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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: And Hello, everybody! Welcome to our premium day of romance spiders week. It is our final day here, and I'm just gonna give everybody a second to join.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: and just to make sure that everything is working. If you can see and hear me, make sure to drop in the chat your name. And then, if you have any plans for this weekend, or what you're going to do with all of the the knowledge you've gained from this week.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: hey? Hope good to see you. Hi, Connie Mike! Yes, I'll be writing all weekend. That's great to hear. Hi, Barbara! Hi, Talle!

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Amazing! Hello from London!

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Oh, congratulations on your upcoming release. Chris. That's great.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Oh, Hannah's watching all the sessions they missed. Yeah, I'm going to go back and watch a bunch of them as well. There are so many good ones that I didn't get to catch live

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: alright. So I'm glad that you were able to find us on our new link. I'm just gonna give a little bit more time here at the beginning. Because I know some people don't know how to find the premium day since. It's a different link. And some of my team is telling me that they're just sending the links out to everyone. So I'm just gonna give everyone a little bit more time to come in, and I'll start by doing our housekeeping, and then we'll jump into this session.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: So I wanna preface by saying that this session is going to be a lot more interactive than the previous sessions where we were just learning so if you have a pencil and paper near you, or if you have

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something to write with, we're gonna actually be doing some writing this session. We're going to be working on pitching a romance novel, and kind of putting together some parts and then sharing them at the end. So

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: make sure you have something near you to write with if you don't.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Okay. So let's go ahead and get started with our session today. So this is the premium day of romance writers week, we're going to start this session after a few quick housekeeping notes. So today's replays are going to be added to the premium hub page

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: so just the way that you got access to this session today. It's going to be added to that premium hub page. There's gonna be kind of 2. The sessions will be in 2 places. They'll be in the premium hub, and then the regular ones on Monday, through Thursday will be in the main hub

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid:  The replays on both sessions will be available on both hubs until March first. And at that point they're all going to move to the Pro writing Aid Community page, and as you all have premium accounts, you will have access to those, and we'll send a link with where those live. At that point. But basically for the next 2 weeks they're gonna be available on the 2 different hub pages. And then here, and then after that, they're going to move to the community page

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please feel free to join the community if you have not already to continue the conversation over the next couple of weeks. And like, I said, that the community is actually going to be where the replays live after the replay period in a special kind of gated place for

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: for premium members. So just go ahead and you can go ahead and join the community now and that way. When the when the replays are up, you can go right there and get them. And then finally, I'm going to paste this link in the chat. If you have the chance. It would be really helpful if you could fill out any feedback about today's or this week's session. In general, we just put the link in the chat.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: This feedback is super super helpful for us. This is how we are able to take this to the rest of the team and make sure that we can keep doing this and keep doing these types of events. And so please please fill out the type form that I've just put in the chat. Just put it in again as much feedback, especially if it's positive as you can give us, is really helpful for us to be able to keep doing these events. Keep bringing them to you for free

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so as again, all the feedback is really helpful for us to just keep justifying doing these events for our team. And they're also really helpful as we go out and look to book speakers. For us to be able to communicate to them why these events are so valuable. The feedback really helps play a big role in. Why, we're able to get speakers and have them kind of come to you and bring their

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: their advice and their thoughts with you.

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So again, please, if you have 2 min filling out that type form is really really helpful.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Okay. And during the session. If you have questions, you can use the QA. Box. But this session, as I mentioned, is not going to be as teaching heavy is actually going to be a bit more bit more action heavy. We're gonna have some writing prompts that we're working through. So if you have questions. You're more than welcome to put them into the QA. But I think we'll be able to just kind of talk through the chat. I'm gonna keep an eye on the chat, because I'm gonna be sharing some prompts, and then you'll have an opportunity to work into right on those

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and then, you know we'll kind of come together and give feedback for them

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: so feel free to use the QA. Few questions, but you can also use the chat for this session, as it's a little bit different.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Alright, I think that is everything. So we are ready to get started. And I just was, gonna say, yes, Sal, I did mean the Circle networking group. There is a second. There will be a separate section for premium members. So you're going to get a link to that once the replays are replay period is over. So it's not there yet. But if you go ahead and join, there's gonna be a separate section for premium members. So if you're already in there, just keep an eye out. We'll we'll bring you to that later.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Okay, let me share my other slide deck, and we can get started alright.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: So this session is going to be a workshop on pitching your romance novel. And I'm really excited about this because I feel like romance novels. Romance is one of the few genres where there are like a lot of pitch competitions. Has anyone you can just tell me in the chat? Has anyone ever participated in any of the harlequin pitches?

