  Romance/Love
This week: Obsession: Romance or Horror? Edited by: Dawn Embers  
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| Romance and love can be wonderful but that is not always the case. Sometimes ones feelings can create an obsession. The result of the obsession can be rosy with romance or it can become dark and twisted, much more of a horror story. It all depends on how you write it. |
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In one of my favorite anime/manga series (Junjou Romantica) there is a part where the main character is trying to figure out romance. He says lines along the lines of how he thought romance was supposed to be all rose-colored classes and lovey dovey stuff. His friend, however, states he likes a dark romance and we see later he has an obsession with the main character's man. Which brings me to today's topic: obsession.
Plus, Halloween is coming up and it's a little fun to walk the line between horror and romance (which isn't always as wide as one might assume). In fact, romance situations work well in some horror stories I've noticed and in truth the topic of obsession could go either way. Obsession Defined
| a persistent disturbing preoccupation with an often unreasonable idea or feeling; broadly. |
Love and obsession be a good thing? I think it was best shown in an episode of How I Met Your Mother, actually, when Ted starts dating a crazy woman. Crazy is okay if the receiver is receptive to the level of crazy. Lilly really wanting to see Marshal again and going door to door till she found the right one, that is an okay level. Chick starting a fire in the university so she could run into Ted... not so okay. But let's start with the romance version of obsession then we can get to the horror version.
 Romantic Obsession
Like with the television example, it is possible for obsession to be romantic. And obsession isn't just about a grip on a single person, or more than one person. It can be on an object or idea. Anything. An obsession with ballet can be what brings two people together in a romance story, for example. Or maybe the character's passion (obsession) for a certain topic is what helps another character fall in love with them.
Granted, the definition of obsession does make it sound a little unhealthy, but who said love had to be reasonable? Like with any story there will be key factors that determine whether the obsession is good or bad. Character, conflict and world come to mind as some good ones. A certain character will handle obsessions a bit better or in a different scope than another. Or, if you don't want the obsession to be a good thing, maybe that is the conflict the characters need to over come in order to reach their ending together. There are many possibilities when using a character's intense attachment as part of a romance story.
 Scary Obsession
On the other hand, sometimes obsession is down right scary. Then it's time to try out a different genre, or even combine genres. While I will admit I don't have the best understanding of Horror, I do know that an obsession can work for a story in that genre. Instead of a cheery, she find him, their eyes meet and they start to fall in love, it can become dark and twisted. The character can stalk, plot and even take action in an attempt to try and get what they want, which can be taken further than considered sociably acceptable. Then you might have a scary story in the works.
  Challenge
October is the right month to try out a romantic horror story, or a scary romantic story, whichever way you want to look at it. Sounds like a good writing practice to me. And some more obsession stories would be fun to read on this site. So, if you write a romance/horror obsession story by Oct 31 (8,000 word max), let me know and I'll send you something in return. *practices evil laugh*
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First is a poem I found that while created years ago it is pretty good on the topic and has a nice flow that I enjoyed reading.
Story with an interesting title. A bit of a gothic romance approach and a longer read than some but might be good to check out.
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Beauty and a broad scope, this story took a different approach on the topic.
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Here is a combination of person and non-person obsession in essence. I had an idea of the end but not quite concrete so it did twist a bit in a great way.
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Love writing a happy ending romance story, then check out this contest. It has some specific requirements and can fulfill all your romance writing desires.
A more seasonal romance approach, this one has some interesting prompts but different requirements than the sappy story contest.
Then there are the horror contests and this is a great one because the prompt will work well with an obsession story depending on the sound picked.
And finally, here is a daily horror contest. With the ever changing prompts there are often some that work well with a romance angle added.
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This month the topic is on Obsession (romance and horror). Would you find anything romantic and rosy about obsession? Or is it more of a dark "love"? What do you think?
Last time I wrote for Romance/Love my topic was on the Rainbow of Romance, a look at GLBT love. Here is a selection of the wonderful responses I received.
By Annette 
Nice first romance NL! I enjoyed reading it. And you make such a good point about the pronouns. As someone who's read quite a bit of your work, I know what you mean by that. Although I felt you mostly pulled it off to let me know who was who in your stories. I'm looking forward to more NLs by you. - Thank you Giselle. That means a lot to me.
By ANN Counselor, Lesbian & Happy 
Thank you a thousand times a thousand. I've been waiting for a newsletter about LGBT romance, or any LGBT writing. A year ago I began to enter an LGBT romance story to every possible contest; some have won. All are designed to let others know our romance is no different than the romance of straight people. We love from our hearts the same way. Thanks for this newsletter. I have over 200 Lesbian and Gay guys Romance for anyone open to understand and accept our romantic hearts. ANN - I know the feeling Ann as I often submit LGBT stories in any contest I can on this site so it's good to see others doing so as well.
By mxtudor
Dawn, I'm so glad you posted this newsletter. I just joined Writing.com again. I didn't post anything here before because I was afraid of what kind of feed back I would get for my LGBT stories so I am thrilled to see that there are some on here. I'm just learning the ropes here but if there are LGBT writing contests on here in the future I would love to know about it. I also agree that there aren't enough LGBT stories that are for the under 18 crowd. We definitely need more. - I'm glad that you enjoyed my newsletter and hope that I can see some stories by you in the future. I'm working on some YA stuff too, so completely agree we need more that isn't 18+ in content.
By Doug Rainbow
I have an interest in classic literary themes, and forbidden love is a great one: Samson and Delilah, Ruth and Boaz, Romeo an Juliet, etc. It seems that gay romance might borrow from classic "forbidden love" themes as models for conflict and resolution. What do you think? - You are right, as with many romance story lines I think. Forbidden love makes for an interesting conflict.
Thanks to those I posted and to those whose comments I didn't link on here for the kind things you had to say about my first Romance/Love Newsletter.
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Romance/Love: October 23, 2013 Issue [#5954]
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