Take a feisty female heroine, add a mysterious book that releases deadly creatures into the world, throw in an old boyfriend, a handsome sheriff, and a devilishly sexy demon. Shake it all up, and a paranormal romance series—Booke of the Hidden—is born.
I had a freelance editor tell me to “lose the romance between the heroine and the demon.” Needless to say, she really didn’t understand the genre. But as you all know with romancing the paranormal, it’s all about the guy who shies away from the full moon, or the daylight or…whatever. Whether vampire, werewolf, or demon, we want our feisty gals to snuggle up to them. The mundane guys are just…well, mundane.
Usually in paranormal romances (or Romantasy as we are currently calling it) and urban fantasies, it’s the world we know…with an undercurrent of a world we never knew existed. Even though you aren’t setting your tale on another planet or another time, you need to ground the reader in fact. Are you using a real city like Anita Blake’s St. Louis or Kat Richardson’s Seattle? Then do some research and make sure the streets and sights are where you say they are. And then create that opening to the netherworld down that blind alley. Introduce the rules of your world as you go along. Don’t info-dump by providing long paragraphs of “this is how it all works. Now! Here’s the story!” The world you create should unfold from the dialog between your characters, from the narrative description, and from the mood.
What sets your world apart from the mundane world around us? What are the magical elements needed for your heroine and hero to move through this world? What and who are their obstacles? And since it’s your world, you set the rules. Stephanie Meyers didn’t make her vampires go up in smoke in the sunshine. Instead, they sparkled! Shifters usually don’t need to wait for a full moon anymore to shift. But what if they did? Or needed the stars to align? Or an eclipse? I like each paranormal series to be a little different. But consistency within that particular series is the rule. This is all part and parcel with world-building. It all has to be consistent to be believable and for readers to love and follow the heroes in their journey, wherever that journey takes them.
You all know what makes a romance a romance. Boy meets girl. Boy loses girl. Boy gets girl. What is going to keep your protagonists apart? Is she allergic to his fur when he goes all werewolf? Does he freak out too much when she sprouts fairy wings? Is it a Romeo and Juliet scenario when both their diverse worlds collide and nothing can bring them together? It’s still about the supernatural and that needs to be integral to the menace keeping the lovers separated. If it’s just everyday ordinary problems, then there’s no need to bother. Readers want to see how these paranormal couples overcome their obstacles supernaturally. And isn’t that the whole point and the fun of it in the first place?
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