20 Steps to Writing Great Love Scenes by Karen Wiesner Have you ever read a love scene so perfect, your

heart is full, your body is abo ut to explode, your eyes are wet and you actually want to cry out at the beauty you've witnessed? Do you forget you've been reading "mere" words instead of expe riencing the most emotional, exciting moment of your own life? Do you have the u rge to light up a cigarette to savor the moment when it's done? Authors don't write these scenes with "mere words." We know there is no such thi ng as mere words. Words are arguably the most powerful form of communication in the world when it comes to playing with a reader's emotions. Here are twenty steps to learning how to write love scenes that will live on in your readers' memories forever. Please note that I've used examples from my own work throughout -- not because I believe I'm the only writer who can write effec tive love scenes, but because I'm a self-promoter to the extreme. Following thes e twenty steps, I'll list some of the greatest authors of love scenes. STEP ONE: Decide what you're comfortable reading and writing. It's becoming very vogue to write romance novels so hot, they'll melt in your ha nds. Does that mean you should join the crowd? Not necessary. It's a rare thing that an author will write a book with a level of sensuality they're not comforta ble with because they'll automatically choose characters that fit their own comf ort level. But don't dismiss the possibility simply because you're unfamiliar wi th the genre or assume that you don't have what it takes to kick it up a notch. You might want to introduce yourself slowly to these steamier stories, if you ha ve a story in mind that requires something a little more racy than you're used t o. Read a little of everything to figure out what suits your writing style best. I remember when I first started reading romances, I was a teenager and, at that point in my life, I was satisfied with both the Harlequin teen offerings as well as some of the raciest types of books around (Carter Brown Mysteries.) In my tw enties, I got a little more conservative in my reading, yet in my own writing I realized that the stories I had in mind required more overt sexuality. I started reading a wide range of books, acclimating myself to sexuality in books again a nd finding out what I liked and what I didn't. I discovered that I liked Silhoue tte Intimate Moments because the emotional and physical love scenes were nicely balanced. A lot of the other category romances were too unbalanced (either all s ex, no emotions or all emotions, no sex) for my tastes. I also found that I like d the more racy "romantic erotica" most, as long as the emotions and characteriz ations were on even ground. STEP TWO: Let your characters decide the level of intimacy, not publisher guidel ines. I used to base everything I wrote on what the publishers might buy. I suppose it makes some sense to do that when you're not published. Target your publisher, t hen tailor what you write to that set of guidelines. Sounds logical, right? I'm not so sure. A part of me really believes that the reason I didn't sell all thos e years was because I was trying to write for everyone else except myself and wh at fit my characters. If you're writing for someone else, you're not writing wha t's in your heart... and it's going to show. The same is true for love scenes. In every one of my books, the level of intimac y is a little different, depending on what that particular hero and heroine dict ate. Restless as Rain and Forever Man are strongly what I dub "romantic erotica" because the emotions are as hot as the physical lovemaking. The characters in t

hese books are very extreme, larger than life and they demand a sexuality that s uits their personalities. In First Love, the sexual tension is definitely there from start to finish and the love scenes are satisfying without being overtly er otic. However, the hero and heroine in this book are in need of emotional healin g, more so than sexual healing. Their lovemaking is part of that healing process , and it suited them to have emotionally sensual loves scenes rather than down-a nd-dirty, deep ones. Leather & Lace, my first published book, was completely dif ferent. The heroine in the book was very innocent and naive. When she thought of lovemaking, it was always in a more "romantic" sense and, because she was so pr ivate, having more low-key love scenes were appropriate. The sexual tension rema ined throughout, however. STEP THREE: Respect your readers. Give them what you promise. I read a Silhouette Intimate Moments a couple years, when they first introduced their "mainstream" theme, that was a wonderfully written story. Ultimately, howe ver, I finished the book so disappointed I had to write to the editors about it. This was a story that had all the ingredients of a fantastic read. So why was I disappointed? I was expecting a romance, a romance that would blossom and the c haracters come to life as they fell in love. What I got was a romance that was a shadow to the external mystery and characters that came to life mostly in the e xternal aspects. I felt very little for the characters in terms of their love bo nd. When they married at the end, I was only mildly glad. That same month, I read a Terry Brooks fantasy novel that contained a secondary element of romance that was never brought to complete fruition. I finished the b ook and immediately started the next in that series, completely satisfied. So why was I disappointed with the romance I bought, but not with the fantasy? B ecause in