Romantic Gestures...the many 'expressions' of Love

Pepper here, and we're talking about Romantic Gestures today!!
How do people in books and movies (and real-life) show love? Oh!! Let's count the ways :-)
Let's start with the little ways :-)

Small gestures
These are "simple" everyday ways of showing love.
Let's hear what some readers have to say about examples of this type of love expression:
Kristine: He goes out on below-zero days to clean off her vehicle and starts the car so it's warm when she leaves for work."
Summer: A foot rub after a long day of work, putting the kids to bed.
Denise: Getting up and making coffee every day before she leaves for work, even though he doesn't HAVE to get up for two more hours.
Rachel: sweet notes hidden around the house, or a note "just because"
Paula: writing a poem on their 48th anniversary and showing love by going shopping with her (because he hates shopping).
Author Janine Rosche added: I love a good running of fingers through hair.

Other ways: using his/her skills to build something unique for the one they love. Supporting the other person's dreams/passions/likes. Giving the other person time and resources (when possible) to explore those interests. Finding ways to keep each other safe. Keeping a letter/book/gift of your beloved because it came from or belonged to them. Or Colonel Brandon staring with such rapt wonder at Marianne as she plays the piano in Sense and Sensibility. Sacrifice can be small or big, so can acts of protection.

One of the most romantic gestures EVER (which fits into both small and grand gestures category) is KNOWING the "loved" person by listening, remembering, and finding ways to express they've "heard" you and want to celebrate the things that matter to you!

Grand gestures
These are the ones that are usually celebrated on movies, right? "Big" things.
Does the hero uproot his life in order to be with the heroine? Does he work all summer on a project in order to pay for something the heroine wanted? A trip for her to take? Does she race across an airport and get on the intercom to stop him from catching his flight so she can tell him she loves him?...um...oh wait...I digress ;-)

Julia Lynch reminded me of Gilbert Blythe giving up the Avonlea school for Anne.
In my case, my husband worked out our finances so that we could take a trip to Ireland at the end of March (for ME...because I love traveling/research. Him? Not so much :-)

Bottom line: Time and intention are super romantic, no matter how big or how small. 

Non-kiss touches
Romantic touches come in all shapes and sizes...and they can be just as unique to the couple as favorite gestures, but there are a few that show the sweetness and meaningfulness of touch.
Stacey shared that her husband will take her in his arms when she gets home and say, "I'm so glad I get to be home with you." (cue the 'aww').

What about the moment on North & South with the hero and heroine touch fingers while she's serving him tea? A guy pushing back a girl's hair from her face? A hand to the small of the back? Linking arms as two lovers walk? Holding hands? Caresses to the face (super intimate). Dancing. Tender glances. HUGS!! (and so many more).

Kissing
Okay, so this is one of my favorites, but I have to tell you, I'm not a fan of watching kisses on movies if the couple looks like they're trying to eat each others' faces off. I do love kisses like..well, as I mentioned above, the kiss in North & South!! Tender, gentle, intentional, sweet...Mama Mia!!!

A kiss is NOT just a kiss!

Romantic kisses come with stories behind them.
There is intention, knowledge of each other, care, and, yes, there can be a sense of awe and passion too!

Kisses of love are expressions of something that's already happening in the heart and, in my opinion, are just extensions of the appreciation, knowledge, tenderness, and delight two people have in (and for) each other. Without the story behind the kiss, there really isn't any romance in it.
Kisses are kind of like the exclamation marks of a million conversations between two people who love each other. 

Words
It goes without saying...hee hee...words DO matter in romance. But it's more than just sweet words. Of course, there are compliments and expressions of appreciation, but there are also thoughtful discussions, intelligent conversations, careful questions to show care, encouragement, healthy debates, and so much more.

One note about the art of innuendo: It's a beautiful thing to see subtlety in stories that show the love and romance growing between characters - the messages between the lines. Even in those more "intimate" moments that are tastefully and beautifully rendered.

Author Rachel McMillan reminded me that there are some beautifully subtle expressions of love shown in the movie/book The Magic of Ordinary Days when Ray begins reading archaeology books so that he can have something to talk to Livy about (and so she won't feel alone). What about Mr. Knightley's rushing back from London to check on Emma's wellbeing after he finds out about Churchhill's engagement?

