Love and Romance, etc.
A Free Newsletter for romance novel lovers
By Bonnie Williams
Theme: The Big Picture of Fiction
By Bonnie Williams
In fiction, especially romance, a theme of a story is not intended to teach or preach. In fact, it is not presented directly at all. You extract it from the characters, action, and setting that make up the novel. In other words, as the reader, you usually figure out the theme for yourself.
So what exactly is the theme or big picture of a story?
Simply put:
Theme of a fable is its moral. Theme of a parable is its teaching.
But the theme of fiction is its view about life and the behavior of the characters within the story.
The theme never explains the story. It's simply one of the elements that make up the story as a whole. Although each reader's experience while reading a story may differ from another reader's, the author's underlying goal, beyond entertaining, is to communicate a common ground with her readers.
Here are some very basic themes you're probably familiar with:- Good always triumphs over evil
- Love conquers all
- Home is where the heart is
Though they may be only be implicitly understood by you, the reader, these examples of theme are the big picture of a story that is universally understood. It is the general and overall concept to a story. Of course, Love-conquers-all is the theme romance readers come to expect in romance novels.
For example, in my erotic romance TEMPT ME, the heroine Cynthia believes sex will ruin the perfect friendship she has with her handsome friend and cop, James. But his undying, and very persistent, love for her makes Cynthia come to realize that sex mixed with love is the most perfect friendship of all. So love (mixed with some steamy sex) conquers all. Or in this case conquers the heart of the heroine.
An excellent example of good triumphs over evil AND love conquers all is Amanda Ashley's (i.e. Madeline Baker) first vampire romance EMBRACE THE NIGHT. A tortured vampire hero finds his humanity again when he falls deeply in love with a human woman - a woman he cannot have. It ultimately is a story of self-sacrifices and eternal love–literally!
Novels Reinforce Our Values
Novels hold our society's fundamental values—and the intention is to validate those values. As readers, we tend to seek out stories, sometimes subconsciously, that reinforce our own beliefs, because we want our values reinforced. However, not before those values are tested, inspected, examined, experienced, questioned, and stretched to the limits. By the end of the story we find that even after all the struggles, our views and beliefs were right all along.
In romance, love is what matters most, and as romance readers—we already know that—however, the arrival of this message comes from an unexpected source. A powerful theme is the search for familiar moral ground, but by an unfamiliar route. So, by the end of the story you, as the reader, should be nodding your head thinking—"Yep, love is the answer after all!"
Love and Romance, etc.©
Bonnie Williams
Copyright © 2008