the first, I fully expected a good, solid romance that was equally bal anced with a good, solid plot. After all, I bought a Silhouette and I expected a romance, but, dammit, I didn't get it. I felt cheated. In the fantasy, I never expected a romance, but there was one there nevertheless. I felt I'd gotten some thing extra for my money and time. The moral of this story: Respect your readers for the time and money they invest in your book. If you set them up for a romance, give it to them in spades. If y ou set them up for a heavy, emotional drama, give it to them. If you set them up for a steamy romance that keep getting hotter and hotter, deliver it. If you do n't give them what you promised them, you'll leave your readers dissatisfied, ma ybe enough to avoid your next book. STEP FOUR: Make love scenes real instead of hokey or overly sentimental. Writing love scenes effectively is very hard to do, yet they're no harder to do write than an action scene. A friend of mine told me recently that the editor-in -chief of a major trade house skips the love scenes when she reads because so ma ny are utterly boring. Isn't that sad? So how do you make your love scenes real? People and relationships are tricky things. The word "normal" in the real world is an impossibility because if you broke down each person into the components t hey're made up of, you'd find someone who is illogical, contradictory, good and evil. You'd find the makings of a hero and quite possibly the makings of a Mr. H yde. When you're writing a character, you're exploring those illogical, contradi ctory, good and evil people and their relationships. You need those things to ma ke a character three-dimensional. The relationship between a man and a woman is, I feel, the most complex one in e xistence. Here you have two people, each with their own emotional baggage, screw ball ways and contractions trying to (or fighting against!) merging their separa te paths into one. The road to that point is utterly fascinating. You make your

love scenes real by making your characters real. A fully fleshed out character w ill make your reader look at the world around them and the people in it in brand new ways. And a fully developed character will certainly make you want to find out what turns them on. STEP FIVE: Use exaggerated awareness. "Exaggerated awareness" -- the first time I heard this term was from Sandra Brow n. I can't imagine anything else that fits what sexual tension needs to be in a romance more aptly. In romantic fiction, an exaggerated awareness between the he ro and heroine is so crucial, it can't be overstated. In a romance, you take for granted that these two were destined, meant to be, fated, designed for each oth er by God Himself. Therefore, every single look, touch, sense is made larger tha n life between them. The sexual tension must reach the breaking point and satisf y the reader (and characters) only temporarily until happily ever after. When th e hero touches the heroine, even accidentally, the reader can see sparks ignitin g between them. When he looks at her, a profound feeling comes over the characte rs and the reader. The emotional impact needs to be conveyed through their every encounter. STEP SIX: Start sexual tension from the get-go. Exaggerated awareness between your hero and heroine needs to begin immediately, the first time they come together in your novel, and it needs to increase in dep th with each subsequent meeting. I remember I was critiquing a story for an unpublished writer a couple years ago , and we were at least halfway through the story. At this point, I not only didn 't feel many sparks between her hero and heroine during their encounters, I was utterly humiliated when they began making love (though the actual event was, tha nkfully!, thwarted.) There's only one of two reasons for a reader not wanting a love scene to take pl ace: 1) they picked up a spicy book accidentally, or 2) the writer didn't set th e stage for love scenes early or enough. If there's no tension between a couple, no exaggerated awareness, a love scene is going to shock and embarrass the read er as much as it will the characters. The last thing a writer wants is a sensual scene that's awkward. When a hero and heroine finally come together for a kiss, an intimate touch or lovemaking, the reader has to be exulted, panting for cons ummation, ready to claw tooth and nail to see that these two characters have a c lear path to the bedroom and aren't interrupted while there! And, most of all, t hey'll be satisfied when all is said and done. In this example, the hero and heroine are in the room together for the first tim e in two years. This is also the first time they're in a room together in the bo ok, so technically it's their very first encounter. Notice the details as you re ad this excerpt: It's as if time stands still for the heroine during those minut es of facing him without warning. The way they look at each other, their breathi ng, right down to the sound of their voices when they talk reveals the depth of their feelings for one another. Before she could finish -- and fathom the strangely uncomfortable expression on her father's face -- the back door opened. Lori not only lost her train of thought, she lost all coordination. Why didn't I prepare myself for this possibility? her chaotic mind wailed. How c ould she prepare herself? Prepare herself for a man who'd left her utterly bonel ess every time he looked her way when she was just a teenager. A man who, now at thirty-eight, affected her twice what he had in her troubled teen years. Ten ti mes that!

