You want to know how to structure your romance novel?

Not sure how to meet-cute? Are your characters Fighting For Love, when they should be Retreating from Love? Feeling a little lost? Then you need to read this book.

At a glance…

This is the gold standard for romance writers.

If you’ve spent any time hanging out in writer forums then you’ve probably already seen people talking about including ‘the beats,’ or ‘hitting the beats.’ This book is what they’re talking about. Gwen lays out a plot structure, a series of beats in a certain order, that you should incorporate into your romance. 

This is starting to sound a bit formulaic, right?

You have an interesting idea for a plot, you don’t need someone else to come along to and tell you how to write your novel for you! Part of the joy of being a writer is that you get to make all those decisions. BUT the romance beats are purely for the romance part of your book. You can still have a wild and adventurous plot separate to the romance. The beats are there to make sure that the romance doesn’t get stale. If you want two characters to fall in love, then you have to follow a certain pattern or it won’t be believable.

Gwen takes all these unwritten rules of storytelling (and human nature) and crystallises them for you in an easy to understand nicely digestible way. Her book is short, easy to read and comes with 80s music recommendations to accompany each chapter and get you in the mood.

I honestly don’t have a bad word to say about this book! …However, I know that some people can get quite annoyed by the very idea that romance arcs are as unvaried as Gwen implies.

Sure, in real life, people fall in love in all sorts of ways; romance can take all sorts of forms but romance readers expect certain things. Gwen’s beats aren’t supposed to be a strait-jacket to your creativity. She is giving you a recipe, that you can add your own tropes and plot into.

The Good:

The beats. If you’re a romance writer then you need this book.

The Bad:

Strangely enough, the bad about this book is the same as the good. Gwen only discusses romance beats. There isn’t anything else in this book; it caters to a very specific audience and if you aren’t in that audience then there really isn’t any point reading it.

Pearls of Wisdom:

People who read romance have certain things that they want from their books. You can do all sorts of interesting and imaginative things with your story, but you have to bear your audience in mind as you write; or, as Gwen puts it:

“Don’t betray your readers!”

See our other reviews here.

Want to write faster? Of course you do.

If you’re struggling with getting your daily word count up, there’s a good chance this book is for you…but be warned, there isn’t any magic formula: it’s going to take a lot of work to actually get up to 5k an hour. The main lesson of this book is accountability and ways to stop procrastinating. Now, that’s obviously very useful, it’s just not the quick fix that I’d hoped for from the title.

At a glance…

Want to write faster? Of course you do.

If you’re struggling with getting your daily word count up, there’s a good chance this book is for you…but be warned, there isn’t any magic formula: it’s going to take a lot of work to actually get up to 5k an hour. The main lesson of this book is accountability and ways to stop procrastinating. Now, that’s obviously very useful, it’s just not the quick fix that I’d hoped for from the title.

Have you ever set aside a few hours to write and felt that sense of excitement? You can feel the hours stretching ahead of you, totally free of any other responsibility, and you’re going to get so much written. It’s going to be glorious. And then, out of nowhere, it’s four hours later and you’ve only written a few sentences.

This book is for everyone who never wants to have that feeling again. Chris’s advice to stop this happening is two-fold. First, learn to focus on your writing. Easier said than done, right? He does have a lot of good ideas. Some are pretty practical and obvious, i.e. turn off your internet when you’re trying to write. Others are more original; he explains how to use writing sprints to focus and increase your words per hour.

I really like the idea of writing sprints and that, if I practice enough, then over time I’ll be writing more and more in each sprint. Personally, that hasn’t worked out for me. I sprint in fifteen-minute bursts and, no matter how focused I am, I write the same amount in a sprint as I did a few months ago. However, I know a lot of people who absolutely rave about Chris’s writing sprint technique so maybe it’s just me.

The problem is, Chris is not the first person to recommend writing sprints. Do a little research and you find that this is pretty conventional wisdom. You don’t need to buy this book to find out how sprints work. Chris explains things slowly and clearly. He puts a bit of a unique spin on the concept and on how to record your sprints. But I would really like the book to be a bit cheaper when his advice isn’t exactly earth-shattering.

Chris’s second piece of advice is to keep track of the amount of time that you spend actually writing, how many words you write in each session, how often you’re doing sprints. It’s about making yourself accountable. This is great advice. It’s really easy to lose track of how much time I actually spend writing. I feel like I write every day. If the chapter I’m working on isn’t finished yet, well that’s because it’s a tough scene and it’s slowing me down. By keeping track of my writing it stops me from making those kinds of excuses. I can look at my spreadsheet and see for myself that I’m getting less done because I’m spending less time writing. Now, maybe I’m spending less time writing because I’m in the middle of a tough scene and I’m not enjoying it…But keeping a log of these kinds of details means that it’s impossible to lie to myself.

I would definitely recommend this book for anyone looking to write faster and avoid procrastination. Even though not all Chris’s techniques worked for me, a lot still did. His writing style is upbeat and full of infectious enthusiasm. I finished this book, put it down and felt inspired, and I bet you will too.

The Good:

Chris’s book made me feel invigorated and excited to get writing, and isn’t that the most important thing about a writing book?

The Bad:

Chris created an app that helps you keep track of your writing sprints using the method that he outlines in the book. This is a paid app. You don’t need his app to use his method, but there is a good chunk of a chapter that reads like an advert for his app.

Yeah, Chris, I know the app is only the price of a cup of coffee…but I already paid for your book and it turned out to be a commercial for something else you want me to pay for. It’s not great.

Plus, the app doesn’t even work…

Pearls of Wisdom:

I want to write faster but it can be disheartening how often I get told that writing must be a slow process, how if I haven’t spent a decade on a book then it’s somehow lacking in merit. I like this quotation that explains what’s wrong with that attitude:

“The gal who’s been writing the same chapter for two months might find just the right words, but you’ll have learned how to convey emotion, show motivation, how to describe a scene, how to craft dialogue, and a dozen other skills she’s never even considered because she’s written a grand total of 20,000 words in her entire career.”