Once upon a time, I wrote Christian romance novels for publication, and now I’m a literary agent living my happily-ever-after in representing many romance authors. Valentine’s Day is my favorite secular holiday.
Ignoring fond stories of St. Valentine himself, retailers encourage spending. Giving and receiving jewelry, flowers, cards, negligees, and candy are all great ways to say, “I love and treasure you.” Expressing love in tangible ways can be part of romance. Some would say those gestures should be a part of romance. Everyone agrees to share your candy with the one you love!
Gifts are pleasures for people of any religion or no religion. But how does Christian publishing portray true romance to readers?
- The Lord is central to the relationship. The hero and heroine in a Christian romance novel find love while considering their relationship with the Lord. The reader may not see the heroine pray, “Dear Lord, please tell me if Blaze is The One.” However, the story shows a faith walk and journey, meaning that the protagonists don’t ditch their prayer lives as soon as they pique the interest of someone with an excessive amount of money, beauty, and charm.
- A meeting of the minds is more urgent than physicality. Christian romance shows the courtship of two people who agree on the Lord’s role in their lives or will agree by the story’s end. They seek relationships with those who share those values. They communicate with each other in meaningful, caring ways.
- Physical attraction is not forgotten. Christian romance readers appreciate witnessing an attractive couple’s companionship. They see the couple discover inspired ways to express budding love. Christian romance novelists must be more creative than writing characters running to bedrooms, so the stories are exceptionally pleasing.
- The man and woman are considerate of one another. Old school bodice rippers sometimes told tales of teenage girls enchanted with their cruel rapists. The inexperienced and unwise heroine falls in love with a fantasy and with lust, so she casts aside doubt about her savage love interest. In contrast, while Christian heroes and heroines can and do have problems, the reader is convinced they have cultivated spiritual resources and emotional maturity to anticipate a successful relationship that will lead to marriage.
- Money is not a factor in Christian romance. I doubt we’ll see “The Christian Billionaire Finds Love in Montana” as a title. While Christians understand money is a tool to gain necessities and even some luxuries, Christian romance doesn’t encourage the illusion of living a billionaire’s lifestyle or the desire for excessive wealth. Books focusing on the person’s possessions as the prime descriptor objectify the character and make the character one-dimensional. In real life, Christians would be ill-advised to pursue a relationship based on any one aspect of a prospective spouse, including a profession of faith. I know many incredible Christian men who would not be suitable for me but would be ideal for someone else. Thankfully, I found my Christian husband years ago. We based our decision to marry on many considerations. Likewise, Christian romance novels support multi-faceted relationships with a firm foundation.
On this Valentine’s Day and every day, my prayer for you is to experience healthy, loving relationships within your household and with your friends and extended family.
God is love.
Mistakes to Avoid at Your First Writers Conference With Dan Balow
In honour of St. Valentine,
to help keep love alive,
I built for the gal who’s mine
a custom .45
with a shiny slide of chrome
and a lightweight frame.
It handles like a Shakespeare poem,
and will bring no shame
when she goes out to the range
with elders from the church;
you may ponder how times change,
but from this end-times perch
I really want each day to see
my dear sweet wife come home to me.
Love this, Andrew!!
Wait! Today is Valentine’s Day? Thanks for the reminder, Tamela. You might have saved my marriage. I gotta get busy.
Christian romance is always more appealing than the world’s perspective. I’m thankful the Lord redeems us and our mess!
Happy Valentine’s Day, Tamela!
I love how Christian Fiction represents clean love scenarios while sharing God’s love in a non-threatening or preachy way. Your article is spot-on, Tamela.
What a great balance you share in your points on Christian publishing, Ms. Murray. Christian publishing speaks to people from many perspectives (not just Christian). This is very encouraging.
I have read your name in the acknowledgments of a number of novels (including Lynette Eason’s novella, “On the Run.” How encouraging to those of us in the early stages of this journey.
Happy Valentine Day Tamela and all the staff at Steve Laube Agency!
God is love and he who, abides in love, abides in God and God in him.
Thank you for ending with:God is love.
It reminded me of the above song and scripture.
Blessings.
Wonderful article Tamela. Thanks for writing and posting it. I enjoyed it a lot.