Their gazes met and locked, sweeping her out of reality on a tidal wave of emoti on, like always. Why had nothing changed? She'd been gone for so long, any reaction to him should have been mild. She'd been all over the world, she'd met and dated a lot of oth er men. She'd somehow convinced herself Blackie was a brief part of her reckless youth...a part that had no ground in reality. Certainly not in her present or f uture. God, he was sexy. Dark, dangerous, that sense of the untamed just barely suppres sed below the surface.... His face was more mature, more shuttered than ever before, and impossibly handso me. He had dark eyes that seemed to hold all the mysteries in the universe, a lo ng nose that flared slightly when he was mad, frustrated. Or aroused. The featur es of his face seemed to be carved from stone. At one time, she'd known every li ne, each texture. She'd actually believed she'd known the man... the inner man w ho remained an enigma even to his closest friends. I loved you. God, I've never loved anyone the way I loved you. I would have give n you everything I had to give if you'd only let me in a little. Vows & the Vagabond by Karen Wiesner It's just as important to create an exaggerated awareness in a book where the he ro and heroine have never met before. It should be conveyed as if something is m issing in this character's life and they recognize that missing piece--even if i t's only subconsciously -- when they meet their eventual soul-mate. For instance , in Leather & Lace, the hero has always longed for a woman who's a little shy a nd inexperienced with men, one who'd love children and the whole forever-after t hing. He sees that in the heroine as soon as he meets her and it creates a breat hless tension until they meet again. One more piece of that puzzle needs to come together every single time your hero and heroine are in a room together, or sim ply in each other's thoughts. STEP SEVEN: Don't use purple prose, hokey euphemisms, words or phrases that make you uncomfortable. But do use words that are appropriate, even if you're a litt le uncomfortable with them. Your characters are trying to tell you it's a word t hey would use. The key to writing a great love scene is to not get mired in either the emotiona l aspect or the physical for too long. Don't let your characters get so swept aw ay, they're riding on a cloud of the author's "purple prose" rather than the emo tions of the most intimate form of bonding imaginable. At the same time, don't l et your characters get so involved in the physical act that it becomes, quite di sappointingly, mere sex. Readers don't want to hear all those cotton-soft euphem isms any more than they want to hear anything inappropriate to the scene. They w ant each sense to be well explored -- seeing, hearing, smelling, touching, tasti ng. Don't neglect the "jarring" senses either, like talking, moving, thinking, b ecause that's where the sense of reality enters in. Here's a good test of whether a word is good enough to use in a love scene. Say it out loud while you're right in the midst of the love scene you're writing. Do es it make you hot? Hotter? Or does it make you laugh out loud? If you laugh out loud, that's a pretty solid indication that it's not a word you should use beca use your readers will probably do the same. I've been stopped many times while r eading love scenes by words and phrases like: "his manhood bobbed up and down li ke a flagpole", "his rod of pleasure", "her honey pot" or "they soared on the wi ngs of love and exploded into infinity." I cringe or I laugh.