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: They have them a number of times per year.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Was anyone familiar with the harlequin pitches? Rather

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: so, Andrews and several

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: cool, okay? Oh, awesome. Luana sold their novel to Harlequin during a pitch. That's amazing.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Dk has done one.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Yes, so the Harlequin Harlequin is one of the publishers, again, is pretty unique to the romance genre, where they actually take pitches from writers. So they're not just taking completed manuscripts, but they're actually taking pitches for novels and then depending on the the imprint. They're giving people book deals and selling books from them. A couple of years ago I think it was in 2021, our one of our speakers, Anya noabonelli!

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Did the same thing. She sold her novel through pitch to Harlequin. She got a book deal through that, and now I think she's about to publish her second one and I believe at that time she hadn't even written the novel at that point she just had an idea for the novel. She was able to sell it to harlequin to one of their imprints, and then basically have the the funds to the deal and the funds to

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yeah, to to publish that novel. It's become a bestseller since. And then again, she's on her second, which is really exciting. So one of the reasons why I wanted to do a pitch workshop today is because.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: again, romance is such a unique genre genre where you actually have the opportunity to do pitching and potentially sell an idea for a novel that's not yet complete. So today we're gonna do a couple of different things. First, we're gonna talk about what would be included in a typical romance novel pitch. Now, I know a lot of people in the chat are saying they might have participated in Harlequin, but have done pitch events elsewhere. I'm gonna give you like a larger structure for what Harlequin themselves asks for from their pitches. The structure that I have is from Harlequin's blog blog and their submissions. But

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: that being said, the structure of a pitch is going to look really really different, depending on what events you do so if you have done like Pitmad or anything like that on Twitter.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Often there's the structure is going to be a lot different. And what you want to include will be different. If you've done something on Twitter. Obviously there's a much smaller kind of character count that you can work with, or at least there was for a long time. So again, what you're going to do for a pitch is going to kind of vary from place to place. But we're going to go through the structure that Harlequin recommends for theirs. And then we're going to actually practice writing something. So we're gonna draft our own romance

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novel pitches based on what we've learned. And then, if we're comfortable, you're welcome to share parts of your work in the chat, we'll have opportunities to share throughout. And then we can just kind of talk about each other's and read them out and see how it goes. So these are really similar to the writing workshop series that I've done previously. If anyone has been to those but it's gonna be just a really fun time to kind of think and brainstorm and practice different pieces.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Okay, so first, let's talk about a pitch. So a pitch is basically an opportunity to give kind of a quick snapshot of your work and highlight all of the fantastic selling points of that, and share them with an editor, and Asian and publisher will then hopefully take on your project. The point of a pitch is that you are condensing what's great about your story into something really, really short and memorable. So it's not really long like a synopsis or a summary, or even submitting

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first chapter, or anything like that. It's just going. It's meant to be a really quick bite, sized. Look at what makes your story so fantastic? And while that might make it seem a bit easier, I've found that pitching is actually incredibly difficult, because you're trying to synthesize. You know, just as someone say in the chat, you're trying to synthesize a really complicated concept an entire book into something really

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: short and snappy. So this again, depending on the format that you're taking can go from anywhere from like 20 words or less. You know something really really short that can fit in the space of a tweet to you know longer events. For you know, like, if you're getting up in front of people and actually having, you know, a couple of minutes to talk about it. So it really depends on the format again, different places will have different formats for what they require. But the key is that no matter what a pitch is, an incredibly short snapshot

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: of what you're working on. It's not going to be something where you have the opportunity to build a narrative and share something you're really trying to get at the essence of your story and the essence of what makes it so special? Really, quickly? Yeah, exactly. It's down to the bare bones of the stories, the who the what, the why and really kind of what makes it compelling?

