No, today’s post is not about living with teenagers. Though I will admit that the love/hate thing certainly applies there. As in last night at our house when our fifteen-year-old daughter screamed at my husband, “I hate you!” He’d just told her she could not go to bed until her algebra homework was complete, as she is barely passing this class and needs each and every point.

Good thing my husband and I understand our daughter well enough to know that what she really meant was—“I’m extremely tired, I hate that I don’t understand math and it takes me so long to do it, and I’m frustrated with myself and my not-so-great teacher. That you guys care about my grades is the last straw.”

A while later when our son came in a few minutes past his curfew and got a lecture, he didn’t tell us he hated us but said, “I can’t wait until I’m eighteen,” then huffed off to his room (we have a fair amount of huffing and eye rolling in our home). Again, we translated what he really meant: “I’m almost eighteen, I feel like I’m an adult, and I hate people telling me what to do. And I really need to get a job that pays better than Arby’s, otherwise I won’t be able to say, ‘can’t wait until I’m eighteen’ in a few months. Cause you guys will call my bluff, knowing I can’t afford to move out. Of course if I do move out, not having a curfew won’t matter, because I won’t have any money to go out and do anything because it will all be going toward rent.”

Isn’t it amazing what we can decipher from one short sentence?

But as I said, this blog isn’t about living with teenagers. It’s actually about writing—specifically, writing romance. The thing I love to do—the thing that keeps me sane while I am living with teens.

Recently, at our critique group, a certain member whose initials are Rob Wells, commented about this love/hate thing found in my writing. He said something like this. “Right here, this girl really seems to like the prince, but two sentences later, she’s annoyed with him and says he’s immature.”

Before I could respond to Rob’s comment, the other guy in our group (aka Jeffrey S. Savage or J. Scott Savage—depending on which genre you happen to be reading) chimed in saying, “Oh, that’s just a Michele book. The first novel I ever heard her read in critique was the same way. The characters were alternately madly in love or ready to kill each other.”

Rob still looked confused, but fortunately the ladies in our group agreed that the passage was fine and the love/hate thing made for good romance.

Later, after going over the edits and reading Rob’s comments once again, I started to think more about this, wondering if the way I wrote the relationship between my main characters really was ok. In the story in question the hero is an immature eighteen. He’s in a position of responsibility that he doesn’t care for, and when we first meet him, he’s all about having a good time until he is shortly saddled with the real responsibility of running a kingdom.

The heroine, on the other hand, is not quite sixteen (this is YA), and she’s much more serious, having had a rather difficult life. That he annoys her is natural—especially when he teases at innapropriate moments. And yet, they are attracted to each other and do end up falling in love.

Starting the hero at this immature point allows for growth, and giving both he and the heroine flaws makes them human. Personally I love stories like this—where the two main characters remain at odds for a good portion of the story. As a reader, I see their attraction to each other, I feel it if the author has done his/her job well, but I also get to experience the obstacles they have to overcome to be together.

Recently on the Frog Blog, Stephanie Black wrote about books that keep us turning pages. Her post was mainly geared toward the suspense market, and most people responded with titles in this genre. While I enjoy reading suspense novels, and I definitely feel there are some great ones that turn pages, it is more often a great romance that keeps me up past bedtime. And in thinking about why certain stories keep me in their grip, I believe it has to do with the whole love/hate thing.

A national market author who does this really well is Judith McNaught. Her stories have kept me up late countless times, with main characters you feel as if you’d like to throttle because they are making things so difficult and taking so dang long to get together. Her heroes are great, though they too, often go about things the wrong way. Her first novel (written a couple of decades ago—and reader beware, some things in this story would never be published today),Whitney My Love is a perfect example of this, with the main characters taking much of the book to finally cross the line to committment and love for each other.

In that first novel I wrote—the one Jeff mentioned at our critique group—I actually have a line where a side character, a wise old woman, tells the heroine that “there is a fine line betwixt love and hate.” Having the main characters go from one extreme to the other was great fun to write and, if the story ever gets published, will hopefully be equally enjoyable for readers to experience. But returning to Rob’s comments, I wondered if every great romance has to be this way, or are there other ways of achieving that magical “romantic tension?” In thinking about Jeff’s comment, I certainly don’t want to have each of my stories sound the same. So is there something else I might be—should be—doing to achieve the desired tension between characters?

My twelve-year-old provided at least part of the answer. She is currently (like many other pre-teen and teen girls in the nation) “Twilight obsessed.” It is only recently that I finally caved and let her read the book (though she has only read Twilight, and that is our deal for a couple more years), but she’s wasted no time at all in following her older sister into what I term “Edward awe.” Each and every day my two oldest daughters watch previews for the movie and check the count down calendar on Stepahanie Meyers’ website. It’s enough to make a mother crazy—except that I’ve started watching those clips with them and really thinking about what makes Twilight the phenomenon it is.

A couple of things to think about . . . Do Edward and Bella initially hate each other? YES! Are they attracted to each other in spite of their differences and the antagonism Edward at first shows Bella? Yes. Does it take a while for them to work through these differences, this awkwardness, the tension (both romantic and other) between them? Yes.

Some of the movie clips have done a great job showing this, as did Stephanie Meyers in the book. That Edward was a vampire and the whole cool storyline that went with that is obviously a huge plus most romances don’t have, but returning to my question—the basic love/hate plot line was there too.

Interesting, to say the least. Also interesting is the fact that once that line was crossed, and that part of their relationship resolved, the following books didn’t hold my attention nearly as well as Twilight did.

So here’s my question to you—fellow readers of romance (except maybe Karlene, because she hates romance :D). What books have kept you up late? What characters and storylines have stayed in your mind long after the last page was finished? And did these stories have the love/hate element? Is Rob (who writes a darn good romance himself) right in thinking my characters shouldn’t be quite so extreme in their feelings? And if so, what is it that makes a great love story so great?

Tell me quickly please—as I’m about to begin another novel.