Along the same lines, you may consider certain words too crude, rude or shocking to use in a romance novel. But what if those words fit the character's personal ity? What if it's something you know they would say? When I was writing Forever Man, I kept writing a scene that required a pretty cr ude word that I don't use in my regular conversations, let alone my intimate one s. I kept shying away from the word too. So I used the test I mentioned above an d said it out loud. It definitely made me hotter, and not simply out of embarras sment at saying something like it. It simply refused to go away. Every single ti me I read the scene, I thought, 'He should think this. He has to. Brett would de finitely think something this erotically, shockingly crude.' So I finally put it in. Now, whenever I read this scene, I feel the hero is so fleshed out, he coul d step out of the scene and leave me breathless in reality! I'm glad I got past my own shyness enough to include it. STEP EIGHT: Set the scene and the mood for yourself and your characters. How do you get yourself into the mood to write a love scene? Set the scene in yo ur mind. Set the scene in your own living room if it helps you. Take note of thi ngs in their natural form. Scents, sights, tastes, sounds, textures. Indulge in pleasure. Light scented candles, peel an orange, play romantic and/or sexy music , put silk or lace or velvet against your own skin. Dab your husband's cologne o n yourself. Put on his jacket. Don't answer the doorbell or the phone! STEP NINE: Don't forget the genre you're writing in. Imagine the sensuality of a love scene in a romantic horror novel where the hero ine both fears and is helplessly attracted to the mysterious, potentially danger ous hero. The heroine would be aware of the temperature of the room, the coldnes s, and the way she warms when the hero appears in the doorway. She would be awar e of that shift of tension within and without her own body. She'd be aware of he r palpable fear and excitement, warring with each other. She'd be aware of the s hadows of the room, the shadows in his face, on his body. The moonlight spilling across the stone floor. She'd be aware of the hero's smell, primal and raw. She 'd start at the slightest sound and would hear her own heartbeat and bated breat hing in the eerie absence of sound that follows. His voice would both unnerve he r and catapult her excitement... You can apply these sensations to any genre of romance. STEP TEN: Use your characters background and experiences in your love scenes. Your characters will help you choose the words they would use in a love scene. F or instance, when writing the first love scene in Restless as Rain, I found myse lf using "musical" references for the erotic acts they performed, since the char acters were musicians. In Falling Star, the heroine is a dancer and she dances f or the hero their first time, doing a sensual striptease that takes him past bea ring simply watching her without touching her. In Forever Man, the hero is a mec hanic and a "road warrior." He thinks in terms of revved engines, power, ultimat e freedom. Both the hero and the heroine are extremely raw, violently emotional and, occasionally, vocally rough people, so their love scenes had to fit their p ersonalities. STEP ELEVEN: Choose your point-of-view very carefully. I've heard many, many people advise writing every love scene in both the heroine and hero's point-of-view. Naturally you know what works best for your books. Gi ven that I'm a never-say-never type of person, I wouldn't advise anyone to never use two viewpoints in the same scene. Regardless, I caution against it. First o f all, why spend the entire book trying so hard to stay in one viewpoint at a ti

me, only to hop between two suddenly and wantonly? You'll confuse and possibly a nnoy the reader instead of deepen the connection. It makes more sense to make a decision from the very beginning of the book: Will you write in two points of vi ew in any given scene or will you write in one at a time? Second, you can't give both of their reactions to every single thing alternately . That would definitely be annoying and overkill. Therefore, when you give both points-of-view in the same scene, you're shortchanging one of the characters "al ternately." When I write love scenes, I write it in one point of view. After eac h love scene, I give the pertinent reactions of the other person (the one who wa sn't in POV during the scene) in introspection. I feel you heighten the intrigue of the individual characters by staying consistent with POV. STEP TWELVE: Decide if you want to write chronologically or like an author on ac id. Another thing I've heard is authors say they make notes of where love scenes sho uld fit in while they're writing, then write all the love scenes last. My opinio n? I've never seen this go-where-I'm-inspired, chaotic way of writing work effec tively for any author. If you leave out scenes and write them last, you change e verything by adding it. You have to alter