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: I might. And again, as some people in the chat are saying sometimes that looks like it's 20 words or less. Sometimes you might have heard the phrase, elevator pitch where you're trying to in theory. Tell somebody that what makes your story great within the space of an elevator ride. Sometimes, again, you might have more time, but really what it is is just boiling it down exactly as something in the chat to the bare bones of the stories.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Yeah, exactly like a hyped up log line, indeed. Okay.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: so the key parts of the pitch. And again, this is what Harlequin themselves says that they're looking for. If they're taking a romance novel pitch are 4 key parts. We're gonna talk about each of these 4 parts, and then you're gonna have an opportunity to practice looking at them first. So the first part that your pitch should talk about is the hooks and tropes. We'll go into that in a second.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: A second is the lead characters. So who your love interest for are. Excuse me. The third is kind of a summary of your defined plot. So what's happening? What you know? What is the setup of the story? And then, finally, it's going to look at the conflict.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: so since we're writing romance, they're always going to end up with their happily ever after. That's kind of one of the big conventions of the genre. But there's always going to be conflict that's keeping them apart. So it's important to talk about what that is in the story or in the pitch itself.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Alright. So let's talk about that first part.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: the hooks and the tropes. So the first thing that we want to think about are the hooks which are the specific elements that draw readers in. And this is a really key part of the kind of romance genre. So you want to think for the hooks about specific professions, types of people, settings, lifestyle, etc. So, for instance, a Christmas story, or a story that happens at a holiday kind of that specific type of romance story that people are really looking for.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: We talked about Ellie Hazelwood earlier this week, so Ellie Hazelwood has all of these books set with scientists. Right? So she's really, really focusing on science and academia and thinking about how all of those you know, all of those kind of work together. I'm trying to think of some other examples. Emily Henry. She's gotten

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: a lot of. She kind of has like, typically like millennial protagonists who are working in publishing or like writing adjacent professions. So those are very, very specific within her books. She's had like a vacation book where they're going to different places a lot of times. It's really, specifically about the place that it is.

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I'd love to hear in the chat. If you have any other examples of books that are kind of take place in a specific setting focus on a specific profession. One of our providing aid users. Leanna Morgan, she writes a number of best-selling romance books, a lot of which take place in Montana right? So they take place in like small town rural America, and she actually, when she was starting to think about her romance, but

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was specifically like, I'm going to go there.

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kale savage does biker clubs yet. Book shop romances?

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Yeah, I think. there's a excuse me if I mispronounce it, Lydia. Says fourth wing at a Dragon college fantasy. There's a lot of in romantic scenes particular fourth wing masses books. There's a lot of like.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: you know, specific types of characters. So like the Fay, for instance, are really big and romantic right now. So there's like fei books in, you know, romantic settings.

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we've got Katie Roberts villain series. This take on Disney villains in fictional setting. Yeah.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Yeah. Dk, says Michigan romance. So once you small town series set in the city. Exactly. So. There's that really big hook of like this is in Michigan, New York City romances, a small town, Scotland. All of these types of places are kind of the hooks that are drawing people in? So again, you're thinking like, where's the setting? What? What is this?

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what is it that people are going to reach for? What type of story are they looking for? Another great example of kind of historical? So aristocrat? If you think of Regency romance as well. Oftentimes there are again

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: those hooks that kind of draw the readers in and think, oh, I want to read about a protagonist like this, or I want to read in this particular world. So that's kind of the first thing that you want to think.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: The second thing that is part of a pitch is your tropes. So we always want to think about the hooks, and then the tropes. So tropes are the plot devices that characters find themselves in, and romance readers in particular really love to read tropes. So enemies to lovers doesn't like perfect example of a trip. So 2 characters who start out hating each other and then end up

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: falling in love as since it's a romance. Novel fake dating is another huge one that happens in romance novel. So for some reason the 2 characters are put together, and they have to pretend that they are falling in love. Or that they are in love for some reason, and then they're going to

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: actually fall in love along the way. If you think about the first Bridgerton novel, that's the perfect example of that kind of fake dating trope where Daphne and the Duker fake dating. They end up falling in love, and they end up getting, you know, really married throughout their so I'm curious. Does anyone have any other tropes that they would like?

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: So we've got enemies to lovers, Alison and Alison's paranormal and the bet? Oh, Bet's are a great one yet grumpy sunshine. Exactly. Friends to lovers. Second chance romance.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Yeah. One bed is. I would say, one bed is definitely a trope. I feel like broke. One bed is not necessarily the trope of

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: It's like a trope of what happens during the story. But there's there's gotta be kind of the reason that they are getting into that one bed so like a road trip romance, right? Or something like that where they're stuck together. And then they all of a sudden have to have to, you know, share the one bed opposite track. Unlikely age, gap, reverse age gapped faded mates, yeah, huge and huge and romantic right now. Marriage of convenience exactly super similar a lot of times to fake dating bodyguard. Slow burn

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: exactly. I would I what I want to point out here is that a lot of these tropes are reasons why people are forced to be be together. So one of the kind of key elements of a romance novel is that the 2 characters meet. They obviously don't fall in love right away, but there is something that kind of keeps them together and forces them to stay together. So oftentimes tropes are reasons why

