Donna Maree Hanson, Author and PhD Candidate

I am currently attempting a paranormal romance/urban fantasy novel. I have a great idea. The story starts hot and smart and strange. Yet as I get into the novel I find that things aren’t as easy as I thought.

It’s not that I haven’t read this genre. I have and I enjoy it. However, it is darn hard. Why?

I’ve been struggling through why this is so. What makes it harder than say  straight fantasy or SF? I think it is balance, believability and character. The two main characters, in this case, the man and the woman, have to appear real or three-dimensional. Now with paranormal/urban fantasy your everyday character can be exposed to something out of the ordinary. This is the case with my heroine. She is thrust into something quite disturbing and fantastic. How do I make her reactions realistic?

When I look over what I have done I see that I am going to quickly. She comes to terms with things too easily. The male character is used to the fantastic so that’s not an issue, but the story does place him in a difficult position. Is he taking it too easy? Do I address the ramifications for him? I look over what I’ve done and see that I need to do more along these lines.

The sex. Now I think I write a darn good and hot sex scene. However, I can’t just have a series of sex scenes now can I? There must be variety, suspense, teasing, tension and a reasonable amount of plot to hang these scenes off, at the same time developing the relationship between the characters, either love or hate. So there’s another complexity.

Plot-now this has to be able to stand. What this type of story is to my mind is a whole story with realistic love encounters woven through it. So I can’t get away with flinging a few bits of plot here and there. Now I need to have twists and turns, impediments for the character in solving the plot issue, and a realisation (as well as the love issue, which can be quite separate from the main plot driver).

Keri Arthur for example has a mystery/thriller plot line along with her character’s sexual encounters. They interweave quite well. Nor is she formulatic. I read a number of her books, then came across one where the character didn’t have sex for quite a few chapters, which was for her unusual.

Related to plot is the world building. You can’t be shy about establishing the rules of the world, often the contemporary world with an underbelly of magic, vampires, elves, whatever. So for this you need to apply the same vigour as you would to your fantasy world building, but make it sit well within your chosen contemporary city etc.

This all adds up to a pretty tough ask. So instead of steaming ahead as I usually do, I am taking time to think, to slow down the rapid assault of my plot, I am taking the time for the characters to show how they feel, explore their reactions. I may need to cut this later, but I think for now this is what I need to do.

I also need to sit down and do a bit more work on the world, the magic, the hierarchy of the magicians, and the technical aspects of the machinations that are to ensnare my characters. Then my next step is to revisit the beginning and slow down, but still keep it pacey. Rats. That’s hard too. Then I need to make sure there is more tension, more near misses with the sex scenes…gee another hard task.

Actually what it boils down to is thinking and hard work. Oh well no one ever said this writing gig is easy.