Romancing the Beat: Story Structure for Romance Novels

Original review posted on the Wordy Speculations blog (https://speculationsediting.com/archives/book-review-romancing-beat-gwen-hayes/) on September 5, 2017 Romancing the Beat is a concise book on story structure for the romance novel by author and editor Gwen Hayes, who herself confesses to loving "kissing books." As an editor, I read a lot about writing, so when I picked up Romancing the Beat, I sat down with paper and pen, ready to take notes. What I did not expect to find was a funny little book that made me laugh out loud while still actually learning something. I Loved It, and Here's Why What I love about Hayes’s book is that she distills the elements of romantic story structure down to their very bones and gives the reader/writer specific advice for creating the plot of a romance novel in a book you can finish in one evening. Romance novels, unlike most other genre novels, have a pretty specific formula. Now, don’t shoot me for saying that, but it’s true, and maybe that’s why romance novels are so successful. Readers expect certain things to happen, and when they happen, they’re happy. Without those things, readers are unhappy. They will be quick to tell you that what you have written is not a romance novel and shouldn’t be marketed as such. For example, if your lovers are cheating, you haven’t written a romance novel. If your lovers don’t get their happily ever after or at least happy for now, you also haven’t written a romance novel. Hayes doesn’t give you tips on crafting sentences. She doesn’t give you ideas for external plot lines. She doesn’t tell you how to create the perfect hero or heroine. She focuses on one element of the craft in one genre. Romantic story structure is all this book covers, but it covers it extremely well. Breaking It Down Gwen Hayes breaks down romantic story structure into bite-sized chunks: four phases, each with five beats. I won’t tell you what they are—you’ll have to read the book for that—but she goes through each phase and beat in its own mini-chapter. Then, at the back of the book, she provides an entire outline with these beats from one of her own stories. To be honest, I flipped to the end first and read this outline. Good, complete examples are often missing in writing books. You can call beats or moments in the story anything you want, but unless the reader knows what you’re talking about and can apply it to his or her own writing, it’s all sort of abstract, hard to pinpoint, and thus, useless. After reading Romancing the Beat, I honestly feel I could sit down and use it write an outline within an hour or so for a romance novel that would fit reader expectations. And with Hayes’s approach, it would probably be a lot of fun. In the meantime, this book is going to serve as an important resource any time I sit down to edit a romance novel, and I’ll have no compunctions about recommending it to my writer clients and friends. Go read it yourself.

This guide is kinda short, but it does what it says on the tin and describes the structure of a romance novel. Note there is only one structure, not more than one, and she doesn't go into what would happen if you deviate from the specified structure. Still, it's a great guide. Hayes writes in a very personable way, full of pop culture references and humor. It may be a hit or miss in that regard. I personally wasn't a big fan of her style, but the information provided was still a gold mine. I'm used to reading writing guides that explain the structure of novels in general. But romance novels are slightly different from that mold and having her point out those differences was really helpful to me. Overall, I reccomend this book for people who want a concise guide to writing romance novels. I don't recommend it for veterans of the genre because it would pretty much explain the basics without going into much detail.

Enjoy the writing and 80s music themes. Really helped spell out romantic book structure. Would have been 5 stars if came with a pdf of the beat sheet but I made my own off this author’s advice. I’d vote this the best book I’ve read so far in this genre (writing rom com help) and I got them all. This one is the one that helped me the most. The tone is fun, conversational and engaging. She tells it straight up and like it is. I appreciate the straight forwardness. Now I just have to write!

This book is a how to outline/ plot book for romance writers. It combines the wisdom of Blake Snyder's "Save the Cat" book and outlining method with a romance twist. The book was short, sweet, and simple, and I found it quite helpful. The author shows you how to write romance novels using four phases, with five "beats" or elements to make sure to include in each phase. I made an Excel spreadsheet with one tab for each phase, to be used in plotting my story. The book is essentially what I already knew from Save the Cat concepts except that it kind of drags them out longer for the push- and- pull of a romance book, and the focus on the two characters and their romance instead of the external arc/story. The author's tone is light and humorous. The one thing I disliked about the book was that there weren't many examples given (whereas Save the Cat is full of examples the whole way through.) The author does give a sample outline of one of her own romance novels at the end, but I think it would be more helpful broken down throughout the book as she shows the individual beats and how they turned out with her own outline/story. Overall I liked this book. It was a quick read, quite helpful to have in my repository of outlining/plotting books, and I'd recommend it to any aspiring or current romance writer.

I almost hesitate to write a review for this book because it's so good that I want to keep it secret from everyone else. With it, I shall take over the romance world! Mwahaha! Okay, no, seriously, this book is extremely helpful. It's not a craft book in the prose sense. It doesn't go into depth about how to construct compelling sentences, POV choices, believable dialogue, etc. This book is essentially about the PLOT and STRUCTURE of a romance novel. It's a short book, which I actually appreciated because she gives the info and then gets out. It might be the only book I've bought about writing that I've actually finished! And I read this one twice! Let's talk about who this book is good for... I've been writing romance for seven years. I'm really dedicated to learning craft, but I struggle with the plot, character arcs, polish of the story elements, etc. This book nails all of the essential aspects you need to make sure your book goes from MEH to WOW! That's what I need. I started taking notes on post-its and placing them throughout the book to make sure I had all of her elements. For any I was missing, I added them to my book. This is going to be my best book yet! I actually want to (and this isn't exaggeration, I'm thinking about doing this) take her book apart, laminate the pages, and add them to a three ring binder that I can then have her explanation of the section, then add my "outline" behind it to the binder--my scenes that accomplish her section. Basically I want to turn her book into a personal workbook. Or hey Gwen, if you can figure out something like that, I'd buy that too!! In sum, I love this book. :)

It gets right to the meat of the subject. Nothing extra you have to wade through to find the pearls. Highly recommend. Quick read. Worth the trouble.