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the 2 characters are going to stay together and have to keep into interacting. So in enemies to lovers, for instance.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: There's they're typically Emma enemies for a reason. Right? They're drawn together for a particular reason. They might have. They might be fighting for the same job, or they might, you know, be an opposite sides of the conflict. Anyway, it's something that's kind of forcing them to interact. So when you're thinking about the overall

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: trope for your romance novel, what you wanna think, too, is like, you know, why do these characters have to keep interacting. What about them is going to keep them stuck together and keep them again interacting. And in some way, and a lot of the ones that we've listed in the chat. Some of some of them don't have anything to do with keeping away, but a lot do like marriage of convenience, force, proximity, bodyguard. Exactly. All of those kind of

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: of those pieces are kind of keeping people together.

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Okay? So what I would like you to do now is, have your opportunity to write your hook hook in the format of kind of person and place. So what type of person or people are your is your book going to focus on? And you can just brainstorm a couple of different options and then place, what's your setting hook going to be so scientists at a university.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Book! Publishers in New York City. So that's your your hook first. It's the who and the where they are. So you know, Faye, people in Fay in valorous, or wherever Jamos world, right? So your type of person, and then where they're going to be. And then I want you to brainstorm one central trope for your story. So enemies to lovers. And then do a little bit more brainstorming about how that's gonna kind of

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play out again. We're gonna solidify this into a pitch a little bit later. But just start thinking about what's that central trope that's going to take place. There will be enemies to lovers. Will it be forced? Proximity? Will it be.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: you know? Friends, to lovers, etc., so I will give you 5 min to brainstorm this, and then when you are done, you can share in the chat, and we will just talk through what we've come up with.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Alright. I'm going to start this timer

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: after this video plays, I guess, and then we will begin. Let's see if and skip this add.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: all right. Our 5 min starts now.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Oh, and someone asked in the chat, are we doing this from scratch or using something we've written? You can do either. So if you want to do something that you've written, that's fine. But feel free to do something from scratch just for fun as well.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Okay, that's that is about 5 min. If you have not already, you can drop your pitch in or your hook and your trope in the chat. I just wanted to answer a quick couple of quick questions that came through the QA. So yes, there is a networking event later today

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: it's on the main schedule, since I think some people had some trouble getting into the one on Tuesday. So we're actually opening it for everyone, and it'll be in the same networking link as Tuesday. So you can access that through the main hub.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: And then Mary asked if protagonists are opposed by society, and not necessarily enemies, otherwise is it enemies to lovers. So, Mary, I wouldn't necessarily call that enemies to lovers unless there's like that

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: banter, or that kind of reason where they individually are getting in the way of each other. I would think of

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: about that as more. I guess it kind of depends. If it's like Romeo and Juliet, it's a little bit more enemies to lovers, because they're kind of on opposite sides of of a divide. But if there's some like societal pressure. I like somebody in the chat mentioned.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: you know, like homosexual relationships not being allowed in their in their world. If it's something like more societal pressures that it could be some more trip with more like societies trying to tear them apart if that makes sense. Okay, so let's look at some of these ones that we've had. I was reading as people were posting them, and then they are so amazing.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: So hope has an enemies, delivers novel about a powerful New York City mergers and acquisitions. Female attorney who is a kidney transplant survivor. Hope that sounds absolutely amazing. One thing to just think about, for that would be.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: you know.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: when you're thinking about in the in the pitch. Think about, especially for a romance novel. Who's the love interest going to be? You know. What is? Who is their enemy? Is it the attorney across it, across across the aisle from them, or something like that. Luana has a gaming writer who works with programmers, who is secretly her anonymous online crush. But they don't know which each other. That, I think, reminds me a lot about

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: what somebody was saying about kind of in the trope of like online pen pals, which I'm not sure if that actually was yours. but yes, exactly that kind of like they have the. They have the proximity. They're talking to each other. They're corresponding. And it's kind of that that Cyrano, almost like they're they're falling in love with each other. But they don't actually know

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Christine has a couple of great great versions of people traveling, so falling for the best friend, sibling at their destination wedding. So that's a really great example of like we're in another place, far, far away from each other. And we're in this destination. So it's kind of getting that like vacation. Exciting vibes. Same thing with the workplace. Ski ski trip.

