Balls and Walnuts
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SBD: The “I love you”
Been so long since I wrote a Smart Bitches Day post, I expect Auntie Beth has forgotten all about me. Have you, Beth? Cuz I haven’t forgotten you. And here I am, back again with another, “Sweet Jeebus is he NEVER going to understand the meaning of SBD?” post.
Simple question, really. Genre conventions are important, right? But allowing your characters to do their thing, act ‘in character,’ is important, too. So what happens if convention runs head to head with a character’s, erm, character?
I’m thinking about the “I love you.” Supposed to come at the end of the romance, right? Something like . . .
“I love you.”
“And I love you.”
Exeunt all.
The curtain, that veil of words, closes within a few paragraphs at most. Perhaps a few pages. But a few chapters? Whaaaa?
But that’s what my hero wants to do. Not so much the heroine; she’s content to leave it to the very end. It makes sense for her to keep her mouth shut about her feelings. But the hero is an inexperienced romantic who has never been burned. He’s drowning in that rush of emotion and damn it he wants to share, share, SHARE with the woman he loves! I LOVE YOU! he wants to scream. I WANT TO BE WITH YOU FOREVER ‘N EVER! Because that’s who he is.
As romance readers, how much does this bother you? Do the “I love yous” have to come at the end, or can I break it up like this? Bottom line, I have to break it up like this, because my hero isn’t gonna act out of character. Does that make my novel something other than romance? *shiver* Lad lit, perhaps? Say it ain’t so!
Discuss.
D.
Nah, the “I love you” can come before the end. I’m quite certain that a whole slew (how many in a “slew”, anyway?) of perfectly good romances have the “I love you” before the end. Seems fine to me, as long as, y’know, there’s romantic stuff afterward. Something not quite settled yet about the relationship.
Besides, lots & lots of romances end with the marriage proposal, or even with the walk down the aisle. How are they getting to that point without saying “I love you” yet? They ain’t.
And even if the book doesn’t continue on to a proposal or a wedding, sometimes that “I love you” is followed by sex scenes. Reeeaaallly long, drawn-out, repetitious sex scenes.
Crap. You’re going to make me go re-read the endings to a dozen books now, aren’t you?
I agree with Darla — the “I love you” doesn’t have to come at the end. And they don’t have to be simultaneous. I can think of several romance novels in which the declaration of hero and heroine are quite separate, and the marked silence of the non-declaring lover is an important plot point.
jmc
Goody! Then I’m still on solid ground, and (hopefully) no one will accuse me of writing LAD LIT. Yuck.
Crap, your hero sounds like my guy Arie. We’ll have to ask Kate about similarities because she’s read both of our MSS. But yeah, Arie says the L-word on page, um, 100something. It’s early. He’s head over heels. Do they get married and call it a novella? No, but I don’t think there needs to be this gut-wrenching wait for a declaration of love. It has to fit the character, which seems to be the case with what you’ve described.
I told my husband that I loved him after knowing him only three weeks. I laugh to think back on how little we knew of each other and, fast forward ten years, how much I love him now — but I meant it. It just meant a little something different than what it means now.
i think half the fun in some romance books is when one character realizes they love the other and then spends the rest of the book trying to get the other to realize that he/she does too. if that makes sense. i actually really like it when it’s the guy who says it first. i get a little tired of macho men who wont admit they’re in love, even though it is SO OBVIOUS to everyone else. that’s why i dont read too many regencies anymore.
anywho…
Completely agree with the above posts. I love you can’t be the first thing out of their mouths, obviously, but it doesn’t need to end the book.
Maybe one loves the other but some prideful aspect of his/her personality prevents that character from believing that s/he is worthy of the other. Maybe they love each other, but the antagonist is preventing the two main characters from coming together peacefully. Maybe one loves more than the other and has to convince his/her partner.
Personally, the declaration of “I love you” isn’t quite enough for me. Sometimes that’s only the beginning of a trust filled relationship. What needs to happen at the close is that the reader has to fully believe that these two are committed utterly to each other. If “I love you” were simply enough, then there would never be any infidelity in any relationships where one or both said “the magic words.”
