Hiya reader friends!

This week in bookish things, I am discussing my top five supernatural romance reads! If you’re tackling the Classic Romance Reading Challenge, then you might have to start this list after February has ended, but it’s definitely worth checking out!

Hush, Hush Saga by Becca Fitzpatrick

Hush, Hush is a page-turner of a romantic thriller filled with fallen angels, Nephilim, and humans who are caught in the balance of forbidden love and the consequences angels face for falling for those humans. It’s fast-passed, action-packed, and well-balanced. Throw in compelling characters, villains you love to hate, and unfair universal rules, and you’ve got all of the elements of an amazing supernatural romance. It’s so perfect, I reread it ever single fall, and usually within a span of four days—one day for each book!

Nora finds forbidden love with her fallen angel, in the first installment of the New York Times bestselling Hush, Hush Saga.

Nora Grey is responsible and smart and not inclined to be reckless. Her first mistake was falling for Patch.

Patch has made countless mistakes and has a past that could be called anything but harmless. The best thing he ever did was fall for Nora. .

After getting paired together in biology, all Nora wants to do is stay away from Patch, but he always seems to be two steps ahead of her. She can feel his eyes on her even when he is nowhere around. She feels him nearby even when she is alone in her bedroom. And when her attraction can be denied no longer, she learns the secret about who Patch is and what led him to her, as well as the dark path he is about to lead her down. Despite all the questions she has about his past, in the end, there may be only one question they can ask each other: How far are you willing to fall?.

The Hush, Hush Saga by Becca Fitzpatrick.

The Immortal Series by Gillian Shields

This was one of the very first books I’d ever read, and my first supernatural romance at that! The story revolves around Evie who is shipped off to Wyldcliffe Abbey School after her grandmother dies. She makes friends with some of the other girls and enemies with others. One her first day of school, her taxi driver only takes her so close to the school and she must make the rest of the way on foot. On her way, she runs into a spectral horserider who is surprised she can even see him in the first place. He realizes she looks strikingly familiar and the familiarity draws him closer to her. I’ve always loved these books, not only because it got me into supernatural romance, but because of the enchanting story kept between their pages.

Wyldcliffe Abbey School for Young Ladies, housed in a Gothic mansion on the bleak northern moors, is elite, expensive, and unwelcoming. When Evie Johnson is torn away from her home by the sea to become the newest scholarship student, she is more isolated than she could have dreamed. Strict teachers, snobbish students, and the oppressive atmosphere of Wyldcliffe leave Evie drowning in loneliness.

Evie's only lifeline is Sebastian, a rebellious, mocking, dangerously attractive young man she meets by chance. As Evie's feelings for Sebastian grow with each secret meeting, she starts to fear that he is hiding something about his past. And she is haunted by glimpses of a strange, ghostly girl—a girl who is so eerily like Evie, she could be a sister. Evie is slowly drawn into a tangled web of past and present that she cannot control. And as the extraordinary, elemental forces of Wyldcliffe rise up like the mighty sea, Evie is faced with an astounding truth about Sebastian, and her own incredible fate.

Gillian Shields's electrifying tale will dazzle readers with suspense, mysticism, and romance.

The Immortals series by Gillian Sheilds.

Angel Trilogy by L.A. Weatherly

This series hooked me from the moment I’d read the synopsis—I mean hello!—angels gone rogue!—what’s not to love? (Especially for a Hush, Hush fan girl) The story throws you right into the action from the first page to the last and the action rarely stops. The story is definitely a page-turner and an action-packed romantic thriller.

When Alex finds himself falling in love with his sworn enemy, a half-angel with links to dark and dangerous forces, he discovers that nothing is as it seems, least of all good and evil. In the first book in a red-hot paranormal romantic trilogy, L. A. Weatherly sends readers on a thrill-ride of a road trip — and depicts the human race at the brink of a future as catastrophic as it is deceptively beautiful.

The Angel Trilogy by L.A. Weatherly.