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Caitlin has a human girl is forced to make a bargain with a demon in a Gothic post-apocalyptic world. I love that enemies to lovers. You can already start to see how they are going to be stuck together through their bargain.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Tommy said. So Tolly had a question about if the trope doesn't kind of fit. So the protags are a bachelor, Marquessin Android, just looking, acting, pretends to be a woman.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: They keep on seeing each other, while the actress or actors disguise to avoid pursuing the law which was against homosexual relationships. Kelly, I think this is kind of what Mary was talking about where it's almost the trope of like society being against them. I'm not actually sure what that specific trope would be called, but what I would recommend is checking out a resource called TV tropes.org TV tropes has first of all, I think everybody should check out TV tropes. It's a really great resource, but it has

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tons and tons of examples of different tropes, and then what they're actually called, and then places that you can watch those being enacted. So that's a really great place to just check. Oh, yeah, forbidden rub. Thank you. Everyone forbidden romance. Exactly. So there's something kind of getting in the way of that. But yes, that's a really common one. And for everybody checking out TV tropes org is a really really great opportunity to just yeah. See a bunch of different tropes and how they're kind of playing out places.

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Okay, let's go through a couple more.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: So we had a a good few that were kind of romantic suspense, or some type of mystery coming in, so Angie's had a cheerful wildlife agent and an angry drifter having to work together and to find a killer in the attic and at a Rondack Mountains to save a reputation and maybe a life. Angie, I am going to read this because I love Adirondacks more than any place in the world. So I am going to be number one on that list when that book comes out

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Frank has a once high, loving power couple, or excuse me a once loving high power couple in the midst of a divorce keep kidnapping their beloved cat from each other. Enemy still, lovers. I love that. It's you can kind of see the playfulness, but also understanding that there's going to be a lot of really deep pain there.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Okay, I'm gonna keep moving on we'll have plenty of other opportunities to write and share, because I want to make sure we get through all of our steps. So that was our first one hook and trope

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our next step is to think about our main characters. So our romantic leads, our 2 romantic leaves our love interest. We want to understand the main characters, since they're going to be one focus of our reading. So you want to think about the kind of big wound that each main character has. So think about like who they are what they do and what has broken them, or what's compelling about them as a character

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with our romance interests. We don't always want to have somebody who just has it all together. So you can kind of think about the formula as a

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: a blank who has X problem. So if we go back to the the example of, like the

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the attorney, the mergers and acquisitions attorney with the kidney transplant. That's a great example. Of, you know up one character. Who is this? They're a merger and acquisitions attorney. So we kind of get a sense that they're like, probably high powered, probably really really smart merger and acquisitions is really specific. Gives me the idea that they're again pro. Maybe a workaholic or somebody who's really committed to their job. And the kidney transplant gives me that other side of like.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: They're struggling with something, II think. Michael, in the chat had a couple of other great options. So there was like the busker, and I think there was can't remember who your other one was, Michael. But again, really great examples of like this one character. You can kind of all met already. Get the idea of who they are and why they might have some issues. Oh, a homeless busker and an abused runaway. Right? So that's a really great example

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of again.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: one type of character. And then

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: you know something about them that's kind of hinting at the wound, and why they might be there. So at this point we want to just think about the essential plot and conflict details in your pitch. You're going to kind of avoid excessive back to story and instead focus on the goals and motivations. So in this format of the pitch, we're not trying to get it down to just under 20 words or something like that. I want to do a little bit more work on

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: kind of who the person is, and what they might want. So as we come to our next section, I want you to think for each of your romantic leads who they are, what's their wound, and what's their goal? So who the main character is? So merger and acquisitions? Attorney, the kidney transplant who wants

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: next? So that's kind of the format, who they are, what their wound or what they're what they're struggling with, and then what their goal is. So that's the format that we're looking for each of your 2 main love interest, or if you have more than one love interest, if it's like harem or something like that, you can talk about it for any of the point of view characters who are going to be really important in that story.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: So we'll have 5 min to brainstorm on this one. Okay, who they are.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: what their goal is. And then again, something specific about about what they are. If you want to go into kind of what makes them tick. That's fine. If you also wanna think about you know why why, they are the way they are. And I just wanna say when I'm using the word wound I know as using the example of the merger and acquisitions attorney that we had

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: does not have to be an actual literal, physical wound. It can just be like what has hurt them or what is damaged them? Why are they? Why are they challenged. Why is love hard for them? And why will falling in love be difficult for them?

