12 Tips for Creating and Maintaining Romantic Tension in Fiction

When Writer’s Digest asked me for tips for raising and lowering the guard of characters in romance novels—I confess, I was slightly bemused. But after some thought, I decided they were asking about maintaining tension between the romantic leads.

(11 Tips for Writing a Regency Romance.)

Tension on the page, whether in a romance or another kind of book, is what keeps a reader reading. Readers of genre romance know from the start that the hero and heroine will end up happily together—that’s the promise of genre romance. So the question is not if they will end up happily together, but how they get to that point. It’s rarely an easy journey—and therein lies the fascination.

The path of love must never run too smoothly—readers want their heroes/heroines to earn their happy ending. So your task is to build a believable attraction between your protagonists, then create believable obstacles to their pursuing that attraction.

1) Dig Deep Into Your Characters

Romance is a character-driven genre and to create an engrossing, believable romance, you need to dig deep into your characters. Who are they? What do they want? What do they need—which is often not at all what they think they want. Work out their strengths and also their areas of vulnerability.

2) Identify Areas of Vulnerability

These might come from past experiences, childhood issues, prejudices of various kinds, even secrets. It might be something the protagonist either actively suppresses or is unaware s/he has, or believes s/he is capable of. Exploiting these vulnerabilities through plot will drive your novel, as the characters avoid or confront and learn to deal with—or are forced to face—their prejudices and inner demons.

Most peoples’ instincts are to protect their vulnerable spots, so while their attraction draws them together, their protective instincts might make them draw back. If done well, this push-pull dynamic creates wonderful tension.

3) It’s a Dance (and Maybe an Onion)

Think of the romance as a dance—two steps forward, one step back. Or perhaps your story is an onion, and as each new layer is revealed, it exposes something that causes one (or both) protagonists to draw back initially. But to earn their happy ending they must find a way to overcome their doubts/uncertainties/fears. Readers will be asking, Will they? Won’t they? Creating uncertainty and interest is the key.

4) Make a Strong First Impression

‘First Impressions’ was the title that Jane Austen originally gave to Pride and Prejudice and to make that final ending happy, both characters needed to confront their prejudices (and their pride) and to look deeper into the other character. In a romance, first impressions, whether positive or negative, are vital.

When the hero and heroine meet for the first time there is often an unmistakable sexual attraction. They may not recognize it at first, but the reader certainly will. And you need to build on that awareness.

5) Turning Points

Most romance novels work through a series of turning points. A turning point is when something happens that changes the direction of the story—and they can’t go back. The first meeting and first impressions is one, where now that they’ve met, they can’t go backwards and ‘unmeet.’ Whatever their feelings about each other, they must deal with them—either move closer together or try to move away.

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6) Keep Them Together

A piece of advice I once heard was “Throw your characters into a crucible—and then add heat.” In other words, put characters in a situation that keeps them together and put them under pressure, so they’re forced to work together. And if in the process, they’re forced to confront and overcome an area of vulnerability, so much the better.

7) The First Kiss

The first kiss is often another turning point. It will spark a whole raft of feelings, generally it knocks their socks off, but it might also cause one (or both) of the characters to feel vulnerable in some way and pull back. Perhaps the other person is not who they think they should be attracted to, perhaps they have obligations elsewhere, perhaps the kiss awakens unwelcome memories, or perhaps things are simply moving too fast for one of the characters. 

The reasons will lie deep in your characters’ psyches. The same goes for any really intimate scene. Lovemaking can be a glorious experience, or it can create more difficulties. And sometimes it’s both.

8) Overcoming the Barriers

In subsequent scenes, the romance (and the story) progresses—two steps forward, one step back. Everything seems to be progressing wonderfully, and then something happens that hits a point of vulnerability—and someone pulls back. And that, whatever it is, needs to be dealt with before the romance can progress. 

But at any point either partner could step away, so try to exploit that uncertainty so readers are wondering will they? Won’t they? And wondering how they will overcome their difficulties to make that very necessary commitment to love. Remember, the readers want them to succeed.

9) Why Characters Pull Back

An event or incident might spark doubts in one or other of the characters, and as a result they pull back in some way. For instance:

S/he isn’t the person I thought they were. The romance is moving too fast/too slowThey don’t want the same things out of the relationship—or think they don’tThe revelation of a secret throws someone in a different lightThey come from different worlds and the difficulties seem insuperableCareless words have wounded one or the otherDoubts about the other’s motivation

Characters are rarely particularly self-aware, and like many people, will often be in denial about what holds them back, but writers must have a clear understanding of what motivates their characters at any one point, and readers will enjoy interpreting the action and understanding more than the character does.

10) Try to Avoid the ‘Big Mis’

The ‘big mis’ is reader talk for the big misunderstanding that keeps our romantic couple apart for whole chapters, when a simple question could solve it. For instance: “Who was that beautiful woman I saw you hugging the other night?” “My sister.”

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11) Build to the Dark Moment

Often the tension will build to a “dark moment”—a climax in which all seems lost—the worst thing happens in the worst way and you wonder how they will come back from that. It’s often something that needs to happen—the breaking through of an emotional barrier, the confrontation of a problem, the revelation of a secret. It might feel dreadful (for one or both protagonists) at the time, but it’s necessary and leads to healing afterwards.

12) Create the Happy Ending

The best kind of happy ending is where the reader feels both protagonists really deserve each other and are convinced that their love will last and grow for the future of the characters. And if the characters have really been put through the wringer, and confronted their inner demons, they will deserve that happy ending even more.