A few recommendations from Rachel regarding well-written intimate innuendo in romance is Laura Frantz's The Lacemaker, Jolina Petersheim's How the Light Gets In, Deanne Gist's Tiffany Girl, and Kate Breslin's As High as the Heavens...for a start :-)

I'd LOVE to hear about some of your favorite romantic gestures shown in movies, books or REAL LIFE...and, to make things more interesting, you can't list the kissing ones :-)

Plus, join me on Thursday evening at 8am EST for a FB live chat about Romantic Gestures in fiction & movies! Bring some examples from your favorites and we'll swoon together :-)Let's talk romance!
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Pepper Basham is an award-winning author who writes romance peppered with grace and humor. Both her historical and contemporary novels have garnered recognition in the Grace Awards, Inspys, and ACFW's Genesis and Carol Awards. Her historical romance, The Thorn Healer, was a finalist in the 2018 RT Awards. Her most recent historical romance, My Heart Belongs in the Blue Ridge, showcases her Appalachian heritage and family history, as well as her love for humor, the mountains, and family. She currently resides in the lovely mountains of Asheville, NC, where she is the mom of five great kids, a speech-language pathologist to dozens more, and a love for chocolate, jazz, hats, and Jesus. Pepper loves to connect with readers and other authors through social media outlets like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Learn more about her and her books at www.pepperdbasham.com

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{Book Recommendation + Giveaway} The Bachelor Girl's Guide to Murder by Rachel McMillan

If you love Sherlock Holmes -- or just adventure and clever writing in a historical setting -- you'll love The Bachelor Girl's Guide to Murder, debut novel from Rachel McMillan and the first in her Herringford and Watts Mysteries.

Oh. My. Goodness. The story takes place in 1910, where our heroines Jem and Merinda are sleuthing in the streets of Toronto instead of behaving and preparing for marriage like most girls their age. Readers will love being a third-wheel to their adventures -- and want Merinda to be a "bad influence" on them, too -- as they become embroiled in solving murders with these strong female characters.

McMillan lends a strong voice laced with humor and intrigue. I love this unique, incredibly intelligent addition to the inspirational fiction market. I (Laurie) have had the privilege of meeting her in person (she once saved me when this conference newbie asked a top editor what she writes. Oops!) and she's just as colorful and sensational as her characters.

I received this book from LitFuse in exchange for my honest review and, as always, wouldn't share it unless I totally loved it!

About the Book

In 1910 Toronto, while other bachelor girls perfect their domestic skills and find husbands, two friends perfect their sleuthing skills and find a murderer.

Inspired by their fascination with all things Sherlock Holmes, best friends and flatmates Merinda and Jem launch a consulting detective business. The deaths of young Irish women lead Merinda and Jem deeper into the mire of the city’s underbelly, where the high hopes of those dreaming to make a new life in Canada are met with prejudice and squalor.

While searching for answers, donning disguises, and sneaking around where no proper ladies would ever go, they pair with Jasper Forth, a police constable, and Ray DeLuca, a reporter in whom Jem takes a more than professional interest. Merinda could well be Toronto’s premiere consulting detective, and Jem may just find a way to put her bachelor girlhood behind her forever—if they can stay alive long enough to do so.

The book is available at bookstores nationwide + these online retailers:

Amazon

Kindle

Barnes & Noble

Book Depository

CBD

About the Author

Rachel McMillan is a keen history enthusiast and a lifelong bibliophile. When not writing or reading, she can most often be found drinking tea and watching British miniseries. Ra
chel lives in bustling Toronto, where she works in educational publishing and pursues her passion for art, literature, music, and theater.

Giveaway!

Leave a comment for the chance to win a copy! Annnnnd....

Rachel is celebrating the release of The Bachelor Girl's Guide to Murder with a Murder Mystery Prize Pack giveaway (details below) and an author chat party on April 28!

 

One grand prize winner will receive:

• One copy of The Bachelor Girl's Guide to Murder
• A magnifying glass necklace
• A bowler hat
• A pocket watch
• A $30 Amazon gift card

Enter today by clicking the icon below. The winner will be announced at The Bachelor Girl's Guide to Murder Facebook party on 4/28.

Happy reading!

Writing Personality with No Holds Barred with the amazing Rachel McMillan

I am SO happy to welcome Rachel McMillan to be our guest at The Alley today! Besides being an avid Sherlockian, intelligent wordsmith, popular book reviewer, and all-around classy gal, she is also an author. The first of her Herringford and Watts series, The Bachelor Girls Guide to Murder comes out in early 2016 with Harvest House. I was thrilled to meet Rachel at ACFW 2014 and love our mutual weirdness.
But she's also brave - because she sent her words out into the world and now they're on the road to publication!