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So who they are.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: what they do, and then what their kind of goal is. So I'll give you 5 min. We want to have again one of these for each of your love interests. It could be for the same story can be for a new story. You can just come up with a bunch of interesting characters, too, if you'd like, and then share them in the chat.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: All right. After our our second advertisement we will begin.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: We're gonna get some really great UK. Ads here

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: all right. 5 min. Please feel free to share in the tap when you're done

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: all right. That was our second. So if you have not already feel free to put yours in the chat. Let's see what we've got. So one that stood out

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: is a hotelier hotelier, deserted by stepmother and brother who wants ownership of the family business, and a lost woman lied to by her mother and brother, who wants to know who she is and where she belongs. I feel like this is a really great example of characters that works particularly for romance novels. Because you can kind of already see how these 2 characters are. Gonna get in are going to

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: to kind of come together. So you can see that they're going to bond by the fact that they've had really difficult

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: interactions with their family. So you can see how that's going to be hard for them to trust each other, but how that can also be kind of like a a powerful way for them to come together. Once they've started to trust each other and learn more about each other.

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You also can see kind of the the hotelier having this really specific place and thing that they want to. They want to engage with. And then the woman, on the other hand, having this like sense of, I've lost my place. I don't know where I am, and maybe that place ends up being the hotel or the the family business where they

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wants to engage. I just wanna look at 2 quick questions in the chat.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: first, somebody ask in this method be used for other genres like fantasy? Or is it specific for romance? It can absolutely be used for other genres like fantasy? I will say, like the the tropes in particular that you're going to use are likely different, depending on your genre so in romantic, for instance, which some people are writing in the chat. This this formula really really works.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: the tropes that you might be using for for fantasy might be very different. So it's not necessarily how the characters are stuck together, and how they're going to fall in love. But maybe it's more, you know, thinking kind of lord of the rings, like somebody, is

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: thrown into a situation where they are trying to destroy an evil object, or and Harry Potter, like young young protagonists, discovers a hidden hidden power that they never knew they had right. So the tropes specifically are going to be a little bit different. And that's where again, a resource, like TV tropes can be really useful because they examine tropes across a number of Jean. All genre is really, not specifically romance. But yes, you can really really think about that.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: I will say that I

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: again the kind of hook for fantasy would be a little bit different. It doesn't necessarily have to be as specific as like this type of people in this type of place. But you can again absolutely think of it that way. You know. It's going to be, you know you can think about. Is it high fantasy or low fantasy? What types of characters again? And fantasy, and a lot of the kind of popular romantic elements these days. There's still like specific types like vampire fantasy. Or again, they fantasy, which is really hot right now.

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so you can absolutely think about it that way.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: And then again, same thing for main characters. You're often not going to kind of hint at how they'll get together in a fantasy or a sci-fi, etc. But you can absolutely think about that kind of central like who the main character is what has damaged them, because main characters are typically damaged to make them interesting. And then what they desire is is really useful, and that works for crime as well. It's really, really popular like with your lead detective, right? There's going to be something about them, something that they want. And then some type of kind of

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damage or thing that makes them unique. If that makes sense

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: and then hope asks, is it what the characters want, and that what makes them tick it, external or internal, can be both. It really depends. Typically when we're talking about a wound like the characters core wound, it's it's internal. But it might manifest externally. So

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: again, going back to the example of the kidney transplant. That's not like something about the person's soul, right? It's not something about who they are, but it is probably something that then has an impact on their psyche and how they're thinking about themselves and how they're interacting with the world so it can be both right. It can be internal and external. Oftentimes it's something internal that's expressed externally, or that is triggered externally, etc.

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And Cindy asked, can this formula work for me more as well? Definitely, you can definitely think about this for memoir, too. Like, think about what's the hook, and what's the kind of

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: not the why you're writing a memoir, because I think memoir could have a lot of power just personally, as you're reclaiming your own story. But like, what's the narrative that you're trying to sell? Tell in your memoir? I think good examples are like the glass castle by Jeanette walls. It's a great walls or walls I can't remember is kind of a great like coming of age, you know. Fish out of water really unique family which is very common in memoir, like, you know, my childhood was extraordinary. For some reason.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: We've also had a lot of memoirs lately like crying in H. Mart, where it's kind of reconciling with the death of a family like an unexpected death of a family member and trying to reconcile that relationship, or something like, I'm glad my mom died by Jeanette Mccurdy is a great example, again, of a memoir of like, I'm trying the kind of memoir of like I've or the memoir trope, so to speak. If I've had a previous

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: in depth, I'm reconciling with this difficult relationship that I didn't quite understand in life, and I'm trying to figure out what that meant for me. So yes, you can absolutely do that and again think it to about. Who are you? If the men were? It's if it's your member. Who are you? And like what?

