Studying Writing The Christian Romance by Gail Gaymer Martin

Gail Gaymer Martin is an award-winning romance and romantic suspense author and has more than one million books in print. Who could be better than Gail Gaymer Martin to teach us how to write a Christian romance novel?

In this series of study, I want to highlight some of the main points that Gail Gaymer Martin makes in her writing resource book, Writing The Christian Romance.

To begin with, lets take a look at what Gail Gaymer Martin considers to be the main elements of a Christian romance. They are:

Believable characters
Realistic conflicts
A solid faith message (this is related to the third thread of a Christian romance novel, not included in the secular romances)
And, of course, the Happy Ending we so look forward to.

The three threads in a Christian romance are:

Personal growth (the hero and/or heroine's struggles to obtain their story and scene goals)
Romantic growth (progressing in four basic steps: awareness, interest, attraction, and falling in love)
Spiritual growth (the hero and/or heroine's deepening relationship with God as they work through their struggles, discovering their spiritual needs)

In future study we'll dig deeper into explaining these elements and development of the threads listed above. Study note topics from the chapters in Writing The Christian Romance will be:
1) Believable Characters and How we get to know them
2) Use of Emotions and Senses in Writing the Romance Novel
3) Christian Romance POV discussion
4) Sexuality in Christian Romance
5) Spirituality in Christian Romance
6) Writing Good Dialogue
7) Introspection--how to make the most of it
8) Plotting the Christian Romance
9) How to Sell a Christian Romance Novel

I will be devoting Mondays to Wednesdays on Study Notes, so this series will take us to April 30th. And then we'll start studying another resource book. If you have any suggestions of which book you would like to see studied next, let me know. If I have a copy of it all ready, I might just bump it up to the top of my list. Right now, I'm considering studying Debra Dixon's GMC, Goals, Motivation & Conflict writing resource.

Looking forward to learning with all of you.

Blessings,

Eileen