House of Night by P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast

Take Oklahoma, Vampyres, highschool students, and forbidden romance, throw them all in a pot and stir them up and your get the House of Night series. Though I am only four books into the series, I can tell you know its fast-paced, action-packed, and filled to the brim with drama—both good and bad. As a fantasy enthusiast and Mythology buff, it was really refreshing to see the goddess Nyx done differently. In this story, she’s very much an active part of new, fledgling vampire, Zoey’s life and I love what P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast have done their twist on elements, mythology, and vampyres.

Enter the dark, magical world of the House of Night, a world very much like our own, except here vampyres have always existed.

One minute, 16-year-old Zoey Redbird is a normal teenager dealing with everyday high school stress: her cute boyfriend, Heath, the school's star quarterback who suddenly seems more interested in partying than playing ball; her nosy frenemy, Kayla, who's way too concerned with how things are going with Heath; her uber-tough geometry test tomorrow.

The next, she's Marked as a fledgling vampyre, forcing her to leave her ordinary life behind and join the House of Night, a boarding school where she will train to become an adult vampyre.

That is, if she makes it through the Change - and not all of those who are Marked do. It sucks to begin a new life, especially away from her friends, and on top of that, Zoey is no average fledgling. She has been chosen as special by the vampyre Goddess, Nyx.

Zoey discovers she has amazing powers, but along with her powers come bloodlust and an unfortunate ability to Imprint with Heath, who just doesn't know how to take no for an answer.

To add to her stress, she is not the only fledgling at the House of Night with special powers: When she discovers that the leader of the Dark Daughters, the school's most elite group, is misusing her Goddess-given gifts, Zoey must look deep within herself for the courage to embrace her destiny - with a little help from her new vampyre friends.

The House of Night Series by Kristin and P.C. Cast.

The Darkest Powers Trilogy

One of the most gripping and thrilling supernatural reads from start to finish, The Darkest Powers Trilogy by Kelley Armstrong, centers around Chloe Saunders a 15-year old girl who’s life is about to change forever, from the first page of the novel. She likes the idea of being ordinary, only her life is far from it—she get shipped off to the Lyle group home after the label “schizophrenic” becomes synonymous with her own name and some unfortunate incidents. It’s up to her to unearth dark secrets and put together a past that will have readers running for the hills in terror.

"My name is Chloe Saunders and my life will never be the same again.

"All I wanted was to make friends, meet boys, and keep on being ordinary. I don't even know what that means anymore. It all started on the day that I saw my first ghost - and the ghost saw me.

"Now there are ghosts everywhere, and they won't leave me alone. To top it all off, I somehow got myself locked up in Lyle House, a 'special home' for troubled teens. Yet the home isn't what it seems. Don't tell anyone, but I think there might be more to my housemates than meets the eye. The question is, whose side are they on?

"It's up to me to figure out the dangerous secrets behind Lyle House...before its skeletons come back to haunt me."

The Darkest Powers Trilogy by Kelley Armstrong.

And that’s it for my top 5 Supernatural Romance Reads for February 2020! Have you ever read these stories? What do you think of this list? What is your favorite story mentioned here? Let me know your thoughts in the comments and as always, thanks for reading!

Further Reading:

• Classic Romance Reading Challenge for February 2020

• 5 Contemporary Romances Everyone Should Read

Thumbnail photo by Jess Bailey.

—Payton

Glen Powell as Charlie Young and Zoey Deutch as Harper in Set It Up. Gif by Payton Hayes.

Hello, writerly friends!

Today, we’re discussing the meet cute. What the heck even is a meet cute anyways? Well, according to Google, is an amusing or charming first encounter between two characters that leads to the development of a romantic relationship between them.

Of course, the way you do the meet cute is completely and totally up to you—it can be cute, funny, or disastrous and comical. How you do a meet cute is completely subjective and can be created in a number of ways, but today I am going to show you how to make a meet cute even cuter—like the cutest it could possibly be.

