Happy Friday, Geekly Gang! Kyra Kyle here with another writing brain dump. I’m still going through a mountain of edits with my own work, and I’ll share more of that in the coming months. The “Ber” season draws near. The “Ber” season refers to all months ending in “ber.” These are the months I pour more work into my fiction, poetry, and essays. Yes! I love this time of year. Can’t wait. Until then, I’ll leave you with some musings on writing hooks. By my count, each novel has two hooks: an external hook and an internal hook. We’ll discuss these two hooks and why I believe romance may be the best genre to read for crafting an internal hook.

The Two Types of Writing Hooks

Like I said, there are two types of writing hooks: an external and an internal hook. While external hooks are the ones that get readers through the door, internal hooks keep readers going. Let’s use Dungeon Crawler Carl as an example. Dungeon Crawler Carl’s external hook is “A dude in his skivvies and magic toe ring traverses an intergalactic dungeon with his talking cat who hurls magic missiles.” Cool! I love this hook by Matt Dinniman. I reached for this book at the store because of its bonkers premise. External hooks can vary wildly. These are the hooks that need to stand out and grab your readers. But I finished Dungeon Crawler Carl because of its internal hook: I cared about Carl and his talking wizard cat Princess Donut. While external hooks vary, typically, internal hooks revolve around the reader caring for a story’s characters. We need to feel a connection.

While writers should read the genre they intend to write, I believe every writer can benefit from reading romance novels/stories. I don’t know when I cared about Carl and Princess Donut. I gave Dungeon Crawler Carl (and I do the same for stories with great external hooks) more leeway because the book had more to share than “do I care about the characters.” For me, I tend to side with vulnerable characters. Since this is the case, I connected with Carl early on. Princess Donut gaining the ability to talk made her instantly likeable as well, but I’m a cat person. I was going to side with the cat whether she talked or not, but I will say that Princess Donut shined more as a character toward the end. She showed that she cared for Carl. She says as much. I’m sold. But I give romance novels/stories less time, and that’s because of the kinds of romantic hooks.

Why Writers Should Read Romance

Often, a romance novel/story internal hook and external hook are the same. If they aren’t, a romance novel’s external hook doesn’t tend to be as thick as other genres. This makes pinpointing the moment you care about the characters easier to do. I might give Dungeon Crawler Carl a good twenty to thirty pages for its characters to grow on me. I’m not as generous with romance novels/stories. If the main thing is the relationship between two characters, I need to care for these characters as soon as possible. Because of this, I may never write romance. I’m too scared. Every writer swims. Romance writers swim with fewer garments. Eek!

But this makes romance novels/stories easier to read for the craft of writing. I should be able to see how and why a romance writer gets me to care about their characters. Or how and why they fail to do so. I don’t read a ton of romance. If you don’t intend to write romance, I don’t suggest reading a lot of romance either. But if you’re struggling with getting your readers to care about your characters, sprinkle in some romance to your to-be-read pile. Typically, every seventh or eighth book I read is a romance or has strong romantic elements. Reading romance novels can help writers find their internal hooks. These are the hooks that make your reader finish your novel. External hooks are only half the battle.

And I figured I’d mention romance novels and internal hooks this month because I’ve been meeting up with my various writing groups again. After all, Ber Season is right around the corner. Many of my fellow writers–at least the writers in my writing groups–look down at romance. Sure, romance has been a top three genre for most of the past fifty years. It’s a popular genre. Perhaps the most popular genre for about half a century, but that doesn’t mean one should discount popular books.

Perhaps it’s the fact that romance novels/stories put their internal hooks (make the reader care about the characters) near the surface that makes them popular. My internal hook theory is one possibility. There could be plenty more, like the promise of a happy ending. Writers delivering on a promise (with the readers) can be powerful. One shouldn’t deride romance because it’s popular. Since romance is so popular, one should study how and why it has popularity.

That’s my writing brain dump for this month. I should have more progress to report next month (Septem”ber”). Woot! Thank you for reading, and wherever you are, I hope you’re having a great day.