You say your Romance novel isn’t about life or death?
Phooey!
It is. The stakes can be just as high as life or death because your character’s spirit will die if she doesn’t have her happy ending. Right?
The approach that I take is to visualize the shape of the story, and establish the patterns in it. I apply a visualized shape/pattern to both the narrative structure (length of story and scenes, for instance) and the thematic structure (what the story is about).
don't just go for the standard car chase or love scene. Build your set pieces on what's original to your story.
“the big, audience pleasing scenes that deliver on the genre elements of the movie.” In a successful comedy they’re the scenes that have you clutching your sides with laughter. In a good action movie they’re the scenes that put you on the edge of your seat holding your breath. In a horror movie they’re the scenes that make you cover your eyes in terror. In a romance they’re the scenes that have you reaching for your loved one’s hand.He recommends 5-10 set pieces per movie.
Ask yourself “logic questions”... they’re one of the first things pitchees and potential buyers ask. Logic questions are about internal consistency and world cohesion, e.g. “Why is the monster attacking this specific town?”, or “Why does she agree to marry him when she’s shown to be terrified of commitment?”, etc.
A character can say one thing, but do another, and that sheds new light on what we (the reader) know about her... the way the character approaches everyday events say a lot about them
It is not necessary to break POV and give characters artificial thoughts in order to fill the reader in. In fact, good use of POV will create a deeper and fuller sense of the setting. Details like whether or not the character regards items and events as unusual or commonplace, happy or sad, fair or unfair, will be picked up by your readers
referring to a village as a "comfortable mudwalled place" tells the reader not only about the setting (primitive), but also that the point of view (POV) character feels comfortable in rustic surroundings.
There is power in standing your character briefly again where they stood before their adventure after it has concluded... reuniting them with old problems, old foes and allies. Because no-where else is their change, their new maturity so obvious.
The MC has an overarching goal or problem that takes a whole novel to resolve...
the order of events (and the events themselves) are carefully titrated to achieve maximum emotional impact and intellectual satisfaction.
Revision... is actually re-vision...you have to re-see the work, see it as an outsider sees it, see it the way you wanted it to be, and then do what's necessary so that the reader, the outsider, sees what you wanted them to see in the first place.