When the reader sees the meeting coming, characters do not

While you can craft a meet cute where both the reader and characters do not see it coming, I think it’s extra interesting when the reader does, because it’s like this little secret between the writer and the reader. I really love meet cutes that do this. It’s like the sense of rising dread you get when you’re reading parts of a story with building tension—except that it’s a good kind of dread because you want the characters to end up meeting. The reader knows something good will come out of this chance encounter, only they know it’s coming, and the characters do not.

Flinn is surprised when Rapunzel hits him with a frying pan during Disney’s Tangled’s meet cute (2010).

A great example of this kind of meet cute is in Disney’s Tangled, when Flynn Rider is running from the law and seeks refuge in Rapunzel’s conveniently hidden tower. We already know Rapunzel is inside and he definitely climbed up the wrong tower. The scene that follows does not disappoint, when Rapunzel smacks him in the face with a frying pan for climbing through her window. I would consider this a comical meet cute, but it works extra well because the viewer knows what will happen before the characters and it builds for extra spicy first meeting.

Joe Bradley wakes a sleeping Princess Ann in Roman Holiday (1953).

Another example of a meet cute where the viewer/reader knows of the meeting before the characters actually meet is Roman Holiday, when Princess Ann shirks her royal responsibilities to see Rome for herself and eventually ends up falling asleep on a street. When the scene shifts to Gregory Peck playing cards with the guys, viewers just know the two are going to meet. After his night out, we see him walking down the same street Ann has fallen asleep on and we’re already anticipating their meeting.

Milo Ventimiglia as Jess Mariano and Alexis Bledel as Rory Gilmore in Gilmore Girls (2000).

Another example of a meet cute where the characters don’t know they’ll be meeting it is in Gilmore Girls, Season 2, Episode 5. Not only does this episode include Jess' first appearance, but it's also the first episode that Rory and he meet. He steals her copy of Allen Ginsberg's "Howl," only to return it to her later in the episode with notes in the margins because Ginsberg is love, you guys. Ah, Jess Mariano — you book thieving-and-annotating bad boy. When Jess swipes Howl from Rory’s room during that ill-fated dinner hosted by Lorelai, and then returns it filled with margin notes, Rory was definitely impressed. (And so were we.) This scene effectively sets up the characters before they even know each other, themselves and shows us that there’s more than meets the eye, both for the mischievous Jess and their tumultuous relationship down the line.

This kind of meet cute makes the reader feel smarter because they know something the characters don’t. This is why it feels like a special little secret between the reader and the writer because the reader feels like he or she has already figured the story out. This is especially effective if you have plot twists and turns later on in the story, because the ground work for the surprises will already be laid out for you.

Characters don’t know they’ll be seeing a lot of each other

Piggybacking on the idea that the characters don’t know they’ll end up together, another meet cute that works really well in many stories is when the characters don’t know they’ll be seeing a lot of each other and/or aren’t too thrilled about it. This is especially fun for awkward situations where the character thinks “oh well, I’ll never see them again anyways,” and then come to find out that they will be seeing them again, and a lot more at that. Awkward is cute, writers.

Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Dido Elizabeth Belle and Sam Reid as John Davinière in Belle.

Pro tip: a sense of awkwardness or secondhand embarrassment is a fantastic feeling to give the reader. It’s as strong as , if not stronger than fear or desire, because its such a vulnerable emotion and it’s one we go out of our way to avoid. If you can invoke this in your reader, then congratulations, you’ve effectively written something that makes people feel.

A great example of this type of meet cute is in the movie Belle, when Dido and John run into each other on her late-night walk. She is startled at first when she finds that he actually came bringing news for her uncle and even more so when she discovers her uncle is John’s tutor and they’ll be seeing a lot more of each other.

Another example of this type of meet cute is in Jane Eyre when Jane first meets Mr. Rochester, he doesn’t tell her who he is, but later when she returns home, she recognizes his dog and realizes the true identity of the man she’d met on the road, earlier that day.

