Leigh Michaels

“Heroes and heroines don't commit adultery.”

“Modern romance novels tell a young woman that she can be successful, useful, and valuable on her own; that there are men who will respect her and treat her well; and that such men are worth waiting for.”

“What keeps readers turning pages is suspense, which you can create using a variety of techniques, including tension, pacing and foreshadowing.”

“The hero of a mainstream stand-alone novel can get by with things the hero of a sweet traditional category romance wouldn't dream of doing.”

“In a romance novel, the core story is the developing relationship between a man and a woman. The other events in the story line, though important, are secondary to that relationship.”

“For readers worldwide, the attraction of romance novels seems to be that they provide hope, strength, and the assurance that happy endings are possible. Romance makes the promise that no matter how bleak things sometimes look, in the end everything will turn out right and true love will triumph -- and in an uncertain world, that's very comforting.”

“A soup manufacturer uses the same colors and design on every label to catch the consumer's eye and assure her that she's getting brand-name quality, whether she's buying bean soup or corn chowder or cream of tomato.”

“Romantic heroes and heroines are a bit different from the sort of people we run into every day.”

“A romance novel is more than just a story in which two people fall in love. It's a very specific form of genre fiction. Not every story with a horse and a ranch in it is a Western; not every story with a murder in it is a mystery; and not every book that includes a love story can be classified as a romance novel.”

“Main characters should grow and change during the course of a story.”

“Suspense arises naturally from good writing - it's not a spice to be added separately.”

“If significant amounts of time go by without suspenseful action - which is often most powerfully motivated by backstory - the story loses momentum, and readers lose interest.”