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Why are you? A compelling subject for the memoir again. That's a bit difficult, because memoir is really powerful as a tool for just understanding yourself. But again, just like to think about

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okay, just go through a few quickly, because there are so many exciting things here. I definitely recommend I'm gonna save this chat. And I definitely recommend saving the chat here, too, because there's just so many great examples of what's coming in here. So Patrick has a main character who's approaching 30 and an extreme introvert. Another wounded met veteran, a disinterested red pill. Sigma mail. They're at their end of the ropes. Something's gonna tie them together to make them save

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: each other. Sharon, if you have a question, I think I see you raising your hand, please feel free to put it in the chat, or into the QA. Let's see, we've got gloria, who has a female lead, who is a virgin armed with years of knowledge from reading steamy romance novels, and she's ready to turn in her V card, and he's a billionaire who's ready to settle down but do death threats. He needs to make an heir while he still can, and she would be a great business. Who'd be ideal to take over his business. So you can already see these are kind of have have some type of marriage.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: We're not necessarily convenience, but arrangement of convenience. And then, you know, you can also see that this is going to potentially cause some issues. Cause it seems like he's much more experience. And she's not which is really great. And it's going to kind of create that compelling thing of romance novels that we love reading.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Okay, we've got 2 more. So let's keep moving. And then hopefully, we'll have enough time to get through all of our parts. Okay. So the next thing you want to do is kind of take this and translate it into a basic arc of your plot.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: for instance, a lawman must protect a witness on a run, and a steamy night together leads to an unexpected pregnancy. So you can kind of see in this. You have the 2 characters. It's then boiled down into what's driving them together, and what might be creating conflict. You can see that in this. So we've got the 2 characters, how they're driven together. So obviously the law man protecting a witness on a run. That's kind of that

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: gel that's making them come together. And then we have what's going to happen to make them stick together, and why? That's going to cause conflict. So they're stuck together because they're protected. They have a steamy night together, and then there's an unexpected pregnancy where, again, there's going to be clearly a bunch of conflict from that.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: So what I want us to try to do for this exercise is, think about boiling down the pieces that we have so far into into a discussion of why they're thrown together, and kind of what the conflict might arise, and do your best to do this into one single sentence. For this particular part of the exercise. So the 2 characters, or, again, more, if you happen to do harem or something like that.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: how they're thrown together. So what's making them stick together? And then what conflict might arise or might cause trouble for them, as they're moving forward so synthesizing what we have so far are 2 leads what throws them together, and then the conflict that's going to arise from that

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: and then you can share your sentence when you are done 5 min to work on this as well

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after the after the timer. I've never had the timer happen this many times.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: All right. 5 min. One sentence, your 2 characters, how they're thrown together, and then what conflict is going to arise?

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: You can also feel free to just kind of workshop what you had previously again thinking about Michaels, of the busker and the homeless person. I think

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: a great way to iterate on that would be what sticks them together. And then what's gonna be the conflict? Alright. 5 min, 4, 4 min, 30 s.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Okay, we've got some really great sentences here. So let's see, we had Rachel has forced to work together on team initiatives. Devin tries to stay away, but finds himself unable to ignore the draw of Justin's attempt to make up for his past mistakes. So again we see.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: go ahead and get the hint of these 2 have some issues previously. They're forced to work together. They're trying to stay away so you could see that there's some tension in that relationship. So they're not going to want to get along but there's going to be something that kind of happens to get them, you know. Get them to be a bit closer, and and to think about kind of how they're

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how they're engaging! Walt says Erin and Amy are forced to interact on a murder investigation because Amy's daughter Sally, plays an important part in finding the body and other clues. So we can again see the word force here is doing a lot of that work. Because we can see that there, you know, something is bringing them together when they might not necessarily want to. And clearly there's going to be a lot of conflict around.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: a lot of conflict around, you know. Any? Anything that has to do with murder. Okay, we have one more prompt to get through. So I'm going to speed through because we only have 4 min left. Now, the last thing I want you to think about as part of your pitch are the obstacles, both internal and external, that could keep the couple apart.