Please help me in welcoming her to our blog today!

A Writer’s Tale:

Once upon a time there was a girl who scribbled fastidiously for over 20 years. During that time, she amassed full notebooks and USB keys chockfull of words and ideas. But she was scared. She was scared to show anyone so she kept these words  and ideas under lock and key.

 

“What are you writing?” her parents/siblings/friends who ask as she took pen to paper in the back of a high school classroom, or on the subway or in a coffee shop.   But she would press her notebook to her chest and gulp her secrecy.

If I tell, then they’ll know.  If I let them see and I am terrible, then this lovely little secret that is mine and fills my brain and jolts my nerves and fills my heart with joy…will just fizzle. If these words are terrible then I am terrible, she equated self-worth with her passion for inky fingerpads and imagined worlds.

 

So, she wrote in silence. She wrote in secret.  She finished novel after novel.

Two years ago, she decided after hundreds upon hundreds of books read and thousands upon thousands of words written, that she would finally take the plunge toward publication.  She mapped out a book that she thought the CBA would like. She measured it, she populated it with characters and phrases and statements indigenous to the market she had studied and learned for most of her life.  She wandered under the misconception of a safety net.   She sent the book out into the world.  While the first chapters secured her an agent, the final product was passed at every publishing house in the CBA.   The feedback, rather than being full of scary rejections that would force her unwillingly back into her secret cave, was sound and encouraging. She took it to heart for its promise and not for guided limitation.

And she started writing more, believing ( as she still does) that a writer should always have something in their back pocket. Even while her first novel was still making the rounds of submission and eking its way to committee meetings (alas, to no avail) her agent sparked a fuse upon return from ICRS and the idea that the writer infuse her next story with her lifelong passion for Sherlock Holmes.

But this, thought she, is rather surged with something close to my heart, the winnows through me, that is so anomalous to me.  Can I possibly write something with so much of me in it?

With no holds barred and with no thought toward rubrics and metrics, imagined or not, she typed and tapped away and presented the final work to her agent…

Who was surprised. What writing classes have you been taking? Her agent wondered. What has changed since you first gave me that initial manuscript a year ago?

 

The writer hadn’t taken any classes. She had done nothing different except…except…..write a book sizzled with her personality and heart.  A book sprinkled with shards of her! She wrote a book in her voice, peppered with her thoughts, pierced with her vulnerabilities, trembling with her desires and ideas and wonderings.

She wrote it jubilantly….elated with the giddiness of crafting this sunny world with live, snarky, brilliant, zesty characters whose strings she jiggled like a puppeteer who just breathed to life.  She wrote while snifflingly realizing someday she would have to send her book friends out into the world with their quirks and depths and idiosyncrasies. She cried when she finally pressed send. She missed her book friends as they experienced the rounds of submission and meetings.

 

But she started something new, aware that…

Writing the book you want to read now meant splay your personality on page.

And this crazy book which coloured outside the lines of any imagined structure the writer thought existed was the project that landed her first book contract.

 

***

 

Writers---write for yourselves first and foremost. Be savvy enough to study the industry, to read voraciously in a myriad of genres, to stay connected to the community, but write also knowing that what may be forging your path to publication is your indelible thumbprint.

Write uniquely.

 Write like no one is watching.  

 Looking back on my reading life, I am aware that the writers whose work orbits closely around my heart are the writers whose personality is embroidered into their pages. 

 Whether you be striving to hit publish on your first Indie book or whether you wait and wade through the uneven tides of traditional publishing, the secret to garnering the first loyal reader and to skimming the top of the dreaded slush pile is you! Wonderful, unique, zany, creative, human and insecure you.

 Zing your books with your personality, even while cognizant of the market you are writing for.

And send that snippet of yourself into the world like Polonius (“To Thine Own Self Be True”) and see what happens.

It could be something awesome.

And it will be you….all you.

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Rachel McMillan is a keen history enthusiast and lifelong bibliophile. When not writing, or reading, she can most often be found drinking tea and watching British miniseries. Rachel lives in bustling Toronto where she works in Educational Publishing. She is a frequent contributor to Breakpoint and Novel Crossing. Her first novel, The Bachelor Girl’s Guide to Murder releases with Harvest House in early 2016.

www.rkmcmillan.com