These times may be a-changin’ faster than Bob Dylan ever dreamed. I watched a Netflix tv series because the plot was good. Fast-warded through the “romance”, then just gave up. I wanted to grab the characters and shout “NO WONDER YOU’RE SO UNHAPPY! YOU’RE ON A DEAD END STREET!”
I dislike the predictability of many Christian romance. We can do better.
Look for “The Three Kisses” soon…unless the staff talks me into a different name.
I love your perspective, Tamela, and couldn’t agree more. It encourages me to keep on writing solid romance stories with old fashioned values for today’s reader. Thank you for sharing.
I appreciate the perspective. However, I would like to see Christian romance take into consideration couples that aren’t physically or internally perfect.
What about those with physical or other “imperfections” (and I use that with utmost care). Can’t their love spark a reader’s interest to turn pages? After all, we live in an imperfect world, not everyone looks like Hercules or Aphrodite.
Does anyone know of a romance novel where, let’s say, antagonist and/or protagonist may have lost a limb, or, is overweight, or underweight, or, struggles with mental illness of one kind or another?
Just felt I had to put that out there. Thank you so much for reading. This doesn’t mean to offend anyone.
Jeannie, thanks for asking. You didn’t offend me at all. I’ll respond as a writer since I used to write romance novels, and I’ll confine my comments to genre romance rather than women’s fiction.
Romance novels are tightly written because of word count limitations. A character can mention she wishes she could drop a few pounds, but since it’s difficult to make a diet-obsessed character interesting, making weight a romance novel’s focus would be challenging for most authors.
There isn’t a lot of room to explore the difficulties of living with mental illness or a lost limb. For example, for a heroine to be diagnosed with a mental health issue on page 30 of a romance novel and then needing to go through the process of how to manage her life probably won’t work. Not only does this development mean the person needs time to adjust, but that’s not the best time to decide to marry by page 203.
There is another option, and that is that the character already copes with the struggle very well. That means seeking ongoing treatment and medications (probably) for mental health issues, or, in the case of a lost limb, simply mentioning that a character is attaching a prosthesis and going about her day. So the issue is there, but not the story focus. Personally, I wouldn’t mind reading about one of these characters, but as with any story, the entire book would have to be compelling.
That said, since you are interested enough in romance novels to comment (Thank you!) and are passionate about seeing characters dealing with various issues in print, why not write this story yourself? I hope this has helped.
Greatly appreciate your feedback, Tamela. Gives me something to think on. Nothing like inspiration!!!
All the best!!!
Jeannie
Points of wisdom. Thank you, Tamela. 🙂
Hi Tamela, I’m sorry I’m putting this out late. I have been waiting and watching for your annual “Books I’m looking for” post.
In regards to Christian romance: I fell in love with the idea of marriage being a “type” or model of our relationship with God, where he is the groom, we are the bride. It is the ultimate model for Ephesians 5. God pursues us. Everybody was/is pursued by God in some way, whether they are aware of it or not. I wrote a love story demonstrating this between two young unlikely people coinciding with the love story between God and his people, Israel, as he pursues them and woos them out of Egypt, betrothing them at Sinai. But, it would be my debut, and I’m not sure if you’re accepting new authors. What do you think? It would fit right along with Connilyn Cossette books. Thank you,
Lisa Phillips
Lisa, thanks for commenting! Sure, I’d be happy to look at your work. I didn’t post the “What I’m Looking For” blog this year because the type of books hasn’t changed. I appreciate you for asking, and I look forward to seeing your submission.
Oh thank you, Tamela! I just sent it.
I am ashamed to say I once fit in the category of looking down on Christian romance novels. Then one day, that was the door that opened for me for traditional publication, so I educated myself on the rules of writing romance and produced a novella that was included in a romance collection. When I shared my publication success with a writer “friend,”, her comment cut. She said, “Don’t you think you’re a better writer than that? You’ve sold your soul.”
She couldn’t be more wrong. While it is true my first novella was inspired by a desire to be published, not a love of the genre, I now know it was the exact path the Lord intended for me. I thank Him every day for opening my eyes to a genre that touches women’s lives in a positive encouraging way and allows me an avenue to share my love of the Lord.