everything a little bit because you ne ed to make sure the scene in question blends with all the others. This is an illogical way to work. Your book won't be seamless if you don't write chronologically. It'll sound like the author (the characters too?) is on acid. Keep in mind that each sensual scene should be an outreach, a layering of the ch aracters, showing their growth toward each other. If you just drop things in lat er, you lose the mood, the momentum and the cohesion from once scene to the next . Writing chronologically, everything will fall into place naturally. The progre ssion and tension increase without taking the reader out of the book to wonder i f the scene actually fits. STEP THIRTEEN: Remember, it's all in the details. Another trick to making sexual tension prominent between scenes is to focus on a certain aspect that intrigues the opposite character. Each characteristic, quir k or little act builds on what's happening in the story and makes it more powerf ul. For instance, in my novel Fire & Ice, the hero is obsessed with the heroine's mo uth from the beginning. You can imagine how he reacts the first time he actually kisses it. In another of my novels, an erotic obsession began early in the book with the he roine watching the hero drink from a bottle of beer. This common act is palpably exciting to her. As soon as he leaves the room, she picks up that bottle and pu ts her own mouth on it. The hero comes back to find her drinking his beer. This increases the sexual tension between them until the fantasy finally becomes real ity. In my novel Reluctant Hearts, the heroine loves the way the hero smells, so much so that she tries to buy his cologne to wear herself but can't find exactly the right scent that matches his. The first time she enters his apartment, she duck s into his bathroom and snoops for it... and ends up spilling it on herself, so the hero knows she was snooping when she comes out. This sensual awareness incre ased the tension considerably. STEP FOURTEEN: Dialogue is sexy -- use it to its fullest. Can you imagine having sex in utter silence? Wouldn't it be embarrassing? The sa

me is true in writing love scenes. Using dialogue within a scene of sensual awar eness can heighten the erotic edge immeasurably. Just a few words can prompt eno ugh excitement to make your reader unbearably uncomfortable. Anger between the hero and heroine can also be as thrilling as movements: She burst into his room, momentarily flummoxed about the fact that he hadn't loc ked it. "You're a coward!" He turned from the window, full body. His eyes were so intense, they resembled g lowing coals. "You're not going to do this to me again. I won't let you." Without the slightest warning, he stalked toward her. Lori's breath stuck in her throat. He was going to walk out of here and she didn't have a clue where he wo uld go if he got as far as his car -He did walk past her but instead of marching through the door, he slammed it clo sed and locked it. When he spun back, a bolt of exhilarated fear went through her. She had no idea what he thought, what he planned to do...and she was afraid he'd come to his sen ses and not do any of it. That he'd leave her, as the song said, all revved up w ith no place to go. She tried to swallow, but he was suddenly so close to her she couldn't even thin k. Not only did he reach for her, he went straight for the buttons on her light cardigan. Instead of unbuttoning it, he tore her shirt open. Lori heard the scat ter of buttons hitting the wood floor but never allowed her gaze to leave his fa ce. "Why can't you leave it alone, dammit?" he asked in a low, don't-answer-me-or-th is-is-over tone. He undressed her as if annoyed by the whole convention of wearing clothes. He wa nted them off and wanted them off ASAP. "Damn, you're beautiful, Princess." Tears filled her eyes at his unexpected, almost unwilling worship. But instead o f increasing her need for tenderness, the tears made her feel needy, greedy... I told you you can do no wrong in my father's eyes. You can do no wrong in mine either. There's nothing I wouldn't let you do to me, Lori thought desperately as his body covered hers and he kissed her at last. Vows & the Vagabond by Karen Wiesner Watch how dialogue heightens the erotic edge, even if the characters aren't talk ing about anything erotic, as in this excerpt: Paul entered the hallway, and her face flushed even as she told herself he was o n his way to the men's restroom. Nothing would happen here. But as she walked pa st, muttering, "See you later" casually, her head on fire, he grabbed her arm an d turned her toward the wall. It seemed only a second passed, so fast she didn't know how she got there and di dn't even consider analyzing it. Paul was there, leaning against her, his arm so close to her head she could have curled into it if she had the guts. Bad enough that she couldn't breathe, speak, swallow or hear anything outside of her own p ainfully thudding heartbeat. She must have looked like a deer caught in headligh ts.

