must find another path to live their lives  - I do this in  To Touch the Knight, A Knight's Vow and The Snow Bride.

I write about foresters and dairy maids (Midsummer Maid), slave girls and scribes (Flavia's Secret), serfs and peasants (To Touch the Knight, The Lord and Eleanor) bull-leapers and kings of small, rural kingdoms where the king helps with the harvest and is also a healer (Bronze Lightning).

In all these, I try to weave the everyday into the stories, those special everyday moments – the first kiss, the ‘I love you’ time, the recognition that this person is ‘the one’, the moment when my hero and heroine meet again, feeling a happy glow, even if they’ve only been apart for a moment. 

We all have times when the world shimmers about us and we feel apart from the hurly-burly, when we step into our own magic world with those we care about.

Everyday but special. That’s what I love to write about and read about.

Writers, do you have stories that show and feature ‘everyday’ heroes and heroines? If so, please mention them with details  in the comments section of this blog. 


Lindsay
http://www.lindsaytownsend.net
http://www.twitter.com/lindsayromantic

Sticking to your story...

How much should you be willing to change a story to fit a publisher's preferences?

I wrote a story a while back and had a certain vision and plan for it. I was happy with it, felt if was perfect and said what I wanted it to say. I found a publisher I liked and respected, and who was willing to take my story on...in part as I had envisioned it.

Their requests were not unreasonable and they were polite in saying, change this if you still want it published here.

I decided a little change was not a huge deal. I guess the more time that passed after writing the story, the less attached I was to it's idea. So I changed a little, and still felt okay about it. Then there was more to change, and more and suddenly the story is not what I had written. Still a good story, but not what I had envisioned for it.

I don't feel like I changed too much, since I am happy with the way it is now. I just wonder if I gave in a little too easily on my original idea of the story.

How much should one change a story to fit a publisher's ideal?

The Music of my Writing

When I sit down to write I almost always plug my ears with music. It helps to focus my mind on what I am doing, blocking out the rest of the house, and it puts me in the right mood for the scene I am writing or the story that I am creating.

I have my own office in the house, thanks to my hubby, but with two girls, two hamsters and one cat it is far from quiet. When I have time to sit down with my computer and write I have to focus myself and block out the house.

Music is my method.

I turn it up and I can ignore the squeals of my girlies as they run about and the rolling hamster balls that crash into my feet. Even the incessant meow of the cat who thinks she needs to be fed ten times a day, doesn't get through when I'm truly focused.

But music does more than just block out my life.

Music enhances the mood for my writing. If I am into a scene where my heroine is angry and, perhaps, looking for revenge, then I might listen to something like Pink or The Offspring to get me into that reved up mood. Not sexy but mad and energetic.

From Treasure of Flowers: ""How dare you speak of my father that way." Outrage bubbled inside of Violet at her father’s character being dragged through the mud again."

If I am writing something soft and sexy I like to listen to Micheal Buble or Journey. This brings me down to a happy place where I can write words of love and romantic desire.

From Treasure of Flowers: "As he drifted off to sleep, he breathed deep the scent of their lovemaking and pulled her soft form closer. Not only was this woman taking him to a treasure, she was turning out to be a treasure herself.

If I am writing something hard core and erotic I will plug in Finger Eleven or Seether to make me feel right for the scene.

From Dreamed Destiny: "His mouth ravaged hers in a desperately hungry kiss. His tongue forced her lips apart and mated roughly with hers. He was angry and he was rough, but she didn’t care. Her body went white hot and she wrapped her hands around the back of his head, encouraging him, asking him for more. She wasn’t ashamed, she didn’t care that she didn’t really know him."

I could write without music to focus me and set the mood, but it wouldn't be as much fun. For me music is a dimension that, unfortunately readers don't get when they read a book, unless they add it themselves.

Happily... Romance is in the air...

Romance and mushy stuff is in the air...valentines...red and pink and white, glittery and lacy and beautiful...I have come to believe this frilly fun is an upliftment of the human heart. Indeed. and softly sighing here, a true celebration of Valentine’s Day is a reminder to our hearts. Yes, romance and love is always in the air...waiting for us, ever available to us...the tender and caring part of our natures.
That’s where us writers of romance novels come into the scene...being extra sensitive to the magical pinkie and red sparkly stuff floating down from the rarified realm of Cupid, and of Venus, or as she’s also known, Aphrodite ~ yes, the sprinkling of love dust secretly inspires our most romantic love scenes *shhhh, don’t tell anyone* ~ also, another little secret straight from Cupid’s bow-shaped mouth, the red sequin-like dust inspires the passionate sexy side of all of us, writer or reader...or red-blooded human.
For now, we won’t get into the subject of dear Cupid's tiny love arrows. However, the color, red...well, read on.
Recently Lexie O’Neill blogged at Title Magic on how red is the color of desire for men, psychologically...as in wearing that curve-enhancing slinky scarlet gown with no back, or wearing that hot little red dress...or is that, a hot little red number? Most women know about tempting men with red instinctively, if not intellectually. Certainly, I have dressed my heroines in red often. In one of my WIP’s ~ the Secret Lives of Fortunate Wolves, the hero adores the heroine in red velvet, and has all sorts of glamor clothing created for her, just for his ‘big bad wolfie’ pleasure.
Yes, I am partial to red, most every shade of red, from a deep ruby blue-red to a flaming, nearly orange red, so naturally the color shows up often in my writing.
In the magickal tradition ~ red is the color of desire.
And since romance is in the air...valentine red, that is... I was inspired to begin this *I don’t know what it is* ... a new WIP, or one of my Serial Flashes... I’m just not sure what, yet. But, take a look...let me know what you think... definitely the spirit of Valentine’s Day is possessing me... or, could it be? Cupid!...where are you?
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Romance’s Red Ribbon ~

Light my loin’s fire,
Red is the color of my desire.
Let’s wing our love higher.
Come, take my breast, my Sire.
To ignite my most savage fire,
Taste my nipples to your desire,
Stoke my passions, take me swiftly higher...
Make them red as berries, my Princely Sire....
O, yes, I beg, tease my nether petals to a fierce needy fire
For you, bring me beneath your throbbing blade, soar us both to red’s most blistering desire...

Kyzaira sighed to the depths of her heart, and felt it flutter within her breast. She’d only meant to pen a few lines of fanciful thought. Yet, there it was, her heart and her desire spilled from her red ink pen onto parchment. Disbelievingly, she stared for a moment. How? When had she become so carried away? Some fair time ago, she had settled at her desk for the purpose of sending a message of polite regard, to be handed to the regional Prince, upon his annual arrival to their realm, as was her social duty. Instead, her folly of feeling, her romantic daydreams had won out, upon thinking of the Prince’s bold visage, often compared to the hunting ferocity of a falcon.
~~~~~~

HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY ~
May your most romantic dreams come true...

Romance is in the air *kiss* from the Kougar...

Savanna

Savanna Kougar ~ Run on the Wild Side of Romance ~ http://savannakougar.com ~