Guess This Topic is Appropriate...

There are so many types of romance when it comes to fiction. You've got your historical, your paranormal, your fantasy, sci-fi, steampunk. There's romantic suspense and romantic mystery. Category and single title. After I finished my first novel, I began researching agents and was completely overwhelmed with the seemingly endless forms of romantic fiction. And to be honest, I really didn't want to admit I'd written a romance either.

Labeling my work as "romance" felt so limiting. It inspired images of chocolate, flowers, really sappy, mushy confessions of unending love.

Barf.

But my manuscript wasn't really a mystery, wasn't taut enough to be a thriller, not elevated enough in language and imagery to be considered literary...and the central plot point was a relationship. Crap. Double crap! Without meaning to, I'd written a romance.

And then I figured out the difference between category and single title. Category stories are more focused, shorter, and very Harlequin-esque. Single title works have more flexibility on length, subject matter...everything. So it's okay to have some mystery and suspense elements, to drag out the relationship and flesh out the characters more.

So I can write romance without barfing. Just Like Lightning is my very first (and maybe only) work with heavy equine involvement, but I'm hoping that won't matter. Under the dirt and horsehair, it's still about humans.