It’s like pornography: I know it when I see it. I know the completion to a Romance novel when I see it. (And usually, that’s why Epilogues bother me. I don’t necessarily need to SEE the wedding and the kids and the happy family once I’ve felt that these two characters will weather all storms together. Because all that happy rolling around in the fresh spring grass after the ending seems as if the author is trying to say that these two characters will never suffer strife ever again. I want to know that they WILL suffer setbacks, but they’ll walk through those times together.)
well, then. I was one of the people who insisted the story was basically done when the male declared his love.
ha! Wrong again. (and I don’t follow that rule either of course.)
This’ll teach you to allow me to be a beta reader, Dr H.
although having another, sudden problem thrown in (external or internal) after the love is declared is often way annoying. Problems should lurk in the whole story. . . I’m thinking of some of the endings I’ve read that felt tagged onto the book just to umm boost word count? create a black moment? Not your story, Doug.
All very reassuring. So I’m left with the one surmountable problem of fixing the later sex scenes and giving it a better ending. No prob!
Thanks y’all.
although having another, sudden problem thrown in (external or internal) after the love is declared is often way annoying. Problems should lurk in the whole story. . . I’m thinking of some of the endings I’ve read that felt tagged onto the book just to umm boost word count? create a black moment?
And those sudden crises are much, much, much more annoying than an extraneous epilogue.
It used to always be kidnapping. Just when all is well and good, the heroine gets kidnapped:
“Never fear, my love! I will rescue you!”
“Oh! Do not hurt yourself, you great manly man. I will find a way to escape!”
“But the villain must be vanquished, even though we thought he was dead in that shipwreck three chapters ago!”
“You are so brave! This only serves to remind me how very much I love you!”
“And I love you too!”
(Meanwhile Suisan is trying to figure out if the next forty pages of the book are really part of this novel or are perhaps taken up with an excerpt from an upcoming novel.)
I hate “end of game” kidnappings. Put them at the front where they belong. Well, except for that famous Jude Deveraux kidnapping where all four heroines are kidnapped simultaneously and must be rescued by all four heroes who happen to be brothers. There needs to be a movie made of that series. Really.
I didn’t put in a kidnaping.
I did, however, add in a home invasion. You beta readers will have to use your imaginations until I finish this monster.
And that Jude Deveraux thing sounds like the Hardy Boys meet Nancy Drew and Her Three Sisters.
Now that Carrie’s comment is out of moderation (sorry for the wait, Carrie!) — thanks & cool! So how about it, Kate? Are Brad & Carrie’s hero cuzzins?
Was Brad also born in late 18th century Delft? Ontzagwekkende! (um, awesome, I think)
But yes, Kate, inquiring minds and all that…
Nope, Brad’s very much the modern boy.
Shalom aleichem!
okay, here’s the thing and you DID ask. And it has been about a thousand books ago that I read these mss.
I wasn’t surprised by what kept Carrie’s characters apart. I knew it was there, had been from the hero’s first appearance (hints of it anyway. Angst, fear, doubt etc)
I was totally gobsmacked by Brad’s problem. I got mad at him because I liked Doug’s characters so much, got so wrapped up in the story, I might have exaggerated my…objection. (I believe I called poor Brad horrible names)
That’s the difference. And Doug? I mean it–if no one else has said anything then you should ignore me and the horse I rode in on.
and I would like to point out that I had a kidnapping shoved into the very end of my first book, a la Suisan’s comment. (Somebody Wonderful)
So what do I know?
ALSO the line about “the book is over when the man declares his love” was something I’d gotten at a conference from a Harlequin editor (it was in a bar and she’d had a fair amount of wine)
Who needs an “I love you.” Actions speak louder then words. Show me the love. I’m feeling all Eliza Doolittle
Kate: in the rewrite, Brad still acts like a butthead but Lori gets her revenge — and early, with very little waiting — and with makeup sex after. There, I’ve given it all away.
Thanks, folks!