Getting Inside the Romantic Hero’s Head––Part I

Contrary to popular belief, the male is the key to any romance. The female may be the “lead” character, but the male, and we’ve talked about the different types (alpha and beta) is the key to the romance. It’s also well-known that most readers of romance are women. Women identify with the heroine of the story. A woman who just wants to be loved like the hero loves the heroine. Click to Tweet #InsideHerosHead #almostanauthor #writingromance101

A romance is written through the two main points of view (POV). The feelings and thoughts of each of the two lead characters is the bulk of the romance.

The male’s reactions and feelings are revealed through scenes from his POV. Which means we get inside his head to know what he’s thinking.

Let’s take the contemporary romance we’ve been working on lately between Tovah and Judah. What we want to do in this series is get into Judah’s head and find out what he’s thinking. We’ve already said a bit about his character, but during this series, we’ll look at everything concerning Judah.

What he thinks. Why he thinks it.

Being in the hero’s head is all about mastering that POV. The tension in the scenes between Tovah and Judah is what will define this romance. We’ve established that every scene must create that romantic tension.

Getting into Judah’s head will ramp it up. That’s why most romance is only two points of view. We’ll talk more about that in the next few posts.

The reader of a romance wants to know what the hero is thinking, feeling, and hiding. His feeling and reactions––generate the readers’ feelings and reactions even more than the heroine’s. Why?  Every woman wishes she could elicit in the man she loves what the hero brings out of his heroine, just by loving her. Click to Tweet #InsideHerosHead #donnalhsmith #writingromance101