Out of the eight books I've written, two are out-and-out romances, while the other six weave two relationships in throughout the series. So I guess you could say I've written four romances if you count a relationship as a romance, not just a book.

Having recently begun work on a fifth (and sixth), I think it's probably a good time to answer the question: where do I start?

First: characters. Sounds obvious, right? Can't have a romance if there's nobody to fall in love with! But I need more than a collection of attributes and a description. The most important question to ask is: what's missing? Why are they, as many romance authors put it, hole-hearted? What's the empty part of them that is filled in by the person they ultimately fall in love with?

And that last point is one of the first questions I answer when I'm coming up with a romantic partnership: how do they make the other person better? I did it for Millie and Elise before I wrote a single word of Remember, November, and it held true over the entire series. Doing it for Without Words was a fun challenge. Skathi is a physically imposing princess, daughter of a queen and a natural leader, what could possibly be missing in her heart? A variant on that is what do they see in each other? Victoria is cold, rational, aloof and arrogant. Not a lot to work with. Oh, but she's also brilliant, fiercely egalitarian, ambitious and relentless in her drive to improve herself. Katya can acknowledge the former while still slowly falling in love with the latter.

The second thing I do is work out their starting point. And by that I mean more than just the meet cute, where they first encounter one another. What is their mental state? (Victoria is in the depths of depression, Katya is completely closed off and mistrustful of everyone.) Do they even register the other person as being attractive/a potential partner? (Vimika is wildly confused and discombobulated, and Aurelai's undeniable beauty only makes it worse!) It can be fun to have sparks fly immediately, with both falling into insta-lust that only becomes love later, but making them work for it and having their closeness develop organically over several chapters is rewarding, too. Also, what is their relationship to one another? Friends? Enemies? Strangers? Class/station? Power differences? Relationship/sexual experience levels? This all helps work out just what they're going to have to overcome to be together, and gives a starting scope to the story.

Once I've worked out where I'm starting from, personally I try to let their relationship develop organically as I write it. I know all of the major plot beats ahead of time, but I find that taking these two people and sticking them alone in a room together tells me more about their dynamic than reams of outlining ever does. I need to spend time in their heads and speak with their voices to work out what little things hook them and add up into affection and on to love. Maybe a quirk or a nervous tic, or a turn of phrase, lots of things can be points to latch onto and spin fun moments out of. I try not too plan out too much of their relationship ahead of time. I find that 'improvising' it makes it feel more real. (I never planned for Millie to turn red every time Elise gets undressed in front of her, for example. I made up Skathi showing Zifa the stars and pointing out the stories behind the constellations on the day, and it's still one of my favorite bits of relationship-building I've ever written.)

So, overall, it's a combination of planning and improvising. It's not either/or for me, and it doesn't have to be for you, either. Ultimately, it's about character and having fun. It's romance, falling in love should be fun, and exhilarating. Let your characters dance and try on each others' clothes, dare to steal kisses in public or make love under the stars! No one knows them better than you, and it's your story.

And that, like love itself, is worth celebrating, isn't it?