Lyss Em's Blog

In a previous blog post, I discussed the six essential plot points and one optional plot point that readers expect to see in a romance novel. However, a novel that only has one scene for each of these and no more probably isn’t complete (or is a novella or short story), and thinking of a […]

In a romance, your reader has to fall in love with your characters. It helps if at least one of those characters—usually the more dominant or masculine one—is positively drool-worthy. What makes a romance character sexy? For masculine characters (my specialty as an M/M romance author), rock-hard muscles and a height over six feet tend to […]

As a writer, I love dialogue. As an editor… Well, my feelings are a little less fuzzy, especially when it comes to interrupted dialogue. When I was editing my first few books, I had to refer to reference materials a lot more than I do lately, and though the go-to guide for fiction, The Chicago Manual of […]

As a writer, I love dialogue. As an editor… Well, my feelings are a little less fuzzy, especially when it comes to interrupted dialogue. When I was editing my first few books, I had to refer to reference materials a lot more than I do lately, and though the go-to guide for fiction, The Chicago Manual of […]

Do you want to get better at using tropes in your M/M romances? Or maybe you’d just like to have a comprehensive list of them handy for whenever you’re coming up with your next great story. My short little guide, M/M Romance Tropes: What They Are and How to Use Them to Plan, Plot, and […]

Recently, I have gotten really into bullet journaling, and it has honestly changed my life. If you’re not familiar with the concept, a bullet journal is kind of like a customized planner, but it can be much more than a planner. The system was originally created by Ryder Carroll and accommodates pretty much anything you […]

One of the most challenging parts of writing fiction is crafting characters who feel like real people. And if you’re someone who has written multiple books like I have, you might find it hard to come up with characters who feel real and who are also different from the other characters you’ve written. Personally, I’ve tried a […]

Dan Harmon, the man behind Community and Rick and Morty, created an explanation of story structure called the Plot Embryo or Story Circle, and it is changing my life. It’s a simpler way of thinking about the Hero’s Journey plot structure, which I’ve always struggled to apply to romance. But the Plot Embryo is simple […]

I’m an author and an editor, but I’m a reader first. Here are a few of the M/M romance books I read and loved in January, February, and March of 2019. Omega Released by Tanya Chris Why I Loved It: I’m a huge fan of A/B/O, and Tanya Chris delivers it without Mpreg, which is […]

The post Recommended M/M Romance Reads January–March 2019 first appeared on Lyss Em.

I’m an author and an editor, but I’m a reader first. Here are a few of the M/M romance books I read and loved in January, February, and March of 2019. Omega Released by Tanya Chris Why I Loved It: I’m a huge fan of A/B/O, and Tanya Chris delivers it without Mpreg, which is […]