Romance Genre Structure and Learning to Dance Within Its Boundaries

Genre structure can be at once incredibly freeing and challenging to a writer. On one hand you have a roadmap, while on the other hand you’re telling a story where the forward motion is not fueled by the ending alone but by the crafting and the telling. For readers, genre structure provides the familiarity and comfort that draws them to reading romance with the promise of both emotional upheaval and satisfaction. Personally, I’m interested in pushing the boundaries of the genre in terms of story while still utilizing convention-familiarity to diversify the worlds and settings. I’ll explore the two unlikely things that have helped me with this: My background in architecture, where you get to dream in form as long as you understand structure and design requirements, and my lifelong interest in Bollywood films which share the same audience expectations and storytelling conventions as the romance genre.