This kind of meet cute is really great because not only does it introduce a whole new level of awkward! but it also allows us to get to know the characters before they know each other and makes their relationship down the road, a lot cuter.

Irony, or something happening that would never happen later in the story

Megan Follows as Anne Shirley and Jonathan Crombie as Gilbert Blythe in Anne of Green Gables (1985).

This is probably one of the most powerful, yet hard to pull off versions of the meet cute, but if you can nail it, it can prove for a really effective first meeting and adds dept to the relationship later. Using irony in your meet cute makes the meeting 100x better because when these two characters are in love some day and they look back on their relationship later, it will be so funny to look back and think about how ironic their first encounter really was.

One great example of the use of irony in a meet cute is in Anne of Green Gables when Anne Shirley breaks Gilbert Blythe’s slate over his head out of temper when he teases her repeatedly. This was a very effective and ironic meet cute because the two characters would never behave in such a way after they’d gotten together but it really makes for a memorable first meeting.

 “I've loved you ever since that day you broke your slate over my head in school." Oh Gil❤️

The second meeting is even more awkward

Okay, the only thing better than making your reader feel the palpable awkwardness is making them feel it twice! (Or three times if you’re gutsy enough!) This kind of meet cute is incredibly effective, especially if you tie it in with the first two where 1) only the reader knows they will meet and 2) they don’t know they’ll run into each other a lot more following the first meeting. This makes for a really, really strong meet cute where the characters and the reader are almost swimming the awkward emotions and the only way to move past it is to keep reading and see how it plays out.

The first meeting happens and once it’s over and done, you can bring it back around for the second meeting which is filled to the brim with potential for even more awkwardness, shyness, embarrassment and dramatic meet cute goodness!

An example of this meet cute is in Downton Abbey when Mary Talbot  and Matthew Crawley meet for the first time, she walks in on Matthew saying some offhanded things to his mother. He is talking about how he will likely be shoved into an arranged marriage with  one of the Talbot daughters since their parents had heard he was a bachelor. She says she hopes she isn’t interrupting anything but of course, that proves to be the case when they meet again later and its super awkward.

Callback to the meet cute

Megan Follows as Anne Shirley and Jonathan Crombie as Gilbert Blythe in Anne of Green Gables (1985).

All of these are great ways to effectively nail the meet cute for your characters, but you get bonus points for bringing it back up later on in the story. It’s really fun to see the characters in love reflecting on their embarrassing first meeting and makes for a great treat for the reader. A callback is a really effective literary device where something happens in the beginning of the story and is later referenced towards the end of the story in another context, essentially calling it back to the reader’s memory.

Audrey Hepburn as Princess Ann and Gregory Peck as Joe Bradley in Roman Holiday (1953).

Some particularly cute examples of this callback to the meet cute is in Anne of Green Gables when Gil calls her Carrot, endearingly, in Roman Holiday when Princess Ann says “So happy, Mister Bradley,” in reference to her muttering “So happy” in her sleep on the street, and in Jane Eyre when Mr. Rochester says, “You always were a witch” to Jane in reference to their very first meeting when he’d said “Get away from me, witch!”

These are just a few really well-done meet cutes and you’ll find it’s always the little things that make these meeting iconic, memorable, and downright adorable.

That’s it for the secrets to the perfect meet cute. Try using them all and let me know what you think. Do you prefer to use one version over another or do you like using them together? Do you ever call back to your meet cutes? What is the most important element of a meet cute? And what are some of your favorite meet cutes? Let me know in the comments below!

Further reading:

• How to Write Hate-To-Love Romance

• How To Write Best Friends to Lovers Romance - That Feels Realistic

• How To Write Love Triangles - The Right Way

• The Top 10 Worst Romance Tropes EVER

• 5 Supernatural Romance Reads for February 2020

• 5 Contemporary Romances Everyone Should Read

• Classic Romance Reading Challenge for February 2020

Thumbnail photo by Natalie.

—Payton