Today I’m recommending some new-ish books that I think would be helpful to romance writers, especially ones who are early in their career. If you’ve been in the game a while, no worries—these are still very applicable and good reading!
First up is Gail Carriger’s The Heroine’s Journey. Gail is very charming and incredibly readable, even in non-fiction, and this book is such a refreshing change from the more…patriarchal ways that we’re often taught fiction. Taking off on Joseph Campbell’s idea of the hero’s journey, Gail flips it so that instead of going on a quest narrative where the protagonist leaves his community in order to become a hero and then is changed so much by the journey that he can’t fit back into society when he’s completed the quest, the heroine goes on a journey from isolation towards community and integration.
Gail’s very clear that a heroine doesn’t have to be biologically female (Harry Potter is a heroine’s journey, for example), and she takes serious aim at the literary misogyny that prioritizes the hero's journey narrative and diminishes the heroine's journey, while also giving heroine's journey writers ways to protect their narrative. While this isn't a writing how-to book, I would definitely recommend it to romance writers to understand the theoretical underpinnings of the romance structure, which is virtually always a heroine's journey.
My next recommendation is Zoe York’s Romance Your Plan (and also the first book in the series, Romance Your Brand). Zoe is a USA Today bestseller, and seriously knows her stuff when it comes to branding romance. I’ve talked about her here many times before—her Twitter and YouTube channels are definitely worth following. And the books are very chatty and conversational so it feels like she's right there explaining everything to you.
Both books highlight how important creating a marketable series is for the longevity of a romance writing career. (While I think some romance sub-genres don’t respond well to series, most do really need that hook of a series to create momentum.) Zoe breaks down how to create a series and all the necessary elements to it, and then also how to market and promote the series effectively. I really like how she puts these processes into clear, actionable steps so it doesn't feel so overwhelming. For my money, these are essential books for romance writers.
Lastly, I want to recommend particularly for writers just starting out Ricardo Fayet’s How to Market a Book. Fayet is the co-founder of Reedsy, which is a service that connects writers to publishing professionals, so there is a fair amount of promo for Reedsy in here. If you can get past that, though, it’s an excellent primer about all of the various marketing avenues you can use to sell your book. This isn’t romance-specific and it’s a very surface-level look at all of these avenues, but I found it helpful to have all of these things in one place as a way to help narrow down your options. From there, you can search out more books or resources that can help you get granular with Facebooks ads or Amazon keywords or newsletter building, etc. It's free right now (it might be permafree) so it's worth picking up to peruse.
If there are any writing or marketing or productivity books you’d recommend for your romance writing career, I’d love to hear about them. I’m always looking for good resources to share with my clients and of course with all of you here in my newsletter.