Ingredients are Key

Ever have a latte from your favorite coffee shop and they forgot to add a key ingredient?

I recently ordered a vanilla latte, only the barista forgot to add the vanilla. It didn’t take more than a second to realize the error. My taste buds shuddered at the omission while they wallowed in bland coffee and hot milk. Gross.

Manuscripts can be like that. Sometimes writers promise something in our selected genre—romance, history, suspense—but then the key ingredients might get omitted. Or you might have a combo genre like historical romance, which is what I write. Your book could be filled with battle scenes and drama, but somehow you forget there’s supposed to be a love story in the mix. Perhaps you focus on the war while forgetting the lass waging battles in her heart?

You might ask yourself, was it a bunny trail you followed that veered from the story to a whole new focus?

Perhaps while writing another book, you become so involved in the romance scenes that, although it takes place in World War I, it might as well be a contemporary novel. The historical elements somehow get lost. Somewhere.

We all have blind spots in our writing. Or perhaps, like the barista, we become distracted and just forget.

Historical fiction is especially challenging since anachronisms can sneak in—those odd phrases, cultural trends, or pieces of clothing that weren’t around in the era you are writing about.

One reader on social media groaned that she was so tired of Regency romance novels in which the dialogue included the simple expression, “OK.” It’s just not okay to include that when you’re writing about the Regency period, which was from 1811-1820. According to the Smithsonian, this expression was initially used in Boston around 1838.

Do you see why writing historicals is such a challenge? Someone always knows if you’re being inaccurate. I must be crazy for choosing to write historicals, but that’s a topic for another time …

It can be painfully obvious when a writer doesn’t do his or her homework. First rule of writing: Don’t cause pain for your readers.

There can be no more disappointment for a reader than expecting a romance, only to be left with a singular kiss with lips barely connecting. While I’m hardly suggesting a passionate bedroom scene, readers do expect a few sigh-worthy moments when the hero sweeps the heroine off her feet with a tender kiss.

A romance without a good kiss is like … like a latte without the flavoring! It’s just not what readers expect. Or want.

Carry on.

Elaine Marie Cooper has two historical fiction books that recently released: War’s Respite (Prequel novella) and Love’s Kindling. Love’s Kindling is available in both e-book and paperback. They are the first two books in the Dawn of America Series set in Revolutionary War Connecticut. Cooper is the award-winning author of Fields of the Fatherless and Bethany’s Calendar. Her 2016 release (Saratoga Letters) was finalist in Historical Romance in both the Selah Awards and Next Generation Indie Book Awards. She penned the three-book Deer Run Saga and has been published in numerous magazines and anthologies. You can visit her website/ blog at www.elainemariecooper.com