"You wanna get together?" he asked in a low voice that had her wanting to melt o n the floor until she became nothing more than a puddle at his feet. Managing to swallow past the baseball lump in her throat, she choked out, "To do what?" He shrugged. She wanted to reach back, carefully unlace the leather strap holdin g his hair in place and touch him. "I don't know. Bake cookies. Read Arabian Nights. Watch old movies." Maybe it was foolish or childish, but she couldn't help asking, "Are you serious ?" "Why not?" he said on a roguish grin that made her dizzy with her own desire. "I haven't had a good cookie in a long time." She was reading into it. His tone wasn't downright lewd. Was it? God, she was so excited, she was afraid her heart would beat right out of her chest...or she'd do something stupid like throw herself into his arms and scream, "I love you, I love you, I love you!!!" "You know how to bake, don't you?" Wendy laughed slightly. "I make a mean chocolate chip," she told him, breathless ly bold. "Mhm. My favorite. The whole bag of chips, right?" His arm slid down and then his fingers tangled with a strand of her hair. Oh now! Just take me now. Pick me up in your arms and take me to your cave. I su rrender. "But of course." Reluctant Hearts by Karen Wiesner STEP FIFTEEN: Definitely use humor in love scenes, if it works. Don't be afraid of humor, even in an introspective or dramatic book. Tenderness can sometimes cross the line into sentimental and, depending on the situation or characters you're creating, humor could ease the tension long enough to give th e reader a magical glimpse into the depth and three-dimensionality of your chara cters. He came down, into her arms, gasping and breathless as he threaded his arms bene ath her shoulders and hair. The look in his eyes was naked with emotion. "Don't cry," he whispered, nuzzling her cheek as she hugged him viciously and her body wracked with sobs. "I can't help it. I don't want it to go away. I don't want to let go of you." He smiled ever so slightly, looking in some ways like an uninhibited child, as h e gazed down at her. "Does this have anything to do with the fact that I'm gonna get sunburn on my rear end?" Restless as Rain by Karen Wiesner STEP SIXTEEN: Ask yourself if you should "raise the stakes" physically or emotio

nally... or both. Another thing I've heard both editors and writers say is "You have to raise the stakes with each encounter", be it with a look, a touch, a kiss or lovemaking. A gain, this is a theory I don't fully agree with. We're writing romance, not porn ography, ladies. There isn't a fine line between these two genres at all. Romanc e has an equal balance between sexuality and emotional bonding. Pornography has sex, little or no bonding. The biggest problem with the "raise the stakes" theor y is that the stakes involved in a romance are emotional, not necessarily physic al. If it matches your book to continue to raise the sexual stakes, go with it, by all means! But remember that it's not always appropriate. It might be more ap propriate to raise the emotional stakes instead. Or to raise both the emotional and sexual stakes. In Forever Man, each love scene increased the sexual intimacy as well as the emo tional bonding. The couple was red hot. It was appropriate to do so. In Reluctan t Hearts, the emotional stakes were so high that it overshadowed the erotic plea sure, although their encounters remained highly sensual, if not graphic. STEP SEVENTEEN: Emphasize the physical, but not at the expense of the emotional. Equalize the two as if on an analytical balance. I admit it, I love reading "sexy books" (as my father-in-law is so fond of calli ng romance novels!) It might make me strange, but I absolutely adore writing lov e scenes too. Why do I love them? Because I'm a nymphomaniac or a bored housewif e who just doesn't get enough? I'd probably be more interesting if I could claim either of those, but the truth is I read and write romance novels because they' re about relationships. Love scenes employ a wonderful combination of raw physical need and breathtaking emotional intimacy. The most exciting thing about writing a book to me is not a ction scenes or heart-pounding excitement from page