When I decided to try my hand at paranormal romance, I knew I’d have to learn everything I could about the structure of a romance arc in order to tell a successful story. In every place I asked for recommendations on romance craft books, the top answer was always Romancing the Beat. It’s a slim volume but wasn’t terribly expensive in paperback, so I bowed to the collective expertise and bought a copy. This book is short because it is packed with all of the necessary information for crafting how to force two (or more) people to fall in love with each other in a way specifically targeted to keep readers invested. It was hard to resist the urge to highlight pretty much every sentence—this book doesn’t waste time with filler. Hayes breaks down an interesting formula that leaves plenty of room for creativity while also explaining why each of the steps is integral. She offers suggestions of how to employ them that can be tailored to any external plot/subgenre while also reaffirming the differences between writing a compelling romance and writing a compelling story that happens to include a romance facet. As someone who is tackling a specifically queer romance project, I truly appreciated that Hayes breaks the formula down by “H1” and “H2” and specifically states that these terms designate gender-neutral protagonists. You can officially add my name to the list of those who will immediately recommend this craft book to anyone interested in developing romantic storylines.

I'm not sure this should actually be called a book. More like a big pamphlet. It's tiny and tries to force some good simple information, pictures, and a TON of jokes in about 85 tiny cut pages so you feel like you bought a "book". The author jokes at lot - which starts off as funny but really is just trying to fill the gaps so this can actually be called a book. You may end up skimming the jokes towards the end because it's overdone. And mostly because you bought it for something else. I'm giving the book four stars because I do feel the author is genuine, but the information on here could literally be a pamphlet. It could be completely sufficient as a one paged blog - without missing $10 from your wallet. Please don't think I'm giving any grief to the author - hence the four stars. There's good information. Just not a book worth by any stretch. I'd say you can condense it to four solid half pages, and you've got all the information you need.

Um dos raros livros que encontrei que aborda sobre a estrutura de romance romântico com certa profundidade. Vai me ajudar muito.

As well as being a reader, I also try to write. To help with that (and not at all as a way of putting off the, you know, actual writing) I have been collecting a lot of books about writing. I have read a few of them, but not recently, so I decided it was time to delve into the archive and pluck one or two out to see if they helped. In the case of this one the answer is: Absolutely! This is quite a short book at a little over 10,000 words, and told in a casual, joking style, but don’t let that fool you. Hayes has obviously studied a lot of romance stories and boiled them down to the essence of everything which must be included to make a satisfying story which has “the feels”. Most writers will at least have heard of “The Hero’s Journey”, often positioned as the archetypal story structure which underlies thousands of years of tales. This is all good, and for many stories the hero’s journey is an invaluable aid, but for romance stories it’s not such a good fit. The hero’s journey works best when there is a single protagonist, with some form of identifiable antagonist to struggle against. An enjoyable romance story, on the other hand, usually has two protagonists, each of whom has their own journey and their own obstacles to overcome. The familiar structure of a romance story has evolved over many years to be a different kind of tale. Hayes has picked this archetypal romance story apart and laid out the constituent blocks ready for us to put them back together again with our characters, settings, challenges and, ultimately, our own kind of “happy ever after.” Some people object to these kinds of structural books, pointing out that they can be limiting, and exclude multiple types of story which don’t fit neatly into the plan. While that is true, it’s not really applicable in this case. As Hayes points out, you are free to tell any story you like, in any way you like, but if you wish to position your story as a romance, then readers will have a certain set of expectations. As much as anything, it is these expectations that Hayes lays bare for us here, so that we can make sure that the story we tell gives readers what they want, and lives up to the promise of the cover. I found this book to be hugely practical, and all the way through I was mentally applying the approach that Hayes describes both to the romance stories I have read and enjoyed (and the ones I didn’t enjoy so much), and to my own stories. I have tried a few times to write romance, either as a standalone story or as part of something else, such as a detective story, and never been fully happy with the results. Reading this book was like chatting to a skilled mechanic about problems with my car. I am determined to revisit some of my unsatisfactory stories, armed with the checklist from this book, and get them running as smoothly as I know they should. I will also be recommending this book to other would-be romance writers.

Like most writers, I've read my fair share of books meant to help my writing, but nothing seemed to quite fit the story I wanted to tell. When I saw this recommended on tumblr, I bought it with the expectation that, hey, if it wasn't what I was looking for, I could always return it. I am keeping it forever. FOREVER. Because Gwen Hayes lays out what romance writers need to see in the simplest way possible. It's clear, well-written, humorous, doesn't get bogged down in how-to's while still informing you, and does its job beautifully. There's nothing about this book that I don't like. I will go back and reference it many times in the future. Thanks for writing this, Gwen!

Well structured, clear, with perfect samples and quick enough to read in one spare hour. I will use it straight away for the editing and rewrite of my current story and the last two as well. I love it, and will come back again in the future for sure.

Really love the simplicity of this little book and how I can go back to it to reference my writing. Found it super helpful as someone who is just starting out writing in the romance genre! Definitely recommend it. It’s such a small book but I love that about it as it can get too much if there’s just a whole dump of info. Also makes it easy to carry around with me if I’m writing outside of my house!