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So if you think about the arc of a romance novel, often they meet, there's some initial attraction and then depending on your trope. Maybe they are fighting, and they're kind of, you know, not engaged, or maybe they are, you know, had a steamy one night stand. You know, it kind of depends on where you're going with your specific romance novel. But you wanna think about the obstacles that they're going to face throughout that. So some of these are going to be internal, related to their damage.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: So again, thinking about what Michael shared one of his characters, had had previous poor relief or poor experiences and relationships, and in interaction. So that's going to be something internal that might kind of keep them apart. I cannot remember. Excuse me, who was the example of the hotelier? Who

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: II and the other love interest who had issues with their family. That's probably gonna cause them to have an internal obstacle where they don't trust each other. So what you want to think about for this part is finally, what are some of the obstacles, both internal and external, there to going to keep them apart? It's not gonna be for long, but there are going to be conflicts that arise throughout the arc of the narrative that keep them from falling in love.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: So for this, we're going to brainstorm, both internal and external. So internal. What is it about these characters and their wounds, the things that cause them to struggle, the things that make them not really open to love, or at least not open to this type of love. And then what externally is going to cause them apart, you know. Maybe they're forced apart by work. Or maybe you know, maybe there's something at the office that you know doesn't allow them to be together, or we've had a lot of forbidden romances, like societal expectations, are keeping them apart.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: So you always want to be thinking in conflict of both. There's going to be internal things that cause them to not trust each other or not want to fall in love right away. Maybe they really believe in the societal forces. But then there's also going to be external pieces that keep them apart as well. And this is going to kind of help create that intrigue and excitement for your readers that will there, won't they? That happens throughout the story?

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Okay? So what I want you to think about are 3 conflicts that will come between your characters. I want you to brainstorm what one external conflict could be. So one thing about society or their situation. In some some regards, again, it's happening outside of them, and then one internal conflict for each lead. So one thing about each lead that's going to prevent them from wanting to fall in love, or that's going to be harder for them to kind of overcome, as they're thinking about falling in love.

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And you can just do these in the form of bullet points and then drop those in the chat. When you're done.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: go.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: you know what it's going to. It's not even timing, but this time, alright, 5 min. Here we go.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: Okay, everyone. We just have a couple more.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: couple more seconds. But as we are rapidly running out of time, I just wanted to answer a couple of the session or the questions in the chat.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: what we're going to talk about in terms of tying this all together is that these are the key elements that you will talk about in the pitch. Now, a couple of people, Stephanie, yellowed, and Robin, have kind of asked, how do we tie this together into a neat little package. Now these are the big elements.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: How you tie them together! It's going to really depend on the format of your pitching like I was saying at the beginning. Different pitch. Events have really really different different structures for what they want. So some common ones like Pitmad, which I honestly, I don't know if Pitmad is still going on. But Pitmad was on Twitter Slash.

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and they had really really clear instructions of basically how your tweet would work and how you're gonna tag that. So what you want to have are these core 4 elements, and then you're going to wrap them into the format of the pitch that you're working for for that particular event. Same thing with harlequins, pitch events these are the core of core elements that you will need to have a successful pitch. But depending on the particular pitch that you're going pitch

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: event that you're going for, you're going to have to package it into different ways. So what I would recommend is that these are the 4 key elements that will build a successful pitch. Then you need to look at the specifics of the pitch event that you're doing.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: and think about how you can kind of format that for for that particular event again. Sometimes that's a sentence. Sometimes you have 5 min to talk through all of these different pieces. So it really is going to depend on what you are doing, and how you're kind of how you need to, how you need to bundle them together. Now, what I would do, depending on your particular pitch event is, look for examples of successful pitches.

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So pitmad you can still see past pitmads on on Twitter. That's a really good example of where you can see pit pitches that have gotten requests from agents. So you can actually see, how did they

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: translate this into the format of the Tweet. There's lots of breakdowns

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: on Youtube. And actually, in some of our past events as well from Harlequin authors who've gotten that pitch where you can talk to them about, you know. What did they do when they kind of got in the room and gave this pitch in person? So it's really going to depend on where you are, how you tie it together. Okay, we are unfortunately out of time, but thank you all so much. This has been so great. There are so many good stories here.

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and I truly cannot wait to read them. Knox is incredibly excited about them. As well as you can see I am going to save the chat right now, so that I have that and Michelle can upload it to our site. I'm going to again put the type form link in the chat. If you've enjoyed this session, or any of the sessions or all of the sessions, hopefully, it's really really helpful for us to get that positive feedback. I work for

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providing aid, so getting all that positive feedback is very helpful for me, but also just in also just in general, really, really helpful for the organization, so that we can talk to the powers that be and make sure that we can keep doing these events and keep bringing great people to them.

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Hayley @ ProWritingAid: So I'll put that link in the chat once again. I have saved the chat, so don't worry about it. I'm going to put that up on the hub after and then yes, I will see you all very shortly. I'm going to be interviewing Alexis Daria in less than an hour. So I'm gonna go get some water and then see you all very soon. Bye, everybody.