to page. Writing a novel is about creating a character and making him or her so real, you'd never know that it's fiction if the book package didn't have a line that reads "All characters a re fictional." All action, all heart-pounding excitement stems from the characte rs. If I can make you laugh and cry, want to throw your arms around my character (s) or even throw a chair at them, I feel I've done my job. If I make you want m y hero so bad, you're all over your husband that night, I'm ecstatic. I've creat ed a three-dimensional character that a real person can interact and feel with. The reason I love romance novels with a high degree of sexuality is because thes e are two characters who get to know each other down to appendix scars. Every em otion is emphasized and the reader feels everything the characters do. I can ful ly immerse myself in them and live vicariously through them. I know everything t hey know, go through everything they go through, feel everything they feel and I 'm privy to everything they think. Sexy books that don't emphasize the emotional in the same scale as the physical are disappointing. It's simply not enjoyable to me and most lovers of romance to read about two people going at it like dogs when little or no emotional ties co nnect them. Sure, the two may end up together, but how can the reader feel as mu ch for them as they want to? In that case, the reader becomes a voyeur and not s imply someone who longs to get inside another mind and who loves to fall in love . STEP EIGHTEEN: Remember, less can be more. You can't write out every love scene in detail, but what if you still want all o f them to be sensual? Sometimes a very short scene can sum up an erotic encounte r better than two to five pages of graphic detail can. Writing succinct love sce

nes isn't easy, but it's a useful skill to learn. Some of the most erotically em otional scenes I've ever written were not graphic. But they were equally satisfy ing to both the characters and the reader. STEP NINETEEN: Don't write sex for the sake of sex or simply to fill pages. Some of romance novels I've read from traditional publishers are very exacting, especially in category romances. First kiss must occur by this page, first lovem aking by that page, and if the rest of the plot is a little weak, throw in a cou ple more love scenes as filler. It's sad that publishers require authors to comp romise a story just to fill pages or because sex, sex and more sex is the theme of that particular imprint. The heart of every romance novel should be the emotional bond between the hero a nd heroine. Everything else is a layer of that emotional bond--be it children, i nternal or external conflicts, and, yes, lovemaking. Don't lose sight of that as you write your love scenes. Make each love scene count, make it advance the plo t and make it necessary to building the emotional bond into something unbreakabl e. STEP TWENTY: Reveal something with each love scene. As we said, don't use love scene for the sake of filling pages or just to write sex. That's cheating everyone. Love scenes should be as crucial to the plot of a romance novel as any other element of the plot. Don't just throw them in for no good reason. Reveal something with each of these love scenes. Reveal the charac ter(s), advance some element of the plot, reveal hidden emotions -- even if only from one character to the reader and not to another character -- like an admiss ion of guilt... or of love. If you can completely take a love scene out and it w on't affect the story in any way, you've probably got an extraneous scene on you r hands. Treat it the way you would any other extraneous scene. Cut it ruthlessl y and don't look back. Love scenes can be a chore. They can make editors and readers skip to the next c hapter to avoid the boredom, purple prose or embarrassment. Or they can be writt en so perfectly, your heart is full, your body is about to explode, your eyes ar e wet and you actually want to cry out at the beauty of what you've created. You 'll forget you're writing words instead of experiencing the most emotional, exci ting moment of your life. You may even have the urge to light up a cigarette to savor the moment. Copyright 2002 Karen Wiesner